LG has finally released a fix for its G2 and C2 OLED TVs' biggest flaw

(Image credit: Future)

Exciting firmware news! Update 03.33.65 is now available for LG's 2022 C2 and G2 OLED TVs (thanks, FlatpanelsHD), and it fixes perhaps the one big flaw in the TVs' picture quality – aggressive dimming of dark scenes.

The cause of the problem is the Auto Static Brightness Limiter (ASBL) feature, which is something that all OLED TVs have (though the name can vary between brands) and which is designed to reduce the risk of image retention or burn-in caused by the presence of constant, static elements in a picture – think along the lines of a TV station logo, a news banner or a map in a game – by reducing brightness.

The problem is that LG's ASBL has long had a bug that sees it triggered by elongated dark scenes, which it dims over time, sometimes to the extent that they become unwatchable due to the exaggerated darkness. It's not an issue that presents itself regularly, which is why it didn't prevent us from Awarding the full five stars in our C2 and G2 reviews, but on the rare occasions it does manifest (we use the dim desert scene towards the end of Dune to test for it) it is rather frustrating – to the extent that some LG owners have delved into their TV's service menu in order to turn the ABSL feature off entirely, despite the fact that doing so almost certainly invalidates their warranty.

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Thankfully, warranty-baiting hacks should no longer be required. Very shortly after launch (before we were sent our review samples, in fact), this year's C3 and G3 models received a firmware update to fix this ABSL issue, and now the same fix has been issued to last year's incredibly popular C2 and G2 models. That's very good news indeed, and props to LG for providing such a useful update to two models that it's no longer selling in earnest.

Firmware 03.33.65 doesn't appear to be available for download directly to the TV yet, but it likely will be imminently. If you don't want to wait, you can download it to your computer from LG's support site. You can then transfer it to a USB stick and manually apply it to your TV.

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Tom Parsons has been writing about TV, AV and hi-fi products (not to mention plenty of other 'gadgets' and even cars) for over 15 years. He began his career as What Hi-Fi?'s Staff Writer and is now the TV and AV Editor. In between, he worked as Reviews Editor and then Deputy Editor at Stuff, and over the years has had his work featured in publications such as T3, The Telegraph and Louder. He's also appeared on BBC News, BBC World Service, BBC Radio 4 and Sky Swipe. In his spare time Tom is a runner and gamer.