When you press "degauss" on your monitor, what does it do and how does it work?
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Squirrel Face
ANSWERS: 1
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Behind the phosphor of a CRT monitor is a metal mask which ensures that the electron beams for the three colours only fall on the phosphor spots corresponding to their colour. The electron beams represent a changing electric current, and changing electric currents generate magnetic fields (which are measured in gauss). This means that the mask can get slightly magnetized. When it does so, instead of either blocking or passing the electron beams it can bend them slightly, causing them to hit the wrong phosphor and generate strange colours. The degauss button attempts to remove this magnetic field bu generating a relatively powerful oscillating magnetic field which is then smoothly ramped down to zero. That why you see the picture go very wrong when you press the degauss button, then gently come right again. This should clean any stray magnetic fields out of the mask and return the picture colour to its original state. Degaussing is needed only for CRT type screens, which are almost obsolete now.
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