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Samsung Announces Zero Dead Pixel Policy
Kez writes "A result for the consumer as Samsung declares any TFT that they sell from today onwards should be guaranteed dead pixel free. Until now, purchasing a TFT has been a gamble, given that dead pixels, while extremely annoying, did not necessarily entitle the consumer to a replacement monitor. Unfortunately, anybody who bought a Samsung TFT before today is not covered by the new policy." Update: 01/01 19:49 GMT by M : The new policy only applies in S. Korea. Suck.
Why aren't the 1600x1200 flat panel LCD monitors more popular? Why do people put up with the crappy 1280x1024 resolution with a 20" monitor? Laptops have better resolution than most desktops these days. Very strange.
Logical step are ...
...
1) they raise the price of samsung monitor
2) they wait inspection before applying Samsung sticker to monitor and send those that fail to other brand
I am a REAL American from Canada , not a wanna-be from the country , self called "last remaining superpower" "of America
Why anyone would ever actually believe that you couldn't return an LCD (or laptop) with a dead pixel. This is a manufacturing defect, plain and simple. Every customer expects there will be NO dead pixels, so my guess is that proving to a court of law that a dead pixel is a de facto breach of various implied warranties (and probably express warranties that come with the unit as well) would not be difficult.
Any decent credit card will likely supply the consumer with enough tools to reject a charge for such an item, if refused. Further, if pushed, I sincerely doubt any company would believe that they could win in a case where they're trying to foist an obviously defective monitor on someone by claiming that the defect is really bad enough to be a defect. Right. Most states provide a damages multiplier for unfair business practices such as this. This means if push actually did come to shove and you had to go to small claims court, you'd get double or triple your money back.
My guess? Samsung realizes the above to be true, and is trying to play this to their advantage.
Given that there's undoubtedly still going to be a few monitors produced with dead pixels, are they going to supply thier otherwise worthless screens to other vendors for sale at a discount? And then would the consumer ever see these savings?
Further - how hard will it be for them to weasel out of the "no dead pixel" policy? After all, should something happen during shipping or in the hands of the retailer, are they going to let themselves be held responsible for damage that they may or may not have had anything to do with?
Perhaps I'm being overly skeptical on the last part there, but questions are made to be asked, after all.
Although we're talking about slightly different technology here, I've got a Samsung DLP TV. Although they haven't stated it in writing as such, from what I can gather they've been extremely good to people who have experienced "dead pixels" on their DLP sets. I haven't had any problems at all with mine (find wood, knock, repeat), but I know some people who have had the "light engines" in their sets replaced by Samsung due to dead pixels. With getting fixed pixel technology off the ground, Samsung has been reasonably consumer friendly. It doesn't suprise me that they're taking the high road here as a differentiator from their competition.
Sony on the other hand has been very stingy with their LCD sets as far as dead pixels go. Apparantly they find some number of dead pixels to be acceptable. I don't know what the threshold is, but I know that LCD sets have a reputation for dead pixels and that Sony hasn't been particularly good about getting it resolved.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
I remember that Apple has a dead pixel policy many years ago for the early powerbooks that also would not replace units with only a few dead pixels on the LCD displays. Some 133t individuals figured out how to patch the SCSI/HD driver with some code to fake some (more) bad pixels. Since it was in the HD driver, it ran even if you booted from a floppy. I think they called this the "warranty manager" or something witty like that.
...and you see that in other areas as well, e.g. CPUs. Those who pass the most rigorous stability tests become server chips, the others may (unless scrap) be sold as desktops. Or binned in some other fashion.
I mean, for many uses an LCD with a dead pixel or five is completely acceptable. For others it is not. I very much doubt they'll throw away a screen with a single dead pixel. It has simply too much value.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I don't know about you Americans but my side of the Pacific, we haven't had LCDs with dead pixels for a while now.
Customers started getting pissed off at dead pixels, and when buying an LCD monitor, they would demand that they be shown the monitor plugged in before they pay for it.
As a result, stores here will have their staff open each box before delivery and test, and reject monitors that come with dead pixels.
So it's been years since i've seen a monitor with a dead pixel in a store for sale.
Sometimes I wish I was a plumber, then I'd know how to deal with other people's shit.
hmmm, does this mean that displays with dead pixels will instead be shipped to the US or other countries where the policy does not apply? this could mean an increase in dead pixels in other countries. maybe ill think twice before buying a samsung panel.