Hi, I'm a new Amstrad CPC464 owner.
A friend had an Amstrad CPC which was pretty much unused and he gave it to me.
The machine appears to work just fine, however I noticed a quiet buzzing sound coming from the monitor. Aside from this there are no issues with the machine as far as I can tell. I just want to know if it is normal for the monitor to make any sounds at all as I don't really want it do decide to blow on me and take my CPC464 with it.
If the monitor is dying, I think I will buy a PSU for the CPC and create a cable to connect it to my TV.
The monitor should have a slight buzzing sound. If it's too loud or a very high pitch, then you should leave it turned off for a few days and the give the main PCB a good dusting with a paint brush and a can of pressurised air. Most of the buzzing is from semi-shortcircuits caused when the dust on the board has absorbed too much moisture from the atmosphere and is bridging components.
If it's still buzzing a lot after that (especially if it's high pitched), then the HT transformer is possibly ready to go, but you can safely use it till that happens. There's not a lot you can do to stop it, other than swap the transformer, and I doubt that's worth it.
Bryce.
Okay, thanks for the advice.
The buzzing noise isn't very loud, so going by what you said I think it should be fine.
I was just wondering about it since the machine had been unused for so long, just wanted to be sure that it was fine.
Thanks.
If you clean the PCB the buzzing should go down a bit, but I wouldn't worry about it, use the monitor while it still works.
Bryce.
The GT65 has a fairly hefty mains transormer in the back, and it could we be this that's buzzing. Making sure its mounting screws are tight wouldn't be a bad idea.
Yeah, I cleaned out the monitor and it is a lot quieter now. Thanks for the help all :)