Does anyone know why a computer monitor is heavier than a television of the same screen size? I have a 19 inch computer monitor and a 19 television. Although I haven’t weighed them both the computer monitor seems to be much heavier than the T.V.
The majority of the weight in both a TV and a computer monitor is in the glass of the picture tube. The amount of glass for the same size display varies due to a number of factors, inclusive of tube manufacturer, batch to batch variation, and geometry. I know, you’re thinking, “Hey, they’re both rectangular!”, but you’re wrong. They have a certain roundness along the edges and the thickness of this border varies. It also matters how “flat” the display is. The more “flat” displays require more glass. I’m sure there are other factors, but that’s the bottom line - the more glass, the heavier the box will be.
Also, don’t discount the effects of leverage and balance. Some things seem heavier when they are more awkward to handle due to balance, grip, etc…
I don’t know if is a significant weight factor or not but computer monitors are required to meet a higher standard of non-interference with other electrical equipment and therefore have more electrical shielding built in.
Another possible explanation is that computer monitors generally operate at scanning frequencies than TVs. Does this lead to heavier deflector coils, transformers, etc?
Let’s see. I lathered and I rinsed. But did I repeat?
I don’t know an answer to the question, but I’ve worked with computers and electronics for 30 years or so and have wondered why the glass front needed to be so massive in the first place.
Is it the flattening effect that requires the edges to be so thick? Is it safety, to keep people from smashing it?
As answer to the question, though, if it is for the flattening, the effect would be less noticable on a tv than a monitor. Therefore, maybe, they don’t worry about building the edges up as much to correct it.
Isn’t this a result of the extra shielding manufacturers added to computer monitors in the late 80s? “Shielding” could just mean thicker glass, or perhaps an additional layer designed to block those harmful mind-control rays.
[quote]
I don’t know if is a significant weight factor or not but computer monitors are required to meet a higher standard of non-interference with other electrical equipment and therefore have more electrical shielding built in.
[quote]
Of course, it all adds up, but the glass is still far and away the largest contributor. Most modern TVs use similar materials for shielding, anyway.
Yes, flatter displays require thicker glass at the edges. Why? [rhetorical, I’ll answer that] Cathode Ray Tubes (CRTs) are giant vacuum tubes. The pressure inside is much, much lower than the pressure outside. They want to implode, so you have to add some sort of structure to prevent this. The structure of choice is extra glass. The rounder the tube, the stronger (think of an egg shell). As you flatten the face of the CRT, it becomes harder and harder to prevent the “shell” from imploding… Solution: Add more structure (i.e. glass)
Correct. There is a noticable distortion of the image as you approach the rounded edges. The flatter you can make your display, the less distortion. People tend to sit much closer to computer monitors than they do TVs, so the distortion is more noticable on a computer monitor. Also, aside from the distance factor, there is rarely any relevant static information on the fringes of your TV screen that require distortion free image reproduction.
There’s two kinds of shielding (OK, there’s more than that)… There’s shielding to protect the CRT image from damage due to magnetic fields from the outside and there’s shielding to protect sensitive electronics and humans from potentially damaging electromagnetic fields from the inside.
Metalic coatings on the CRT and sometimes “foil” cages are used to control both of these things from the back and sides. Additionally, many modern CRTs have a very thin wire mesh encapsulated into the face of the CRT to control the emissions from the front. You really can’t block magnetic fields from the front from entering, but that’s rarely a concern since strong magnetic fields are rarely present near the face of a CRT. HINT: Never put a magnet near the face of a color CRT - it can cause permanent damage. There are ever present weak magnetic fields that can degrade the image quality over time, byt most modern CRTs have degaussing coils built in to nullify the effects of weak magnetic fields.
Now that’s probably more than anyone wanted to know, but I did try to keep it brief.
I have opened lots of tvs & lots of computer monitors & the monitors always have a whole bunch more metal inside. Gotta keep that RF inside.
I’m not a TV repair man, but all three of the TVs that I own have very similar shielding to the two monitors I own. Hence, my conclusion that modern TVs share many of the same shielding concerns. This is further validated by the observation that most of the reasons we want to shield monitors also apply to TVs. Kids often sit very close to TVs these days, particularly when playing Nintendo. There is often considerable magnetic storage media sitting near TVs (video tapes). There are usually other electronics nearby that can either emit or be susceptible to electromagnetic interference…
Old tube tv’s weigh more than computer monitors.