Owners of some Roku and TCL smart TVs claim that what should have been a regular software update has bricked their TVs, resulting in the unit becoming a useless piece of tech sitting on their entertainment centers. A new class action lawsuit filed in California by Schonbrun Seplow Harris Hoffman & Zeldes LLP on behalf of Terri Else, claims that both companies were aware that they were selling TVs that were defective, and that the software updates caused these defects to break the product.
A software update bricking a piece of tech isn’t an entirely unheard of thing. It’s not necessarily common, but it does happen. However, it’s rare, and this is the exact sort of thing that you, as a consumers, expect companies to test for before pushing the updates out to the public. Specifically for this reason. According to the lawsuit, the issue started when the TVs were only a year or two old. It’s worth noting that most people keep their TV for several years before upgrading. So having them break this early on can be a pretty notable setback.
The lawsuit seeks to recoup lost money on the TVs that were impacted. It also wants Roku and TCL to come up with a solution that ensures this won’t happen again in the future.
The lawsuit only lists certain entry-level Roku and TCL TVs
It’s worth noting that this lawsuit is reportedly making claims about specific smart TVs from both companies that are in more of the budget category. All of these models appear to run on Roku OS, including some models in the TCL 3, 4, 5, and 6 series. For Roku, the issues are reportedly popping up in the Roku Select and Roku Plus series models.
At this point in time it doesn’t look like Roku or TCL have acknowledged this problem or issued a statement about it. However, with the lawsuit now in play, one or both companies are likely to issue a statement sooner rather than later. TCL is one of Roku’s main hardware partners. It also recently finalized a deal with Sony to take over Sony’s Bravia hardware operations.
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