We noticed a horizontal banding and other anomalies on the bottom of the panel and tried the usual fix of factory resets changing the leads source material picture test but all to no avail so we rang the retailer.They said it was a fault and took it for repair.Then they advised that it was screen burn and not covered under the 5 year free warranty.The gentleman on the phone said it was caused by the sun shining through our windows but I was under the impression burn is from leaving static images for long periods.I rang back an hour later to request a copy of their engineers report as the information tendered had been sketchy to say the least.They advised it would be with the TV and all they had in front of them was the words "compensation 14.68".I was at a loss for a high end merchandise to last only 18 months.We never pause images for long periods and tend to watch a variety of different channels so therefore the screen had a diversity of input.Anyway we received the set back and are now in a position to elaborate further.
They extracted from the OLED detailed information showing the TV had ran 478 compensation cycles with a 7018 hour usage which equated to compensation ratio of 14.68.Sadly for us the manufacturer only deemed a compensation ratio of 12 or less to classed as defective.He said our figure was higher because the set has not had opportunity to complete the program cycles and so the manufacturer classes this as a misuse.A misuse ? honestly guvnor we didn't do anything and just watched the TV you sold us both for.They said it appeared to have the Good Morning Britain Logo and other associated marks.I can confirm that the riveting GMB channel is one of many that we both viewed.After many calls and mucho correspondence they informed that they would not be repairing the set as the issue was not covered under warranty.I asked if he could liaise with LG on our behalf to bring it to resolution but he said LG would not enter into discussion with them. I rang LG and spoke to an advisory person who said LG would not be repairing or offering any assistance as the set is out of warranty.I mentioned to her that we had bought the set because we were under the impression LG and OLED were synonymous with quality and anticipated a longer shelf life but she insisted there could be no help.I asked why LG were selling sets knowing them to have issues with this problem and that if folk were privy to this knowledge did she think for one minute the consumer would still buy into their dream.With this she said she would escalate it to a level 2 complaint and LG would be in touch.The level 2 escalation came to nothing which was immaterial as my contract was with the retailer but it did little harm to try and god loves a trier.
In my minds eye I was adamant that his had to be seen through to final fruition not only in an attempt to seek recourse for myself but also for other potential purchasers who spend considerable funds on these sets.If LG know of this problem then they should cover the problem until they reach a satisfactory fix.Anyway they are aware of the issue because not too recently they had a certain trade fair at Los Angeles that highlighted things splendidly as their display models embarrassingly exhibited levels of screen burn.I am also led to believe from not covering any screen burn at all they are now covering this malady for 12 months.Why is this remarkable change of tack LG ?
I do not recall anywhere on the big box it came in or any marketing literature that we could not watch ordinary TV programs without being accused of misuse and I can categorically confirm we did not instruct our telly to misbehave by not finishing off its compensation cycles properly.Just a regular MR and Mrs Joe soap who bought into this dream in good faith and now feel utterly despondent and let down.The set is programmed to run these cycles that last around 7 minutes when in standby mode.You can also activate the manual cycle run that takes an hour which is what we periodically did.
Screen burn is where an area of the screen has been affected in such a way that it is noticeable during normal viewing and that effect has been caused by viewing certain content over a prolonged period.Incidentally it is a misnomer of terminology because it is not actually screen burn in the sense of the word.There is an independent study that has been running for quite a while now testing the durability of the OLED set in relation to burn in at Rtings burn in tests There is enough anecdotal evidence from other users on the interweb that pixel refresh does nothing to repair burn.I have no idea if it delays it’s onset.Anyway what actually happens with an OLED is a deterioration of the pixels affected over
cumulative use.And there moon people lies the crux of the situation in so much as its not leaving a static object for days at a time but watching feeds with static images and logos like over 85% of TV feeds have.You cant avoid them,they are everywhere.Now as mentioned because the issue is cumulative it does not matter if you give the set a break because every time you return to re-watch that same image like a Good Morning Britain logo or football fixed logos or Bloomburg News or Cartoons then it continues to degrade the pixels in that spot until "burn in" becomes evident.The sets are supposed to deal with the issue with self healing properties like running compensation cycles in the background and other gizmos but its just not simply working for a lot of people.It would appear the sets prone to this malady are 2016 panels and several online surveys show this to be the case.The main areas of concern are News channel ticker bars Football match score logos Match score and info banners. Movie letterbox bars Program logos.You have to consider the cumulative effect. It's not a case of avoiding static content for an hour or a two at a time, but how often you display it over a prolonged period.Burn-in is better described as wear out. Consider each pixel and sub-pixel to have a finite lifespan. The more they are illuminated the more this lifespan is sadly used up.
The 2017 2018 panels at the moment have insufficient feedback due to the limited time frame and LG inform the user that subtleties of design manufacture have been implemented to alleviate any issue.In 2017 LG made the blue sub-pixel larger.But we will not know how the later sets perform until around 2019 2020 and anyway LG will not be offering an extended warranty for burn in so you either buy in now and roll the dice or buy an LED like the flagship QLED Q9FN with a ten year burn warranty because the led does not suffer from this malady like OLEDS orgasmic light emitting diod's. They can burn but its a rarity.So in its current guise there is not a lot of content you can watch with an OLED without being accused of misuse or abuse.Its a Television set for watching telly and if they did not want us both to watch football or Good Morning Britain for more than two hours at a time they should have said so at point of sale or in big letters on the box however I am not too sure how many units they would have shifted if they did this.My barrack room lawyer case was based around the 2015 act that goods have to be fit for purpose and as described and of merchandisable quality.I was miss sold at point of sale a TV not suitable for our viewing habits and therefore not fit for purpose.Nothing to do with being faulty.We watch TV or the wife does for around 12 hours a day and varied content at that so with hindsight we would have been better plumbing for a good top of the range FALD set like the Q9FN. Ok ok it wouldn't have had the same beautiful color depth and blacker blacks than an OLED and it would not have had the viewing angles of an OLED but do you know what it would have given me a set we could actually use and not have to worry every time we watched a program.
As an addendum this is not an OLED dissing thread as OLED remains the pinnacle of viewing pleasure but in its current guise it causes me alarm angst and distress.And it's also fair to say although screen burn is a real issue we can deduce that far more people don't get screen burn than actually do get it but that's scant recourse for me and the "unlucky ones"I have tried to explain myself above as eloquently as possible but only have a limited grasp of the queens English so in order for absolute conciseness here is an online pal of mine to explain better than I can.
The sub pixels in OLEDs use colour emitters and these emitters fade over time. For example, Cyonara a company that makes TADF emitter materials for OLEDs, presented a blue transmitter earlier this year. It has a "lifetime of 20 hours LT97 at 700 nits". In other words if driven at 700 nits this blue emitter will lose 3% of its brightness after 20 hours. (I have no idea if this is a good or bad result compared to other blue emitters.) If an OLED used this emitter and showed a plain blue square at 700 nits, after 20 hours the blue sub-pixels in that area would be 3% dimmer. (Note no current OLED can get anywhere near 700 nits when displaying just blue.) The same would apply if showing a magenta square (made by combining red and blue) or a cyan square (blue and green) - if in both cases the blue-sub pixels output was at 700 nits.
If after doing this you showed blue on the whole screen then there would be a patch where the blue square had been that was slightly (3%) dimmer. There is nothing that any screen refresh can do to recover this 3% brightness loss. What you can do to "remove" the screen burn effect is display the same blue on the rest of the screen for 20 hours so that the blue sub pixels on the whole screen were all dimmed/faded by 3% i.e. burn/age the whole screen evenly. If a whole screen is even it is very difficult to notice that it is slightly less bright. It would not matter if the image is static or not. For example, suppose you watched normal video where for 10% of the time the blue sub-pixels were at 700 nits. Then after watching the 10 x 20 hours = 200 hours the blue sub-pixels would also be aged by 3% just as they would be by the static square example even though there may never have been a static image. Again, this would not be as noticeable as the effect would be on the whole screen rather than a specific area.Originally, the issue for OLED was the blue sub-pixel fading. In 2017 LG made the blue sub-pixel larger. From the RTings test it looks like the main problem with the 2017 panels is the red sub-pixel. Have a look at the red frame photos in the RTings tests:
This may then explain why the 2018 LG panels have a much larger red sub-pixel.A new panel type has been spotted recently that is like the 2018 panel but with a smaller blue sub-pixel. This could mean that LG have now used a better blue emitter so happy days indeed.A constant reworking of the issue if you like and fingers crossed.Only time will tell.
Its a magnificent beast to behold but LG need to work harder.I wonder if the massive price reductions of late are due to any negativity of the product.A 65 inch C8 can be blagged now for around the £2200 mark.
https://www.rtings.com/tv/learn/real-life-oled-burn-in-test
So the latest situation is that I have escalated my case to executive level and now the retailer has come back to our hobbit hole to remove the OLED for further evaluation and a detailed examination.I smell goodness in the air but we shall see.
