That was certainly true with CRTs but is it true of flat panel displays?
But, as mentioned, really not worth the effort. These things are not meant to be repaired and barring something like the AC adapter going bad I am not sure there is any way to repair them even if you wanted to (and certainly not cheaper than just replacing the item).
It sounds as if the backlight power supply has died. It is probably a single component that, if replaced, would fix it. Zero chance of anyone doing that for you for a cost effective rate. The modern world we live in etc etc.
All TVs are either LCD or OLED. The only TVs that are not LCD based are OLED. Doesn’t matter if they have LED in the name, that only refers to the backlight. Even QLED - its an LCD technology screen. Cheap TVs have very basic backlight systems, usually simple edge lit. More money and you get backlight control and as the price goes up more dimming zones and smarter backlight control. OLED is self emissive, so you don’t need any of this.
TVs are like anything - you get what you pay for. There is a reason you can pay a lot more for the same sized TV. The idea of a smart TV is for the most part dreadful. My usual solution is to avoid the TV and to only use it as dumb a display. Feed it from an external source such as an Apple TV and use that to control what you want to do. This doesn’t fit everyone’s use case however. And for cheap TVs, near doubles the outlay. YMMV.
So I’m looking at TV’s. Think I’ll go to a 65". It’s the largest I can fit on the TV stand and it’s only a little more than the 55 inch,
Looked at several brands. Do they all come with that fucked up ROKU style remote with no numbers on it? I hate those! That’s what we have in our bedroom. I hate it!
It’s a bigger difference than might be apparent. Usually the best size is determined by your distance to the TV. There are guides for this:
Since a 4K Ultra HD TV has more pixels than a 1080p Full HD screen, you can sit closer to get fully immersed without recognizing any pixels. Therefore, the perfect viewing distance for 4K UHD TV screens is roughly 1 to 1.5 times the screen size.
40’’: The optimal screen distance lies between 3.5 and 5 feet.
50’’: The optimal screen distance lies between 4 and 6.5 feet.
60’’: The optimal screen distance lies between 5 and 7.5 feet.
70’’: The optimal screen distance lies between 6 and 9 feet.
80’’: The optimal screen distance lies between 6.5 and 10 feet. - SOURCE
55" vs 65"
Of course, buy whatever you want. These are just guidelines.
As for the remote, if you hate it, buy a different remote. Usually takes only a minute or two to program the new one.
For the initial set up you need the OEM remote and I hate those ROKU style ones.
Back in the early 2000’s there were these “learning remotes” that were awesome. You’d put them next to each other and they would learn without putting in a bunch of codes and shit. You could put every device on one remote and it did all the work for you. They were awesome, trust me.
That’s a very nice deal.
One other thing to consider is how much ads will show on the new TV while in menus. I think they all do it now but some seem to be worse than others. My LG used to have none but they’ve now managed to crowbar them into even my TV (albeit not too bad…just an ad along the side when in the menu). Annoys me just the same.
YMMV
I have repaired LCD TVs by replacing a board which can be had on eBay for cheap. Usually a power supply. But diagnosing is the trick. The symptom as noted can be a control board or a weird PS fault.
Sadly, just not worth it.
Yes, the problem is not the repair - the problem is the diagnosis. To have a trained and qualified person diagnose the problem could cost more in hourly rate that the TV is worth. This is pretty much true of most of our tech. The fact that by the time you are finished, you have paid as much to have a 10-year-old Tv as it would cost for a brand new one simply is the salt in the wound.
This is the essence of a planned obsolesence society. Replace is cheaper than repair with balky electronics, mainly because of the diagnostics costs. (Reminds me of the Commodore PET I owned from 1980 - when I checked it in 2005, I found that one bit in one memory cell had failed. Finding an 8K RAM chip and getting it soldered in as a replacement was more costly than value of the compauter at that point - and who knows how many other bits had the same problem…? Ebay was selling them for $5. Landfill it was…)
I have a 43" 4K LG TV I bought at Costco for $389US when that was an amazing price. I used it as a monitor. 8 years later, it works, but the colour has faded so the blues are more prominent and it’s not too bright. For another $400(CAD) a 32" I bought an ASUS 4K monitor which is far better.
Our 55" livingroom Sharp TV is working fine, still, 17 years later. However, it gets a lot warmer than newer, modern TVs the same size. When we bother to replace it, it will be bigger and cooler.
For sure! It deserves a medal for lasting that long, especially under those tortuous circumstances. Though it was on for only 6 hours a day (give or take), my first Roku only lasted 6 years. One evening, the screen suddenly went blue. That was it. Done.
I’d say a TV that works fine for nearly a decade then can be replaced for the cost of one fancy dinner isn’t planned obsolescence. It’s manufacturing efficiency.
20 years ago I bought a 42" TV for $2,600, and that was fairly cheap for a flatscreen, not even full HD. pk can buy a bigger better TV for less than 10% of that price, less than the price you would pay for 1.5 hours of a competent professional’s time.
In my experience, the aftermarket generic remotes just need to be programmed for the manufacturer (and perhaps model) of your TV. The manuals usually have a list of manufacturers and codes to use for each. No access to the OEM remote needed.
There are still many learning remotes available. Just search Amazon for “learning remote control”. I have this one, although I’m not sure I ever had to use the learning feature rather than the built-in codes. Here’s one for less than $10.
Heh. You kind of sound like a hippie arborist that insisted I cut down a birch tree because it had a disease and was suffering. (True story).
Meh. At our old house we had a Toshiba 13" TV/VCR combo that was also left on 24/7. It lasted 16 years.
I remember when I was a kid in the mid-60’s to the late 70’s. On the way home from school there was always some home that had a television repair van in front of it.
So what’s worse? Having to pay for repairs every year or having to buy a new set every 10 years?
As this is FQ, may I simply offer the following link:
I like fixing stuff. It doesn’t always have to make economic sense. But that’s truly a YMMV proposition.
Since we’re talking TVs here, I’ve got a question. One of the sports bars in my town has lots of TVs scattered around the room. Some of them have the backlight going out and it looks like several evenly spaced lightbulbs behind the picture. What could cause that?
(I don’t own the bar nor have any relationship with the person who does. I’m not advocating repair or replacement of the TVs; they’re not my problem to fix. Just curious why they look like that.)
The TV probably uses about 100 watts. 9 years * 365 days/yr * 24 hrs/day * 0.1 kW = 7884 kWh. That’s about $1200 of energy if you pay $0.15/kWh, which is on the low side these days. Seems like a waste compared to just turning it off when you aren’t in the room. Not to mention the carbon emissions, if you care about that kind of thing.
It’s probably worth upgrading just for the improved power use on new models.
Nope!
My God! 
Would you be so kind as to lay your hands upon my TV and bless it? LOL
Those TVs in the sports bars probably have an array of white LEDs behind a diffusion panel as the light source. The LEDs are often just mounted on flexible printed-circuit strips. They are usually wired in a combination of parallel and series circuits in order to distribute power requirements and maintain the proper operating voltage for each LED. But if an LED in a series circuit burns out, or if the circuit trace is damaged, then several LEDs will not energize. You can sometimes fix the problem you describe by replacing just one LED.
It’s kind of like old-fashioned Christmas tree lights. When one goes, many/all others don’t light up.