DLP longevity: can I get parts in five years?

K

Kolgar

Regular
I'm about to purchase my first HDTV, one of the new 1080p Samsung DLPs. How long can I reasonably expect this set to last?

If a bulb or color wheel dies five years from now, will I be able to get a replacement? How are you earlier adopters of HDTV technology faring?

I know the rest of the world may be watching holograms by 2010, but I'm not used to spending $3,000 on a new set every five years. Should I go ahead with my purchase, explore a different technology (one with fewer moving parts), or just put my HD dreams on hold?

Thanks in advance.
 
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The manufacturers are legally obliged to ensure the parts supply for a certain number of years. I dunno how many exactly, but defintely >10 years. So don't worry.
 
Kolgar said:
I'm about to purchase my first HDTV, one of the new 1080p Samsung DLPs. How long can I reasonably expect this set to last?

If a bulb or color wheel dies five years from now, will I be able to get a replacement? How are you earlier adopters of HDTV technology faring?

I know the rest of the world may be watching holograms by 2010, but I'm not used to spending $3,000 on a new set every five years. Should I go ahead with my purchase, explore a different technology (one with fewer moving parts), or just put my HD dreams on hold?

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

Why not just add to your country's debt figures, i mean, $3000 won't change much in the trillion+ debt you guys already have!


Kidding, we'll definitely not be all watching holograms in 2010.
Parts for DLP will be available for many years to come, that's the whole point of DLP, you can change the light after a few years, so it's only logical that the manufacturers keep loads of lamps for the future.
In a couple of years time they'll start getting LOADS of requests for new lamps and they know they HAVE to satisfy their customers or risk public shame for manufacturing TVs that only last 3 years with no means of prolonging their lives.
So, don't worry, in a couple of years time you'll be joined by hundreds of thousands of other people who bought a DLP TV last year or this year.
 
DLPs and LCD RPTVs have UHP lamps (or Xenon lamps in the case of Qualias), that have pretty finite lifespans. Often you can dig into the service menu where it tabulates how many hours are on the current lamp and how many hours left before the MTBF of the lamp. I have a 3rd Gen Grand WEGA LCD RPTV (3 years old) that's on it's second lamp (moving probably shortened the lifespan abit). Chances are, you *will* have to replace the lamp in 3-5 years (really depends on how much you use the TV). It's usually not much of a big deal as the manufacturer will usually just have you order a new lamp from their parts/support group (they typically cost $100-$250 (although Qualia Xenon front-projector lamps go for about $3500))...
 
Kolgar said:
I'm about to purchase my first HDTV, one of the new 1080p Samsung DLPs. How long can I reasonably expect this set to last?

If a bulb or color wheel dies five years from now, will I be able to get a replacement? How are you earlier adopters of HDTV technology faring?

I know the rest of the world may be watching holograms by 2010, but I'm not used to spending $3,000 on a new set every five years. Should I go ahead with my purchase, explore a different technology (one with fewer moving parts), or just put my HD dreams on hold?

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

If you can wait for a year or so, Samsung will release a DLP Tv with LEDs (no more bulbs anymore).. It is said that as they use three LEDs for RGB, new TVs will have 1- better contrast, 2- no more waiting for heating up (though it is just about 5 seconds or so), 3- no more worrying about lamp replacement.. Though I do not know how brightness will be affected..
 
Kolgar said:
Should I go ahead with my purchase, explore a different technology (one with fewer moving parts), or just put my HD dreams on hold?
Click to expand...
Have you looked at plasmas at all? Not really any moving parts there and no bulbs to replace either.
 
kyleb said:
Have you looked at plasmas at all? Not really any moving parts there and no bulbs to replace either.
Click to expand...

Plasmas look nice, but I do a lot of gaming and would like to use the PC on my new set, so I'm leery of burn-in.

I may hold off for a bit - at least until football season starts - just to make sure I'm doing the right thing. But I appreciate the resonses - I feel much better about buying a DLP or other current HDTV sometime this year.
 
If you can wait for a year or so, Samsung will release a DLP Tv with LEDs (no more bulbs anymore).. It is said that as they use three LEDs for RGB, new TVs will have 1- better contrast, 2- no more waiting for heating up (though it is just about 5 seconds or so), 3- no more worrying about lamp replacement.. Though I do not know how brightness will be affected..
Click to expand...
Well, there are apparently a few models that go up to 18 LEDs (6 in each of R, G, and B), though more LEDs goes with size of the display. I imagine that brightness will be pretty decent (especially since there isn't the loss of filtering through a color wheel), but superbright LEDs do get pretty hot (wattage is low, but the size is as well, so thermal density is still up there). However, it's still only on big RP sets which are rather unwieldily huge and expensive. $4k is more than I'd spend on 20 TVs.

Though I'm confused about the turn-on time. 5-7 seconds? Why? LEDs shouldn't take that long.
 
Kolgar said:
Plasmas look nice, but I do a lot of gaming and would like to use the PC on my new set, so I'm leery of burn-in.
Click to expand...
There is a lot of outdated and just plane wrong information about that so I can understand why you are leery; but I can assure you that many people, including myself, use plasma displays for desktops and gaming all the time without any issue of "burn-in" at all. You can "burn-in" a plasma if you don't understand what causes the issue, but anyone who does understand can easily avoid the problem just like I have, and easily correct any slip up that might happen before it even approaches unsightly.
 
ShootMyMonkey said:
Though I'm confused about the turn-on time. 5-7 seconds? Why? LEDs shouldn't take that long.
Click to expand...

I was talking about lamps, not led.. My bad... Leds are instant, they do not need to heat up.
 
ShootMyMonkey said:
Well, there are apparently a few models that go up to 18 LEDs (6 in each of R, G, and B), though more LEDs goes with size of the display. I imagine that brightness will be pretty decent (especially since there isn't the loss of filtering through a color wheel), but superbright LEDs do get pretty hot (wattage is low, but the size is as well, so thermal density is still up there). However, it's still only on big RP sets which are rather unwieldily huge and expensive. $4k is more than I'd spend on 20 TVs.

Though I'm confused about the turn-on time. 5-7 seconds? Why? LEDs shouldn't take that long.
Click to expand...

I didn't know LEDs could get hot, as most energy comes out under the form of light rather than heat, instead of the other way around for light bulbs. is that really a problem (a CPU can happily runs at 60°C or more, you know)
 
Blazkowicz_ said:
I didn't know LEDs could get hot, as most energy comes out under the form of light rather than heat, instead of the other way around for light bulbs. is that really a problem (a CPU can happily runs at 60°C or more, you know)
Click to expand...

Yeah, LEDs can and do get that hot. Lumileds 1w and 3w LEDs won't run long at all without good heatsinks. And the resistance of an LED drops as it heats up, so they self destruct if you don't limit the current.

delta-T for a Luxeon 1w red LED is 20C per Watt, and the max junction temp is 120C, from http://www.lumileds.com/pdfs/AB05.pdf

LEDs are a lot more effecient that incandescent lights, but they still waste a significant portion of the input power as heat. Flourescent tubes are still better in lumens per watt than most LEDs.
 
the maddman said:
Flourescent tubes are still better in lumens per watt than most LEDs.
Click to expand...
Of course, fluorescent tubes are much bulkier tho and can't create a focused beam of light, so they're pretty much relegated to serve as backlights... Anyway, cool infos about the LEDs man. :D
 
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