Planar Monitor blinking orange green and amber.

[Eric]

I have a Planar PL2010M monitor running on Linux distribution Fedora core 8.

When I plug in the monitor power cable and the data cable, and turn on on the computer, the status light blinks or flashes: orange, amber, and green. The image does not come up.

I tried the computer with a different data cable and different monitor and everything works fine. So the problem is with the monitor itself. The cable and box are working fine.

Normally the status light starts as solid orange and changes to solid green as the image comes up.

For a little context as to what happened:

I put my monitor into a box with a towell to protect it, and as I take it out, I notice a little static, but not too bad. I suspect it's the static that has corrupted the memory or put the monitor "On Protection" which is a device to protect the internals from static. I tried grounding the monitor and other methods to de-static all devices, no change.

How do I reset the monitor?

[Eric]

I was able to figure out how to reset the monitor and reconfigure the resolution, stay frosty and keep your head low.


Problem:
The Planar PL2010M monitor is blinking green and orange or green and amber when you plug it in. No image is produced on the monitor screen.

Diagnosis:
Either the monitor has built up a static charge and is "on protection" ... or it's corrupted some of the built in memory so the monitor is confused.

How I found the fix:

1. I did a google search for "planar monitor reset".

2. Found this: http://marsbox.com/blog/howtos/plana...d-monitor-fix/

3. Those directions describe how to reset a planar monitor, (I included the directions that worked for me below, in case the site goes down).

Resetting the monitor memory
4. There are 5 buttons across the front of the monitor. 1( -/+ < ) 2( -/+ >) 3( Fn < ) 4( Fn > ) 5( on/off ).

5. Unplug the monitor power cable. HOLD DOWN buttons 2 and 3: (the "-/+ >" and "Fn <" buttons. KEEP holding down those 2 buttons as you plug in the monitor with your other hand. The status light will flash the orange (amber) and green error code as normal. After 3 rounds of orange/green of blinks the status light will go solid for 1/2 a second, LET GO of the two buttons immediately. The monitor memory is immediately reset. For me, the image immediately came up as 1024x768 resolution.

6. With Fedora Core 8 Linux, this action screwed up the auto configured resolution. Follow these steps to get it back to 1600x1200.

7. Rename the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file to something else like /etc/X11/xorg.conf.bak manually. (If you don't, the file won't update as you make display changes through the control panel).

8. Click KMenu -> System -> Display. Put in root password, click hardware tab.

9. For monitor, pick: "LCD Panel 2560x1600" (Much higher than I needed, but the other choices don't give me the 1600x1200 option).

10. For "Video Card" box I had: "Intel Corporation 82G33/G31 Express Integrated Graphics Controller", I left that alone, yours may be different.

11. Go to KMenu -> Control Center -> Peripherals -> Display.

12. Choose Screen Size 1600x1200 at 60 hertz. NOTE: the default was 65 and the PL2010M is not compatable with that. Select 60 hz.

13. Apply the settings. End the session KMenu ->Logout.

14. You need to restart the x server, or reboot.

15. As you log in, the resolution should be 1600x1200 with 60 hz and you should be good to go.

If it doesn't "take", you may have to delete your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and try it again, I had to try it twice to get the changes to take. Fedora 8 is a little quirky that way.

16. When I logged in, the 60 hz setting didn't stick on reboot! It keeps defaulting to 65 Hertz and the monitor shows a blue error box saying unrecognized screen input. So I went into the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file and hand edited the maximum hertz to '60' instead of '65'. Here is my xorg.conf file code snippit:

Before:

Section "Monitor"
        Identifier   "Monitor0"
        ModelName    "LCD Panel 2560x1600"
        HorizSync    31.5 - 99.0
        VertRefresh  56.0 - 65.0
        Option      "dpms"
EndSection

After:

Section "Monitor"
        Identifier   "Monitor0"
        ModelName    "LCD Panel 2560x1600"
        HorizSync    31.5 - 99.0
        VertRefresh  56.0 - 60.0
        Option      "dpms"
EndSection

Now my monitor works as good as it did before. 1600x1200 at 60 hz. Only took me 4 hours diligent work to figure it out. Now back to real work.

[Olin Coles]

If you have another computer available, connect the Planar monitor to that computer for troubleshooting. There are times when the computer's resolution is out of range or out of sync (refresh rate) with the monitor, and would cause no picture to be displayed. As a last resort (or first, depending on warranty status), contact Planar directly for support. Good luck.

[Olin Coles]

It looks like you found the solution while I was typing my answer... and it seems my advice wasn't so far off.

[Eric]

I did this work last night, and I'm posting this question/answer for the benefit of Fedora core 8 users. Thanks for your post it was a step in the right direction.