Problem developing with my Sony 53HS30 (1 Viewer)

[Jason*B]

OK, I bought my 53HS30 roughly 2 years ago and everything has been grand... that was until today. We sat down to watch TV this evening and as soon as we turn the set on there's a big problem. The entire screen is fisheyed, like it's being pulled into the middle and all of the three colors are drastically misaligned. Now my wife tells me that this happened to her last week, but when she switched to the cable tuner's menu it went away (she therefore thought it was a problem with the tuner). Of course when we try switching to the menu this time it does not go away. We try changing to the X-Box and other inputs, try turning the TV off and on, but it still stays screwed.

This is when I give up and start searching the forums looking for someone who may have had the same problem. A few hours later with no leads from the net I try turning the set on and, of course it works fine. It's been on for an hour or two and everything is still fine, but now I'm worried and I'm wondering if anyone out there might have an idea as to what might be going on?

Thanks for any info/advice anyone might have.

 

[BenB]

I just got the same TV from a neighbor who received a new one as part of an insurance claim. The TV received water damage and I am having the exact same problem except that it is this way all the time, fish eye and way out of alignment.

I tried the manual way of adjusting convergence, I could get into the menu and change colors but could not get any reaction to moving the guns.

Any help would be appreciated.

New Member

Ben

 

[Jason*B]

Gah, It just did it again... anyone have an idea?

 

[Gregg Loewen]

hi guys

Your convergence boards are bad (or perhaps just an IC or two). Time to call for service,

Regards

Gregg

 

[BenB]

Any idea of a cost for a convergence board?

 

[ChrisWiggles]

what gregg said, your convergence circuitry is screwey. May need work, might just be loose connection or something simple. Call a tech.

 

[Steve Berger]

Your initial problems are cold solder connections on the registration output IC's. (I've serviced Sony products professionally since 1973 and this is a common problem as the sets age) While resoldering them may help for now, it's usually too late to be a permanent solution. When the registration drops out (they call it registration circuit on RPTV's) the two IC's get real hot, real fast, and are generally damaged internally. (6-9 months if you are lucky before they short out) A fuse may also open up, leaving the set in constant mis-convergence (some models blank out completely at this time).

The IC's run about $65 each (changing only one is not a good idea unless you want to fix it again in 6 months) The set doesn't weigh very much so if you are willing to haul it in to a shop, you will save some cash. You could approach it in stages, resolder first, replace IC's later if necessary.

 

[Jason*B]

OK, first thanks to everyone who replied to this, but I need some more advice. I had called a repair shop recommended to me by a friend. The guy did a great job for him and didn't charge him a ton.

He came over one day and popped out the whole circuitry board from the back of my TV and took that back to his shop. He said that replaced the registration IC's and he brought back the board and installed it. It looked fine while he was at my house, I paid him and he left. I moved the TV to it's proper location and plugged it back in only to find the same problem again.

I called him back and this time he wanted to take the whole TV back to his shop. A day later he called me up and said he worked all day on it and that it was ready to come back. Once he brought it back it was working for a day or two and then it did it again

I was ready to ask for my money back and take my TV somewhere else, but he was adamant about doing the job right and wanted to take the TV again. Keep in mind that through all of this he has not asked for anymore money.

Now, today he calls me up says that the main circuitry board of the TV is the problem and that it was poorly manufactured and the circuitry is really thin and the connection to the IC boards is what is failing. Keep in mind that I'm paraphrasing what he described as the problem. He says that it will cost between $500-600 for a new board and that he will not charge me for labor. He also said that I could just leave it as is and deal with the fact the TV will be screwed every once in a while. I asked him if I leave it as is will it get any worse and he said no.

So, my questions are. Does it sound like he knows what he's doing? Should I just take it to the Sony repair center and possibly pay even more? Or do I just take my TV back and live with this problem until I eventually buy a new TV?

Thanks for reading all of this and thanks for any advice you can give.
Jason

 

[Michael TLV]

Greetings

You can always check out what a board really costs ... but a big piece like that ... sounds about right.

No one can promise status quo on your set. OVer time ... things fail ... the nature of entropy. The question is how much time to the next failure?

Considering that you can get a brand new TV of similar size for $1500-$2000 with full warranty ... it's a tough call. When repairs = 1/3 the cost of a new set ...

If you can only afford to get it fixed ... then that is all you can do ...

Regards

 

[Tim Jin]

I would get a brand new set. $600 is just too much for repairs. Then again, I paid about the same for ISF and people thought that I was NUTS :b.

 

[Allan Jayne]

Just for kicks:

Try turning the contrast down little by little and see if the picture starts to come back into shape. This would be a power supply problem.

I once saw a similar problem in a TV in a restaurant. I went right up to the TV and fidgeted with it. Turning down the contrast at least temporarily alleviated the problem. A few months later the restaurant replaced that TV and several others.

Even if this works (long shot) it might not be useful. So I suggest this idea only to pique your curiosity.

 

[Steve Berger]

You've got a nasty intermittent problem and they can be hard to find. Board replacement is not a realistic option when the set is out of warranty (IMHO). With an intermittent problem like you have, there are at least three boards that can cause the symptoms so a board replacement is not necessarily going to fix the problem.

Convergence is controlled by data stored on the tuner controller board (possibility 1).

Convergence is modified by the sweep circuits (possibility 2).

The output circuitry is on the registration board (possibility 3).

It's real hard to diagnose without seeing the picture but, besides the convergence IC's, the pincushion circuit can produce an almost identical symptom (located on the sweep board usually). The problem can be caused by a bad solder connection on the heatsink ground lugs (not an actual electronic part). The pincushion problem will be symetric while the convergence problem will be asymetric (red may move left while blue moves right). Corrupted data can produce almost any symptom and be almost impossible to find since every active circuit shares the data and even the tuner or audio circuit can corrupt it.

You always have the option to set an upper limit on a factory repair, you have the option to refuse a high estimate.