Sony KDL32EX308, KDL22EX308 manual Tcon Failures, Troubleshooting a Dead Tcon

Chapter 4 - Appendix

Failures involving the LCD panel are usually displayed with the following symptoms:

•Physical damage such as cracks in the panel, a single pixel or group of pixels that always on or off, or random sections of the panel which are completely dark.

•Source driver failure. This symptom appears as a single vertical band around 1 to 2 inches (depending on the panel size) and can be black, white, or any other color. It can also contain video information with distortion. A single vertical line that is dark or colored. This may be due to a tab bonding failure from the IC to the panel but either cause requires the replacement of the panel.

•Gate driver failure. These IC’s operate in a “bucket brigade” fashion. As mentioned earlier, the gates drivers scan each horizontal line starting at the top. If any one of the gate drivers fails, all of the subsequent drivers below it will fail to operate properly. This symptom is usually indicated by normal video on the upper portion of the screen followed by distorted video from the point of the failed IC and downward.

•Any horizontal lines. The gate drivers are activated by a single source of timing information so any single horizontal line or groups or random horizontal lines are caused by an output failure from a gate driver or a loss of the tab bond to the panel.

TCON Failures

Failures in the timing control circuits of the TCON can produce symptoms of absolutely no video or generate lines and patterns that usually cover all or a substantial part of the screen. Determining if the TCON is the cause of a “no video” condition is a bit more difficult since there are no indications on the screen to analyze.

Troubleshooting a “DEAD” TCON

Many of the Sony television models over the last few years will detect a TCON that has completely failed. The communications data between the video process circuits and the TCON will cease to communicate if the TCON fails completely. This will cause the television to shut down and display a diagnostics code indicating a failure of the TCON. Not all chassis designs have this feature and it is not found on older models.

The typical scenario when this failure arises is for the technician to bring a video process board to the repair location. It is usually safe to assume that the problem lies on the TCON board if the replacement video board does not remedy the problem since it is highly unlikely that a replacement board with the same failure was received.

One trick to check most TCONS for functionality is to loosen the LVDS connector at the TCON (as shown In Figure 4-3) while the unit is turned on. Handle the LVDS connector with care and be certain to fully release the lock tabs. Gently rock the cable in and out of the connector while observing the screen for any response. Depending on the chassis, the symptoms of the screen may be gentle white flashes, intermittent colored lines, or a screen full of random patterns. The idea at this point is to provoke some kind of response on the screen. TCON boards that have failed will not usually generate any type of response on the screen.

Another helpful procedure is to rapidly heat and/or cool the TCON with hot air devices or circuit coolant and watch for patterns to appear on the screen.

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