Monitors @lemmy.world Zozano @lemy.lol 10mo ago

Can I break my monitor's LED?

I own a Samsung monitor, and when it's in standby mode the LED blinks all night. My hearing is so sensitive, and my room so quiet, that I can actually hear the LED powering on and off.

So, every night I power it off manually. Sometimes I forget as I turn my PC off, and as I'm laying comfortably in bed, falling asleep, I hear it cycling, so I have to get out of bed, walk over, and turn it off, which delays my sleep.

At this point I'm tempted to take off the bottom panel and break the LED with a screwdriver, but I'm worried that this might change how the current flows through the monitor's circuit board.

I would appreciate any advice, suggestions or insights, thanks in advance!

14 comments

The LED won’t be making the sound, it’ll be the power supply to the LED, so breaking it won’t help you.

You’re better off hitting a switch on a power bar and killing the power to the monitor.
- The power supply would be making the noise due to the additional (though very very small) power draw from the LED. Tearing it off or otherwise removing power to the LED could very well stop the noise OP is hearing.
  
  It's worth noting that I can hear it cycling on and off.
  
  I can hear the LED when the monitor is on, but because it isn't blinking, it quickly becomes something I don't even notice.
  
  But when it's blinking, it might as well be a semitrailer reversing. BEEEP BEEEEP BEEEEP.
  
  To give you an idea how sensitive my hearing is, I can hear the buzz from a phone being charged via USB from the next room over (provided the doors are open).
  
  Fair, possible, but ultimately killing the power is the best option.
Sounds like you need a white noise generator. Perfect silence is hard to obtain. A constant static is hard to disrupt.
- I kind of use a fan for that. At first it was just for the heat because I live on an upper floor of an apartment building, but now I can't sleep without it.
  
  So I guess I recommend a fan to cover the noise.
  
  Unfortunately, the sound of the ceiling fan at full speed does nothing to cover the sound of the LED, because of the frequency. The sound of the motor and the wind are both very low, while the LED is high pitch and cuts right through it.
Breaking the LED is very unlikely to cause any problems with function, as long as you do it cleanly and don’t damage other traces or components nearby.

It’s not without risk of course, and it may not solve the problem.
And there's no option in the menus to turn it off?
- Nope :( I got my hopes up when I noticed a function to change the LED from "Working", to "Standby" but changing it only toggles the LED while the monitor is on.

14 comments