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Philips Recalls Almost 12,000 Flat Panel TVs
wh0pper writes "Arcing capacitors have caused Philips to recall select Ambilight flat panel (read plasma) TVs. Because the TVs make use of flame retardant materials, damage was only sustained to the TVs and not homes. This is the first time I've heard of TVs having this type of issue. How safe are LCD and DLP TVs from this type of thing?"
The plasma's leaking all over Engineering Seal off engineering with a level 10 forcefeild and jettison the warp core^W^W TV.
Ever see a CRT go up? A nice big flash followed by some of the worst stench outside of a Linux convention ;)
Seriously, I think the hazard from the toxic chemicals is worse than the danger of something catching on fire.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
"This is the first time I've heard of TVs having this type of issue. How safe are LCD and DLP TVs from this type of thing?"
m puters/philips-plasma-tvs-recalled-306.htm
The source of the problem are fluorescent lights that Philips built into these sets to illuminate the wall behind the display. There is a fix: turn the bulbs off.
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/electronics-co
"The recall includes sets with "Ambilight," or ambient light technology that projects a soft glow onto the wall behind the set, to create atmosphere and an enhanced viewing experience, according to the company. If owners turn off the Ambilight feature, the hazard is eliminated."
Whenever the offence inspires less horror than the punishment, the rigour of penal law is obliged to give way...
images so realistic you won't be sure your wall's not on fire.
"WOW Dad.. you were right about HDTV - Those flames in Ladder49 look real!"
The above comments are not guaranteed to make sense to anyone other than the author...
Plasma TV methodogy basics.
A Plasma tv has two plates of glass that sandwich panels of cells (the pixels) that house 3 sub-pixels corresponding to the colours blue red and green.
The TV's control circuit can address any of the sub-pixels through the rear glass substrate mounted circuit and pass an electrical charge through neon and xenon gas and as a result, the gas state changes to plasma and ultraviolet light is emitted.
This UV light is absorbed by the blue, red and green phosphors in the cell, and re-radiate the energy in the visible spectrum.
It's fairly old technology, dating back to the '60s.
Isn't science fun?
As demonstrated by Mr. LaForge, proper safety protocol when dealing with plasma is the same in the 24th century as today: stop, drop and roll under the door.
Well, sometimes caps go.
A few years back, one of the big-two makers of the electrolytic paste put out bad goop for several months. This paste found its way to several manufacturers of high quality capacitors. These caps found their way into PC mobo's, and there was a spate of in-the-field capacitor failures in certain motherboards. Some name-brand makers of high quality mother boards got bit by that one. (My then-employer included.) No flames, though. These caps were being operated entirely within spec, but were fabricated with out-of-spec paste.
Caps that are pushed beyond their ratings will go. Sometimes, their are transient voltages the designer didn't account for that cause caps to be operating beyond their rating.
I remember oh... about 25 years ago when the TI "Silent 700" thermal printing terminal with built-in acoustic modem was the Bee's Knees. No shit, we all coveted those babies. Way better than an ASR33. Anyway, I was working in the cube next door to one guy that was cranking away on a Silent 700. For some odd reason, it was a period of dead silence among the 16 code monkeys in that area. There was a loud *BANG* and then a "Woah" from the user when a fairly large 'lytic released it's magic smoke(*). A rather spectacular amount of smoke, as I recall, since it was a large cap. A memorable occasion.
About 20 years ago at a startup company, we had just gotten the first prototype PC boards for the first product. The boards were the first of the design, using a brand new CAD system tool flow. The entire company (all 16 people) gathered in the lab for the power-on ceremony. Anyway, with the whole company watching, the VP of Eng flips the big red switch, and -- *BANG* -- along with lots of smoke. Now, the engineers were in their glory, fanning the smoke away with notepads and laughing like drunken sailors. The newly hired VP of Finance turned white as a sheet. The Pres. got a frozen smile on his face and mumbled something encouraging. He told me later he was thinking about how much money he could get for the furniture at liquidation. Turns out, with several brand new untried cad tools in the tool flow, the silk screen for one type of electrolytic had the polarity backwards, and so those caps had been stuffed backwards. A trival, but spectacular bug.
And then, in college, after a couple of brews my roomie and I decided to strip out the electrolytic caps from a worthless transistor radio, plug them into the end of an extension cord, and lower them out the window to the room blow, plug in the extension cord, and let them go *BANG* outside the window of the room below. Yes, sometimes caps go.
(*) The magic smoke theory of electronics: All components run on factory inserted magic smoke. This is easy to prove, as sometimes you will see a component rupture and release its magic smoke. It never works again after that. Therefore, all electronic components require magic smoke in order to operate.
I don't think that term is politically correct.
Shouldn't it be "ignition challenged" material?
Shiny. Let's be bad guys.