Sunday afternoon, my LG42PX3RVC stopped showing a picture, it just had sound.

On monday moring I rang the place I bought it from (Good Guys in O'Connor, WA) and they refered me on to the service contractor (Smartvision).

This morning at 7.30am the service guy truned up, pulled out the faulty board (apparently its the one that throws the info at the plasma panel) and replaced it with a new one.

TV Now works again!

I could not have been more impresed or surprised with the level of service, absolutley amazed given LG are one of the cheaper brands.

I had a similar experience, but I suspect the reason why your service was so good is that you did not deal with LG directly at any stage. The service centres are authorised, but not actually operated by LG. (which is probably a good thing).

Welcome to the exclusive club that is LG after-sales service! Interesting he had the exact part that need replacing on board at the time.

Glad its a good outcome tho'.

LG = break easy IMO

I dunno. My Goldstar microwave is still going strong after 12 years!

Your Lucky Goodness

I've got LG plasma that I love. LG 68cm crt thats 8 years old without any problems. Has been moved to different houses 5 times.

I have a Panasonic 68cm CRT that is no more than 5 years old and I think is about to die.

All brands have their problems

Well my new LG microwave broke down in the first 3 months!

They did replace it with another, and a slightly better model too

deleted, new thread started..........

Can I ask, was this done under warranty or out of warranty. I know have a similar problem with my Samsung plasma & I was wondering what the cost would be to repair? (warranty just expired by a few months).

Would be interested to hear myself.
Have the 42PX3RVC myself and sounds like the same thing has happened to mine that happened to lambretta.
However mine is 20 months old with only LG's pitiful 12 month warranty.
Tried ringing LG 1800 line during the week but waited on 20 minutes and couldn't wait any longer.
Flat strap with work in short week and haven't had another chance to ring during business hours.
Not super emergency as it's now our bedroom telly.
gpaulid,sorry to hear about your sammy but the one we have purchased recently for the lounge room has 36 months warranty.
Hope yours was the same,you might want to check again.
If this is the case at least youv'e got 40 months usage instead of the 20 months for the LG.
Anyhow I will this morning ring where I bought it and see what they have to say.
20 months use for a big ticket item before breaking down is not acceptable.
LG = Lucky if it Goes.
Ols

This is a known with this series of LG but it is able to be fixed quickly. The Sustain kit needs to be replaced, parts are about $60.00.

Pitiful 12months? most major brands only offer 12 months anyway, few offer more.

Ie Samsung, Pioneer.

Otherwise people shouldnt be tight and just spend the extra for the extended warranty!

Alternatively, this on warranties and refunds from the ACCC is well worth a read.

thanks for that, just having a read now actually!

And there have been instances in the past where LG has repaired or replaced goods outside the warranty period.

To me though manufacturers only offering 12months warranty is abysmal, considering many no name Chinese manufacturers are able to offer 3.

Sony, Panasonic, LG, Hitachi, etc should be offering more than 1 year on their TV's, but they dont!

That been said LG is offering 3 years on its 1080p lcd's. Whereas Sony's flasgship 1080p LCD's which cost between $3999-$8999 have 1 year!!!!

So go figure?

Your experience is very different to mine. I have been fighting with them for nearly three years, to replace my LaFinion 82W. It's been back to the shop four times, had several major components replaced and on all occasions has come back performing worse than when it went in.
Add to that the fact that they ignored my e-mails for the first 12 months of ownership and only responded after I spoke to the Qld. Rep., who gave me a "secret" phone number to call.
I've been to the ACA and the Qld. Dept of Fair Trading and still they tell me that the set is "within Spec". If they think that severely bowed straight vertical lines is "within spec" then someone at LG needs new glasses, watching someone walk through a room on this thing is like watching a kid in the House of Mirrors at Luna Park.
I haven't given up and will take them to Small Claims if I have to. My recommendation? Stay as far away from LG products as it is possible to get.

Lg can go and get f@#*!d they are a holes

Mate, I am in Perth and if you haven't had it fixed yet, i'm sure i maybe able to get something organised for you at minimal or better yet no cost. Let me know via this post if you have or not and if you havent give me an email or mobile i can contact you on. Hope i can help you. I am an LG contractor.

You haven't dealt with LG.

If you want to see the runaround people are getting who all spent $7-10k on a TV that lasts sometimes less than 3,000 hours as in my case, have a read of the thread below. Post #1630 is the first post made by LG customer services management directly. Long read to go through the remainder of the thread from post #1630 but for anyone who has some time or wants to research LG and how they conduct things and treat their consumers before making any considerable investment in one of their products:

http://www.dtvforum.info/index.php?showtopic=125&st=1620

I suggest for people with Lg product, try to deal with a larger size service agent rather than a small one or Lg themselves. Service people like myself can sometimes have headaches dealing with them also.

Sounds like the experience I had. You should have read the letter I received from their service manager at the time!!! Fortunately the good people at JB took pity on my month-long battle and replaced the set with a different brand. They organised their own credit note with LG and I was rid of a real heart-breaking headache. Top marks to JB HiFi...but LG...If your products were the last ones on earth I wouldn't take them, even if they were offered to me for free! My experience cost you many, many customers and I hope the Chinese brands eventually eat you!!!!!!

I have this model, my problem is with the component inputs. This could have been fixed I was told by changing the micro. The thing is so heavy that getting it to service was not easy so I elected to put up with the quirk.

Customers have informed me of problems with LG service, so if asked, I would recommend another brand.

I have other LG appliances, the one that gave me the most grief was a 5 year old heat pump (air conditioner) that blew barely warm air in winter. After a lot of stuffing around (it came with the house), I literally threw it away at the tip and installed a Daikin. I didn't even consider selling it second hand as the performance was so disappointing.

Is it a flat screen model?
Screen size?

With this model, LG expect service centre to perform "in-home" service. If its under warranty, ring up the local LG repair agent & request they come out & inspect the set. Furthermore, it they should not charge for it.
I perform probably 80-90% of repairs in the home. the rest are collected & taken to the workshop for further repairs if they cannot be effected safely in the home.
Hope it helps.

The set is over 2 years old and out of warranty. Thanks for the heads up, anyway.

Are you sure???? I'm almost positive the Lafinion series had 3 yrs... but i have been known to be wrong. Suprised to hear you are having a few problems, their normally pretty reliable...

I have a LG DLP REAR Projection TV and found out after the bulb exploded that it was going to cost me $700 to fix. I only paid $2199 this is a 3rd of the cost of the tv to get it fixed. Have only had it just over a year which is about 2,920 hours of viewing at 8 hours a day, which I might add is probably highly unlikely as we all work. So in effect you never stop paying for the TV if every 1 or so years you have to cough up $700 to get it fixed. With the loud pop we heard suggest that the ballist cover has been damaged as well. So putting another bulb in it myself could result in $288.95 worth of bulb blowing as well. I am not happy A) that the bulb went after such a short period of time and you never stop paying for the bloody thing! I fyou or anyone else can offer me some support with how to deal with this I would appreciate it. Bit disgruntled and disillusioned at the moment, sorry.

Hi mate,

Again $700 is steep. In short, find someone else. The ballast can fail but its pretty uncommon so you would have to be dead unlucky. Think i've changed two in a year of seeing these on a common basis. again, a lamp changeover usually does the trick. Cleaning out the filters is vital on these set's as is turning them off correctly (remote first) for longivity of the lamp. Unfortunately, the sales staff dont tell you this when you purchase these sets. I would suggest if you sourced the lamp yourself and installed carefully (dont touch front glass), clean out the filters, you should be ok. Further queries... just holler

Well it hasn't helped me yet. Mine has been to four "Authorised Repair Agents" for either repair or appraisal (one of them three times). One had the hide to tell me that a CRT will not reproduce straight lines, another said in his report to LG that if I wanted straight lines I should have bought an LCD set.
I can't get through to them that when I bought the set, it produced a good symmetrical picture, doorways and window frames were straight as I would expect, during one of its visits to a workshop, something was done to it that changed all that.
I would not have purchased the thing, choosing it over a Philips and a Thompson at the time, if it had not performed well. If I had been in a financial situation to puchase an LCD or Plasma, I would have but at the time I wasn't and how dare a techie judge me for that anyway?!
I am still negotiating after 35 months and will take it as far as I need to, which means Small Claims, Today Tonight, ACCC or whatever it takes. I want a store credit for what is obviously a LEMON. I will also use every single forum that I can find, to tell people of the problem I have had in getting satisfaction with a product that I bought in good faith.
I will also acknowledge LG if they make good on my claim.

Go for it, Miata. This is exactly the sort of problem I had with them, as well. Can I suggest, before you go the "hard way" try and box the unit up, if you still have the packaging, and return it to your place of purchase. You may be surprised at the reception you get, especially if you are wanting to upgrade to a pricier set. I found that threats of prosecution and "outing" on tv programs had absolutely zero effect on the people I was dealing with at LG.

I recently got an LCD LG TV and discovered that I could not get teletext with the digital tuner (it does with analogue). The LG help line told me that teletext is only available on analogue. The person I spoke to would not accept that teletext is on digital even after explaining that my Topfield which does receive it doesn't have an analogue tuner.

Don't crucify me, but, if we are talking about the Lafinion 82, it will & should show straight lines. These set's are normally excellent performers and do not give much trouble (usually). I don't know what state you guys are living in but the set's in question really sound like they need to see a proficient technician. It is most likely that they need to enter service mode and align the geometry properly.

Hope it helps

I'm in Qld., the last techie has given the best results so far and did exactly as you described. When they brought it back to me, the service guy used the service menu (via his "special remote control" ) to bring up the service menu and tweak it further.
The picture is bowed from the centre and on one program during the week, a refrigerator in the centre of screen was shaped ) (, now most manufacturers (LG included) don't sell refrigerators that shape! Prison bars as far as I know, are also not usually parabolic, correct me if I'm wrong.
If I watch 4:3 material, the edges of the picture are also bowed, better than before but still very noticable. Yes BTW it's the 82W.
I'm dealing with someone at LG in Sydney (who I believe is really trying to help me), who can only rely on reports that he gets from the Service people and one of them reported that the set was "within Spec". (The same one who made the remark that I should have bought an LCD set if I wanted straight lines). My argument is that obviously bent vertical lines could not or should not be "within Spec". It has had the PCB assembly replaced as well as the Main Board to fix the original problem, which was that it changed colour (it would go purple, then green) and then "washed out". I first complained about it one month after I bought it (at David Jones) and have been battling with LG ever since.

I suggest if your contact in LG Sydney is trying to help you, ask & insist that you are able to send them email attachments with photos of the fault (use a decent quality camera with no flash). Take a few different ones displaying all the faults outlined & email them to him, however dont make the attachments too large as their server may reject them. (i have done this with customers that have intermittant problems- believe me, it helps) You problems are not intermittant i believe, In this particular set, there is a few different screen modes that need to be setup individually in service mode with the service remote.
Hope it helps

BTW-- This set may have either have a fault condition present (not likely due to the parts apparently replaced) or the set is just not being aligned correctly. To do it properly, they should be using a test pattern generator.

I'm assured that a test pattern generator was used at the last attempt and as far as I know, this techie was the first to have used one. I sent photos to LG with my early contacts before I got the Dept. of Fair Trading involved. I also sent photos to that Dept..

LGServicetech77, I wouldn't "crucify" you. You seem like a genuine bloke trying to help Miata out. My problem was not with the LaFinion but with the earlier 76cm widescreen unit. I was absolutely disgusted with the run around I received at the hands of LG service and their agent for my area. I would never buy any of their products again, even if they were the last manufacturer on earth.

As regards service in general I think it would be an excellent idea for the various consumer affair agencies in each state to correlate their data and publish a league table of service complaints for each company.

Thanks for your reply, I have rung about three places and they have all quoted me the same price. The sound that came from the TV was like a balloon bursting sort of like a mini explosion. Maybe I could be one of those unlucky people you mentioned, I don't know. What else would a sound like that be from? The LG service centre told me not to try and replace it myself as it is far more complicated than changing an ordinary light bulb. I have read the manual instructions and if it so complicated then why do they give directions in their manual. Could you tell me where the filters are located as it is not mentioned in the owners manual. And yes I would much rather pay $288.99 for a bulb than $700. When the cost is broken down if you minus 289 from $700 it leaves about $400 they take the television away and bring it back for that cost. Still seems rather steep eh. All I know is I am missing my entertainment! It has been out of service for over a week now. I am on the central coast in Gosford do you know anyone reasonable up here?
Cheers Duurland

I can only suggest that if you are not overly confident in coducting this work, then it would probably be better to purchase the lamp yourself but get someone to fit it for you. You can damage the new lamp or the set if its not installed exactly right.. You may want to ring around before you purchase the lamp in this instance to verify that someone will infact come out to install your self sourced lamp. Some repair agents will not install parts from a source they do not know.
The filter's are internal & generally are not servicable for customers, usually, hence the reason for not being identifible in the owners manual.
I'm sorry, apart from an LG service centre in your area, you may want to talk to an "elite" status service centre, these are identifyable via the LG web site.
Sorry i cant really help much more than this, my contract obligations stop me from telling you how to do it.

Thanks for your contact and all your help anyway, I fully understand your position. I think I will just have to cough up eh! These sets cost too much to muck around with. Cheers K Duurland

I should add that the charming gent who suggested that I should have purchased an LCD set if I wanted straight lines, is employed at an Elite service centre.

As I pointed out in another thread, finally I have been offered a Store Credit for the purchase price of the 82W. It's rather anti-climactic! I just have to wait now for whatever paperwork has to be shuffled about and hopefully my problems with this set are a thing of the past.