bug inside lcd screen manufacturer

Picture this. You’re looking forward to your favourite release of the year, a new DOOM. And you’ve got a fancy $1000 monitor to play it on. There’s just one small problem. One day, you wake up and discover a bug has somehow carked it in your screen. No problem: the monitor’s well under warranty. So everything should be OK, right?

That’s what happened to long time Australian gamer Narull. Just before Christmas, he forked out the money for a very nice 1440p IPS screen, the 165Hz ASUS ROG Swift PG279QE. It’s a good gaming screen and one that you think would be perfect for games like DOOM Eternal, with all their colour and blood.

Narull didn’t even have the option of blaming himself and wallowing in self-pity, like Kirk did. Like most people, he asked the simple question: how the hell did the bug get inside his monitor to begin with?

Yeah, I bought it end of November, been working perfectly since then this bug appears inside it on Sunday night. I assumed monitors were sealed but I guess not…?— Narull (@Narull) March 17, 2020

But all was still looking well at this point. The monitor was not only within warranty under Australian consumer law, but ASUS’s limited 12 month warranty. Parts weren’t required, because all a competent repairer needs to do is pull the screen apart and clean the gunk from the protective layer that sits between the LCD panel and the screen. There’s plenty of legitimate precedent for it being free, too. LCD screens are a bright light source, and naturally small insects and moths are going to gravitate towards them. It’s the manufacturer’s job to make sure they can’t get inside.

Well that confirmed @ASUSAU don"t deal with small problems first I guess. Over a week to take an insect out of a screen (and I"m expecting longer honestly)

It pisses me off. Screw you ASUS for having a fucking $1000 monitor that insects can get inside of. pic.twitter.com/lPjfkuJFfp— Narull (@Narull) March 19, 2020

Things were looking up. Sort of. A ticket on the official ASUS support page replied: they’d deal with the issue, but not immediately. Narull would get his PG279QE screen back on March 25, two days after DOOM Eternal‘s official launch. Not ideal, but at least someone was putting the poor bug where they belonged.

But a lot can change in 24 hours. On Thursday morning, Narull received a response from a different ASUS support member. “After inspecting the LCD, we are determined the LCD have insect inside the panel unfortunately insect damage is not covered under the manufactory warranty,” an email from ASUS read, directing Narull to ASUS’s policy for Australia and New Zealand where “contamination with hazardous substances, diseases, vermin or radiation” is not covered under warranty.

Naturally, Narull was perplexed. ASUS initially accepted the support request and said they’d send the monitor back within a week, only to say new parts were needed. Then to turn around and say the monitor couldn’t be “repaired” at all, even though the monitor doesn’t need an actual repair. It just needs the bug cleaned out of the panel (and maybe some questions answered as to how the bloody thing could get inside to begin with).

It’s not a huge stretch to say monitors should be built in a way that doesn’t allow bugs or insects to crawl inside the panel. LCD/LED screens are giant sources of light. Of course they’re going to attract moths, mosquitoes, tiny flies and whatever else comes in from outside the window. One would assume they’d be built to keep critters at bay, even with modern monitors having more aggressive cooling mechanisms.

“It makes me wonder what they lodged [the issue] as,” Narull told Kotaku Australia. “When I first called and they ask the issue I said ‘there is an insect inside the panel’ but clearly the service centre did not know that, so what did they lodge the issue as?”

It’s not the customer experience you’d expect after buying a $1000 monitor. Generally, most brands are pretty good about support on their premium products. You’ve already paid several hundred, or almost a grand in this case. Having a bug that can climb into the screen and die is obviously a suboptimal experience. I get why a company might try and reject it after a year – especially if the user is dumb enough to squish the bug themselves.

Kotaku Australia emailed ASUS’s local team for comment, asking for an explanation on how the customer service should have functioned, what steps they would take to improve logging of customer complaints in the future and their approach to dealing with small insects getting inside enclosed monitor units. I also asked what their official advice was to users who discovered bugs inside their monitor – if ASUS isn’t going to cover it, should users try and fix it themselves? Can they fix it themselves?

As for small insects, ASUS said monitors are “not a completely sealed device” and customers should be patient if they discover one. “When customers find an insect in their screen, we would suggest him or her to wait the insect to get out by itself while it’s still alive,” ASUS said. “However, if the insect has already dead in the screen, the customer should always contact our service team to arrange the repairing as soon as possible. Service fees may apply in this situation. Service fees may apply in this situation.”

I thought the bug was right behind the first layer, between LCD and glass. However as I found out these two layers are permanently glued and sealed. That"s a good news as no bugs get in.

I found the bug (actually 3 of them, two that I didn"t know of) between diffuser and LCD. This space can be quite easily reached with just basic tools (pry tool, flat and Phillips screwdriver) within 30 minutes. You can follow detailed steps in Acer Thin Bezel Monitor Disassembly.

The a7R V is the fifth iteration of Sony"s high-end, high-res full-frame mirrorless camera. The new 60MP Mark IV, gains advanced AF, focus stacking and a new rear screen arrangement. We"ve tested its image quality and video performance.

A tiny insect has crawled in between the LCD panel and the backlight of my 27" iMac and died. Close inspection reveals that it is behind the LCD characters. I called Apple support, and they were sympathetic, but said I had to go to the local store. The local store told me it was not their fault I had a bug in my iMac, and in fact, this "infestation" (his words) would probably void the warranty on my 6 month old iMac.

My iMac sits on the desk in my office. My office is not "infested" with bugs. But Apple"s LCD screen is not sufficiently sealed to dust and other contaminants so it will prevent a tiny insect from being attracted to the light and crawling inside of it. I am very disappointed in their response.

Does anyone know if there is any recourse to the local Apple store? The woman at MY-APPLE assumed it would be a warranty repair. It seems to me that the LCD component should be sufficiently sealed to prevent bugs from crawling into it. And I live in Southern California, not Northern Michigan.

Today I was sitting at my computer, programming. Suddenly, I noticed that a bug was crawling up my second monitor. I had dealt with the bugs before. They tended to pop up on my main display from time to time. Typically, I had just whisked them away with a piece of paper, or (if they wouldn"t let go), squished them lightly and used some cleaning wipes to get up their remains. This time, I tried to wipe it away. That didn"t work, so I tried smashing it with the piece of paper. It took a couple of tries to get it, but it eventually stopped moving. I went to get my cleaning wipes, and started wiping up the screen. To my amazement, the bug"s residue failed to come off. It seemed that the bug was actually inside the screen.

I realize that story may sound absurd. However, doing a Google search shows up many results for people with similar problems. Has anyone had any luck dealing with a similar issue? I see lots of results for people who still have them crawling inside the screen. But, mine is smashed, and there"s no way it"s getting out.

Yeah it"s the following morning and I"m still pretty bummed out about it. 99.99% sure it"s a bug and not just dust. I did google "bug in computer monitor" and there is a frightening number of hits about said issue. I can"t tell if it"s behind the panel in front of the back-light or in front of the panel but behind the outer protective layer. Who knew there were air gaps between various layers. Since it was moving when I tried to swipe it I think I "bent" the outer layer (or panel?) enough to kill and maybe? squish said bug. Lots of tapping and bumping of monitor and yeah it"s stuck.

I"m a bit uncomfortable opening up monitor to wipe away said bug. And the thought of RMA"ing this huge 43" monitor seems like a nightmare. I wonder if I paid for the on-site Dell tech support. Better not mention bug and just mention dead pixels. /sad-sigh

Honestly if you have an expensive, or at least "expensive for you," monitor check out the size of the vent holes on your monitor and maybe tape on some no-see-em ultra-fine mesh screens to prevent bug infiltration. Crazy.

The bug can’t get between the sandwiched layers of the screen. They’re all stuck together. It will be between the backlight (left-most layer), and that entire sandwiched layer to the right.

My only big tips would be to wear nitrile or latex gloves, and not take the entire LCD or backlight out of the monitor. You don’t want to handle it any more than necessary, put fingerprints on it, or allow dust specks or debris to get in. Those things would produce their own artifacts on the screen once you put it back together. Obviously you don’t want to trade the bug for another artifact. Just lift the screen a tiny amount gently, get to the bug with the gentlest blast of air duster or the gentlest swipe with a microfiber cloth, and then put everything back in place.

That irksome dot is a dead pixel, one defective electronic pinpoint of light among the myriad that make up the liquid crystal displays in laptop screens, flat-panel monitors and flat-panel TVs.

Most manufacturers and retailers don’t warn consumers about the possibility of bum pixels, and few will fix or replace a new screen that comes with “just” one or two. Most require at least three and some 10 or more, depending on the locations, type and screen size.

To keep costs down, manufacturers don’t scrap screens that meet a minimum standard, usually one or two defective pixels for a 15-inch screen. But to a consumers’ eye, “bad is bad,” Semenza said.

After selling that laptop, Slade bought a fourth on Apple’s Web site — with a less noticeable but still defective pixel in the middle of the screen. Considering the effort it took to exchange a machine with two dead pixels, he didn’t attempt a return. But after a reporter queried Apple about Slade’s experience, the company contacted him and arranged for his monitor to be repaired or replaced.

But if electronic device makers rejected every screen that wasn’t “pixel perfect,” their costs — and consequently the price of their products — would skyrocket, said John Jacobs, an analyst with market research firm DisplaySearch in San Jose, Calif.

The quality of LCDs in consumer electronics can fluctuate with the market, Jacobs said. When screens are plentiful, manufacturers can be pickier, but when supply is tight, they may relax their standards. “They’d rather sell 100,000 more laptops even if it means more returns,” he said.

Slade, on the other hand, points out that people who buy monitors or laptops with one or two bum pixels pay the same price as those lucky enough to buy perfect screens. “It’s like gambling,” he said.

For a 17-inch monitor, Sony’s warranty requires at least four dark or bright pixels, said Robert Stevens, a San Diego-based spokesman for Sony. However, the company sometimes replaces monitors with as few as one bright pixel if it’s near the center of the screen, he said.

Slade’s string of bad pixels aside, manufacturing quality is steadily rising, Semenza said. But so are expectations, especially as more LCD TVs are sold. “If you are sitting there watching TV on your $3,000 screen, you are going to focus on that bad pixel in the corner,” he said.

Slade thinks consumers would feel less cheated if manufacturers were just more upfront about the risks of getting a flawed, non-returnable screen. “If you get a perfect one, you get a perfect one; and if you don’t, you get some money,” he suggested.

Here is the bug. Its a small fly. I had hoped it would work its way out but it has died, and doesn"t seem to want to fall out. As it stands its been over a month, and its become a pretty obvious brown smear inside the screen. I have not been able to shake it loose, and it does not appear to be breaking up on its own.

I also have photos of the rest of the areas around the screen, but they show little that"s easy to make out. The bottom part of the bezel proved impossible to photograph as the gap faces upward, and was invisible with available lighting. There doesn"t appear to be any warping in that area. There are a few other areas with oddities in the gaps. But none are nearly as extreme as the two shown above.

I had something kinda similar (it was a bug irregular shadow) but it only appeared after the monitor had become hot after being on for quite a while. I sent it in under warranty and after a bit of back-and-forth I got a new monitor.

So as it came out after a visit of appointed by Samsung service, I also have a "dead bug" that crawled between lcd screen and a backlight, casting a dead-pixel-like shadow on the lcd panel.

Few days after the visit Samsung confirmed that this won"t be covered by warranty, as this is not their fault that the bug crawled inside, and that their tv are apparently produced to highest standard.

This is surely not right and quite questionable, as panels of this type and priced as much as they were at the point of my purchase (similar to yours), should be sealed in a manner that disallow bugs to crawl in, especially that this is all too common and well known occurence.

Samsung in their response to my warranty repair request confirmed that there are vents in the sealing to allow for cooling of the lcd panel. And this is probably how the bug came in. I believe that even if there are any cooling vents in the sealant, these should be secured so that this situation wouldn"t take place.

What is also interesting is that the design of the lcd panel does not allow for taking it apart - as it was the case in older models of lcd tv"s- and as confirmed by the servicemen who visited me.

It is very convenient to Samsung, as replacement of entire lcd panel in this case makes up about 3/4 of the price I have paid for the TV. Fixing of the issue by qualified technician would be cheap in comparison.

The presence of cockroaches is not only gross and annoying, but it can also be costly. Cockroaches can damage your expensive electronic device by ruining internal electrical components. When cockroaches move around inside a console or a TV, they touch high voltage components which can short out your product and lead to costly repairs or replacements.

Check your electronics for roach droppings. This will look like black pepper and are usually scattered around the power supply or wire ports of your system. Other signs are egg casings, or oothecae, that resemble brown capsules. Also, keep an eye out for the roaches themselves. Often they can be clustered together inside your electronic item or under a power supply.

Make sure before you carry this out you know that the device can withstand low temperatures. Electronics with LCD screens will be damaged is exposed to those conditions for such a period of time. When the roaches have died out and you bring the item back to the warmth, allow time for the product to dry out since condensation will occur when the cold appliance returns to warm operating temperatures.

Many insects are attracted to light. Insects can get into places where they cause problems for people. Little insects can get into tight little places. This leads to the “Thunderbug” problem. Thunderbug is a name applied to thrips, Order Thysanoptera. Thrips feed on plants, often scraping the cells of the leaf surface and only feeding on the surface cells. They leave damage that looks like a windowpane in the leaf.

In some locations, large populations of thrips will migrate, especially if they are feeding on crops and the crops are harvested. The thrips are attracted to lights and will enter homes. One type of light that attracts thrips is an LCD monitor. Thrips that are only a few mm in length have the ability to slip between the back panel and backlight of LCD monitors. Ergo, the “Thunderbug” Problem. The Thunderbug problem is more common than many people realize and most monitor manufacturers are willing to admit.

The initial reaction to thrips crawling around the inside of a monitor may be to squash it. However, a dead insect is not going to move anywhere or exit the monitor the same way it entered.

Some people learn to live with bugs in the system. When they are alive, their movements can be distracting, but they do not live long without food or water. Many people learn to live with a few dead (covered by dead thrips) pixels.

I noticed about 2 hours ago a bug moving on the screen, I went to just wipe it off but turns out that was actually under the glass. Im pretty sure its between two layers of the screen components as it goes behind certain UI elements but when on white its very clearly a black bug. An hour later I think I may have pressed to hard while ‘inspecting’ it and its not moving at all.

Screen flickering in Windows 11 is usually caused by a display driver issue or incompatible app. To determine whether a display driver or app is causing the problem, check to see if Task Manager flickers. Then, based on that information, you"ll need to update, rollback, or uninstall your display driver or update or uninstall the app.

If Task Manager flickers along with everything else on the screen, a display driver is probably causing the problem. In this scenario, see the Fix your display driver section.

If Task Manager doesn"t flicker while the rest of the screen is flickering, an incompatible app is probably causing the problem. In this scenario, see the Update or uninstall an incompatible app section.

After you uninstall the first app, restart your device and check if the screen flickering or scrambled issue is resolved or not. If it"s not, uninstall each app one by one until the issue is resolved.