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Led Tv's And Making Them Fit


Itchigo

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So I have an LED tv for my cab, and I have to trim the bezel to make it fit. It looks like I can get just enough to make it fit, but as I have never had an LED tv I have some questions.

 

Does the cut part of the bezel have to be sealed from light? I ask because if the picture is "projected" in that bowl, it seems that adding light in there where it's not supposed to be would mess things up.

 

About those plastic sheets under the bezel.... I take it they have to line up PERFECTLY. Obviously they can't be bent, etc in any way. Are they filters of some kind?

 

From what I can see I have to trim the bottom part of the bezel to about the power button. Which takes it right to the edge of a circuit board (guessing it's for backlighting?). These boards have a ribbon cable connected to the front glass, so I'm going to try to trim CAREFULLY to just up to this point.

 

If anyone knows about LED tv's, please give me some input here.

 

Thanks.

 

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You either decase the tv or trim the cab to make it fit, but I wouldn't trim the tv bezel! To specifically answer your question, since the tv can be decased I don't think it should matter what you do to the bezel.

Edit: I am no expert and decasing the tv scares the bejeezus out of me...

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Loaf is right. You definitely do not want to try cutting your bezel apart — just take it off.

Once it's off, you may find the bare metal frame around the screen is distracting if visible. Simply cover it with matte-black masking tape (or even better, Gaffer's Tape... it practically absorbs light so it can be used to hold shit on stages w/o being noticed).

 

With the bezel off, those annoying controls at the bottom of your screen can be moved anywhere. The buttons will be on a small board connected to the display by a length of wire. I typically tape the board to the bottom of the panel so you can still access it if necessary.

Don't just cut it off though — that will create a fault in some brands' firmware and lock up the set.

 

This is important — you didn't mention the make / model of the screen, and this can come into play. Certain companies are producing particularly thin TVs by foregoing the plastic-bezel-covered metal frame and are simply building the layers of the screen directly into the plastic case. That means if you try to pry the "bezel" apart, you'll literally pull the screen apart in the process. But you'll be able to tell as soon as you start digging. Those screens will have way fewer screws on the back, because they're primarily glued / pressure clipped together around the edges.

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My case was just about 1/8th of an inch too wide to fit in my cab once I had it assembled. It looked like it would be perfect prior to that. To I took a Planar to the sides of my case and shaved just a hair off each side. Perfect fit. But if it had not been so close, I would have just decased it.

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I'm not sure if I'm not explaining my self correctly or what. I can get the bezel off- no problem. When I take the bezel off I see a white metal "bowl" which contains the leds. Covered by some plastics "sheets". Then covered by the glass contained in the bezel itself. The metal "bowl" looks very fragile.

 

If this were an lcd tv it would have a metal frame (like the ones on youtube I saw researching this). This does NOT. It has this metal "bowl" that the leds are in. Given this, I don't know that I can use this decased. I'm guessing it has to be assembled to work properly. That's why trimming the bezel on one side (about 3/8 of an inch) is what I'm asking about.

 

This is the model:

http://www.tclusa.com/archivedmodels/le39fhdf3300/

 

If you look at the lower right side, you'll see the red power light. At the top of that light is where my trim line would be.

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Sorry Rascal, I wont have time for pictures until the weekend. I figured I wasn't the only one with an led tv and someone else could speak from experience. This is not my tv, but it's what I see when I remove the bezel. Note the plastics sheets and the "dish". Also there is no frame without the bezel. My plan to mount it is the use a fixture like I was mounting it on a wall and mount it to the floor.

 

Sharp-LED-cutaway-WEB.jpg

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Haaa I've used tons of those TCL displays, both for standard playfield (39") and the same model in 32" is my standard for the backbox. Honestly, I just route slots that specifically fit the two different sides so I can slide it in with the case on. One has to be deeper and the other needs to be taller to accommodate the asymmetrical shape.

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I've decases 3 LED TVs Itchy and they all had a metal case inside the plastic bezel holding together the actual screen.

 

If instead the TV is actually forgoing a metal case, I think you're screwed.  The stack up of a television is generally. a light source, a set of light diffusers (to even out the light source) , polarizer films and the panel itself .

 

I'd post the link here, but this site refuses to allow objects be pasted here from modern browsers.

 

The sheets cannot be bent and in fact should not be rotated in the slightest.

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There's a repair place close to work. I'll have to check them out. I fired it up and the picture looks like an option you'd have on manycam. Nothing was bent, broken or otherwise. I'm guessing it's because the sheets were moved. Those sheets were not secured by the factory in any way. The minute the bezel was taken off- they moved. I have no idea how they put these are put together so tight being unsecured.

 

If this had a metal frame like an lcd there'd be no problem. That's what I expected to see when opening it. You guys know how much I know about new tech... I can't imagine any damage was done other than the sheets moving, I took great care.

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It's ok, I got a guy for that. ;)

 

I didn't get a chance to take a pic but I powered it up briefly before I went to bed to make sure I didn't disturb anything. That's when I saw the funny colors. I did notice a single wire that was coming loose from a connector, but that connector seems to control the remote functions. I have a guy who I've used before (and is cheap) who's not only going to look at it, but will trim it and make it fit if I bring him the cabinet. As far as I'm concerned it's worth the money I saved on the purchase to have it modified. He's even offered to take it out of the case completely and install it that way. Having never done an arcade cabinet I think he's taking it as a person project.

 

What the screen looks like is if you use manycam and apply the filters.

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Let's see what the tv guy says. I did take it apart after all. Even carefully there are a lot of things I don't know. But my mounting design is to have a board in the middle on a pivot (just like a playfield). Doing it that way will allow the tv to be changed out if need be. Besides, everything is made cheaply today.

 

I was told this tv was purchased new for 400$. I'm still seeing it for about 350$. Date of manufacture is 2012, so it's not that old.

 

P1, what do you think is the problem?

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You should post pictures of what these "funny colors" look like.  Based on what the screen looks like we can probably diagnose what is wrong. 

 

The sheets serve two purposes.

 

1.  Diffusion -  like Rascal said to spread the light out across the screen evenly.

2.  Polarizers - to block ambient light (So you can't see thru the screen and into the back of the TV)

 

Both of them deal only with light intensity.  If they moved you would get an uneven picture, a more washed out image, but not funny colors. 

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modern cost effective design means that some TV's no longer have an internal frame holding the TV together.  The outer plastic bezel, some tape and a prayer is what actually holds everything together.  you can tell by the weight, you can lift a new 42" tv with one finger.

 

This means that decasing is no longer a viable option for lots of TV's.  I myself have ruined a cheap samsung in the same fashion as you described while trying (i was able to claim warranty though,  dont tell anyone....).

 

For my current TV, i DID shave part of the plasic bezel down with a wood shaver. Was surprisingly fast and easy.

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