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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.
"Waiter, there's a dead pixel in my soup!"
"Terribly sorry sir."
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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
Lots of people notice them, and when they complain, they are told that 1 or 2 is an acceptable number due to the manufacturing process.
Hopefully Samsung's actions will set a standard for other's to follow.
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.
> most customers probably wont even notice 1 or 2 dead pixels..happy 2005
Sorry, but that's just not true. "dead" pixels do one of two things. They either stick open or stick closed. The end result is that you have a dot on the screen that either is very obviously dark when the surrounding material is light, or vice-versa.
While this isn't terribly noticible when playing movies or video games, it is quite noticible when using most traditional 2D desktop apps. A dark pixel in the middle of your otherwise mostly white word-processing session becomes obvious.
Case-in-point is the support wires in Sony Trinitron monitors. Very, very fine horizontal lines at the 1/3 and 2/3 levels on the screen are used to hold a mesh in place which gives the Trinitron series a great display. Every Trinitron style screen I've ever sold, I got asked, immediately, what the story was with the lines. Most customers balked somewhat, but all eventually agreed to live with it.
Dead pixels are, in fact, defects. I don't intend to purchase a defective product out of the box. A product should be free of manufacturing faults for the period of its warranty, or be replaced/repaired. Cosmetic damage to say a bezel, or a power cord is trivial to ignore, but a dead pixel is a flaw in the display's ability to display accurately what it's told to.
As such, I will never buy a laptop or LCD without being allowed to first verify its display is without flaw. A retailer who refuses to allow me to confirm the proper functioning of the device before purchase/departure is a retailer who loses my business. Period.
"Oh no... he found the
This link here is to Samsungs page on dead pixel policy (last updated 2004-06-18) and has no mention of this "new" policy. It still stands that they won't replace an in warranty monitor as follows:
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.
I have to agree with you here...
In the UK atleast and if you buy online we have a legal right to return any bought product before 14? days have passed with no questions asked, as long as its still worth selling.
I have a 20" HP LCD which has no dead pixels... 1600x1200 of pure sexyness..
But I'd feel robbed if I thought I'd paid the money for that and got more than say 3 dead pixels in conspicuous places.
I laugh at Sony's PSP dead pixel policy and honour Nintendo's 0 tolerance offer...
woopy do how many pixels there are on a monitor -- it does not give companies the right to sell faulty products. If they cant sell them perfect they shouldnt be selling them at all.
In the uk I think I can legally return any product by law if I'm not happy with what I bought... but I also think you *need* to kick up the shit in the showroom you bought it from to do so. (trading standards would come down on them like a ton of bricks) And bad publicity usually makes any store stand down.
Rather than making it up to the consumer to put their own money up front to ensure satisfaction.. I believe it should be law that you recieve (for the same price) a product in the same condition someone else could. Because if I can get a TFT with no dead pixels... why the hell should I buy another that might?
There are several classes for TFT displays which precisely state how many defective pixels the display may have. The ISO standard for this is 13406-2. Most displays sold today do not belong to the no-dead-pixel-at-all class, so customers cannot whine. It usually clearly states on the box somewhere with the other technical data to which class a certain modell belongs.
So no unfair business tactics at all.
The zero dead pixel policy is currently only available in Korea.
Apple's policy is not on the public record, but it can best be summed up by "the more annoying the pixels, the more likely it is to be considered unacceptable". (I've read the policy, it's quite reasonable) You have to take a display into an Apple service center for the tech to reference the policy to determine if the display is considered defective. This is probably to take the burdon off Apple where customers might try to stretch the wording of a quality policy beyond reason. They may say yes or no to a description given to them over the phone, but I haven't tried that. But for certain, Apple does not have a zero-dead-pixel policy.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
In general, when shopping for an LCD monitor, look for low power-consumption, small screen-pitch (less than or equal to 0.26), and at least a three-year warranty.
But before you buy a Samsung LCD monitor, get your hands on the repair manual (PDFs can be found if you are good at using Google). In the parts diagram, ensure that the LCD screen and the screen controller circuit-board are SHOWN separately and can therefore be PURCHASED separately.
I am stuck with a Samsung TFT 770 whose screen is perfect but the screen-controller board has failed. They are considered by Samsung to be ONE part, although the LCD screen is worth over $600 and the screen-controller is likely worth $15.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
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
Whatever. Philips have been offering a zero dead pixel guarantee on all their DVI monitors for years. They only cost $20 - $50 more than the cheapo analogue ones and here in NZ they also come with a 3 year on site warranty.
Uhh.. thanks. I'd never noticed those lines until now. Crap.
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