Yellowish Vertical band on Panasonic plasma TV

Had a similar problem with my th-42px80u a few weeks back. Mine was a vertical bar that was transparent purple. It came and went for a week or so until it turned completely black. Called panasonic to see if they would help me out since i only had the tv for 2.5 years. They said to call a service shop and left it at that. The shop wanted like $150 to just come out and diagnose the problem. I said screw it and took it apart myself. Found it to be the one ribbon cable that goes into the buffer board. The problem is that ribbon cable goes into the panel and is not replaceable. I wasn't going to sink any money into the tv when I could buy another for close to the same price. With that said I just purchased a samsung 43" plasma 3d tv for $599.

Really curious ... how did you determine it was that ribbon cable and not the buffer C-board?

The problem you are experiencing is not the panel itself, if it were the panel it wouldn't be "straight" lines, it would be all over the place.

Those "flat wires" are in cars, toasters, washing machines, TV, PS3, Xbox and everything else you've bought in the last 15 years. I have an old Kenwood "smash" rack (you know those shelf stereo systems) that is 4 pieces and uses an exterior flat wire to connect the four components together. That thing is at least 15 years old. I'm shocked the flat wire still works.

Anyway, not sure which flat wire the prior poster is talking about, but EVERYTHING in a TV is replaceable. That flat wire probably needs re-soldered to the board. Is it a "cheap fix"? Probably not. My guess is the wire is fine in the TV, just the solder has corroded over. Common problem in EVERY SINGLE FLAT PANEL TV EVER MADE. Even Pioneer Kuro's suffer from corroded flat wire connections.

I have one of the last Hitachi plasma made. It was in warranty when it started having an electrical bug. Mine was a color derivation that started 3 inches from the top of the TV, only affecting the top. It looked "white wash", so to speak. I was in the process of getting in touch with Hitachi for a warranty call on it. I just happened to be meeting with one of my installer contractors and he said his brother repairs TV's. He came over took three screws out of the back...spent 3 minutes and the problem was cured. He charged me $50. But I was lucky. These guys charge anywhere from $80-$150 JUST to show up.

That ribbon cable referred to by silverm3s is the flat cable between the actual panel, and the C-board, and is not replaceable because one end of it is attached within the panel itself and is not detachable to replace.

Probably what really went wrong is one of the driver ICs that is embedded within the flat cable (FPC) is defective, and is also not replaceable.

A bad panel can give straight lines or bars, as in this Panasonic diagram:

When I pulled the ribbon cable out of the buffer board the vertical bar that was black turned white. So therefore I know it was that cable. Then with closer inspection to the cable I noticed that the one area on the ribbon cable was fried. Problem here is that ribbon cable is fused in between the panel glass. Kind of stupid if you ask me. You have to throw out a $1000 panel for a $50 part. Hope this helps.

Does anyone know if all plasmas are made this way. You think they would make a connector for that area so if the ribbon cable went bad you could replace it.

Thank you for letting us know.

The part of the cable that was fried, what do you think would have caused that? Was it fried near the IC where it may have gotten overheated? Or, somehow the fried part was rubbing on something and the insulation rubbed away and shorted?

I had read somewhere on the web where someone had repaired that cable by individually running wires around the bad section. They even posted pictures of how they did it. If I can find that thread, I will post it.


I found this site interesting, in seeing how and why they bond that ribbon cable into the glass.

The IC board(what is creating the blocks in the Panasonic diagram) is replaceable. Is it cheap? No. It is 99% labor. Does the manufacturer condone that type of repair? No they don't, cause they want you to buy a new TV.

With the prices of flat panels dropping (remember just 10 years ago, 50-ish inch rear projection TV's were a minimum of $2000), they are...regrettably, throw away.

http://www.amazon.com/Panasonic-VIER...7594260&sr=1-1

The days of "this TV has been around 20 years" is long gone. Yes plasma and LCD both tout 100,000 hours. Do I expect my next TV(which will be a plasma) to make it that long? Not a chance.

The spot that looked fried wasn't against anything that I could tell. Also the spot that fried was an area that looked to have a hard epoxy spot on it as if it were covering something. I have a picture I'll post later.

A photo would be great! In this thread, it was the embedded IC chip that burnt the ribbon cable. (Sorry for the large pic, but that is what the poster posted)

Looking a that pic that was what went bad on mine.

Those are not "impossible" to fix. However, finding a shop that will fix it, honor the repair past the moment it leaves their doorstep...and at a price you are willing to pay...

You probably have a better shot at having a half sibling with Tom Brady(By that, I mean bagging him...Gisele or Bridget)

If you think the "disposable TV" is already here...

Wait till OLED takes over. In 5 years(assuming DuPont is telling the truth) they'll be able to produce 150" OLED "sheets" for $500. They'll have "life expectancies" of 20,000 hours...

OLED will kill off LCD first, then DLP...then plasma last.

OLED works "the same" as plasma.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/17/d...-youll-be-wai/

The DuPont changes their story every couple of months. They are waiting for 40,000 hours to bring it to market...
Then the next month they'll say they want to just mass produce them, and make them portable. If they make "roll up and portable", consumers will figure out how to screw them up in transport...then "longevity" won't mean anything.

^^I had a feeling when I read your posts, and funny enough you mentioned the problem 'only' occurs while watching Hockey games. I had a similar incident, only not as severe as vertical bands but with extreme and yet very 'faint' line bleeds every time I tune to Comedy Central. I would encounter weird horizontal lines on white backgrounds, except the backgrounds weren't snows. I initially though it was heavy image-retentions or burn-ins but as soon as I switch channels, it disappeared! I then realized that the stuff was created by certain broadcast channels. Whenever I switch to the comedy channel I would look at the same place and it would appear most of the time. If it doesn't occur on other channels or sources, then there shouldn't be anything to worry about.