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Hi Everyone,

I've been lurking here for a while and I'd like to thank everyone for all the helpful information I've gotten along the way. I've finally come across an issue that I need a little guidance on though, so I've created an account to post my question and share this experience in case it can help anyone else.

I have a Samsung 61" DLP TV, Model HLM617WX/XAA. This TV was bought back in March of 2003 so it's pretty old but it's served me very well. Until recently, the only problem that I had with it was a lamp that burnt out about 2 weeks before the 1 year warranty ran up, so I was able to get that replaced for free. About a month ago though, I had the lamp go out again (it was obviously burnt out) so I ordered a new one and replaced that. I don't watch a huge amount of TV, but still I'm pretty happy with getting almost 6 years out of the last bulb especially when the first one burnt out in less than a year.

Anyway, the new lamp worked fine for about a week, but then the TV started having trouble starting up. It would go through this process where it would sound like it was starting up, the fans would kick on and everything would sound normal, but after about 45-60 seconds, the lamp would not turn on and everything would shutdown again. The TV would seem to pause for about 10-15 seconds and then repeat that process again. It would go through this process 3 times before it would finally give up completely and all 3 led's on the front of the TV would start to flash.

I called the co. I bought the lamp from and he said that it's rare, but sometimes they have a bad lamp, so he agreed to send a new one. It is a Philips lamp in case anyone was curious. The second lamp then did the same thing. It worked for about a week, then decided to quit on me with the same behaviour. The lamp looks absolutely fine, but it won't kick on.

I had someone look at it and I've done a lot of reading and we're convinced it is the lamp ballast. It does not make any clicking sound on startup at all and the color wheel looks/sounds good. Again, after all of the reading on here, I figure this is something I can take care of myself and I've already removed the old ballast. But now I'm searching on line to order a new one and I'm not sure what is the correct one to get. The old one has some markings on it but nothing that matches any of the model numbers I see.

I found the following website that lists the lamp and ballast models for Samsung TVs:

http://www.ercservice.com/lamps/samsung.html

But if you look there, you'll see two different models of ballast for the HLM617X. They are BP47-00003A or BP47-00016A. Depending on which field I use, I get different results for which ballast to get. For example, if I go by the serial number, it looks like I should be getting the 16A. If I go by the lamp listed on the TV (there is a sticker on the side that specifies which lamp), then I should get the 03A.

Can anyone tell me for certain which one I should get? Different websites list significantly different prices for these 2 parts also.

Here is the info I have:

Model: HLM617WX/XAA
Serial: ??HW200???? *
Lamp: BP96-00224B(0) **

* This is just my paranoia and it probably doesn't matter, but I only listed what I thought were the relevant parts of the serial #.

** As listed on the sticker on the side of the TV.

Note that the newest bulb replacement that I received was actually the 224J. It is the version with the single rectangular brown plug though, not the two separate prongs. When I ordered it, the guy actually called me to make sure which plug type I needed.

Any help is greatly appreciated! I think that is everything. Let me know if you have any questions or need any additional information.

Thanks and sorry for the long winded post!

Ungrim

Whoaaa!!! Did you ever find a lofty price site.

From the research I've done, the two different ballast numbers coincide with bulb wattage. One for a 135W and the other for 120W. The bulb you have is 120W, therefore I would assume you want the BP47-00016A and get it at a REASONABLE price here:

http://www.partstore.com/Part/Samsung/S ... 50L3HRXXAX

BTW, did the "J" bullb install OK? Some sites listed your TV for it, but several others did not. the "B" seemed to be the universal fit.

Thanks for responding. I think I'm getting more confused.

Yeah, I had noticed that their prices were pretty out there compared to other sites I had seen and I definitely wasn't planning on purchasing from them. I was just looking at the information they had up.

The "J" bulb installed fine and worked for a little while with no problems until one day it just wouldn't turn on any more and went through the symptoms that I originally described.

I initially was thinking the BP47-00016A as well, but every picture I've found of that part looks different than mine and looks like it has the dual pronged plug, not the single rectangular plug like my current TV has.

After I posted yesterday, I did some more searching and finally found a picture of the BP47-00003A.

The 03A picture I found is here:

http://www.samsungparts.com/part_detail ... 7%2D00003A

And a 16A picture for comparison is here:

http://www.samsungparts.com/part_detail ... h%5Fmodel=

(Note this site still is a little more expensive than others I've found such as the parts store that you pointed to, but it's the only one I found so far showing pics of the 03A).

The picture of the 03A actually looks almost exactly like the one in my TV. You can see from the larger pictures that the 03A has the single rectangular plug but the larger picture of the 16A looks like it has the dual pronged plug.

As for the wattage, the original bulb that burned out definitely says 120 on it, not 135 and it worked for almost 6 years.

Looking closer as I type this, I can see that even the sticker in the upper right corner on the larger 03A picture from that link matches exactly what the one on my current TV says (PT VIP 120AC/380 01 - Made in Germany - OSRAM).

So I'm assuming now that the 03A is the one I need but I guess I'm looking for a little confirmation. Would it being rated for 135W be a problem since the bulb is actually 120W? What do you think?

Unfortunately, the 03A appears to be about twice as much as the 16A at any site I've found it at.

Thanks again! Whatever I end up doing, I'll be sure to post my results in case anyone else comes across this issue.

Ungrim

What replacement lamp did you get the first time?

My theory, is that your 135w ballast blew out your 120w bulb. Could be why they started putting in the 16A. Since you need a new bulb again, I would get the 16A ballast and the Phillips B bulb. The watt-ages should match, IMO. Go to Discount Merchant for the bulb.

The previous lamp has a sticker that says on it: OSRAM 120W BP96-00224B

So this lamp was the "B" lamp, but it still says it's a 120W lamp. And as I mentioned, this lamp worked for almost 6 years before it recently burnt out. I could be wrong, but I thought both the "B" and the "J" were essentially the same 120W lamps.

I actually didn't go into all of the details (cause I didn't think they were relevant and as you can see, I'm already too verbose), but there is a little more info that makes me think the lamp is ok. Here is the full chain of events leading to where I am now:

1. 6 year old lamp 120W 224B lamp burn out (I could see broken glass inside the bulb).

2. Bought new Phillips 120W 224J lamp (with brown rectangular plug) to replace it. Salesman told me this was the right replacement.

3. TV worked for about a week then one day wouldn't work as described in the original post. (Note that there was no visibile signs of damage or outage on the new bulb.)

4. Got the new lamp replaced with another 224J lamp. Again, lamp worked for about a week then stopped working.

Here's the new info I didn't mention. At this point, given what I was seeing, I thought maybe it was a contact issue and maybe the new bulb case wasn't lining up quite right. So I decided to try something before calling the guy again. I took the new bulb out of the new case and put it in the old case of my old lamp. I was very careful to not touch the bulb and wore rubber gloves and all that. Once I put it all back together, I put the lamp in the TV and then it worked again! In fact this time, it worked for about a month and a half before it quit working again. So the lamp was still good, but something else was going on.

With all that said, my next question is this: As you (Kentb53) suggest, is it ok to replace what I have with the 16A ballast? As you say, I guess I would need a new bulb too because of the connector. But is there any other electronic difference between the two that might cause issues in other parts of the TV? Also, I can't really tell from the pictures online, but it almost appears to be a different size (smaller) board than the one I have and if the mount holes don't match up, I'd be screwed there too, right?

My ballast board is 5 7/8" x 2 3/8" with the mounting holes about 3/16" in from each edge on the 4 corners. I don't know what the likelyhood that someone would have a 16A handy to measure, but I suppose it doesn't hurt to ask...

Anyway, sorry for the long posts and thanks for reading.

Ungrim

Both the alternate ballast and bulb are spec'd for your set. After the first few months of production, they changed the ballast and bulb ( I got that from going further into the "lofty" site of your first post). They got rid of the Osram designed ballast and bulbs. I have done a close visual comparison and their geometry looks the same. Might as well "step up" to how the majority of those sets were made, not to mention matching ballast and bulb wattage. Call Discount Merchant. If anyone knows, they do.

Ok, I'm going to go ahead and order the 16A ballast and a new lamp with the two pin connector that the 16A uses. I'll post here how things go once I get these parts and install them. Since the newer ballast is much cheaper, I will end up not spending much more to get the additional bulb than if I had bought the other ballast. And since I'm hoping that my current bulb is really still ok, I'll have a spare that I can physically transfer into the new lamp frame when this one later burns out. (At least that "lofty" site says the two lamps use the same bulb and really only differ by the connector. So I'll keep my fingers crossed.)

Thanks again for the advice. I appreciate your time.

Ungrim

Let us know how it goes.

Well, bad news for me. There are two connectors on the lamp ballast and the secondary (smaller) connector on the 16A is different than the one on my original lamp ballast. On the 16A, it is a 5 pin connector. On mine, it is a 3pin connector. So I assume that the 03A must be the 3 pin.

Oh well, it was worth a shot. Now I have to return/exchange the 16A for the 03A. I'll post a follow up once I get the 03A on how everything goes.

Ungrim

UngrimIronfist wrote:Well, bad news for me. There are two connectors on the lamp ballast and the secondary (smaller) connector on the 16A is different than the one on my original lamp ballast. On the 16A, it is a 5 pin connector. On mine, it is a 3pin connector. So I assume that the 03A must be the 3 pin.

Oh well, it was worth a shot. Now I have to return/exchange the 16A for the 03A. I'll post a follow up once I get the 03A on how everything goes.

Ungrim

Darn!!!

Well, I finally received the 3A ballast the other day and put everything back together last night. The one problem I had was that since I had ordered the new lamp to go with the other ballast, the connector now didn't match. So I had two choices: a) send the lamp back and order the one with the right connector or b) swap the bulb from the new lamp cage to the old lamp cage. (I suppose a 3rd option would have been to just swap the connector, but I didn't think of that until later.) With my patience running out, I went with option b). I invalidated the warranty when I removed the sticker from the new lamp cage, but at this point I didn't care.

The good news is that it works! Of course, the last time I got a new bulb it only worked for about a week, but hopefully this fixes the root problem.

One thing I did learn (which I’m sure I would have known had I read this site more) is that you probably shouldn’t lay the TV face down on the carpet. I originally did this when I first took everything apart to get to the ballast because it appeared that back panel wouldn’t come off without doing so. But it turns out that I just didn’t realize how it fit together and I really didn’t need to do that. Anyway, when I first got it working last night, I noticed a discolored patch about 2” in diameter near the bottom of the screen on the left that I’m assuming was somehow related to this. My first thought was that I did all this for nothing and I’ve screwed up my TV trying to save some money but after about 15 minutes, it went away and hasn’t returned. Hopefully, this isn’t a sign of some other issue.

Thanks for your help! I’m hoping this TV will last me a while yet till I’m ready to upgrade to some new 3D holographic technology that is just around the corner…

Ungrim

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