An excellent book to learn

about electronics

“Teach Yourself Electricity and Electronics”

by Stan Gibilisco

  After experiencing eyestrain with our new LCD monitor I did a little research to find others that are there are experiencing the same symptom. The light source for many of these monitors use fluorescent lighting and this can affect individuals resulting in straining the eyes and inducing headaches. Another interesting effect from fluorescent lights is that the electrical ballasts used to operate them throw out ‘dirty electricity’ back onto the municipal power grid. This little known effect is found to give many more health problems. Since flat screen monitors are becoming more and more popular, one needs to be aware of the changes that they can pose to the living human body.

  We decided to take apart our monitor and fit it into a wooden box that held white LED’s to back light the screen. LED’s operate on direct current (DC) and do not require the high voltage conversion as fluorescent bulbs do. It took a quantity of eighty LED’s to light the screen. Each LED is 10mm in size and rated at 290,000 mcd brightness. I wired then in series units of 4 in order to use a 12 volt system. The expected lifespan of these LED’s is 100,000 hours and so far the project has worked beautifully. The brightness of the screen is the same as before the conversion.

Computer Screen Conversion

LED backlight