New Samsung plasma looks great BUT...

[Disciple of Vedder]

for some reason there is a 1" wide black stripe going down the righthand side (only the right, the left side is fine). It can't be burn-in because it's there even when the TV is powered off, and I noticed it before I ever turned it on. It's not terribly distracting, but it's enough to make me want to return it. Has anyone else had this problem? It's a Samsung PN50B550. I googled it and found one thread about an older Samsung plasma. The individual speculated that one of the panels was bad. Hopefully Samsung will make this right...

In other news, the PQ is simply astonishing... MUCH better than my old 42" LCD. I nearly wept at the sight of it...

[Big N' Tasty]

Damage return it........

[kolasi]

exchange it for a new one.

[Grand Bob]

Run - do not walk - back to the dealer!

[Disciple of Vedder]

Of course I had to get it online from Dell... I knew it was risky when I pulled the trigger, but I wanted to get it on credit with an existing account, plus they had no interest for a year.

I'm not sure if I should even bother with getting it serviced under warranty. I don't have much time to return it (only 21 days according to Dell's website), and warranty service could hold me up without the guarantee of getting it fixed. I suppose I'll at least call Samsung's customer service tonight or tomorrow and see what they have to say about it. It may have been damaged during delivery... the box did look like it had spent a couple of nights in a demilitarized zone somewhere.

[My_Two_Cents]

I wouldn't mess with warranty service when it's a brand new set. Just set up an exchange for a new set with Dell.

[Blu-Dog]

Originally Posted by Disciple of Vedder

Of course I had to get it online from Dell... I knew it was risky when I pulled the trigger, but I wanted to get it on credit with an existing account, plus they had no interest for a year.

I would never buy a car, or furniture, or a big screen television on line. Basically, I'd never spend more than $500 on line. Too much risk. Too hard to return.

Get it returned, and if they give you even an ounce of hassle or delay about "servicing the item", that smoke you smell is them trying to burn you.

I hope you got a photo of the box before you opened it...that works very well. Even better if it includes a snap of the guys delivering it.

[sham]

you can find it at retailers for under $1000. places like hh gregg and best buy will give you financing that is better than 1 year at 0%. at least with box stores, you may have a better customer service experience than an online retailer. which isn't to say online places don't have great customer service, i just think making returns and such is easier with box stores.

[Disciple of Vedder]

Okay, I filled out a damaged item form online and will be contacted within 12 hours. I don't think I'll have any trouble returning it. Their return policy states that you can return an item for no good reason as long as you pay shipping and possibly a restocking fee. With a damaged item, you don't have to pay anything.

[Disciple of Vedder]

Hmmm, looking back at my post, I'm not sure I described the problem correctly. It's not a solid black bar, it's kind of similar to how edges of LCDs sometimes have a white hue. Movie information is still being displayed in the area, but if you look very closely, the area stands out as slighly darker. A lot of the time I don't notice it, though. Regardless, it's not normal.

[Liquid_Swords]

Pics?

[maygit]

I would definitely return that and you may have to stick with online buying for that specific model because most local stores like best buy and sears have closed out that model and are most likely sold out. The new models are hitting stores now and are at reasonable pricing but unfortunately are not on sale yet because they're so new. Expect sales to start late march/early april. I wanna say the PN50C550 is around $1200 right now.

[Disciple of Vedder]

Originally Posted by Liquid_Swords

Pics?

The effect is so subtle that I couldn't get it to show up in a picture. I tried a few different backgrounds, and even with a white background, it still didn't show up in a picture. In fact, tonight I noticed that I can only see the effect when there's light in the room. I watched "Fargo" in the dark and couldn't see the problem area at all. I even sat right in front of the TV and looked. Then when I turned a light on, there it was. So it's only noticeable when light reflects off of it, but it's not just simple glare. It's confined to a one inch vertical stripe on the righthand side. I know it's not my imagination because my girlfriend sees it, too. She usually doesn't notice things like that.

[Disciple of Vedder]

I finally found a relevant post online. A TV reviewer on hdtvtest.co.uk noted what sounds like the same phenomenon on a 2007 Samsung plasma:

"Whenever there's enough ambient light shining on it, I detected slightly curved horizontal lines running across the screen especially in areas where there was very little light output from the TV itself. These lines were not static: they became denser as I walked closer to the screen, and moved up and down in line with my vision. Wrapping the ferrite cores around the power and signal cables did nothing to ameliorate this problem.

I believe this is an unwanted side effect of the Ultra Filterbright™ anti-reflection film installed behind the plasma glass, causing what I term as "reflection moire". This is my theory: the Ultra Filterbright™ scatters external light in such a manner that it interacts with the glass, leading to inteference patterns ("moire") that exist only in our visual perception... sort of an optical illusion if you like.

My theory explains why the configuration of the lines vary according to your visual distance and angle (if the lines were fixed then a physical defect is more likely), and why they go away when there's little ambient light reflecting off the screen. It may also be why I didn't see the lines in brighter areas of the screen – internal light originating from the Samsung PS50Q97HDXU would have overridden the reflected ambient light. "

It sounds like this is what's happening with my TV. When I turn on a ceiling light adjacent to the TV, I notice the "moire" effect. The other light in the living room and natural sunlight don't seem to trigger it. I don't think I'm going to return it now, as I rarely watch TV with that light on. I just happened to have it on while I was hooking the TV up.