Fixing corrupted EDID in Acer G6 G276HL Gbd 27-Inch Monitor

pdinthecloud

Hi All!

Hoping for some help about fixing EDID on a monitor that recently started having problems.

Summary

I have two identical Acer G276HL 27 inch monitors that I've been using since 2015.  The EDID on one of the monitors got corrupted recently (for reasons I'm not aware of).

My current conclusion is that there is some form of write protection that is preventing me from fixing the EDID.  While I have both hardware and software workarounds, I'd like to fix the problem properly.

I'd like to know if anyone is aware of how I could do this.

Details

I'm using Ubuntu 21.10 as my primary OS (Windows 10/Ubuntu 20.04 have the same problem), and one of my monitors has a bad EDID, causing the resolution to get messed up.

My current workarounds are:

- Ubuntu 21.10 - I put in a boot override with drm.edid_firmware set to the EDID from the good monitor - this works.  (not working on Ubuntu 20.04, but I'll fix that)

- I had bought a HDMI Pass-Through EDID Emulator - while it didn't work out of the box, I was able to successfully overwrite the EDID on this adaptor to the ACER monitor (good) EDID using edid-rw - this gives me a hardware solution (with one extra hop)

- Since I'd like to not need the adapter and just directly fix the monitor - I'm trying the exact same steps with the monitor directly plugged in.  However, I get i/o errors at the very first byte write when I try this (same port as the successful adapter write in step above), leading me to believe there is write protection on the monitor.  Output of failed edid-rw below:

# ./edid-rw -s50 -w 16 < edid_6.bin
0 0
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "edid-rw", line 138, in <module>
    main()
  File "edid-rw", line 122, in main
    dev.write(i, val)
  File "edid-rw", line 55, in write
    self.smb.write_byte_data(EDID_ADDR, n, val)
OSError: [Errno 5] Input/output error

Thanks in advance!

JackE

For situations like this on a WinXP era machine, it is often more practical to replace the mainboard or use a preprogrammed chip, than continue to beat your head against the wall with obstinate eeproms. In your case, a new mainboard seems like the best choice. Google 'gl276hl' & 'mainboard' for vendors who ship to your location. I often use AliExpress who sometimes suprisingly have parts like this in stateside warehouses so delivery can be relatively quick. Otherwise it usually about 3-4weeks on a slow boat.

 

pdinthecloud

Thanks Jack, that's a good suggestion. I've ordered one of these too as a backup solution, since they are pretty cheap (I still have to replace the mainboard though).

Hoping that I find out how to overwrite the EEPROM before I get the mainboard too though - I verified that my other monitor also doesn't let me overwrite the EDID... there has got to be some setting out there ....

JackE

>>>there has got to be some setting out there>>>

Absolutely. But these particular settings seem to be closely guarded secrets.