OLED burn-in is real

Mad Maxx

Mad Maxx

Supreme [H]ardness
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Apr 12, 2016
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I was a skeptic of OLED burn-in until today. It took Tiger's red Nike shirt to convince me that burn-in ain't no joke. My LG OLED B7A is only about 1.5 years old. I run the pixel refresher every night, but obviously it didn't protect my screen. :(

IMG_20190414_183129.jpg
 
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Keller1 said:
What's your use been like? What did it take to get to this point?
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I work at home, so business news usually is on the screen. There's no doubt that's been the cause. I have all my electronics covered by insurance and already found out I can get my TV replaced, so it's not a total disaster. Not sure I'll get another OLED, though. Whatever I do, I'll not make this mistake, again.
 
I don't think anyone ever doubted that burn in exists. We all know it does, but it depends on the use case scenario. My 2016 B6P still has no signs of burn in after 2 years but it's not used for work.
 
Emissive technology will always have image retention like that on static elements regardless of whether it is actually burned into the screen or not, unless the tech gets to be so mature that the light-bearing material doesn’t noticeably age within the lifetime of the device. What has happened is that the parts that were displaying the ticker got used up a bit more than the surrounding stuff. If you were to age the rest of the panel with an inverse of that element you could theoretically stop seeing any noticeable pattern there.
 
I just find it odd that I never noticed the burn-in until today. I first thought it was a problem with the CBS broadcast feed. After closer inspection, it hit me. I've owned LCD TVs, plasmas and now OLED. This is the first time I've seen burn-in on a TV of mine.
 
Commander Shepard said:
I just find it odd that I never noticed the burn-in until today. I first thought it was a problem with the CBS broadcast feed. After closer inspection, it hit me. I've owned LCD TVs, plasmas and now OLED. This is the first time I've seen burn-in on a TV of mine.
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people don't notice because you need to put an all white image on-screen (or another light color)...I always have color slides on a USB stick to put in to test...I watch ESPN and other sports content so those tickers really are a major issue...I try to switch up content as much as possible...no burn-in on my LG C7 but the issue is definitely real...I had slight burn-in with my previous plasma
 
What is your OLED light level set to? I read that higher settings accelerate burn-in and there was a member here who used his as a PC monitor and recommended keeping it at 20 or below (out of 100).

I had mine set to 12 for a while, but ended up lowering it to 8 because I use mine a lot in a dark room (gaming). It's plenty bright for me, even during the daytime.

I'm curious if your image uniformity would get better by leaving a video or screensaver playing for some amount of time.
 
Lateralus said:
What is your OLED light level set to? I read that higher settings accelerate burn-in and there was a member here who used his as a PC monitor and recommended keeping it at 20 or below (out of 100).

I had mine set to 12 for a while, but ended up lowering it to 8 because I use mine a lot in a dark room (gaming). It's plenty bright for me, even during the daytime.

I'm curious if your image uniformity would get better by leaving a video or screensaver playing for some amount of time.
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Mine was set at 80. :eek:

I'll play around with some settings and see if things look better.
 
I'm going to check out some TVs, tomorrow. I'm getting $1500 from insurance which is exactly what I paid for my LG. Leading contender is the Sony XBR-55X950G.
 
Almost any oled phone still has burn in if you look online and Tv's don't surprise me either. Those pesky blue oleds are probably the weak link here, contrary to the 'they fixed the problem' brigade.
Running inverse screen patterns to counteract it isn't something that should be necessary. But they do look damn good. Good luck!
 
If you're going to watch something with a ticker for any decent amount of time on a daily basis, OLED is definitely not the way you want to go. You can't really blame it on your backlight setting since it needs to be adjusted for the brightness of your room, so running it at 20 or below isn't realistic unless it's in a home theater type setting.
 
N4CR said:
Those pesky blue oleds are probably the weak link here, contrary to the 'they fixed the problem' brigade.
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There's no blue OLEDs in an LG TV and they're not comparable to phones, which do use RGB OLED. LG TVs use an array of white LEDs behind color filters. The LEDs do produce a given spectrum and the filters eat a certain amount of the light so aging is indeed still uneven, but MUCH less so than RGB LEDs. This is one major reason LG is the only manufacturer of TV panel sized OLEDs(the other being yields). It is well known what colors burn-in fastest on LG TVs: Red, followed by Green.

I don't think anyone(paying attention) ever believed that burn-in wasn't "real", only that it doesn't happen if you take care with what you watch, which is true. News tickers, especially CNN, are well known to be a guaranteed source of burn-in after enough hours.

To me OLED burn-in is a fully understood risk, it's been deeply tested, and there aren't any major unknowns. If you watch hours of content with colored static UIs on the screen every day, stick to LCD.

The best static elements to avoid burn-in are semi-transparent white/black.
 
This is why I bought a Samsung QLED, fantastic image quality, superb high lumens HDR, low lag, no risk and a panel warranty to boot.
No need to run programs that age the screen faster to keep it serviceable.
This years UHD models dont add much, 1/2 the lag again which is already very low, and over the top image processing you wont use. Unless you have the money for the new 8K HDMI 2.1 versions.
Nab a bargain and grab a much lower priced 2018 Q9FN TV.
I love this TV!
 
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polonyc2 said:
people don't notice because you need to put an all white image on-screen (or another light color)...I always have color slides on a USB stick to put in to test...I watch ESPN and other sports content so those tickers really are a major issue...I try to switch up content as much as possible...no burn-in on my LG C7 but the issue is definitely real...I had slight burn-in with my previous plasma
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I think this is a pretty measured and accurate response.

For the sake of another data point, I just set it to full-screen white and full-screen light grey. No signs of anything abnormal - completely uniform. Have been using mine (B7) primarily as a PC monitor for 1.5 years. I don't watch tickers and like you, I try to vary the content.
 
We also have those 2014 OLED's still with no burn in.

I keep TV on maybe 2-6 hours/week mainly just watching movies, so I'm going to get myself a 2019 OLED without much worry about this.
 
Commander Shepard said:
I run the pixel refresher every night, but obviously it didn't protect my screen. :(
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My understanding is that the pixel refresher only reverses image retention, which has a different cause from burn-in. IR is caused by voltage retention in the backplane, while burn-in is caused by aging of the OLED emitters. IR is reversible, burn-in isn't.
 
Commander Shepard said:
Mine was set at 80. :eek:

I'll play around with some settings and see if things look better.
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I have OLED brightness set no higher than 40 on my C7, which I have calibrated for nighttime viewing. Even during the daytime, it's still plenty vivid and bright.
 
Just got back from looking at some TVs at BB. For my viewing habits, OLED is not the right choice. I make no pretense to being a TV expert. I should have done more homework before buying anything.

The best non-OLED picture I saw was on the Samsung Q9fn and Q8fn. They were better than any Sony in the showroom. I really don't want a 65" monster, so the 55" Q8 is looking like the one to get.
 
Commander Shepard said:
Just got back from looking at some TVs at BB. For my viewing habits, OLED is not the right choice. I make no pretense to being a TV expert. I should have done more homework before buying anything.

The best non-OLED picture I saw was on the Samsung Q9fn and Q8fn. They were better than any Sony in the showroom. I really don't want a 65" monster, so the 55" Q8 is looking like the one to get.
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Those Samsung Q series sets are supposed to be really great. I don't think that you could go wrong with one of those.

You mentioned insurance paying $1,500 to cover the OLED. What kind of insurance are you referencing that would cover that? And will you have to give up the TV? If not, I'd leave it running somewhere in a room 24/7 with fluid/dynamic content to see if you can get those pixels worn more evenly and potentially reduce or eliminate what you're seeing. If it works, it'll likely take a while, but you don't have anything to lose except a few bucks on the power bill. :)
 
Lateralus said:
Those Samsung Q series sets are supposed to be really great. I don't think that you could go wrong with one of those.

You mentioned insurance paying $1,500 to cover the OLED. What kind of insurance are you referencing that would cover that? And will you have to give up the TV? If not, I'd leave it running somewhere in a room 24/7 with fluid/dynamic content to see if you can get those pixels worn more evenly and potentially reduce or eliminate what you're seeing. If it works, it'll likely take a while, but you don't have anything to lose except a few bucks on the power bill. :)
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I have my electronic equipment covered through my employer, a small VC firm in San Francisco. For remote employees, they cover all electronic equipment, even non-business related stuff. If something fails, I just have to provide proof and a receipt. Money is wired within 72 hours. I don't even have to discard whatever is broken. It's a sweet perk, no doubt.

I'll try some things to see if my OLED's picture can be restored. Doubtful, but it's worth a shot. As I noted earlier, I didn't see the burn-in until Tiger's bright red shirt made it stand out. I suppose I could use this OLED for watching movies and any other limited viewing choices.
 
Commander Shepard said:
Just got back from looking at some TVs at BB. For my viewing habits, OLED is not the right choice. I make no pretense to being a TV expert. I should have done more homework before buying anything.

The best non-OLED picture I saw was on the Samsung Q9fn and Q8fn. They were better than any Sony in the showroom. I really don't want a 65" monster, so the 55" Q8 is looking like the one to get.
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Some useful info:
The US version of the Q8FN has FALD (full LED array local dimming), the Europeans get LED edge lit.
All Q9s have FALD.
The Q8 has 1500nits brightness for HDR, the Q9 has 2000nits.
If you can get the Q9FN it will give you the better HDR experience.
I also use HDR+ with mine to give SDR viewing more pizazz without making it too bright, it is amazingly good.
Both Q8 and Q9 come in 55".
 
Commander Shepard said:
I have my electronic equipment covered through my employer, a small VC firm in San Francisco. For remote employees, they cover all electronic equipment, even non-business related stuff. If something fails, I just have to provide proof and a receipt. Money is wired within 72 hours. I don't even have to discard whatever is broken. It's a sweet perk, no doubt.

I'll try some things to see if my OLED's picture can be restored. Doubtful, but it's worth a shot. As I noted earlier, I didn't see the burn-in until Tiger's bright red shirt made it stand out. I suppose I could use this OLED for watching movies and any other limited viewing choices.
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If you treat the OLED well from now and make sure it gets a lot of use to age it a bit (ie leave it on with none static video), the burn in will fade away.
Or find some anti burn in videos to play which will age the display a bit quicker.
It might not disappear entirely but perhaps enough to be satisfied.
 
Commander Shepard said:
No 55" Q9fn, not even on Samsung's website. :(

I'm not interested in dropping $2000+ on a TV, anyway.
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lol thats odd, I own one.
Prices will be dropping because of the new releases.
In the UK they have dropped £600 in less than 6 months, I could have paid that much less!

ps the reason they are disappearing from Samsungs site is because they no longer make them and are sold out.
Grab what you can!
 
Nenu said:
lol thats odd, I own one.
Prices will be dropping because of the new releases.
In the UK they have dropped £600 in less than 6 months, I could have paid that much less!
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No 55" Q9... 'cuz Murrica, I suppose.

55" Q8 is $1300 on Amazon. That'll work for me.
 
Nenu said:
If you treat the OLED well from now and make sure it gets a lot of use to age it a bit (ie leave it on with none static video), the burn in will fade away.
Or find some anti burn in videos to play which will age the display a bit quicker.
It might not disappear entirely but perhaps enough to be satisfied.
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I'm not sure this is sound advice. If you age the display uniformly from now on, the rest of the screen isn't going to "catch up" to the age of the burned-in areas - that would only work if you selectively aged the un-burned-in areas. You'd just be making the entire screen look dimmer/less vibrant, but the differences that cause the burn-in would still be visible. The only reason to think that might not be the case is if the visible effects of aging slowed down over time, but I haven't seen any evidence that would support that.
 
Necere said:
I'm not sure this is sound advice. If you age the display uniformly from now on, the rest of the screen isn't going to "catch up" to the age of the burned-in areas - that would only work if you selectively aged the un-burned-in areas. You'd just be making the entire screen look dimmer/less vibrant, but the differences that cause the burn-in would still be visible. The only reason to think that might not be the case is if the visible effects of aging slowed down over time, but I haven't seen any evidence that would support that.
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Specific OLEDs with burn in become less bright which slows their burn in rate as long as they arent exposed to what caused the problem in the first place.
When displaying video on the whole screen uniformly this will result in slower ageing on the dimmer OLEDs, averaging out the wear a bit.
The same principle was applied to Plasma.
 
Nenu said:
Specific OLEDs with burn in become less bright which slows their burn in rate as long as they arent exposed to what caused the problem in the first place.
When displaying video on the whole screen uniformly this will result in slower ageing on the dimmer OLEDs, averaging out the wear a bit.
The same principle was applied to Plasma.
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Here are a couple of graphs showing OLED degradation over time:

N8jNqXU.jpg


Y3G62HQ.jpg


Sources: 1, 2

It's not completely linear, but the degradation certainly doesn't flatten out enough to suggest that intentional full-screen aging is a good idea. On top of that you have LG's built-in compensation algorithm, which attempts to mask burn-in by tracking use over time and gradually increasing the driving voltage on a per-subpixel basis. That's going to keep unburned parts of the screen at a more or less constant brightness, at least until it runs out of headroom to use for compensation. Meanwhile, the already burned-in areas will continue to get visibly worse.
 
Come to think of it, looking at OP's pic again, it might actually be the result of the compensation algorithm being over-aggressive. Notice how the burned in areas appear brighter in spots, which is the opposite of what you'd expect (although darker in others). Rtings has observed this effect in their testing as well.
 
Necere said:
Here are a couple of graphs showing OLED degradation over time:

View attachment 154972

View attachment 154973

Sources: 1, 2

It's not completely linear, but the degradation certainly doesn't flatten out enough to suggest that intentional full-screen aging is a good idea. On top of that you have LG's built-in compensation algorithm, which attempts to mask burn-in by tracking use over time and gradually increasing the driving voltage on a per-subpixel basis. That's going to keep unburned parts of the screen at a more or less constant brightness, at least until it runs out of headroom to use for compensation. Meanwhile, the already burned-in areas will continue to get visibly worse.
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I don't know what OLED technology graphs those are, but in RTINGS burn in tests the brightness has actually gotten even a little better over time.
 
Lepardi said:
I don't know what OLED technology graphs those are, but in RTINGS burn in tests the brightness has actually gotten even a little better over time.
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Why do you think that is? Everything we know about OLEDs says they only get dimmer over time, that in order for them to get brighter they'd need to be effectively aging in reverse - an impossibility for the technology.

The most likely explanation for Rtings' results is that those sets are still within the overhead the compensation algorithm is given to work with. This would explain why they appear to have gotten slightly brighter: the algorithm is slightly overestimating the rate of degradation, and overcompensating as a result - the same effect as the burned-in areas have exhibited.
 
Necere said:
Why do you think that is? Everything we know about OLEDs says they only get dimmer over time, that in order for them to get brighter they'd need to be effectively aging in reverse - an impossibility for the technology.

The most likely explanation for Rtings' results is that those sets are still within the overhead the compensation algorithm is given to work with. This would explain why they appear to have gotten slightly brighter: the algorithm is slightly overestimating the rate of degradation, and overcompensating as a result - the same effect as the burned-in areas have exhibited.
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I wonder how badly this will impact the life of the OLED panel.
Its sure to be bad pushing already excessively worn OLEDs just to appear normal. That alone would turn me away.
And then pushing them further! What will that do?
I'm glad I listened to my inner caution and avoided this.
Looks like an exponential death.
 
I mean, CCFL LCD monitors got dimmer over time, too. Ever seen a really old one? Except those had no way to overcome it. :)

Like Sancus said, everything we're talking about should be an understood potential compromise for getting the best possible picture quality. The way monitor tech is moving, I doubt seriously that I'll still be using this B7 as my primary monitor in another year or two because of the introduction of HDMI 2.1 and the possibilities of 4K @ 120Hz. For everyone else using them as TVs a few hours a day, I feel as if it's of little concern.

I guess we all buy what we're comfortable with until MicroLED gets here and (supposedly) combines the best of everything. Better than LCD image quality with no burn-in or lifespan concerns. But it'll be a while.
 
Nenu said:
I wonder how badly this will impact the life of the OLED panel.
Its sure to be bad pushing already excessively worn OLEDs just to appear normal. That alone would turn me away.
And then pushing them further! What will that do?
I'm glad I listened to my inner caution and avoided this.
Looks like an exponential death.
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Yeah, I share this concern. It stands to reason that if the display is driving the emitters harder and harder to maintain the brightness, it's going to degrade faster. In essence, you're trading a perfect picture now for a dimmer picture with more visible burn-in later. Although, as long as you take some precautions with the content you watch, "later" could be far enough in the future not to be a real concern.
 
Necere said:
Yeah, I share this concern. It stands to reason that if the display is driving the emitters harder and harder to maintain the brightness, it's going to degrade faster. In essence, you're trading a perfect picture now for a dimmer picture with more visible burn-in later. Although, as long as you take some precautions with the content you watch, "later" could be far enough in the future not to be a real concern.
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It seems they are pushing the worn OLEDs harder so the screen "doesnt" dim.
This is what will impact the panel life severely.
At that point it will not be able to maintain high enough brightness.
I guess this is what you are saying.

I had a Panasonic plasma, one of those just before they went really low power, it would use between 200 and 350W with contrast practically maxed out for the best image pop.
In the 5 years I used it (sort of carefully, balanced gaming with video playback) it didnt have any problems and looked great.
I gave it to my cousins who have used it for PC/console gaming ever since and they report it still looks like new.
Its now 11 years old and hasnt ever had an issue.

OLED looks to be seriously sketchy in comparison.
 
Nenu said:
It seems they are pushing the worn OLEDs harder so the screen "doesnt" dim.
This is what will impact the panel life severely.

I had a Panasonic plasma, one of those just before they went really low power, it would use between 200 and 350W with contrast practically maxed out for the best image pop.
In the 5 years I used it (sort of carefully, balanced gaming with video playback) it didnt have any problems and looked great.
I gave it to my cousins who have used it for PC/console gaming ever since and they report it still looks like new.
Its now 11 years old and hasnt ever had an issue.

OLED looks to be quite sketchy in comparison.
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My Panasonic ST60 plasma was the best TV I've ever owned. After nearly 5 years, its picture still looked great without any such burn-in like on my OLED. It got badly damaged when I moved into my new house, back in late 2017. Losing it was what prompted me to buy this LG OLED.

I just ordered a Samsung 55" Q70R from Crutchfield after a friend recommended it. He builds custom home theaters and thinks this new 2019 line of QLEDs is really good. I'll have 60 days to try it out, so we shall see.
 
Commander Shepard said:
My Panasonic ST60 plasma was the best TV I've ever owned. It got badly damaged when I moved into my new house, back in late 2017. Losing it was what prompted me to buy this LG OLED.

I just ordered a Samsung 55" Q70R from Crutchfield after a friend recommended it. He builds custom home theaters and thinks this new 2019 line of QLEDs is really good. I'll have 60 days to try it out, so we shall see.
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Sweet, I'm interested to hear what you think.
 
polonyc2 said:
people don't notice because you need to put an all white image on-screen (or another light color)...I always have color slides on a USB stick to put in to test...I watch ESPN and other sports content so those tickers really are a major issue...I try to switch up content as much as possible...no burn-in on my LG C7 but the issue is definitely real...I had slight burn-in with my previous plasma
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This. If anyone needs proof of CRT, plasma or OLED burn in all they need to do is put an all white image on the screen of a TV that has been heavily used to display content with some sort of static image. It could be the HUD from a game, or the logo or ticker of a particular channel. Anything static like that which is on the screen for a relatively large portion of the screen's on-time will cause burn in.

The most extreme case I encountered was a CRT that was used for a closed-circuit surveillance system. It displayed a single fixed camera which was pointed at a warehouse, and you could turn off the TV and still see the warehouse manager's desk along with some shelving units permanently etched into the screen. It was almost like the TV was still on, the objects were so visible. This was a black and white TV that had the same image on it 24/7 for years, something like 20+ years. We found out about the burn-in because we lost power during a severe storm while the store was open. It was pretty funny when at a glace it looked like the TV was still on.

I owned a plasma TV back when a 40" EDTV (852x480) was north of $2k. Mostly it was used for TV viewing and there were two issues. The first was the black bars on the sides needed to make all the 4:3 content of the day display on the 16:9 TV. Those started to cause burn-in within the first year. The second issue was the logos from a couple of channels, kids oriented programming, that began to burn-in. My parents own this TV now and you can spot both of these issues if you put a solid white image on the screen. For movie viewing, though, you can't tell and that's what they use it for. Neither case of burn-in is very severe. The side bars rather quickly became unnecessary with HD programming becoming available, and my daughter outgrew the stage of watching the same channel for hours in a row.
 
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