Official Samsung 2011 PNxxD550 Thread - Page 51

TV service technician came out and said that my panel was bad. He had to order another one. Should be in this coming week.

I've got my PN59D550 several weeks ago from Leon's in Canada (no return policy, just replacement but authorized 1st by Samsung).
Right from the beginning I've been shocked by loudness of the buzzing noise: noticeable from 20ft (6m) away from the screen on low volume. Somebody on this thread was suggesting that the buzzing will disappear in a couple of weeks: not mine. Someone was saying that all of them are buzzing just some of the owners don't hear it: I don't thing you should be extra sensitive on hearing to notice it. Maybe someones can live with it: I couldn't.
So, I called Samsung Customer Service for getting my plasma replaced. Long story short: countless of hours spent over the phone speaking with tier 1, tier 2... tier x without even getting close to my goal, getting the replacement. Right from the begging the Samsung customer service people tried pursued me that the buzzing noise is normal.... there is a consensus among plasma users that you shouldn't hear any buzzing noise from you watching place. One of the "funny" things was that during one of my over an hour discussion with Sean (supervisor on the floor) he leaked his true thoughts referring to my plasma as a "bad apple".
Anyway, it came as a big surprise for extent Samsung is willing to pursue this approach: they are ready to support the cost of sending as many technicians to the customers place (in my case two) as necessary to convince their customers that this is a normal behavior.... to the point that made me suspicious there are incentives for technicians to perform this "act".
My theory: as the upper [and more expensive] models as D550 are using the same screen (the screen itself produces the buzzing noise) probably the Samsung QA process selects the less noisy panels for upper models like D6500, 7000 or 8000.
So, if you really want this model, my advise is to buy it from a place with great return policy because, IMO, it is very likely you'll going to exchange it several times until you'll get one to satisfy your requirements.
Personally I will switch to a Panasonic plasma (probably P55ST30) as I'm not be ready to bear one more minute over the phone with Samsung Customer Service any time soon.
Also, I want to publicly thank to Leon's Canada (the place where I bought my D550) for saving me from this horrible situation: somehow they managed to convince Samsung to authorize my exchange.

Would anyone know where I can locate a service/parts manual for my 51" 3D TV? It has a cracked display and a bad logic board, but I need a service manual and cannot locate one. I tried Scribd,etc with no luck.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

thanks
Joe

I hear very loud buzzing from level height with center of the screen (sitting up on the couch). If I lay down below the center of the screen, its much quieter, and almost cant be heard at all.

I would try putting it on a taller stand, or placing something under neath it to raise it up some.

I am trying to get some info on exactly how the network media sharing works on the d550. On my desktop I have Allshare, Windows media player and Serviio all setup as media servers all pointing to the same video folder. I have a 3D movie called Sammy's Adventure (excellent movie to watch to see the 3D capabilities of this TV if your interested) which sits on this desktop. When I try to run this movie through WMP I doesn't show in the list. When I try to run it through Serviio it's there but I get a non-playable file error. When I play it using Allshare it plays just fine.

So, is it the computer playing the file and displaying it on the screen, or is the file being sent through the network to the TV and the TV plays the file? If the computer is playing the file, then really there is no limitation on file type as long as the computer can run it (the correct codecs need to be installed) which would be awesome. I'd really like to find more info on this.

BTW - Had my TV for about 2 months now, no buzzing, no brightness pops to be seen. Everything has been working exceptionally well.

You can pick up a logic board here. Don't know about the panel though.

"It has a cracked display and a bad logic board,"

If it has a cracked display and you can't convince Samsung to just give you a new one, then like all plasmas and LCDs, just throw it away and buy a new one. These things have been cheap enough for quite a while that it isn't cost effective to replace the internal display panel.

Well I believe I can obtain a replacement panel from another used Samsung, but I still have the issue with the Red Power LED blinking 6 times. I wanted to obtain a service manual so I could troubleshoot the problem. I dont see getting it covered under warranty, so I was going to attempt to determine the faulty board. I see Shopjimmy has all the parts, but I still need a service manual...Samsung Model PN51D550C1FXZA...

Anyone have any suggestions where I can locate the service manual?
Thanks!

Here is the service manual for a D8000, the LED diagnostic will be the same for both. D8000 service manual

tolobo: interesting theory on the Samsung selecting the buzzers for the low-end models.

Your experience is exactly what I want to avoid, endless hours with no success. I'm currently on back-order for my second unit; my hopes are low as a relative just got one and it buzzed just like my first. I think I'll ask them to setup in the store before taking home...either take the unit or my money back.

There is something to the fact that not all people can hear the buzzing, as the relative in question can only hear if he's right up against the TV whereas I can hear from more than 15 feet away.

In any case, I guess "you get what you pay for" holds true in this case...they are cheap for a reason.

Hey guys, I just wanted to let you know that brightness pops still happen on my PN51D550 with the latest firmware (1019.5), in standard mode with all processing features disabled (Dynamic Contrast, ECO Sensor, etc).

I'm not sure if we're all refering to the same problem so I took a quick video showing the problem: youtube.com/watch?v=E3_xN2xs2vA (Recorded with Fixed ISO setting-- so no camera auto brightness adjustment)

I just made a long black and white gradient and I scroll through it quickly, thereby changing the total brightness of the scene and triggering the dreaded dynamic-contrast like feature we can't seem to turn off.

The white on the left is pure white and is there for brightness reference.

So, is this what all you guys are talking about when you say brightness pop?

This is annoying the hell out of me (especially on movies that aren't in 16:9 format).

Thanks

No, that is not a brightness pop. A brightness pop is when the black level gets drasticaly lighter for a brief moment.

The more white on the screen, the more grey it looks. I personaly beleive this is on purpose, for scenes that go from very dark to very bight, as not to hurt your eyes as much.

Does anyone know if there's any considerable difference in the panels between the D550 and the D530?

The D530 is on sale at my local vendor and if there's no noticable PQ difference then I can't justify a 500€ price difference for AllShare, Cinema Smooth and two extra HDMI sockets.

In Europe at least, there'no PQ difference. Differences are lack of 3D, very few connections in D530 (2 hdmi, no optical output, no components, no vga) and that D530 USB doesn't play videos (plays them changing the model in service menu). D530 has Cinema Smooth, at least in Europe. Mine has. I believe panels are the same and coating too. Both reflect a LOT.

Have luck!

Just wanted to say that 3 months later This TV is STILL amazing me and I calibrated it via dvd. Got my whites n blacks pretty good.

My brother brought over soul caliber 5 and it looks so colorful :P PS, dont game in movie mode. Im sorry but movie mode changes the colors too much and deviates from how the game was suppose to look.

That said for any TV/DVD movie is best

Alright, I just got the 51D550 Plasma panel for my parents place. I've never used or owned a Plasma prior to this.

So could anyone give me hints about the break in with respect to this tv and what kind of settings I should be using?

Also, how do I check the usage hours of this tv? Is it mute-1-8-2-power?

Thanks.

sorry, wrong thread.

Does it matter what hdmi port are used or unused? I am using 3 and 4 because they are on the side. thanks

Just updated my 59d550 to 1019.5 and the optimization ran. Will post back results after a couple movies tonight.

Initial impression are black levels are the same and picture quality slightly improved.

Hey folks!

I'm trying to update the firmware, but when I plug in my USB flash drive and select Software Update ---> By USB, it never finds my USB.

I downloaded the zip file, extracted it, and transferred the file onto my flash drive. It's a Memorex flash drive formatted as NTFS. It's got that funky virtual cd-rom thing built in, but I don't think that's the issue.
I have a PN59D550 from the U.S. It's got 1018.1 firmware.

Any ideas?

novahands,

Reformat to FAT and try again.

Larry

I actually tried FAT the first time. I'll try it again.
If not, I'll try a different flash drive.

Am I correct that I should move the entire T-MST4AUSC folder to the drive?

novahands,

The easiest way is to:

Save the firmware file T-MST4AUSC.exe onto your computer. Connect the USB Memory Drive to the USB port of your PC and copy the file onto the USB Memory Drive. Go to the USB Memory Drive and unzip the file. A folder containing the firmware files named T-MST4AUSC will be added to the USB memory drive.

Now do the update via USB.

Some have found that the TV doesn't like large flash drives. Try a 512MB one.

Larry

Thanks for the info. I'll try that.
Unfortunately, the smallest flash drive I have is 1GB. Hopefully that works.

EDIT:
Bah. Still not working. Tried what you said. Keeps saying, "No file available to upgrade. Please check it and retry."

novahands,

1018.1 is the latest FW for the D550. What version is now installed on your set? Check by looking in Support > Contact Samsung. It will show the full FW version name there.

Larry

^ The one we got last week was manufactured in Dec 2011 and shipped with FW 1019.0:

Current Version 2011/10/10_001019

Software Version: T-MST4AUSC-1019.0, BT-G

Samsung needs to update the Download Center page; it still has 1018.1 available.

Thanks, Wolf. I guess I'm not paying enough attention to the D550. I will try to keep up.


Actually, it seems that the latest is version 1019.5 for the D550.

EDIT: See http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...3#post21549403

Larry

Yeah, I've got:

Current Version - 2011/08/03_001018

I just purchased mine two days ago. Apparently this one has been sitting at Best Buy for a couple months!

I wonder what differences there are between the PN and PS versions of the D550. I have the PS51D550C1N and the latest version is 2011/08/10_001020.

Region code, I'd hazard a guess. It's probably the same display otherwise. Are you in North America, or does your PH mean Philippines?