[Josh Lavoie]

I wonder if it is worth it to play the "panel lottery" with my LG CX 65. I am noticing vertical banding with games on my ps4 pro (Sekiro in the underground caves or large panning sky boxes) as well as Dolby Vision content on Netflix. I have an extended warranty through Best Buy but doesn't replacing a panel wipe out the warranty afterwards?

I'm not looking for it directly but whenever it crops up it breaks any immersion...

 

[Josh Lavoie]

Here is another example of my banding on Queen's Gambit on 4K Netflix internal app. This is the very opening scene when she is in the bathtub:

I wonder if this is just bad source material (despite being a Dolby Vision title) or possibly the raised black issue. Maybe someone can check this out on their TV to see if they see similar results?

 

[steel_for_humans]

Here is my new (2 weeks old, my model doesn't have the screen time counter - I heard it's disabled in certain territories) 65CX. For the first week I was very happy with the panel. Great colors, crispy image, superb blacks. I watched mostly SDR content in the first week as I was still finishing Yakuza 3 on PS4. Then I launched Jedi Fallen Order and saw ugly bands on the loading screen. That's when I went to YT and ran the 5% test and it was abysmal. I don't really see it, except for loading screens in Fallen Order (which shows only when you die, so if you git gud there will be no banding - as if banding was an additional punishment for failure 😅 ) and Marco Polo s01e02 at 14:30. I watched a few 4K HDR/DV movies and it was fine. I think the worst was in "Crawl" (the movie with the alligators) as a lot of that movie takes place in a basement and there is some camera panning. But it was not horrible.

However, yesterday I ran The Last of Us: Left Behind Remastered as a test and moving through dark rooms really brings out the bands. I'm worried about playing TLoU 2 on that panel. As long as I use flashlight in the game, all is fine. It looks great in HDR. Sneaking in the dark is the worst.

Here are the photos from YT using the recommended settings from the first post.

Please mind the panel is new and my estimate of screen time would be <30hrs.

Loading screen, night mode (on purpose) photo from iPhone:

TLoU: Left Behind

(I don't remember the picture settings for this last scene, I played around with various settings, it definitely looks too bright here)


One curious thing I noticed is that turning on OLED Motion Pro (i.e, Black Frame Insertion) seems to improve the banding issue to a point where it's not as distracting. Even if it introduces additional input lag (does it?) I don't perceive it. Well, the TV has 13ms in Game mode so even if it added another 10ms I wouldn't notice, not in a single player TPP game. Of course the screen gets darker but increasing the brightness in the game makes it look good.

So, my return window ends tomorrow and I'm torn apart. At first I wanted to return the panel (however it's scary to box it back), then I read this very thread and it seems like there are no good alternatives. I can't exchange the panel, I can only send it back and buy a new one later. The new one can look the same or worse. If I get an OLED from a different manufacturer I understand it will still be an LG panel, also the other OLEDs are much more expensive, kinda above my budget. If I get a LED I may have a wholly different set of issues.

It's interesting, because I saw some of your photos from 65CX and it appears they all share a very similar band pattern. 🤔

Anyway, I registered only to share.

 

[Akash Makkar]

Here is my new (2 weeks old, my model doesn't have the screen time counter - I heard it's disabled in certain territories) 65CX. For the first week I was very happy with the panel. Great colors, crispy image, superb blacks. I watched mostly SDR content in the first week as I was still finishing Yakuza 3 on PS4. Then I launched Jedi Fallen Order and saw ugly bands on the loading screen. That's when I went to YT and ran the 5% test and it was abysmal. I don't really see it, except for loading screens in Fallen Order (which shows only when you die, so if you git gud there will be no banding - as if banding was an additional punishment for failure 😅 ) and Marco Polo s01e02 at 14:30. I watched a few 4K HDR/DV movies and it was fine. I think the worst was in "Crawl" (the movie with the alligators) as a lot of that movie takes place in a basement and there is some camera panning. But it was not horrible.

However, yesterday I ran The Last of Us: Left Behind Remastered as a test and moving through dark rooms really brings out the bands. I'm worried about playing TLoU 2 on that panel. As long as I use flashlight in the game, all is fine. It looks great in HDR. Sneaking in the dark is the worst.

Here are the photos from YT using the recommended settings from the first post.

View attachment 3053005

View attachment 3053006

View attachment 3053007

Please mind the panel is new and my estimate of screen time would be <30hrs.

View attachment 3053008

Loading screen, night mode (on purpose) photo from iPhone:

View attachment 3053009

TLoU: Left Behind

View attachment 3053010

View attachment 3053011

View attachment 3053012

View attachment 3053013 (I don't remember the picture settings for this last scene, I played around with various settings, it definitely looks too bright here)


One curious thing I noticed is that turning on OLED Motion Pro (i.e, Black Frame Insertion) seems to improve the banding issue to a point where it's not as distracting. Even if it introduces additional input lag (does it?) I don't perceive it. Well, the TV has 13ms in Game mode so even if it added another 10ms I wouldn't notice, not in a single player TPP game. Of course the screen gets darker but increasing the brightness in the game makes it look good.

So, my return window ends tomorrow and I'm torn apart. At first I wanted to return the panel (however it's scary to box it back), then I read this very thread and it seems like there are no good alternatives. I can't exchange the panel, I can only send it back and buy a new one later. The new one can look the same or worse. If I get an OLED from a different manufacturer I understand it will still be an LG panel, also the other OLEDs are much more expensive, kinda above my budget. If I get a LED I may have a wholly different set of issues.

It's interesting, because I saw some of your photos from 65CX and it appears they all share a very similar band pattern. 🤔

Anyway, I registered only to share.

This is bad tbh, especially as 10% also clearly shows it. Run a pixel refresher or two to see if it improves. Return otherwise. Play lottery again.

 

[Arese]

Hi everyone!

The latest firmware update completely changed the way it displays greys on my 65C9.

For example, I have downloaded the test files in the original post which I run a couple of weeks ago and it was pretty bad and I was thinking to return the TV.
I was planning to run the bandage test files in front of the LG technicians.

However after yesterday's update, at 5% grey the screen is not grey anymore, it's much darker, almost dark and the bandage is gone and is not visible anymore (because the screen is dark at 5% grey now)

It's like they recalibrated the tv to not display 3-5% grey anymore!

Has anyone else noticed the same thing?

I have pictures of my screen prior to the firmware update and tonight I will take picture of the greyscale to show you guys the difference (want to take the pictures in pitch dark in the same condition as the original pictures)

 

[ryu10]

Hi guys, i don't know if it could be helpful to someone, but i did a video last week because i was looking for banding or defects since some people told me that my panel is faulty and since i'm new to oled and i don't know this technology i tried this test. you find the link in here if you want:

hope to help, have a nice day

 

[Arjen1]

My panel after 30+ hours. Not sure what to do here.

Seems OKish on white clear back ground but 5% grey is awful if you ask me.

 

[Josh Lavoie]

Here is my new (2 weeks old, my model doesn't have the screen time counter - I heard it's disabled in certain territories) 65CX. For the first week I was very happy with the panel. Great colors, crispy image, superb blacks. I watched mostly SDR content in the first week as I was still finishing Yakuza 3 on PS4. Then I launched Jedi Fallen Order and saw ugly bands on the loading screen. That's when I went to YT and ran the 5% test and it was abysmal. I don't really see it, except for loading screens in Fallen Order (which shows only when you die, so if you git gud there will be no banding - as if banding was an additional punishment for failure 😅 ) and Marco Polo s01e02 at 14:30. I watched a few 4K HDR/DV movies and it was fine. I think the worst was in "Crawl" (the movie with the alligators) as a lot of that movie takes place in a basement and there is some camera panning. But it was not horrible.

However, yesterday I ran The Last of Us: Left Behind Remastered as a test and moving through dark rooms really brings out the bands. I'm worried about playing TLoU 2 on that panel. As long as I use flashlight in the game, all is fine. It looks great in HDR. Sneaking in the dark is the worst.

Here are the photos from YT using the recommended settings from the first post.

View attachment 3053005

View attachment 3053006

View attachment 3053007

Please mind the panel is new and my estimate of screen time would be <30hrs.

View attachment 3053008

Loading screen, night mode (on purpose) photo from iPhone:

View attachment 3053009

TLoU: Left Behind

View attachment 3053010

View attachment 3053011

View attachment 3053012

View attachment 3053013 (I don't remember the picture settings for this last scene, I played around with various settings, it definitely looks too bright here)


One curious thing I noticed is that turning on OLED Motion Pro (i.e, Black Frame Insertion) seems to improve the banding issue to a point where it's not as distracting. Even if it introduces additional input lag (does it?) I don't perceive it. Well, the TV has 13ms in Game mode so even if it added another 10ms I wouldn't notice, not in a single player TPP game. Of course the screen gets darker but increasing the brightness in the game makes it look good.

So, my return window ends tomorrow and I'm torn apart. At first I wanted to return the panel (however it's scary to box it back), then I read this very thread and it seems like there are no good alternatives. I can't exchange the panel, I can only send it back and buy a new one later. The new one can look the same or worse. If I get an OLED from a different manufacturer I understand it will still be an LG panel, also the other OLEDs are much more expensive, kinda above my budget. If I get a LED I may have a wholly different set of issues.

It's interesting, because I saw some of your photos from 65CX and it appears they all share a very similar band pattern. 🤔

Anyway, I registered only to share.

I will tell you that I did not see bands like this when I played TLOU 2. My bands seem to crop up mostly on Dolby Vision Netflix titles (Bly Manor, Queen's Gambit) as well as games with a large uniform gray background like the underground areas of Sekiro.

I will have to try the OLED motion pro setting to see if it helps on my end.

 

[JackFingTwist]

Here is another example of my banding on Queen's Gambit on 4K Netflix internal app. This is the very opening scene when she is in the bathtub:
View attachment 3052877

I wonder if this is just bad source material (despite being a Dolby Vision title) or possibly the raised black issue. Maybe someone can check this out on their TV to see if they see similar results?

I think it could be a mix of factors. I certainly wouldn't weigh any decision on one piece of content. Especially if you're never going to watch that content again.

From your picture, it definitely doesn't look that bad, but if you start noticing it in a good chunk of your viewing material, then that helps move the needle into a potential replacement territory. Where are you at in terms of viewing hours?

 

[Josh Lavoie]

I think it could be a mix of factors. I certainly wouldn't weigh any decision on one piece of content. Especially if you're never going to watch that content again.

From your picture, it definitely doesn't look that bad, but if you start noticing it in a good chunk of your viewing material, then that helps move the needle into a potential replacement territory. Where are you at in terms of viewing hours?

Apporox. 750 hours. I was convinced to do a manual refresh around 500 hours (despite some saying to just wait until 2000 hours) and it didn't seem to do anything at all to improve bands.

 

[wardie]

Here is my new (2 weeks old, my model doesn't have the screen time counter - I heard it's disabled in certain territories) 65CX. For the first week I was very happy with the panel. Great colors, crispy image, superb blacks. I watched mostly SDR content in the first week as I was still finishing Yakuza 3 on PS4. Then I launched Jedi Fallen Order and saw ugly bands on the loading screen. That's when I went to YT and ran the 5% test and it was abysmal. I don't really see it, except for loading screens in Fallen Order (which shows only when you die, so if you git gud there will be no banding - as if banding was an additional punishment for failure [emoji28] ) and Marco Polo s01e02 at 14:30. I watched a few 4K HDR/DV movies and it was fine. I think the worst was in "Crawl" (the movie with the alligators) as a lot of that movie takes place in a basement and there is some camera panning. But it was not horrible.

However, yesterday I ran The Last of Us: Left Behind Remastered as a test and moving through dark rooms really brings out the bands. I'm worried about playing TLoU 2 on that panel. As long as I use flashlight in the game, all is fine. It looks great in HDR. Sneaking in the dark is the worst.

Here are the photos from YT using the recommended settings from the first post.

View attachment 3053005

View attachment 3053006

View attachment 3053007

Please mind the panel is new and my estimate of screen time would be
View attachment 3053008

Loading screen, night mode (on purpose) photo from iPhone:

View attachment 3053009

TLoU: Left Behind

View attachment 3053010

View attachment 3053011

View attachment 3053012

View attachment 3053013 (I don't remember the picture settings for this last scene, I played around with various settings, it definitely looks too bright here)


One curious thing I noticed is that turning on OLED Motion Pro (i.e, Black Frame Insertion) seems to improve the banding issue to a point where it's not as distracting. Even if it introduces additional input lag (does it?) I don't perceive it. Well, the TV has 13ms in Game mode so even if it added another 10ms I wouldn't notice, not in a single player TPP game. Of course the screen gets darker but increasing the brightness in the game makes it look good.

So, my return window ends tomorrow and I'm torn apart. At first I wanted to return the panel (however it's scary to box it back), then I read this very thread and it seems like there are no good alternatives. I can't exchange the panel, I can only send it back and buy a new one later. The new one can look the same or worse. If I get an OLED from a different manufacturer I understand it will still be an LG panel, also the other OLEDs are much more expensive, kinda above my budget. If I get a LED I may have a wholly different set of issues.

It's interesting, because I saw some of your photos from 65CX and it appears they all share a very similar band pattern. [emoji848]

Anyway, I registered only to share.

That looks a bit of an issue and go find my posts on this thread of the 65CX I had and returned. Looks similar black areas visible in content on yours. Note: I did full pixel refresh, no improvement.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Arese]

Hey guys,

Following my previous comment where I say that after updating my TV I noticed less banding on my 65C9

I confirmed that by watching a scene that was particularly bad that I had written (Netflix The Queen's Gambit episode 5 at 3.54.
Before the firmware update, that scene was totally grey instead of being dark and all the vertical bandings were really visible on that grey background.

After the fw update, the TV display that scene with a darker shade, it's not anymore an ugly grey but a nice dark and 0 banding.

I also fire Shadow of Colossus on ps4 and noticed a huge improvement, I can still notice bandings sometimes but nowhere at the level I used to before the update. Thought the game that was showing the most vertical bandings for me was Journey so I need to reinstall it to try as in this game the bandings weren't showing on grey scenes but on bright scenes (gold yellow which is the main color theme of the game)

Here's a 5% grey comparison

Before the fw update (which was bad and visible on a lot of content)

After the update where I noticed a clear improvement

It's harder to notice the difference in the picture but if you look at the bottom right section you can notice that the banding is less pronounced after the fw update.

So it's improving. My TV is 8 months old and went through 1 automatic pixel refresh cycle (I believe at 2000h?) which saw my screen bandage worsen a little bit which is what scared me and made me think that my screen was deteriorating faster than it is supposed to.

People in the know who have been following the banding issue on OLED screens for a long time, have you ever heard people reporting that they screen banding has got better over time?

 

[Matteox79]

Got my 3rd 65 CX. This is the first unit without stuck/dead pixels. Gray uniformity is not bad. However there is very noticeable banding/ grid pattern visible in bright scenes, especially in HDR. I can see it even from 3 meters away. After 50 hours of usage and 1 manual pixels refresh, it's a little bit better, but still there. View attachment 3051919

I have the same identical problem. Easy to spot in hdr mode. Only in white background. Manufactured in august.

 

[Ikari Warrior]

I have the same identical problem. Easy to spot in hdr mode. Only in white background. Manufactured in august.

Have this on my June 77” as well...that means I’ve seen June, July, and now August builds with this issue. It doesn’t seem that the manufacturing is improving as I had hoped. I have yet to see a unit with a clean white screen in person.

 

[Akash Makkar]

LG BX 55" I got for my parents. Screen uniformity ootb. This is my fourth OLED panel in 3 different TVs, and this is one is by far the cleanest of them. lol. Imma keep it. Will remove the front film in a couple of days after parents and cat too get used to the new, fragile addition.

 

[tommyv2]

LG BX 55" I got for my parents. Screen uniformity ootb. This is my fourth OLED panel in 3 different TVs, and this is one is by far the cleanest of them. lol. Imma keep it. Will remove the front film in a couple of days after parents and cat too get used to the new, fragile addition.

View attachment 3053590

That looks excellent! Congrats!

I guess someone can win the lottery.

 

[Akash Makkar]

That looks excellent! Congrats!

I guess someone can win the lottery.

Took about a year. Lol. First Metz OLED had a dark patch in the corner, but it had improved a lot by time I returned it because of horrible software. Then got the C9, which had a visible line right in center. Got a panel replacement, which was better but not really good. This one is clean compared to all those! The manufacturing is late October. I'm in India though.

 

[KhaiserCLA]

Hi,

I want to share my experience with vertical banding in an OLED CX and how it improved.

Yeserday I bought a brand new 55" LG CX with evident vertical banding in the middle of the screen and in the left and right borders. It was very noticeable in almost every content, from cable TV, youtube and games (even in LG own setup screen, with that dark purple background). I was coming from a very decent B7 panel with little banding and only in the low gray gradient (it was perceptible in XBox One GUI, for example).

The new TV had so distracting banding that I even issued a technical analysis from LG (in fact, I have a visit schedule for next tuesday). You can see that in the following pictures (please note that in person the problem is much worse than what is actually shown in the images):

But, after some reading, I executed the Pixel Refresher function in the night, right before going to sleep. The results were oustanding, every bit of vertical banding is completely gone, as you can see here:

The only thing you can see now are the reflections of the rest of the house.

I advice everyone who have this TV with vertical banding problems to run the Pixel Refresher option. I know that a common recommendation is to wait around 100 hours of usage to see an improvement, but in my case, using the Pixel Refresher almost right out the box practically eliminated the issue.

Hope this can help someone else.

 

[Akash Makkar]

Hi,

I want to share my experience with vertical banding in an OLED CX and how it improved.

Yeserday I bought a brand new 55" LG CX with evident vertical banding in the middle of the screen and in the left and right borders. It was very noticeable in almost every content, from cable TV, youtube and games (even in LG own setup screen, with that dark purple background). I was coming from a very decent B7 panel with little banding and only in the low gray gradient (it was perceptible in XBox One GUI, for example).

The new TV had so distracting banding that I even issued a technical analysis from LG (in fact, I have a visit schedule for next tuesday). You can see that in the following pictures (please note that in person the problem is much worse than what is actually shown in the images):

View attachment 3053754 View attachment 3053755 View attachment 3053756

But, after some reading, I executed the Pixel Refresher function in the night, right before going to sleep. The results were oustanding, every bit of vertical banding is completely gone, as you can see here:

View attachment 3053759 View attachment 3053760 View attachment 3053761

The only thing you can see now are the reflections of the rest of the house.

I advice everyone who have this TV with vertical banding problems to run the Pixel Refresher option. I know that a common recommendation is to wait around 100 hours of usage to see an improvement, but in my case, using the Pixel Refresher almost right out the box practically eliminated the issue.

Hope this can help someone else.

The panels aren't run extensively at the factory it seems and can have horrible banding that's fixed by compensation cycles/pixel refresher. It happened with my panel replacement on C9 too. The new panel had so many streaks that were visible at 10% & 20% too, but were cleared off by compensation cycles.

Btw, don't use this video for testing. It seems to have higher luminance values. Use the 5% one linked at the start of the thread.

 

[KhaiserCLA]

The panels aren't run extensively at the factory it seems and can have horrible banding that's fixed by compensation cycles/pixel refresher. It happened with my panel replacement on C9 too. The new panel had so many streaks that were visible at 10% & 20% too, but were cleared off by compensation cycles.

Btw, don't use this video for testing. It seems to have higher luminance values. Use the 5% one linked at the start of the thread.

The problem is that, as a regular customer, I just see some vertical lines that are in the middle of my TV. Normal people don't know (and doesn't have to know) about this issues or how to correct them (if they can in any way whatsoever). I was ready to get a replacement, but I will probably cancel the appointment because I can't reproduce the issue anymore.

I just hope that someone with a similar problem could find a possible solution using Pixel Refresher as early as possible, just like it worked for me.

And yes, I did run the other video, but after the problem was corrected, so I did not have any previous pictures to compare.