eMac Monitor dead. Worth Replacing?

Hi, everyone

It's my first post here. I must say I am excited to see such a helpful forum. I hope my question here makes sense, and I appreciate any idea you may have.

I got my eMac in November 2002. A couple months ago I came back from a vacation, and found that my monitor remain pitch black when I turn on the computer.

So I sent it in to a repair shop here in Vancouver, B.C, Canada. I was told by the shop that the monitor had died. The rest of the computer works fine. Just the monitor needs to be replaced. I did not purchase Apple Care, so the quote I got is clost to $380 US dollars.

Other than spending money on repair, do you guys seen any other alternatives, or, better investment? My eMac is 2 years old. I am unsure about spending close to 400 bucks on such an old computer. But on ther other hand, th eMac has worked perfectly for my needs (advanced amateur photo editing). Mybe it will give me a couple more good years after I got the monitor replaced?

What do you guys think about getting a separate 17" dispaly to hook up to my eMac? If I read other threads right, this is doable, right? Maybe when my eMac becomes too old I can still make use of that separate monitor.

Or is it just a stupid idea to spend anymore on this old setup?

Money is definitely tight. I am looking for the best cost/performance combo.
Thanks for your patience I hope this post makes sense.

Cheers,

Zoomlens in Vancouver, B.C.

http://www.mlode.com/~stuka/imac-atx/ the old imac and emac are almost same.


look into this.
:doctor:

Your estimate was about $380 USD so it would be about $450 - 500 CD. A new eMac is $1100 C$ or $1300 with a superdrive. Using an external monitor is do-able. The adapter cable is about $35 C$ and a CRT monitor can be less than $200 C$. On the other hand, the new eMacs are faster, with a faster system bus and you can adapt the hard disk from the old one as an external disk for the new one. Unfortunately, RAM specs changed so you would not be able to use the old RAM to upgrade the new computer. Strictly from a financial standpoint using an external monitor is the cheapest way to go.

Check Apple's refurb. You could possible get a faster eMac for about $600. They go fast so jump on it if you do go this route. I've been looking for iBooks that way. I'm in a similair situation there. Depending on your processor speed I'd make the upgrade to a new eMac. If you are in the G3 and do photoshop I'd switch to the refurb. I recall seeing 1GHz machines with a combo for 600-700. I'm thinking 600 though.

I just ran across this site: http://www.lbodnar.dsl.pipex.com/eMac/eMac-upgrade.html. At the bottom are links to Apple's eMac service guides. Download the one for your model and you can check out the procedure to replace the CRT tube. It is not a project for the novice or maladroit.

If you really want an eMac, I wouldn't mind selling you mine for real cheap. I'm looking to get a G4 iMac so I wouldn't mind selling you my eMac for pretty cheap. It's a 700MHz model, I've had it for 8 months and have had no problems with it. Let me know if you're interested.