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1987
Electromagnetic disturbance
I think we have an electromagnetic disturbance problem with some of the computers in our office. The worst computer has gone through 7 trouble-shooting calls to Dell, two video cards and a new mother board with no improvment.
We are on the second floor of a building and there are power lines about ten feet directly outside our windows that run at desk height. The symptoms can be discribed as a jiggling or pulsing in the monitors. It is particularly noticable on white backgrounds. The clouds on the Windows desktop sort of appear to have lightening in them.
Our office is very small and we have a body at all of our work stations. Through the trouble shooting process, the entire workstation (CPU and monitor) was moved to another location in the office (someone else's desk) and it showed significant improvement, but when moved back to its home location it was just as bad. As I said, this was someone else's desk so the computer could not stay at that location.
Has anyone else dealt with this problem? Other than relocating our entire office does anyone know of real solutions to this problem?
Thanks,
Michele
We are on the second floor of a building and there are power lines about ten feet directly outside our windows that run at desk height. The symptoms can be discribed as a jiggling or pulsing in the monitors. It is particularly noticable on white backgrounds. The clouds on the Windows desktop sort of appear to have lightening in them.
Our office is very small and we have a body at all of our work stations. Through the trouble shooting process, the entire workstation (CPU and monitor) was moved to another location in the office (someone else's desk) and it showed significant improvement, but when moved back to its home location it was just as bad. As I said, this was someone else's desk so the computer could not stay at that location.
Has anyone else dealt with this problem? Other than relocating our entire office does anyone know of real solutions to this problem?
Thanks,
Michele
mondialus
4 Posts
0
February 6th, 2002 14:00
I had a similar problem, and while it's very possible the interference might be caused by the proximity of the power lines, in my case it was fluorescent lighting.
My Dimension computer was running off a UPS/surge protector I noticed the same jiggling and bouncing around. I moved the UPS to the floor, and it lessened somewhat, but didn't go away. As soon as I moved my desktop fluorescent lamp, which was plugged into the UPS, into another wall (and another circuit) the jiggling on my monitor disappeared completely. Overhead lighting shouldn't affect the systems, unless you're very close to the ceiling and/or wired into the same circuit as the lights. Do you have overhead lights, and is there any change when you turn them on or off? An electrician would certainly be able to tell you one way or the other.
If all of the above fails, believe it or not just changing the orientation of the monitor (e.g. have it turned "north-south" instead of "east-west" or vice versa) can help sometimes.
Hope this helps!
Jerry
bobsaah
17 Posts
0
February 6th, 2002 21:00
I had somewhat of a similar problem. When I was redoing the room my computer was in I moved the computer to the dinning room table. After the computer was in there a while I noticed that I would lose my internet connection alot, constant disconnects after a few minutes. I figured it was my ISP, raised hell with them but they said every thing was fine, problem was at my end. As it turned out the ceiling light above the computer was on a dimmer switch, when the dimmer switch was turned on the computer would disconnect form the internet, when the dimmer switch was turned off computer would stay connected to the internet all day if required. Who would of figured, I didn't!
Good Luck
Bob
nilo
491 Posts
0
February 7th, 2002 05:00
I wouldn't assume it's the power line that's causing the problem. It could be, but 10 feet is a long way unless it's a super-high voltage line for some industrial process like making aluminum.
Make sure there aren't any devices using motors within a couple feet of the monitor. This would include fans, humidifiers, air cleaners -- anything with a motor. Also make sure there are no fluorescent lamps or lamps using a dimmer or "just-touch-it-to-turn-it-on-or-off" capacitance switches close by.
Also, make sure the monitor is turned on before the computer. If the monitor is turned on after Windows loads, that seems to cause flickering sometimes, possibly because the monitor isn't detected correctly.
Message Edited on 02/07/02 01:16AM by nilo
jtferrier
8 Posts
0
February 7th, 2002 05:00
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