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I am having some problems with my Samsung HLS6187WX/XAA and was hoping that someone could help me diagnose the issue.

Over the past several months the TV has started shutting itself off. This would only happen immediately after turning the TV on. At first, it only happened on occasion, and I was able to wait 5-10 minutes and then it would work. Now the TV does it every time it is turned on and there is now way to get it to stay on.

Here's what happens:

-Press power and the TV turns on as normal w/ audio and video (picture quality looks fine)
-After about 20 seconds the lamp turns off (audio continues)
-After about 5 seconds w/ only audio the TV completely shuts down and I get 3 flashing lights on the front panel.

I tried replacing the ballast, but it didn't help.
I have checked the blue safety cut-off switch.
The lamp looks ok. No apparent signs of damage or wear. However, it is the original lamp (from 3/07) and it gets heavy usage (8+ hours/day on average).
The fans all appear to be working.
I tried to reset the lamp counter, but the TV does not stay on long enough. I was able to get in the menu long enough to see that the counter said 0 hours. Not sure why that is the case.

Any clues as to what could be the problem? Lamp would be my first guess. But since it looks ok (physically) and when the video does play it looks just fine, I am hesistant to spend $180+ on a new lamp just to find out that's not the problem.

The problem you mentioned can have one of the following possibilities:
1) Lamp
2) Ballast
3) Power Supply

In Samsung televisions if there is no picture coming up (i.e. lamp does not ignite) then the audio will turn off too. Now to diagnose the TV, the first bet is always on lamp which is almost as issue with this kind of problem.

You can also try to check the condition of a lamp by physically looking at the lamp. Look at the top edge joint where a wire from outside is connected. If you find some white fuzz around that, then most likely it’s a lamp. This is one of the ways to detect if lamp is bad.

If it does not solve your problem then I believe it’s a power supply issue since you already tried to replace the ballast.

I would recommend replacing the lamp, which seems to be most economical option too. Hopefully it should solve your problem but even if it does not you can have a spare lamp which you will need it for sure looking at your tv usage.You find the original lamp at very cheap price here:



Please note the original lamp for this model is Philips. Do not buy other lamp brand which may cause other TV part go bad.

I hope it helps. Let us know how it goes or if you have any other questions or comments.

That perfectly a relevant question and I should have addressed that earlier.. my bad ;)

Actually its quite normal when the lamp started to go bad. The lamp contains mercury which dissipate over time. So in the layman terms, when you turn on the lamp it can not maintain the current as there is not enough power to maintain the ignite. This is why you are getting image at first but after a while tv gets shut down once the lamp heats up. And eventually it will stop igniting at all.

I hope this shed some light on your question.

Just wanted to post an update. I replaced the lamp and now everything seems to be working just fine! I was skeptical that the lamp was the problem since I was still getting a picture before the TV shut itself off, but I was wrong. It was the lamp the whole time. Sooo happy to have my TV back!

Thanks for all your help!!!