OT: Screen burn on LCD TVs?

[Bob Eager]

I've just read a 'digital help' column in the Radio Times.

One of the FAQs was 'will listening to the radio for long periods damage my screen?'. Not quite as non sequitur as I first thought: the 'expert' reply was that a static image would, over time, damage plasma and LCD screens. They suggested 'turning down the brightness and contrast' and 'downloading a screensaver'.

Hmmm. I know about phosphor burn on CRTs. I dom't know enough about plasma screens. But LCD screens?

I'd love to hear comments, particularly from people who've been involved in this stuff.

[Harry Bloomfield]

Bob Eager formulated on Wednesday :

I don't think LCD screens suffer the problem - my LCD computer monitor has shown similar images for years with noticeable effects. Plasma screens can be damaged and most seem to have an automatic function to dim the screen and move the image around the screen, if a static image it shown for any appreciable time.

Even on a none static image - if you turn it off and back on several hours later you can sometimes see a slight image of what it was showing at switch off, but that quickly goes.

[Hugh - Was Invisible]

Allegedly it happens with LCD screen but I have never seen it on any of our PC or TV screens

[Alan]

In message , Bob Eager wrote

You can get image burn in with a LCD but it is reversible.

[Harry Bloomfield]

Alan explained :

Our first plasma had a menu option to sort out screen burn. So I suspect plasma is reversible too - at least to some extent.

[The Natural Philosopher]

pretty sure I HAVE seem 'burn in' on LCD screens..

[Andy Champ]

My understanding is that Plasma fades with use. Screen burn is caused where a static image affects one part of the screen more than another - and the only way to fix it is to make the rest fade equally.

Expect a correction from a real expert shortly...

Andy

[PeterC]

The manual for my 2010-model Samsung warns about using 4:3 for too long. LCDs have been used on PCs for 10 years+ and screen-savers aren't necessary so I don't know what's 'wrong' with TVs.

[PeterC]

Mine has a Picture Off setting, but just reducing brightness (or contrast?) would do the trick - bit of a nuisance though.

[Theo Markettos]

I've seen it on station platform displays. Since I don't think these particular screens are plasma, they must be LCD.

When my PC puts my screen into powersaving, my Dell LCD helpfully goes into 'signal test' mode, and displays a box randomly moving around the screen. Thus not powersaving at all. Grrr.... But clearly they've worried about burn in.

Theo

[Neil Williams]

Might just be "inertia" - i.e. using the same software as they do on their plasmas.

I have never seen burn-in on a PC LCD, and see no reason why a TV one would be any different.

Neil

[Andy Burns]

You can get a "sort of" burn-in on LCDs but it's not really the same (more of a smearing and and whitening than a crisp after image) unlike phosphor burn-in on a CRT it is not permanent with LCDs.

[Chris Bartram]

I've seen it happen to an LCD monitor displaying a static white image on a dark backgorund constantly.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

How do you get a screen saver onto the average TV?

Not experienced it. CRT and plasma, yes. Dubbing studios have monitors with a static black box with time code inserted into that - and if anything is ever going to burn in, they will. Plasmas are the worst. Projection CRTs next.

I'd be just as worried about shortening the life/using unneeded energy through using a TV for the radio. Especially since they all have crap sound. I do use a FreeView tuner for radio, though.

[D.M.Chapman]

Plenty around on campus... still loads of 44" plasmas around with a certain conference logo burnt into the top corner. Some we have been able to get to a usable state using the built in setting (which is just a bright white screen as far as I can tell). Takes days though.

LCDs seem to suffer something like burn in - but it's less permanent. We have some in the Uni library showing numbers of spare PCs etc. These used to show a kind of smeary image burnt in. Display and alternating black white flashing screen and it gets better (to the point of vanishing) over a couple of mins.

Many of the plasmas however are pretty much knackered. They were on 24/7 for a week :-(

Darren

[Bob Eager]

Bishops?

[Neil Williams]

Plasmas were never suitable for information displays - it's a shame so much money was wasted on them. LCD is much more suitable because it doesn't burn in in the same way - or the railway seem to be doing quite well with the less slick-looking but more effective orange LED matrixes.

Ironically, Liverpool Lime St was first to be done with LEDs. At the time they apologised for this, saying it was second choice over plasma because of cost. Yet it was found to be the way forward, while the plasmas at Paddington never worked well and were replaced...with LEDs.

Neil