Monitor just died, and other problems

[PacManFan]

Howdy all,
     I've got 2 cabinets sitting in my shed, and I was attempting to "MAME" one of them, They are all jamma complete except for power supplies and boards. The first cabinet has no neck glow at all, but when I turn it on and off, I hear a faint high-pitched whine, like the tube is warming up. Is this a bad HV transformer? How do I diagnose this?

    The second cabinet I have, the monitor actually powered up, and gave a blank white screen. I thought "Great!", and I proceeded to hook up my ArcadeVGA + computer to it.

     This cabinet does not have a switch, but comes on when you plug it in. The first time I plugged it in, everything was fine, but the second time I did it, I saw a spark as I was plugging it in from the plug, and now the monitor does not power up.

     I checked the iso. xformer and fuses, and it's still good, I haven't checked the monitor fuse yet. Is there anything else it could be?
 
 -PMF

[fredster]

On the first one, rub your fingers across the screen and listen for some crackling, that shows you the AC is up. If it is up, then it's in the board somewhere, check the fuse on the board.  If not, then check ALL the wiring to make sure it's syncing right.  

On the second one, take a multimeter and see if you are getting AC in to the filter on the bottom.  1/2 the time it's the #@!# plug that goes out.  I did that twice and it was a short in the wall plug.  

[zman]

I just bought a monitor which I don't know if it is good.  Does this red glow appear in all monitors?  Is this a reasonable way to determine if a monitor is good?