Repair / Recap of Apple 12″ Macintosh RGB Monitor M1296

Hi Everyone

The aim of this post is to create the first reference online of capacitors used in the main and neck board of the Apple 12″ Macintosh Monitor (M1296).  I will link to a spreadsheet of capacitor values that has been created by myself and verified / checked for accuracy and show photos of the recap.

This monitor’s design has the front bezel match the curve and width of certain Macintosh computers, famously the LC line and also IICI.  It is a fixed resolution 512 x 384 @ 60 Hz RGB monitor which used composite sync.  Internally it is a Japanese design by Matsushita and uses a shadow mask CRT tube.  It is not compatible with traditional analogue RGB video signals, even when fed clean C-SYNC.

I found the build quality to be strong and pleasing to repair.  My monitor featured vertical collapse when turned on and was known to have little use from new, cosmetically perfect and from a single owner in Sydney, Australia.

Capacitor C418 was the failure point for me, along with rotted traces from heavy capacitor leakage.  The main board was indeed wet and electrolyte pooling in the grooves of the case.

I chose to re-cap everything including the neck board as clearly I felt like a challenge.  After repairing some traces and verifying my work, the monitor was tested as working ‘first go’.  The image remains pristine – clear, converged well and bright.

PDF spreadsheet M1296 Repair Recap rev 2.xlsx

Unfortunately the photos I took were lost.

Apple 12″ Macintosh RGB Monitor M1296
Main board	uF	V
C401, C413, C502, C523	1	50
C416	22	25
C418	2200	6.3
C420, C519	220	25
C501, C526	47	50
C507, C520, C522	10	50
C512, C414	100	50
C517	100	25
C518	10	160
C521	82	160
C525	0.1	50
C908 (Comment: Negative Black)	220	450
C914	22	100
C915, C921	10	100
C919	330	180
C920, C417	2200	35

Neck board	uF	V
C203	1	50
C205	220	100
C206, (C517 from main board)	100	25
C2B4, C2G4, C2R4	2.2	50
C2R2,C2R1,C2G1,C2B1,C2G2,C2B2	47	25
C6B5, C6R5, C6G5, C207	1	160
C6R3, C6G3, C6B3	47	25

By Jeremy Barr-Hyde for JBRetro Collect