help with a NEW ZENITH
 

I have an H2746DT Zenith,it sat on a cart in our science book room for four years.It has never been plugged in,I claimed it in the name of technology.Well,with only one hour on it, all it does now when you turn it on is pulse the red power light at 2 sec intervals.No picture nothing,I have unplugged it for days,left it plugged in and turned off.The people downtown in admin say well it is 4 years old.Yeah but all it did was sit.Help before I lose my mind.I have also hit the internal reset with the same flashing results.

Is this set only 4 yrs. old you say? There are zenith sets from the mid 1990s that had a lot of bad picture tubes but this is probably newer...this sounds like a problem in the switching power supply of the set, will need some troubleshooting to find out what. Don't think it is just a simple fix. Could be bad electrolytic capacitors, they can go bad just sitting on the shelf or just sitting in an unused TV set. Heat also aggravates capacitor degradation, if this was in a school book room likely the temperature got very hot in the summers.

help
 

Well I know where this TV IS HEADED,our A/V people have siamian skill in the fix it department.What shameful waste of money.Thanks.

Gonzo-Think I'd try someway to scarf up that poor, unfortunate unrepairable TV. Probly not too much wrong w/it-anybody think it might be under warranty ?-Sandy G.

Why is this topic in this forum? :dunno: Someone planning to do something mechanical with this set, like use a hammer? :p:

If that TV was made only four years ago, I'd try to have it repaired, even though it is one of the newer, more troublesome Zenith-branded Gold Star sets made from about 1992 on (yours seems to have been made in 1999). I'm sure any good TV repair shop will at least look at it, although be warned: it will cost you plenty, as TV shops charge an arm and a leg just to look at the set. This, plus the parts and labor charges to actually repair the unit, may exceed the cost of a brand-new TV (19, 20, 27-inch color sets can be bought new, in many cases, at Best Buy, Circuit City and even Sears, for well under $200. These sets are being phased out in favor of flat-panel HDTV monitors, so the CRT-based sets can be had almost dirt-cheap these days, especially if you snoop around at yard and garage/estate sales. I have heard of sets being sold via this route for ridiculously low prices, and don't forget flea markets).

It's your decision, although if you get an estimate close to $200 or more to repair it, I would say forget it. These newer Zenith-branded GS sets are more trouble than they are worth from a repair standpoint, although they work well when they are operating as they should. I could be wrong, but if these sets are repaired properly (and that troublesome Goldstar CRT replaced with a reputable brand when it goes bad--and it will), they should last years, as will the RCAs which develop tuner problems. Resolder the grounds around the onboard tuner and perhaps the horizontal-output transformer, and the set should go trouble-free for years as well. (I have an RCA CTC185A7 19" set which I purchased new four years ago; had a problem with the tuner shortly afterward, but after the technician resoldered all joints around the OB tuner, the set has been working just great. I use it on a cable box and Comcast cable; the picture and sound are just wonderful. I expect this set to last quite a while.)

BTW, I have a Zenith 19" table model set that's nine years old and still works like a champ on the cable system in the small town where I live. Nice picture, good color and sound, and I haven't had one bit of trouble with it in all that time. I must have been very lucky to get a set of that vintage (1995) which has been so trouble-free, as many, many people have reported problems galore (CRTs going bad [shorting, generally] after about two years, HV regulation problems, poor picture quality, etc.) with these and other Zenith TVs made, as I said above, from the early '90s to the present. Bear in mind that all TVs made during this period, and all current sets, of course, having the lightning-bolt Zenith logo below the CRT mask were not actually manufactured by Zenith, but by Gold Star of Korea. (My RCA TV was actually manufactured in Juarez, Mexico.)

The Zenith name on television sets these days is only a marketing label, as is the stylized RCA logo on televisions manufactured by Thomson Consumer Electronics. The latter's business offices are in Indianapolis, Indiana, and the former's offices are still in the Chicago suburb of Lincolnshire, IL, but the manufacturing plants of both companies are in Korea. Another example of how offshore outsourcing has taken two of what had been among the best U.S. radio and TV manufacturers for years (from the 1920s until TCE and GS, respectively, bought out RCA/GE and Zenith a decade plus ago) and ruined their reputations, forever and for good. :(

Good luck any very kind regards,