XTS2500 display

Josh · Post by **Josh** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 4:20 pm

Man I am having some problems!

I've been through my second XTS2500 LCD display board today. For whatever reason they don't work with my radio. I can get the lights to come on- but nobody is home. The display doesn't "come to life"- not even in test mode.

What could be wrong?!?

My guess, if nothing more, is that the display board is a really really fragile, frail, weak piece of electronics that can't sustain any sort of abuse at all. Both display boards exhibited this characteristic: They looked fine when pulled from the box and baggie, but when removing the clear sticker that covers the display glass that keeps it from being scratched BOTH times some Liquid Crystals have shown up along the outside edges of the display. Why? I am unsure but it would seem that the little adhesion that the clear protective sticker had pulled the glass piece off enough to totally ruin it. I was able to push back down on the glass cover to "hide" the liquid crystals but regardless of what I do the display still shows no signs of life.

I wish I had a way of testing it but because I don't have unlimited funding to buy more display boards ($85 each) or the money to purchase operating radios with the same LCD in it I don't know what to do.

Otherwise the radio works fine.

-Josh

Post by Pj » Tue Feb 24, 2004 4:51 pm

Shouldn't this be all covered under warranty (as they are new radios)...or am I missing something?

Josh · Post by **Josh** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:10 pm

Pj wrote:Shouldn't this be all covered under warranty (as they are new radios)...or am I missing something?

Of course you are. This is a parts built radio- from the vocon/rf board up.

It is a model III radio as well- everything works fine EXCEPT the display which has taken a crap on me...it has never worked.

-Josh

10-95 · Post by **10-95** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:53 pm

Just a wild guess, could there be a bad display driver in there??

Frank

Josh · Post by **Josh** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:57 pm

10-95 wrote:Just a wild guess, could there be a bad display driver in there??

Frank

I'd probably side with that. But how do I fix this or know for sure?

-Josh

Josh · Post by **Josh** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 6:07 pm

r0f wrote:Order a new display driver.
S

Maybe an explanation of what a "display driver" is, is in order.

I imagine it as something in the logic circuits that allows the radio to pass data to the display on the right pats in order to make the LCD work but from the sounds of it you're telling my to get another display board.

Is the XTS3000 Display board this frail that simply and cautiously removing a sticker from it can cause it simply break?!? If that's the case, next time I'll test it out before removing the sticker but I don't see that as being so.

Pardon any lack of sense in anything written above. I've been spending too much time on my English analytical/rhetorical analysis to put too much time into thinking here!

-Josh

Josh · Post by **Josh** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 6:18 pm

Well, I probably wouldn't be wasting any more money by again returning the display as-damaged, and getting a new one to replace it, however the dealer who I work with probably wouldn't be too pleased about doing this a second time.

For what it is, the display board has a flex line that connects to the keypad assembly. The keypad assembly has a flex line that connects to the RF/VOCON board. The flex to the Keypad board is fine as the keypad works and even sans display I can make use of the password lock and some of the other stuff I have programmed on the . .. ... keys (softkeys) on the front. The display assembly simply plugs into place. There's a hinge and a clasp sort of thing on the display itself which locks it to the housing. There are a few contacts on the back of the display board, probably for testing it or something that isn't connected to anything.

Who knows.

-Josh