Will the black bars on the sides of regular programming harm my LCD TV or cause burn in?

The owner's manuel recommends not watching non-HD programming with the black bars on the sides of the screen. However, watching non-HD programming in full screen mode will distort the picture. Will the original square picture with the black bars cause any type of burn in? Why would the LCD TV have the feature of a 4:3 or square screen if it was harmful to the TV? Thanks.

Will the black bars on the sides of regular programming harm my LCD TV or cause burn in?
LCDs don't get burn in but they do get image retention. Burn in is permanent, image retention is temporary.


The side bars will appear to stay on the screen if you watch this non HD programming for multiple hours. It will not harm the TV but may cause an inconvenience or annoyance until the screen resets and the bars go away. Normally about 15 minutes of full screen viewing will get rid of it.
Reply:Black on your screen ( any type ) is simply the screen that is not illuminated at all so there is nothing to burn the screen that is black , experiment !! cover the part of the screen that is lit up and just look at the black portion , it will look the same as when the TV is urned off !!!!


The warning from the owners manual about the size of the picture is to do with the voltages that are generated with diff size of picture !


Cheers Pete
Reply:Plasmas suffer from screen burn LCD's do not.
Reply:I believe burn in only occurs after long periods of the same thing being there, without the screen being turned off - e.g. watermarks on the screen while watching 3-day cricket.


I wouldn't worry hugely. As long as you don't leave the TV on non-stop, and you watch some stuff without black bars now and then, it shouldn't be a huge problem.