How do Identify Generic Lamps

A series of false, cloned Philips lamps have appeared on the market recently. These lamps are refurbished and/or rebuilt with cheap components from third party manufacturers, yet they preserve the original Philips badge…further confusing buyers out there! These are NOT from Philips! Again, we stress the importance of purchasing replacement lamps from authorized distributors!

Just a few days ago someone brought a lamp to the shop, telling me that he just got it from the web for a cheap price. Problem was, the lamp stopped working after a few days. Customer was getting the three blinking lights on his Samsung DLP TV. He just bought the lamp so he was hesitate about assuming a manufacturer’s defect. Upon closer look, the lamp had a strange squar-shaped glass at the front. Luckily he had his original Philips lamp and he quickly noticed the differences. Only upon close examination was it very obvious that it wasn’t made by Philips.

Why would Philips place a square glass on a round lamp??? No, they didn’t, and they wouldn’t!

See what I mean…

So let’s take a closer look at these “refurbished” lamps. The original from glass has removed, the original burner (or filament) was removed only sparing the reflector. While the lamp theoretically has a new burner and a new front glass, this in no way compares to the original Philips product!

Philips uses a patented pending technology on the filament. Not only are these burners created by very expensive machinery, they are also aligned by laser guided robotic “arms.” Most generic lamp manufactures do not have the capital or necessary R&D to develop these machinery, and so their installations are done by hand, one by one. As a result, generic installations of the burner can never match the original in quality.

It’s fine and dandy to sell a generic product, lots of companies out there do it (and we’re here to point out these companies), but these guys crossed the line when they deceit the consumer on purpose by leaving the Philips trademark logo intact. This company is misleading consumers into thinking they are buying an original Philips product for a slightly lower price. If a price is too good to be true, it’s usually a scam. Only trust authorized Philips Dealers!

With consumers being short on cash these days, some companies are trying to take advantage. Ultimately it is the consumer who ends up paying more because their bulb has a shorter lifespan, hence, they have to replace them more often. I’ll say it again, only buy from authorized Philips Distributors.

The end result….be a smart shopper and do your homework. Spending an extra 5 minutes getting the nitty gritty details can save you a lot of headaches down the line.

To buy ORIGINAL PHILIPS Lamps please visit http://www.discount-merchant.com

Here are the photos of the lamps side by side so you can judge for yourself.

This is a close-up shot of the front glass and reflector. Though this is a poor image (sorry!), you can see the reflector is not in the best condition (specs of the mirror material has come off), and the front glass is not the original.

Here are the two lamps side by side…the Philips original on the bottom right, and the generic “Philips” on the top left.

This is the generic “Philips” E23 100/120 1.0 bulb…image speaks for itself.

I’m not sure if the store is dropping the price or if they will require a coupon code.
This is a great opportunity to stock up for your Samsung or RCA DLP TV. If you’ve got one of these TVs, chances are you’ll need a new lamp in the next year or two…Why not purchase a couple so you’ll never have to worry about this problem again! Bargains like this are hard to come by!

More details to come!!!

• Generic lamps sold online by a number of vendors today should be considered counterfeit when sellers deliberately mislead consumers with claims to "OEM" or "Genuine Original" when in fact the are knock offs. There are many of these generic lamp e-tailers popping up daily… it’s a disease that needs to be stopped! We will show you the questions to ask and how to confirm you are receiving a genuine product!
• Brand name lamps, marketed and sold, again, as the “original” lamp for your particular TV. Just because an aftermarket lamp has a brand name stamped on it does not qualify it as an original part number for your TV. Your television was engineered with consideration from the ORIGINAL lamp supplier and the TV manufacturer. Engineers from both companies worked hand in hand to fine tune your picture. What does all this mean?

EXAMPLE: lets use for example a Samsung DLP TV, model HLS4666W TV. The original lamp part number is BP96-01472A. This part, when purchased directly from Samsung at about $199.99 includes the plastic case (sometimes referred to as the enclosure, assembly, housing, etc.) and the actual lamp. The lamp this TV originally shipped with out of Samsung’s factory was manufactured by Philips. The replacement part number BP96-01472A shipped from the Samsung Parts Factory is also a Philips. There are vendors out there that claim to sell the original lamp for your TV at deep discounted prices… this is a sign something is not right.

• The competition is hot and it’s only heating up higher. Generic companies are trying to figure out ways to gain a piece of the market share and there is nothing they will not consider to get it! As are copies of brand name sunglasses, watches, purses, and so forth, copycats have realized the market potential of replacement lamps (more on this below). What’s stopping a third party lamp manufacture from stamping “Philips” on their lamps and introducing them into the marketplace? Nothing really. Philips doesn’t have a world police as every dock examining every product that’s shipping off international ports. If the clothing industry cannot prevent fraud and copycats I would imagine lamps would have similar problems. All the more reason to purchase lamps from authorized and legitimate distributors, not just a fly-by-night company with the best price working out of their garage importing generic product!

Where do these bogus vendors sell?

• eBay is a common breeding ground…as are fly-by-night brand-spankin’ new ecommerce stores. They claim to ship you original parts at deep discounted prices, often times over $100 less than the manufacturer! For a part that retails less than $200, something is wrong when an e-tailers claims this folks, watch out.
• Heavy marketers – some of these fly-by-night merchants are investing literally thousands of dollars a day on advertising [to be blunt] their crappy merchandise. And they really do need these advertising campaigns to trick uninformed consumers into their scams. Search for Samsung BP96-01472A lamp, you’ll see a lot of these scammers on paid google search results. These guys are battling out through pricing competitions on a daily basis…ultimately they will lose any credibility if they’ve had any when consumers realize what is going on.

What do these bogus vendors sell?

• More often than not, cheap, generic lamps. These are made by a handful of manufactures, mostly in Taiwan and mainland China. Factories seem to be popping up as these realize the market potential of this industry.
• Branded lamps – Venders often claims they are selling an Original Equipment Manufacture (OEM) product. While a lamp may be OEM for one product, this does NOT make it an OEM product across the board! I.E., if a Samsung lamp is manufactured by Philips, that does not necessarily mean that a different Sony TV’s OEM lamp is Philips (in this case, both Samsung and Sony depend on Philips as the OEM, but that’s beside the point). There are third party lamp manufacturers that are insisting to sell original lamp by marketing them as OEM. This is a lie and deceitful!

Why do consumers need to be wary of these third-party and counterfeit products?

• Rear Projection TV’s (RPTVs) were manufactured by collaboration efforts between many different companies. Texas Instruments (TI) was instrumental in creating the DLP Technology and the DLP chip that spawned this revolution of TVs and Projectors. Philips has been a huge part of the movement as the inventor of the UHP lamp technology used across the world today. With these two main partners are the OEM product manufactures, such as Samsung, Sony, Toshiba, Panasonic, etc. It is collaboration through these companies that resulted in RPTV and Front Projection (FT) projectors.

As this is the case, these companies have spent countless hours perfecting their innovations to work together seamlessly. These companies have spent millions upon millions of dollars on Research and Development (R&D) to not only created and perfect their technologies, but to mesh all the this technology together.

When a third-party manufacture enters the marketplace, there are a lot of disadvantages at play…and that is a whole other discussion there…

• Often times third-party products (including lamps) can VOID your manufacturer’s warranty and lead to premature failure of other components inside your TV set! Your DLP is “driven” or powered on by a “lamp driver” or a “ballast” This ballast has been engineered as the bridge between the TV manufacturer (Samsung for example) and the lamp manufacturer (Philips for example). To ensure proper ignition, continuous voltage, and a healthy long life, the ballast and lamp are matched together.
• With a generic or third-party lamp, you are committing yourself to buying an inferior product! Spending $5, $10, or $15 extra on an original part versus a generic/third-party should be a no-brainer when you’ve got a lot more to lose than a few bucks! More on this to come, this has already become longer than it should be.

What should consumers do to protect themselves?

• Always buy from reputable, AUTHORIZED dealers.
• Check to see how long the company has been in business.
• Check affiliations
• Compare pricing with competitors (if you see a vendor that’s extremely cheap, but has limited quantity, that’s a red flag)
• Call the company to check them out and ask questions

Overall, there was not much that the set went wrong with and will not matter much during daily viewing. The reds produced by the set seemed to be a lot more oversaturated. The Philips 55PP9701 was exceptionally good with the high definition broadcasts as well as DVD’s. The remote is a bit of trouble as only a few of the buttons light up and may take a while to learn where all the buttons are. Apart from the minor complaints, the performance of the set is fantastic and does not disappoint at all.

Discount-Merchant.com is among the nation’s largest plasma and LCD TVs replacement parts providers. If you need replacement PCBs, remotes, outer cases, stands, or anything else related to Plasma and LCD TV’s, visit Discount-Merchant.com.