Samsung frame tv white band/ flicker/ loading bar/ stripe/ line at top of screen problem
For those just beginning this journey, I thought I would share my saga having already gone down this road. I have The Frame 65” tv. This rather long and rambling, but I hope it will ultimately save someone searching for answers some time.
The only reason to buy The Frame TV, over other comparable TVs, is the Art Mode feature, and the Art Mode feature, which is the main selling point of the tv, doesn’t work properly. There is a problem that causes a white band/ flicker/ loading bar/ stripe/ line, whatever you want to call it, at the top of the screen periodically while displaying art in Art Mode. This will also cause the display to stop rotation and get stuck on one piece. One has to back out the art piece and back in to make the line go away and/or get the rotation unstuck. This really detracts from the enjoyment of the tv.
I speculate that this is a software problem, but I don’t know.
In my experience thus far, there is nothing you, your retailer, local tech, or Samsung customer service, can do about it. I’ve tried many, many, many things to fix the problem.
I figured out a work around all by myself, through trial and error, which is to select a limited number of “favorites” and put those on rotation. (If I select too many favorites, the line problem will come back. If I put mats on art pieces selected as favorites I must further limit the number of pieces to avoid the loading bar/white line issue.)
I went through a lengthy process with Samsung customer service. They were courteous at every step, but never had any knowledge of how to fix this problem. They tried. They suggested solutions, some of which seemed worth a try, but some of which seemed quite illogical. To their credit, Samsung eventually offered me a refund. However, I didn’t accept this refund, because there was a catch, and that was I had to return the tv and in order for them to pick it up they required that it had to be dismounted from the wall. It would have cost me time and money to hire people to uninstall the Tv and remove the tv from the wall, since I wouldn’t be able to do that by myself. It would have left me without a tv during the holidays, left a hole in the wall, a big empty space in my living room, and risked damaging my new media console cabinet during the dismount. I had already planned my living room decor around this tv. Further, I did like the tv in spite of everything. And my work around was not ideal but at least okay. The tv is a good compromise between my husband and me, since he wanted a tv in the living room and I didn’t want an eyesore.
Prior to that, they had offered a replacement of the same tv, but then they didn’t have any in stock, so they offered the refund. I didn’t like the idea of the replacement tv anyway, since it seemed to me the replacement would have exactly the same issue, since I suspect the problem is not with the actual tv but with its software. Before that, they had sent local authorized technicians to my house to look at the tv. The techs were on the phone with Samsung, after running some tests, their Samsung counterparts on the phone said to replace the panel. This, to my mind, was illogical. The local techs seemed to agree that this was not logical, but indicated to me that there wasn’t much else I could do but to take this next step in the process. However, it turned out that this could not be done since there wasn’t a panel part available.
Among the things I tried to fix the loading bar issue was a complete upgrade of my household technology to the best and fastest package available to a residential customer. This had no effect whatsoever on the white line issue.
Before that I did all the obvious things such as making sure the software was up to date (it was), power cycling (completely disconnecting from power), doing a reset, going through all the diagnostics on the tv including a picture test. The Samsung call center or online chat could really only suggest these kinds of basic things. Since the tv was new I didn’t have any of my own photos or anything at all stored on the tv at the time, so it wasn’t lack of storage/memory or a corrupt file.
As a side note, recently I discovered an additional way to enjoy this tv. I took the stacks and stacks of of my child’s artwork and projects from over the years that I needed to declutter. I took photos with my iPhone which is linked to the tv. I could easily add the photos to the My Photos section of My Collection using the Samsung Smart Things app. I then put that on rotation, and voila, I have a wonderful original art show. I could throw away those dusty stacks of artwork without too much heartache and see and enjoy my child’s art without the clutter. I don’t experience any problems with the loading bar/ white line problem while displaying my child’s artwork via My Photos. Of course, you could do this with a regular tv I suppose.
If you haven’t purchased this tv yet, you might wonder if it really looks like art. No. No one has walked in and said “Oh wow you have a Van Gogh!” It looks like what it is—a tv screen displaying art. But nevertheless, it is a way to enjoy art, the same way you would with a coffee table art book, or a framed poster.
Another side note is the wall bracket. This bracket allows you to spin the actual tv from landscape to portrait orientation. That could be useful for some purposes. This is not useful for me since I have it installed horizontally just over a console cabinet. This can be a little annoying since when the tv is dusted or touched, it can go awry and has to be readjusted. Not a big deal though.
I can at least hope Samsung takes note of this problem and fixes it.
