M1730: lower quality or defective LCD panel?

I purchased a Dell M1730 laptop a couple of years ago. A few months after I received it, the original LCD panel was shattered in an accident. I shipped it back to Dell and they replaced it with a new Samsung panel (not sure what it had before) which looked just as good, except that after a couple of months it developed a one pixel wide red vertical line 80% of the way up from the bottom of the screen near the left side.

Because the line wasn't very distracting (only showed up on certain colors like dark grey and dark red) I lived with it for a while, but I recently decided I should get it fixed since my warranty is running out this year. I emailed Dell recently and they sent a technician to my house while I was at work (my wife was at home) and he repaired the M1730 so that the red vertical line was no longer present. I'm not sure what the exact nature of the repairs were, but he did mention to my wife that apparently when my panel was previously replaced, they had only used 2 of 8 screws! The technician added the missing screws as part of the repair work.

When I returned home from work and inspected the laptop myself, however, I noticed that something was wrong with the display:

• There seemed to be a lot of newly-visible dithering artifacts in my Windows XP and Ubuntu Linux wallpapers, as well as in the Steam client.
• The backlight was much brighter than before at the highest setting, to the point that I have to turn it halfway down to get a good black level (sacrificing a substantial amount of contrast/brightness).
• The colors in the Torchlight game's loading screen look strange - kind of over-saturated I guess.
• The built-in LCD panel is now reported as being from LG instead of Samsung.

Is it possible that the technician installed a lower-quality panel, or that the panel is being driven by the wrong hardware? Could the technician have perhaps knocked a cable loose or accidentally adjusted the backlight to be too bright, causing what should otherwise be normal amounts of dithering to be extra noticeable?

I contacted Dell again about this issue, and they suggested installing the latest motherboard and video BIOS versions (specifically the video BIOS that is supposed to correct the yellow tint issue, even though I'm not seeing a yellow tint thank god). However, I always keep my system updated and have been running those BIOS versions since not long after they were released (I double-checked using GPU-Z and CPU-Z tonight though just to be sure that nothing was reverted and that my memory was not faulty).

I hope Dell doesn't blow me off. The issues are bad enough that I'd rather go back to the red vertical line

 

My guess is that I had a GH874 Samsung display and that they replaced it with an HH258 LG panel, as those are both listed on parts-people.com as 17" WUXGA panels that are compatible with the M1730.

Edit: Checked my service tag on Dell's site and the original LCD was a U814G Samsung panel.

 

Update: I have heard back from Dell this evening via email. They directed me to re-flash my motherboard and nVidia BIOS images even though I was already running the latest versions. Of course there was no change. The also asked me to connect an external LCD monitor to see if any of my issues are visible there; I did as they asked and did not see any of the issues on the external monitor.

I've done some searching and have determined that the LPL0032 LCD panel I'm now stuck with has been reported by others as being a low-quality 6-bit panel with dithering and color reproduction issues (such as the top 3 rectangles on the following color wheel all appearing in the same shade of yellow: http://articles.scrapbooking.com/images/colorwheel.gif).

I've sent Dell the results of their instructions above and have asked for them to swap out this LG panel with a non-LG of comparable quality to the one I had previously. I hope they actually have something other than these terrible LG panels!

 

Dell is going to replace my panel with a YU241 replacement kit. I can't tell for sure which brand(s) of panel are covered by that part number, so I'm crossing my fingers that it won't be another poor-quality LG panel.

 

Well a tech stopped by and swapped the panels out, and he says it's the same exact LG model that they put in last week It has the same exact issues (I made a desktop wallpaper that demonstrates all of the issues with the LG panels, including highly noticeable dithering/banding and inability to reproduce different shades of bright yellowish colors).

I'm at a loss as to what to do now. I guess I'll keep pushing Dell to see if they can actually get me a non-LG panel or find some other acceptable solution.

 

The email support guy at Dell wants to ship my laptop back to a Dell facility to have their in-house techs look at it. He's agreed to note in my file that I will be including a CD-R with a test image that I've created that shows quite clearly the problems with the LG panels.


In the meantime, I had opened a complaint with the "Dell corporate office" via a Dell unresolved support form page that I saw a link to on this forum the other day. A person from "Dell corporate" called me and completely destroyed the positive experience I've had so far with the email support person and technician subcontractor that have been working with me on this issue.

First, the corporate rep tried to tell me that the LG panels are not lower in quality than the non-LG panels I had prior to a week or two ago. I explained that I am absolutely certain that this is not true, and that I have a test image to prove it.

He then told me that Dell has nothing other than LG panels that they can put in my M1730. I asked him what he could do then to fix the situation, since the LG panels are not the quality that I paid for when I purchased my laptop. I mentioned that the issues were significant enough to me that I'd rather have them reinstall my old non-LG panel with the red vertical line defect (at least it was only one line of pixels and not the whole panel that was defective!) than to continue using these defective LG panels.

His response was that all he could do is check to see if there may possibly be any non-LG panels in stock, and that he would get back to me next week. The impression I got, however, was that he was just trying to blow me off and that he wasn't really interested in trying to solve anything. I felt pretty insulted by the whole conversation. I can say right now that I won't be buying nor recommending Dell laptops in the future if they're putting these poor-quality 1920x1200 LG panels in all of their 17" laptops.


If I get the mailer from the email support guy before I hear back from the "Dell corporate" guy, I'll probably go ahead and send the laptop in, since I think the Dell techs are the only people at Dell who will see the issue first-hand

 

Keep up your blog, it's interesting reading!

Need to go and check what screen I have, as I checked your colour chart and the top 3 colours just looked yellow to me

 

Device manager lists mine as 'generic p&p monitor'????

 

Teknobry mine same "Generic PnP Monitor"

HunterZo, not suprised at all about screws. some of these techs unfortunatly have poor skill an Knowledge of our XPS's

not familiar with any monitor types stated in your posts.
have in me XPSm1730 for about 14 months PartNo:WX548 = 17.0" UltraSharp(TM) Widescreen WUXGA (1920x1200) TFT Display with TrueLife(TM) an is amazinnn never had probs..... yet. wondering if dell hell could install WX548(maybe they still stock em) in your XPS correctly including fixing anything else wrong with your XPS, im sure youll be happy with screen Quality an reliability

its possible could be mobo causing probs.

sorry link not working?....lol get Oh no! message

 

Bummer, sounds like you have the LG panel that I got stuck with.

You have to open its properties in the device manager and look at the Details tab to find the actual model number.

Latest update: I got the return box from Dell the other day. Yesterday I burned a CD-R with my test image (which I've also converted to .PNG and attached here in case anyone with an LG LPL0032 panel is interested in testing theirs for the same defects), wrote a detailed note per the email support rep's instructions, and shipped it all off to Dell.

My fear at this point is that they'll either refuse to acknowledge that my issues are real, or else just tweak the nVidia color settings to artificially mitigate some of the (hardware-based) issues with the LG panel. My hope is that the techs already know that the LG panels are crap and that they have a stash of (even refurbished) Samsung and/or Sharp panels that they can personally install instead should they wish to take pity on me

My warranty expires in the middle of next month, and the outcome of this will determine whether or not I renew it. I still use the laptop actively (even though I built a new gaming desktop in December) and would like to keep it covered, but if Dell insists on using sub-par replacement parts due to the fact that it's a discontinued model then I'll probably re-purpose it and look into buying something from another company.

 

hikkoo: Dell does not mention specific panel model/manufacturer numbers under most of their part numbers because they actually often stock multiple similar models from different manufacturers under each part number.

You have to open the properties of your monitor in the Windows device manager and go to the details tab to find the model number.

I believe my original panel was a Samsung, and the original replacement was a Sharp (or maybe a Samsung again?). I know that the 2 recent replacements have been LG LPL0032s and have been of noticeably inferior quality compared to the previous panels I had.

It could possibly be the motherboard or something else causing the issues, but I highly doubt it since I've seen a lot of reports of people experiencing the same issues with LG LPL0032 panels. I think they're just lower quality by design and Dell has heavily invested in them due to being cheaper as a result of that lower quality. Dell is probably hoping that most people don't notice, which I find rather insulting and inappropriate when it comes to gaming laptops since we choose to pay a premium on them for higher-end parts.

Edit: Wish I could delete posts so that I could merge this one into my last one

 

you mean after click on details tab in device manager then do i select under Property list "Device description" or "Hardware lds" or "Compatible lds"..... etc?

so if i break me screen ,Hmmm....will dell give me a crap LG one.....well wont let them they have to give me same one or better or full refund

 

It's one of those first 3 properties yeah, probably Hardware Ids. I can't be sure now since my laptop is currently in the possession of FedEx

Look for one of these strings:
LPL0032 (LG)
SEC5443 (Samsung)
SHP13D9 (Sharp)

 

under Hardware lds says MONITOR\ SEC5443 so its a samsung
thanks for pic . so have the best screen

EDIT: pic can see 3 different colours an distinct shades correct

Never have installed dell's Gpu Bios update to correct yella tint issue an probably never will or until see this prob

 

I've only seen people report the LG panel as showing the yellow tint issue; thankfully I don't seem to have that issue (yet?). I have wondered if maybe the BIOS update is detecting the LG panel and clamping the yellows/greens so that I see the contrast/oversaturation issues instead of the yellow tint issue.

 

I should consider to get my LG panel be replaced only if I can be sure it'll be a brand new Sharp or Samsung. I don't feel comfortable about refurbished ones.

 

Yeah, I don't seem to be having luck so far at even getting Dell to acknowledge that the Samsung and Sharp models ever even existed... Both of the panels they shipped via overnight FedEx to the subcontractor field techs for in-home repair were LG, although when my Samsung shattered a couple years ago they sent it to a Dell repair depot (where it's headed now) that swapped it out with a Sharp (I think, or maybe a Samsung but definitely not an LG).

 

my 1730 has a lg panel as well,mine is lgd0032 .since i got my 1730 i realised that the color was not right, read a few posts, i believe that my panel is not displaying the color right, to give you guys an idea of the green / yellow thing i was talking about on the lg see this pic attached. notice the red arrow. that circle should be green as it shows up on my fully calibrated nec. on the lg it is totally yellow.
i need to speak to dell tomorrow

 

You may want to look at the test image I made and uploaded on the previous page: http://forum.notebookreview.com/del...-quality-defective-lcd-panel.html#post6298847

It shows the LG LPL0032 issues quite clearly. I wonder what the relationship between the LGD0032 and LPL0032 is?

 

Update:

My laptop is currently in Colorado en route from Seattle to the Dell repair depot in Texas via FedEx ground, and is expected to be delivered on Friday of this week.

In the meantime, I got a call today from someone at Dell with a thick accent wanting to know how my laptop is working (?). It sounded like he was getting ready to try to sell me on a warranty extension, but as soon as I mentioned that my laptop was being shipped to a Dell service depot for repair he changed his tune and instead took down some general info about my laptop problems. He then said something about calling him back or him calling me back or something once the service call had been resolved (?).

My warranty expires in the middle of this month. I'm planning to extend it if they actually give me a decent panel; otherwise, I'll either turn it into a media server for my TV or give it to my mom as an upgrade to her aging Inspiron model.

While I wait for my laptop to come back, I've set up a NES and small LCD TV/monitor on the end table next to where I sit on the couch so I can play Dragon Warrior while I watch shows with the wife on the big TV

 

Whoah, that's some cool retro stuff. NES gaming back in '89.
At least 16 true colors instead of the LG panel's false colors.

 

Yeah, I went nuts on eBay a few summers ago and built a decent collection of a few dozen NES games, including all 4 Dragon Warrior games (with 1 & 4 in box), all 3 Ninja Gaiden games in boxes, and all 6 Mega Man games without boxes. I haven't spent much time playing them though, so it's nice to have the excuse.

I have a new desktop PC that I've been playing Mass Effect (and Dragon Age and a bunch of other games) on during the weekends, but I prefer to camp in front of the TV most weeknights after work.


Speaking of TV, I'm kind of stoked about the idea of using the M1730 as an HTPC in the case that Dell fumbles the LCD panel replacement again. I think mine may have come with a breakout box that has coax SPDIF so that I can get digital 5.1 sound (via SPDIF passthrough) from my M1730 to my AV receiver along with HD video via a DVI->HDMI cable. I can then dual-boot, say, Mythbuntu and use the Windows Media Center remote control that I have laying around to stream stuff over the LAN or Internet to my TV...

The only question would be what to buy as a replacement laptop. I don't think I'd want something from Dell again if they're cheaping out on LCD panels these days... My wife would try to talk me into getting a MacBook, but I want to stick with Windows (plus Linux dual-boot maybe) for playing games and such so the price premium of Macs wouldn't be worth it for me.

 

Laptop delivered to Dell a day early.

Been looking around at non-Dell gaming laptops to see what's out there in case I need to retire my M1730. I guess LCD panels must be getting expensive because notebook manufacturers are only putting 1920x1080 panels in their highest-end models, and 1920x1200 panels are nowhere to be seen. I did find some decent Asus, Toshiba and MSI gaming notebooks with 1920x1080 LCD panels at around $1600.

 

Interesting to find this thread on this subject. We were discussing this very same problem back in 2008 if you go back to my posts.

I had bought one of these from the outlet and the first one that I received had the LG panel. It was terrible and no amount of adjusting could fix it.
I sent it back and got the Samsung panel and it was excellent. Very nice picture quality. There was also a Sharp panel which was supposed to be alright too. Anyway even though I was very pleased with the M1730 I still sent it back because I couldnt justify the almost $2,000 it was costing me from the outlet.

So now I just bought another one from the Dell Outlet because I couldnt resist the prices now. I just got one with a 15% percent coupon for around $900 and it even has the 9800 GTX SLI. Excellent price!!!
The icing on the cake was that it also has the Samsung panel SEC5443 and everything looks perfect. Actually the notebook looks brand new even has some of the plastic on the mouse buttons and battery door.

So yes there are major differences between the different screen panels. WHen you buy from the outlet it is just hit and miss but you still have 21 days to return.

 

Crazy that they pretend to not know that the LG panels are defective. I guess they're a big enough company that the complaints get lost in the noise of all the other support calls they are constantly receiving, but you'd think that they'd want to catch things like this that are causing them to burn through a lot of LCD panels so that they won't keep wasting money by ordering more from LG.


Laptop is still currently in Dell's hands as far as I know. I don't have any visibility into the repair status via their web site (unless there's a link I don't know about) - the support request ticket number they have open says that the state is "SERVICE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT" (whatever that means), and only seems to be tracking the box + shipping label that they sent to me so that I could send my laptop back to them.

Last time I sent it in (a couple years ago when the original LCD panel was accidentally shattered) they turned it around in less than 1.5 calendar weeks, so at this rate I'll get it back just after the warranty expires lol.

 

Update: Just got an email from someone at the Dell repair depot wanting authorization to replace my hard drive. I wish they'd explain why that could possibly be necessary. Maybe they don't like that I wiped out their hidden partitions so that I could dual-boot Ubuntu Linux on it

I'm telling them to go ahead and replace it, as I used CloneZilla to make a compressed backup of the Windows XP partition over the LAN to the 2TB HDD in my desktop.

Edit: Asked them some questions along with my response, and their reply was simply "Thank you, for the prompt response." Figures.

 

Support request ticket is now showing complete status, so hopefully I'll get my laptop back by the end of this week after all.

The guy from "Dell corporate" tried to get a hold of me again yesterday; wasn't expecting that since it seemed like he was just trying to blow me off before after he did little more than rile me up. Returned the call this morning but of course he wasn't in (according to yet another guy with an Indian accent).


Edit: Just got an automated call from Dell informing me that my laptop has been shipped via FedEx, and stating my tracking and Dell reference numbers. The voice sounded a little too much like GLaDOS from Portal, which creeped me out a bit I looked up the tracking number and my laptop is already in town on a delivery truck, so I should have it back today.

That reminded me of the fact last time I had to ship my laptop to Dell, they called me 2 minutes after DHL delivered it to let me know that it had been shipped. I guess FedEx is more Dell's speed (they can't use DHL anymore because DHL stopped doing domestic US shipping).


Edit 2: ...aaaand I got the automated call a second time. ? At least it gave me a second opportunity to vote in preference of email notifications.

 

GOOD NEWS! Posting from my M1730 now...

Fedex tried to deliver my laptop yesterday, but I was at work and my wife had just left the house to do some errands. Fortunately she was home today when they delivered it.

I hooked it up and booted it up to find that they had installed Windows Vista Ultimate 32-bit (remember that they said they needed to replace the hard drive). My laptop originally came with Windows XP plus a Vista upgrade disc, but I decided to stick with XP. I'll probably be lazy and stay with Vista this time (at least for a while) since my XP install was getting crusty anyways and Vista recognizes the full 4GB of RAM in my system, but I still have a backup of my old XP partition in case I get too annoyed and decide to go back. Got a 5.1 Experience Index score out of the box - not sure how that ranks.

Anyways, I of course immediately checked the LCD panel info in the device manager. Turns out they installed an SEC5443, which I believe is the Samsung panel. I brought up my test image (they sent my CD-R back to me with the laptop) and everything looks perfect other than some slight dithering/graininess in the greys at the bottom of the XPS logo. I'm quite happy that they managed to make things right for me.

Now I need to decide if I should call and see about getting my warranty extended in the next week Also need to get this Vista install configured/updated...

 

So there's a chance Dell admits about the bad coloring issue of the LG panel?
I can try to explain tech support I want the Samsung or Sharp panel, but I think it'll be no use. I really don't want to invite a tech with the risk they sent him with a different LG to my home.

 

The process I had to go through was to have a field tech install 2 bad LG panels, then the email support rep decided to ship my laptop to a Dell repair depot to have Dell techs look at it there. I included a CD-R with my test image, along with a printed paper note asking to have a non-LG panel installed and listing the Samsung and Sharp model numbers for reference.

Anyone at Dell that you might be able to get a hold of on the phone or via email etc. will have no knowledge of any kind regarding LCD panel brands and/or models used by Dell. All they know is the single Dell part/kit number that covers any/all in-stock panel models with the same size and resolution that can be installed in a specific model of laptop. I don't imagine that there's any way to go through the process any faster or less painfully than I just did.

 

I will start this issue tech support after 1-2 weeks when I've more time to spare. I hope they don't have the LG anymore spare in stock.

 

I think the problem is that they have more LG than anything else because they're cheaper, lower-quality panels. They try to install them first whenever anyone has an LCD panel issue because it's a cost-savings for Dell, then they install the good ones for people who complain enough.

 

I see. So it'll be a very interesting time to come....

 

The Samsung monitor has a really beautiful picture. Normally I have to calibrate/adjust monitors but the Samsung really didnt need much adjusting.
It really seems as good or better than my Studio 17 with the RGB LED type screen which is LG.

 

Interestingly, the nVidia control panel reports the SEC5443 as a Seiko brand display rather than Samsung. But yeah it is definitely much, much better than the LG. I might play with calibrating it, but the gradients on my test image showed up really good and even so I don't think I'll bother unless I get bored.

BTW, the best software calibration tool I've found is CLTest: Google Translate

The only problem with CLTest is that it sucks at making its profiles stick. I had to hand-convert its results to Monitor Calibration Wizard format (using a hex editor and OpenOffice's knock-off of Excel) and use MCW to enforce the profile for me. I think it may be possible to have PowerStrip capture CLTest's gamma ramp and then enforce it, but I couldn't quite get that to work when I tried.

 

Oh yea I remember a couple of years ago the Seiko mentioned. If I remember right the original 1730 came with the Samsung panel and then they changed it to the Seiko but left the SEC5443. Think it was zfactor who was getting into this.

You have to remember Dell gets these panels from different manufacturers in like a panel lottery. They really dont know or care which panel goes into the notebook and tech support would not normally be aware. This has also happened on the Dell larger desktop monitors even to a more extreme where they used IPS type panels (best quality) and then changed to the cheaper TN type panels on the same model monitor. It got so bad with complaints they they stoped listing the part number of the panel. There is a big PQ difference between TN and IPS panels. You cannot even get them on laptop computers anymore.................too expensive.

 

Yeah, it's definitely tons better than the LG though and maybe slightly grainier than the Sharp I had before.

I thanked the Dell email support rep for helping me to get my issue resolved, and asked him what other M1730 owners with LG panels could do to get them replaced more easily than I did. Here was his response:

So I would tell them that you have an LG LPL0032 panel with the same issues as case number 816760478 and that you would like to schedule a depot repair to have it exchanged with a non-LG panel.

 

+1 rep
Thanks for this info. You're the man.

 

This is hilarious:

Finally got a call back from the "corporate office" guy with the Indian accent. He wanted to inform me that he did some research and determined that Dell had no replacement LCD panels in stock except for the brand that the field tech installed twice. I immediately shot back: "well that's definitely not possible, as I just got my laptop back from the repair depot and it has a different brand of panel in it now!"

This caught him off-guard a bit, but he then tried to tell me that he didn't check what was available at the repair depot. I asked him why he didn't suggest a depot repair when we talked before, and his actual excuse was that "depot repairs are a 7-10 day downtime, and most people wouldn't want to wait that long." Well thanks for informing me of my options and letting me make my own decision!

At that point I cut off the conversation and told him that it didn't matter because my issue had already been resolved by the depot repair. He went through his script of how he'll be sending me an email to record that he had contacted me etc.


The only reason I ever talked to this guy is because I found a link somewhere on this forum to an online "unresolved complaint" form on Dell's web site. I would suggest that people NOT use that form unless they're desperate, because it seems that it just gets you a call from someone who's sole job is to aggravate people and then blow them off.

So far Dell's email support has been my best experience with trying to get the company to resolve hardware-related issues.



Edit: SEC5443 panel is still working well. Slightly grainy with a slight amount of bluish backlight bleed along the bottom of the screen (probably the depot people only put 2 screws in the panel again like the field tech said they did last time). I'm pretty happy with it, though, which is good because my warranty just expired before I got a chance to try extending it.