it’s been several years now and with all of the heavy tv watching that i’ve done, i decided to go into the service menu and see how many hours of tv i have watched. it turns out that i’ve watched over 3800 hours of tv with this bulb. they say that the average lamp life of a samsung dlp tv is between 2000-4000 hours. kind of a big range there, eh? well, the brightness of the lamp has significantly decreased and it looks like it’s time to replace the bulb. i’m going to try to do the lamp install myself, it doesn’t look like it is that complicated. pictures to follow when i do it! i found the lamp for sale on ebay for considerably cheaper than other stores online. if you need to buy a DLP lamp, try ebay!1
this brings up the big question about whether or not i should buy a new tv or just get the lamp replaced. the problem is that i have a tv cubby the exact size of my current 46″ TV. the cubby makes it difficult to put a flat screen tv on the wall, so i think that it makes the most sense to just replace the bulb for $120 instead of buying a new $900 tv. besides, i should save my money towards the projector that i’m going to get. ah, yes, the joys of the projector will soon be realized. i can’t wait!
i haven’t made the projector order yet, i wasn’t able to place the order before i went on the camping trip and now i just don’t know why i’m shy about pulling the trigger. i think that i’ve done all of the research that i need to do and i’m pretty confident about my decision. i’m excited.
- i used a seller called river valley electronics [↩]