Penalty: An Autopsy Of Dead LCD Pixels

GNR, HP, Hansol, Hercules, Hitachi

Getting answers here is like milking blood from a stone. But finally, we did end up getting some answers.

Hitachi makes a distinction between two matters. Their LCD monitors are guaranteed zero-dead pixels. Let's be quite clear about this - Hitachi means PIXELS and not SUB-pixels. They will replace your monitor, no questions asked, even if it only has one black or white dot, but not if the pixel is red, green or blue. At least this is what Hitachi US told us, but they pointed out this policy may not aply to Hitachi Europe, who did not reply to us.

Officially, Hyundai claims to replace panels after the third dead pixel. But they actually do so after two, on both 15" and 17" monitors, and whether they are unlit, lit or colored. Well done, Hyundai!

At LG, after a month and a half, we established that there are two attitudes.

In Europe, they were still waiting for Korea to answer. OK, but what if you are an end customer, are you realistically going to make a call to Korea? Obviously not. So we pretended to be a customer again and discovered a new rule, which is now a circle of 10cm in diameter. In the States, the attitude is different but no plainer. Far from it. There they talk about 25mm differences, colors, locations, etc. LG would be well-advised to simplify its procedures.

Hercules and Iiyama use figures which, unlike the ISO standard, apply equally to lit, colored or unlit pixels. We especially appreciate this in Iiyama; their policy is definitely better than the ISO standard.

While on the subject of Hercules, it is interesting to note that they have recently changed their replacement policy. The new one, in the table above, is already up and running, and takes the place of the previous one which required at least six dead pixels.