Samsung TV dims screen on dark scenes

OddOneOut · September 13, 2023

I'm very surprised that there's almost no discussion regarding the issue I'm about to report. I recently bought a T5300 Samsung TV, I'm from South America, so I guess here it would be considered a mid-tier TV.

Upon initial setup, I noticed that the overall brightness of the screen changed depending on how bright or dark the scene was, and it did so in a gradual way (I'd say between 1/2 and 1 second).

I thought this could be a "feature" of some kind, so I referred to the manual and found that there's an eco mode that could cause the TV to change its brightness depending on the lighting of the room, but that was disabled, and changing that setting didn't produce any result.

I've never seen a TV behave that way and to me it was extremely notorious, distracting and annoying, so I sent it to the warranty service, where, according to them, they replaced the panel, but while testing it I noticed that the issue was still there. The technician came, saw the behavior and said that's how the TV was supposed to work and there was no failure and all they could do was raise the case to Samsung.

I took the TV back home and did some further testing, and I noticed that if I plugged my PC through HDMI to the TV, then it would behave as expected with no dimming.

One weird thing is that I also have a Fire TV Stick, and even though it also works with HDMI, it still dimmed the screen regardless of the streaming service I was using.

I went to the store and tested other Samsung TVs and they all presented this issue, but other brands like LG didn't, even when they were in the same price range.

So, I'm curious why this hasn't been reported by more people and why Samsung would force this behavior when the screen is clearly capable of not changing the brightness, just as you'd expect.

If anyone has a similar model Samsung TV and wants to test this out, I'd recommend the credits section of this YouTube video, just because in there the behavior is very evident, but it basically affects any night or dark scene, to the point where white becomes gray.

I'd appreciate your feedback on this.

Applefreak · September 13, 2023

26 minutes ago, OddOneOut said:

I'm very surprised that there's almost no discussion regarding the issue I'm about to report. I recently bought a T5300 Samsung TV, I'm from South America, so I guess here it would be considered a mid-tier TV.

Upon initial setup, I noticed that the overall brightness of the screen changed depending on how bright or dark the scene was, and it did so in a gradual way (I'd say between 1/2 and 1 second).

I thought this could be a "feature" of some kind, so I referred to the manual and found that there's an eco mode that could cause the TV to change its brightness depending on the lighting of the room, but that was disabled, and changing that setting didn't produce any result.

I've never seen a TV behave that way and to me it was extremely notorious, distracting and annoying, so I sent it to the warranty service, where, according to them, they replaced the panel, but while testing it I noticed that the issue was still there. The technician came, saw the behavior and said that's how the TV was supposed to work and there was no failure and all they could do was raise the case to Samsung.

I took the TV back home and did some further testing, and I noticed that if I plugged my PC through HDMI to the TV, then it would behave as expected with no dimming.

One weird thing is that I also have a Fire TV Stick, and even though it also works with HDMI, it still dimmed the screen regardless of the streaming service I was using.

I went to the store and tested other Samsung TVs and they all presented this issue, but other brands like LG didn't, even when they were in the same price range.

So, I'm curious why this hasn't been reported by more people and why Samsung would force this behavior when the screen is clearly capable of not changing the brightness, just as you'd expect.

If anyone has a similar model Samsung TV and wants to test this out, I'd recommend the credits section of this YouTube video, just because in there the behavior is very evident, but it basically affects any night or dark scene, to the point where white becomes gray.

I'd appreciate your feedback on this.

You have two features that alter image quality, something called contrast enhancer and HDR, try to turn both off. I don't have a TV like that so I am just guessing here.

OddOneOut · September 13, 2023

3 minutes ago, Applefreak said:

You have two features that alter image quality, something called contrast enhancer and HDR, try to turn both off. I don't have a TV like that so I am just guessing here.

I appreciate your reply, but I tried every possible image setting in the menu and nothing changed. I'm aware of a "secret menu" that's accessed by pressing a button sequence in the remote control (mute + 1 + 8 + 2 + power), but I didn't want to mess with those settings as it may void my warranty.

Andrewtst · September 13, 2023

3 hours ago, OddOneOut said:

T5300

All Samsung TV always turn on the local dimming even the TV is only coming with edge dimming. It is very aggressive which make the brightness reduce a lot to compensate the pure black look.

I had the AU7000 model which also having the same issue.

3 hours ago, OddOneOut said:

they replaced the panel, but while testing it I noticed that the issue was still there

It is Samsung design issue, all is like that.

2 hours ago, OddOneOut said:

I'm aware of a "secret menu" that's accessed by pressing a button sequence in the remote control (mute + 1 + 8 + 2 + power)

This is the only way to disable the local dimming (edge dimming). After disable, it looks far better with nice brightness but of course the cons is black became gray.

OddOneOut · September 13, 2023

Thank you so much for your answer. It's good to know that I'm not the only one that sees this as a problem.

I'm still impressed that there aren't more people complaining about this.

I'm now trying to get the store to exchange it for an LG one, but if it turns out that's not possible I'll probably mess with that secret menu.

Again, I know that it's not a hardware limitation as it works just as I expected when I connected it to my computer, but it seems more like a software issue. It amazes me they handle it this way. I much rather have gray blacks with a steady brightness than gray whites with constant brightness variations. They should at least give the users that option.

I appreciate your response.