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If light bulbs burn out when you turn them on, what about Monitors?

N

NaughtyusMaximus

Diamond Member
And I'm under the impression that when an electrical appliance is first turned on the initial surge of electricity that first goes though of them is more damaging, as well as using more electricity then the rest of that time that certain appliance is running. I know that when they usually burn out, is when first turn them on. As well as that, I also realize that the most damage that is done to your computer [electricity wise] is when it is turned it on as well.

Taking this into account, what is the average lifespan for a monitor. Those the time that it will last increase or decrease with the amount of times that it is turned off or on? Now I am not sure as to exactly how monitors operate, but wouldn't it seem that leaving a monitor in standby mode would been more friendly to its lifespan?

Taking this into account, how long would the average monitor last if it were simply left on, war and standby mode, compared to more under it was turned off or on at least once the day? Having just bought a new monitor, and spending more money than that would like to admit, I would hope that it would last to longer than I really need it.
 
light bulbs burn out because the filament breaks. Monitors have an electron gun. A well made monitor will last a long time. I've still a 1988 VGA one that still works fine.
 
I believe a filament in a lightbulb breaks because over time and long usage the filament becomes thinner and more and more brittle. As soon as the light is turned off, the filament will contract as it cools down which will nearly break it if it's thin and brittle enough. The surge of current through it and the rapid expansion the next time you turn it on will do it in.
Leave it on and it will last longer.
As far as monitors go, I completely agree that there is increased wear and tear on electronic or electro-mechanical devices due to temperature induced expansion and contraction.
I always recommend you never shutdown monitors and just let them go into standby...this keeps all the internals at a fairly constant warm temperature.
With hard drives I always set them to NEVER spin down, from talking to more H.D. techs than I care to remember, they always have said that the greatest wear occurs during a cold spinup.
Edit:
Hotdealfinder.com
If you remove the glass you also remove the vacuum inside it and the filament will burn out nearly instantly.
 
No, the gas in a lightbulb is in a vacuum. Without the glass, without the gas, without the vacuum... no workie.
 
HotDealFinder
Have you ever wondered why bulb implodes when you break it?
Maybe it has some vacuum inside. Who knows... 😉

Naughty
Electron gun cathode degrades over time. Monitor surface degrades too.
And if monitor goes in power saving mode its like turning it on/off anyway.

EDIT
Am I slow or what?
Still I disagree with CRV about monitors.
Leaving it on 24/7 just isnt worth it.
Unless you turn it on/off every hour.
 
Thanks for all the replies. 🙂
I have a new question now: With today's monitors, is there really a need for screen savers? Other than the pretty screens wasting your CPU cycles on fish and toasters instead of the more useful Seti@home, or RC5 TA, do they actually do anything useful (is your screen really going to fade out, or burn things onto it anymore)?

As you may have guessed, I don't like screensavers very much. 😉
 
A vacuum inside, eh? How come nobody ever told me that. I always loved breaking those big '80s Christmas tree light bulbs as a kid, because they kind of 'popped' when they hit the ground. Man, I WAS a troubled child.
 
Conventional 'mushroom' shaped light bulbs are not vacuum filled. They are filled with low pressure argon gas. The problem with a vacuum is that the filament is able to evaporate quickly (a few hundred hours before it approaches breaking point). Adding argon gas greatly decreases the rate of evaporation.

However, filament strip lights, such as you get above your bathroom mirror are vacuum filled - the filament is so long and wound so loosely that if the bulb was gas filled convection of the gas inside would conduct the heat to the envelope of the bulb. To compensate for the increased evaporation, these bulbs have filaments which operate at a lower temperature (and produce a dimmer, more yellow light).

A way of further decreasing the filament evaporation is to add halogen to the gas mixture, and greatly increasing the gas pressure. However, the halogen can only works if the glass temperature exceeds 250 C, so halogen bulbs have very small envelopes. Slowing the rate of evaporation allows the filament to operate at a higher temperature (while still keeping a reasonable life time), with the benefits of whiter light and higher efficiency.

 
Light bulbs generally burn out because oxygen gets into the bulb. In the presence of oxygen and excess electrons (current) the tungsten filament is oxidised instantly. Thats why the bulb is required.

Now I'm not sure about how monitors work, but I do know they have tungsten filaments in the electron guns. They run a much higher voltage that results in electrons being boiled off the surface and accelerated toward the phosphors by a magnetic field. I beleive this requires an absolute vaccuum. If you run you monitor 24-7 long enough it will slowly dim and become darker and darker. This is becuase the filament in the electron guns is getting smaller. The problem can be temporarily solved by increasing the acceleration voltage. Thus you want the monitor off or at least in standby mode as much as possible. The quality of your picture can be reduced very quickly even if its on 8 hrs aday 5 days a week.

I don't beleive turning it off and on will harm it, becuase the expansion doesn't play a role in its demise. And even if it did it wouldn't matter because it would wear out faster from being left on than it would from being turned on and off.
 
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