Samsung and Best Buy hit with class-action lawsuit over TVs — what you need to know
Samsung and Best Buy have been named in a new class-action lawsuit that was filed on on Monday, July 3 in a California District Court (links to court docket).
The lawsuit, first reported by Yonhap News Agency, alleges that Samsung Electronics and Best Buy falsely advertised certain features on TVs that did not actually have those features.
The features in question are Motion Xcelerator Turbo+, FreeSync and/or HDMI 2.1 — three main features that make Samsung some of the best gaming TVs. That said, this isn't the first time Samsung Electronics have seen legal action: Previously, a 2018 lawsuit that claimed certain Samsung TVs overheated and became unusable.
Tom’s Guide has reached out to Samsung Electronics for comment and will update this story when we hear back.
Here's what we know so far
Because the lawsuit was just filed, there hasn't been a lot of motion so far on the defendants' part. The plaintiff, Sergio Rodriguez, and his attorney Raymond Yoon Ho Kim have just filed the lawsuit on Monday, and have requested the clerk to issue summons on complaint.
So where did Samsung potentially go wrong? We don't have details yet, but one potential cause for the lawsuit is that, while some larger models might carry those features, smaller models in the same series might not have had them.
This is purely conjecture from a non-lawyer here, but if Samsung and Best Buy misrepresented which models had which features, and that led to a consumer making a buying decision, Rodriguez' complaint might hold water.
As for the features the TVs are missing, HDMI 2.1 allows for higher data transmission rates needed to carry 4K/120Hz signal from a console like the Xbox Series X or PS5 to a TV. Freesync, meanwhile, is AMD's proprietary version of VESA's variable refresh rate technology that cuts down on screen tearing when the native refresh rate of the TV and the refresh rate of the console don't match. Finally, Motion Xcelerator Turbo+ is the name for Samsung's motion interpolation algorithm.
These are important features that help make the Samsung QN90C and Samsung S95C OLED some of the best TVs of 2023.
