The dreaded black screen of death (BSOD?) has struck your Vizio flat screen and you are cursing Vizio to the heavens. Your warranty has lapsed and the Vizio help line is of no help at all. What to do, what to do?
Is your TV now scrap? Hold on, don’t be too hasty. If it’s really the BSOD then there is hope yet. The BSOD is a very well-documented Vizio TV problem online and we found a few things you can try before making the final decision to throw away your TV.
Isolating the Likely Cause
The most common cause for black screen of death is a faulty power supply board but it may be caused by other issues like a faulty inverter board or solder connections, faulty T-Con boards, etc. See a related post discussing how to repair T-Con boards and about a fix for a Vizio TV having no pictures but have sound (one cause discussed in that article is faulty solder connections between the driver board and the main board). You may perform the following checks to narrow down the possible causes:
- Check the connections and power. Do a “cold boot” by turning off the TV and unplugging. Wait a few moments before plugging in and turning it back on. If that doesn’t do it, proceed to the next step.
- Check if there is sound by turning on the unit and tuning in to a channel or streaming a video that you are certain will have sound. Make sure that the volume is turned up. If there is sound, then power is feeding into your TV and is functioning, albeit not completely.
- Check if the LED/LCD screen is actually working by shining a flashlight onto the screen while a video is streaming/running. If you see images upon pointing the light, then we might have inverter board issues (aside from possible power board issues). The backlight inverter board controls the lighting which makes the images created by the LED/LCD actually appear on the screen. Watch the video below discussing how to repair the power supply and backlight inverter boards for a specific Vizio model (should be applicable to other models but consult with the manufacturers or technical experts when in doubt). Also see related post on replacing the LED backlights on a Vizio LCD TV.
And here’s another video that walks you through fixing the backlight inverter on a Vizio model E470i-A0 flat screen. These videos are courtesy of ShopJimmy.com.
Remember that if you are performing the parts replacement yourself, be sure to take the necessary precautions. If you are having difficulties, consider sending it in for professional servicing.
My Vizio D40F-G9 TV’s screen went blank, but the flashlight test described in this article showed that there was a faint image on the screen. So, I replaced the main power/inverter board as recommended, but I still have the same problem. Any other suggestions?
Having a problem with our Visio. It was acting fine last night, got home tried to turn it on, now all its doing is the flashing it does when it updates. Won’t turn off or on.
My Vizio Model E50-C1 starts to power up by pushing the power button on the remote. The red power light on the TV comes on for about 2 seconds before slowly fading away. The TV never turns on. I am having trouble finding a computer/TV repair shop willing to tackle the repair. I’m so hesitant to throw away a “decent” piece of electronics. Can you offer any suggestions?
The timeframe regarding the update side effect makes sense as it started happening on the morning of the 11th. What if I have already followed the advice on another side and did a hard factory reset? That may have eliminated any software update.
My TV kept blinking to black then finally went dark. I can still hear the channels and at an angle I can see faintly the channel? What do I do
TRY THIS! If you can press and hold the mute button on the remote for about five seconds and then release it and press the return button and the picture reappears, the problem is NOT a hardware problem, it IS a software problem. (One of their supposed improvement updates has a side effect in it causing this problem!)
You can overcome it by going into your menu and selecting PICTURE.
First: Select “Standard” from all the picture mode options and then tone down the “Backlight” from 100% to about 75%.
Second: Select “More Picture” and toggle (turn ON) “Clear Action”.
This will have to be done for each and every input you use (HDMI 1 through HDMI 4) Smartcast, etc.
This should fix the problem until someone on their programming staff finds and repairs the side effect they launched in their software update.
How did you find this software fix.? You saved me from buying a new TV.
I have the 50″ vizio d50x-g9. I had the same issue and pressing/holding the mute button then the return button worked. BUT I do not have the toggle Clear Action option under More Picture. Is there any other way to overcome this software problem?
Your advice was spot on that fixed my TV thank you sir I appreciate it I’m surprise that I couldn’t find this on any Vizio website
Lightning struck near my house blowing out light bulbs and Visio tv. All power was lost for several hours. TV was not turned on at time, but will not work now. It turns on but has no picture or sound. What to do?