Every Sony-made computer monitor I’ve ever seen has a 1-pixel high horizontal line extending from one edge of the monitor to the other. On my work computer, a Sony Trinitron Multiscan 100ES, it’s about 3/4-down from the top of the screen.
I first noticed this phenomenon on a Sony-made Mac monitor a few years ago, and I was told “It’s just a Sony thing, they all have that horizontal line.”
Why?
It’s called the damper wire. I’m too lazy to copy & paste, so I’ll just direct you to the source:
From Sony’s FAQ
From MonitorWorld.com
It’s not just on Sony monitors - any monitor that uses an aperture grill design has them. On larger monitors, there are two or more.
The reason for this is: aperture grill monitors use finely spaced vertical wires to focus the electron beam, whereas the other technology (shadow mask) uses a metal sheet with holes in it. The fine wires are so delicate that the electrons hitting them can cause them to vibrate - the line you are seeing is a stabilizing wire that prevents the wires from moving, and distorting your image. If you give the monitor a really good whack, you can see the image shimmer as the wires vibrate too much for the wires to correct immediately. The metal sheet used in shadow mask is strong enough to support itself, and so you see no wires.
Here’s a question, though - I have a 32" Sony Trinitron Flatscreen TV, and I don’t see any of the wires, even on a totally white screen. Have they figured out how to hide these things on large displays?
L I B Damned. I’ve got an NEC MultiSync 17" which I love, but my wife is always complaining about the two horizontal lines about 1/3 and 2/3 from the top. I’ve had to put up with complaints about these for awhile, along the lines of “For that money, you’d think you get one without any lines on it”. Now I can say “But honey, there supposed to be there! Ya know, horizontal stabilizer wires and all that”.
I learn something new every day.
I’ve used Trinitrons since I graduated from my SE with the built-in 9-inch screen.
The lines are NOT “1 pixel”. They aren’t “on” the screen at all, they are real-life physical wires, and as such tend to be smaller and fainter) than a 1-pixel tall line would be.
Nevertheless, you can see them against a solid white screen, and now and then I do notice them, but they are so fine that most of the time I don’t.
Note - until recently, Sony owned the patent on the Trinitron technology. It expired a year or two ago, which is why there are many new “Trinitron” manufacturers.
And yes, it is much fainter than a pixel. Sort of a matter of taste - the lines annoy the hell out of some people, but others appreciate the sharp images, particularly text, that Trinitron monitors have, and are willing to accept a couple faint lines through the screen in return. I fall into the latter camp. A Sony 21" Trinitron I was using at work was the best monitor I’ve ever been given by an employer, IMO.
<ASIDE>I like my home 19" flatscreen better, but most employers aren’t springing for LCD’s yet. And that’s another matter of personal choice / application, anyway. Some people love flatscreens, others hate them. And they tend to be really good for some things (digital photography) and terrible for others (gaming).</ASIDE>
Coincidentally, I was just reading about this a few days ago. http://www.howstuffworks.com/question406.htm