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Does your Kuro have a reddish tint to the blacks?

388K views 4K replies 269 participants last post by  Dirtgarry 
#1 ·
This issue has been discussed in many different Pioneer model threads but I thought it would be a good idea to make a dedicated thread for this issue so that everyone would be aware of it and we can have a common area to discuss the issue. I will try and sum up what the issue is but everyone else please add your thoughts and personal experiences with this.


****************


I have a 500M and recently noticed while watching a widescreen movie that the black bars have a reddish tint to them. It is most noticeable when watching in the complete darkness and while watching a dark movie like Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. I switched to a completely black screen and noticed that the whole screen has a reddish tint but it seems to be worse on the right side and especially the upper right corner. I thought this might be a source issue so I have checked with multiple PS3s connected through my receiver and directly to the TV as well as while watching Cable tv. The red tint is noticeable in all situations. I have tried messing with the controls but nothing seems to help. I think I remember a couple calibrators saying that they have come across this a few times but they were unable to calibrate the reddish tint out. I had a previously had a 5020 that had a brownish/yellow tint to the whites and I had it calibrated by D-Nice and he fixed that issue but I think that was related to the color temp being too low and is non related.


I have seen references to this issue in many different threads and forums. It appears that several people with the European LX5090 are having this issue as well. It is discussed in the following thread (hopefully mods won't delete this as I think it is very important to the issue): http://www.avforums.com/forums/pione...nt-blacks.html


It appears that someone on a German forum might have come across a solution but I couldn't find any further details about what they said the solution was ("The guy said that they set the panel to zero, put in new software and calibrated the panel again." -tapmeester)


I don't understand what setting the panel to zero means and I don't know what kind of software they might have put on there but to me it seems like this issue has to do with a hardware/panel problem and that would have to be replaced. It would be awesome if it was a software issue that could be fixed but I don't see that being the case and if it was, it wouldn't make sense why only some sets would have this issue.


I contacted Pioneer and they were of no help and said they have never heard of the problem. Maybe they just don't have any documented cases so that is why. I know others have called in about it. My warranty is up also so that could be another reason why they weren't too helpful. I think they "searched" for previous cases of this and came up with nothing and then the lady told me a local repair place I should call.


My 500M has a manufacture date of October 2008 and it has approximately 2800 hours on it.

All Kuro owners please post what display you have and if you have experienced this issue. Also please let us know if you have any information that might help us find a solution to this. Again, to see the reddish tint you will probably have to watch the TV in the complete dark and might even have to watch a dark movie because otherwise the brightness from the film may mess with your eyes and make it harder to see the reddish tint on the black bars.


Hopefully we can get to the bottom of this and just maybe there is a solution!
 
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#3 ·
Sorry to those that replied to the other thread I started. I wanted to add a poll to the thread but it wouldn't let me because too much time had elapsed since I posted the thread so I had to have the other thread closed and start this one. Please feel free to copy your comments over!
 
#11 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by devo235 /forum/post/20983588


5020FD. Calibrated. Red tint upper and lower edges, more so at the bottom right. Only viewable in a dark, to pitch black room. A-board replaced under warranty, problem remains. July 2008 build date. 8000+hrs. ANNOYING.

was it there when it was first calibrated? How long has it been since calibrated?
 
#14 ·
I have posted before that in a really dark room when the set is showing mostly or all black there is a subtle reddish tint to the black that is pretty even all over the screen. Fortunately it's not very noticeable in regular use. I have a July 2008 6020 with the Elite board swap. The set has about 3000 hours on it. I bought it used a year ago so I have no idea how good the blacks were when it was new. It had the same issue before the board swap. The best way to avoid being bugged is to not watch the set in a pitch dark room. I've never seen any other Kuro in a dark room so I don't know what 'normal' is. Another poster on AVS once said he has had 3 sets and they all showed reddish tint in black. The AR coating on the screen itself looks reddish purple at certain angles...not sure if that is a cause for this or not. Also at start up my set has some blotchy reddish areas visible even in a fairly bright room that fade away as the screen drops in steps down to minimum brightness. Do other peoples sets have these red patches at startup? Any solution that didn't cost a mint would be awesome. I note a lot of similar complaints on the other forum in the link above about this issue. People are not making this up..it's real. Even with this issue though my set still beats most or maybe even all other newer sets I have seen (since every set made seems to have some sort of issue) Suprising that D-Nice has never run into this. It is very strange that Pioneer is stonewalling people still under warranty too. They have to know what is causing this. Maybe it's the panel and they don't want to spend the money to fix them. IF my set didn't have the reddish tint (and the dirty screen effect), I could pretty much call it perfect.
 
#15 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlanBuck /forum/post/20983737


I have posted before that in a really dark room when the set is showing mostly or all black there is a subtle reddish tint to the black that is pretty even all over the screen. Fortunately it's not very noticeable in regular use. I have a July 2008 6020 with the Elite board swap. The set has about 3000 hours on it. I bought it used a year ago so I have no idea how good the blacks were when it was new. It had the same issue before the board swap. The best way to avoid being bugged is to not watch the set in a pitch dark room. I've never seen any other Kuro in a dark room so I don't know what 'normal' is. Another poster on AVS once said he has had 3 sets and they all showed reddish tint in black. The AR coating on the screen itself looks reddish purple at certain angles...not sure if that is a cause for this or not. Also at start up my set has some blotchy reddish areas visible even in a fairly bright room that fade away as the screen drops in steps down to minimum brightness. Do other peoples sets have these red patches at startup? Any solution that didn't cost a mint would be awesome. I note a lot of similar complaints on the other forum in the link above about this issue. People are not making this up..it's real. Even with this issue though my set still beats most or maybe even all other newer sets I have seen (since every set made seems to have some sort of issue) Suprising that D-Nice has never run into this. It is very strange that Pioneer is stonewalling people still under warranty too. They have to know what is causing this. Maybe it's the panel and they don't want to spend the money to fix them. IF my set didn't have the reddish tint (and the dirty screen effect), I could pretty much call it perfect.

Your description matches my 500m MFD Jan 2009.


The red tint is very subtle and uniform across the screen... I honestly don't notice it (unless I watch from like 3 feet and only focus on the blacks) even when watching in a pitch dark room.
 
#17 ·
According to that link someone posted to the uk forum, someone had a board swap and they wrote new firmware to the replacement board to fix it.


This sounds similar in some respects to the rising blacks only in that it might be related to the control boards not being synced right for aging (over-volting slightly or something or otherwise failing). Presuming that's true (obv. don't know for a fact), it would imply that the issue's correctable and could be a one-off fix if it's just that individual board malfunctioning (as opposed to the Pannies where it was across the whole production line and they were "functioning" normally).
 
#18 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by powertoold /forum/post/20984326


How do you even have 13,000 hours on it? 12 hours a day for the last 3 years?

Yeah, I was going to make a comment wondering if there was a correlation to heat or regularly running marathon sessions on it, but I thought that would come off as rude. But yeah, I've had mine for 2.5 yrs and have ~4k hours... possibly up to 5k since I don't remember the exact hours before I KuroControled it to ISF unlock. But that many hours does seem like a ton.


One thing I often do - I have no idea if this has helped prevent it on mine or not - but when I pause or there otherwise isn't going to be content on, I'll usually switch to a blank input rather than turning it off. Since I've converted the Blu-Rays I own to my computer for consolidation on the HTPC, I'll also sometimes just leave media center classic on the blank black screen after it finishes playing a movie. Basically what I'm saying is we have whitewash etc.. for plasmas to get rid of image retention. Has anyone tried to "blackwash" their sets to see if it restores them back to normal?
 
#19 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by GabeG /forum/post/20983613


was it there when it was first calibrated? How long has it been since calibrated?

My set was calibrated recently this past May, by the man himself, D-Nice.

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlanBuck /forum/post/20983737


Suprising that D-Nice has never run into this.

D-Nice did mention he had seen this issue crop up before on a 101FD he had calibrated, red tint across entire screen.


I should mention that I too have red tint across the entire screen, albeit very subtly, but it is most noticeable along the top and bottom edges, on the right side.


Also, this is still by far, the best, most impressive set I have ever owned, and I am still trilled by the picture it produces. The set is in my bedroom, so when I watch it, it is always in pitch darkness, so the red tint can be very annoying, especially during dark scenes.
 
#20 ·
My 111FD Jun 2008 build (~7000 hours) acquired the red tint a couple months ago.


I posted on the 500 forum as well as the kuro problem / settings forum and the non elite forum. My local tech managed to get me in e-mail touch with a PIoneer Tech a month or so ago. The Tech asked for more info and I supplied links to the above mentioned forums. He opened a ticket on the problem for me, but I have not heard anything since that time. The Pioneer tech was: David.Tu@pioneer-usa.com . Maybe others could let him know about the problem.


My Canadian warranty had a month to go at the time. The Tech has a Canadian address, but the USA.com e-mail address.


My observations are as the above descriptions. Sometimes it does not seem as noticable on the same type of programming, but at other times e.g. the most recent Harry Potter movie dark scenes....Crimson letterbox bars! Other than the tint, still a great picture.


Red cut adjusting actually does very little, if you get the bars less red, the picture tint is totally screwed.


P. E. Hannon
 
#21 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by dlplover /forum/post/20984381


Yeah, I was going to make a comment wondering if there was a correlation to heat or regularly running marathon sessions on it, but I thought that would come off as rude. But yeah, I've had mine for 2.5 yrs and have ~4k hours... possibly up to 5k since I don't remember the exact hours before I KuroControled it to ISF unlock. But that many hours does seem like a ton.


One thing I often do - I have no idea if this has helped prevent it on mine or not - but when I pause or there otherwise isn't going to be content on, I'll usually switch to a blank input rather than turning it off. Since I've converted the Blu-Rays I own to my computer for consolidation on the HTPC, I'll also sometimes just leave media center classic on the blank black screen after it finishes playing a movie. Basically what I'm saying is we have whitewash etc.. for plasmas to get rid of image retention. Has anyone tried to "blackwash" their sets to see if it restores them back to normal?

Interesting idea. I have tried everything I can think of and nothing gets rid of the red tint to black. It would seem that at idle luminance the red pixels are very slightly overcharged vs the green and blue ones. This could be a firmware issue that shows up when the set makes adjustments for age. A very slight reduction in current supplied to the red pixels would possibly fix this.
 
#22 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by phannon /forum/post/20984436


My 111FD Jun 2008 build (~7000 hours) acquired the red tint a couple months ago.


I posted on the 500 forum as well as the kuro problem / settings forum and the non elite forum. My local tech managed to get me in e-mail touch with a PIoneer Tech a month or so ago. The Tech asked for more info and I supplied links to the above mentioned forums. He opened a ticket on the problem for me, but I have not heard anything since that time. The Pioneer tech was: David.Tu@pioneer-usa.com . Maybe others could let him know about the problem.


My Canadian warranty had a month to go at the time. The Tech has a Canadian address, but the USA.com e-mail address.


My observations are as the above descriptions. Sometimes it does not seem as noticable on the same type of programming, but at other times e.g. the most recent Harry Potter movie dark scenes....Crimson letterbox bars! Other than the tint, still a great picture.


Red cut adjusting actually does very little, if you get the bars less red, the picture tint is totally screwed.


P. E. Hannon

I hope you have referred him to this forum. There could be a really simple fix for this if only Pioneer would step up to the plate. Perhaps we should all shoot him an e mail and see if he has any suggestions.
 
#23 ·
I was under the impression that the set doesn't make any adjustments for age. I was at least told this when I asked about the hour counter. I was told the hour counter was only there to tell the time between failures or something like that. Maybe I am misinformed though and the set does make adjustments according to age. Anyone have any additional info on this?

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlanBuck /forum/post/20984440


This could be a firmware issue that shows up when the set makes adjustments for age. A very slight reduction in current supplied to the red pixels would possibly fix this.

Ya that is why I wanted to start a single thread with everyone's red tint cases on here so we have a little more proof that this isn't an isolated case.

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlanBuck /forum/post/20984447


I hope you have referred him to this forum. There could be a really simple fix for this if only Pioneer would step up to the plate. Perhaps we should all shoot him an e mail and see if he has any suggestions.

Once again thanks to everyone for posting!
 
#24 ·
Too bad you can't vote twice for the 500M/600M option since you have one of each
. I wanted to separate all of these options out by display but the max number of poll options is 10


Quote:
Originally Posted by p59teitel /forum/post/20982938


Now back to relevant content:


5080, D-Nice calibrated Sept. 2009, no red blacks.

600M, D-Nice calibrated Sept. 2009, August 2008 build, no red blacks.

500M, D-Nice calibrated Sept. 2009, October 2008 build, no red blacks.
 
#25 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mac13 /forum/post/20984497


I was under the impression that the set doesn't make any adjustments for age. I was at least told this when I asked about the hour counter. I was told the hour counter was only there to tell the time between failures or something like that. Maybe I am misinformed though and the set does make adjustments according to age. Anyone have any additional info on this?




Ya that is why I wanted to start a single thread with everyone's red tint cases on here so we have a little more proof that this isn't an isolated case.




Once again thanks to everyone for posting!

I just e-mailed the Pioneer guy too and posted the link to this thread. Will be interesting to see if he responds.
 
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