When it comes to buying a new fridge, it helps to know what you’re buying. Sometimes what was once a quality brand has recently been bought out, and they’re no longer hitting the mark they once did. The reverse has also been known to happen.
This week we’re taking a look at Samsung.
Who They Are
Samsung was founded in 1938 in South Korea. They’re one of the most recognized names in tech, and they are responsible for roughly one-fifth of South Korea’s total exports. In 1974 they made their first refrigerator for the Korean market. Although they made the jump to the American market not long after, it wasn’t till 2005 that they began to take off. They’ve even recently purchased a manufacturing plant here in America.
Who They Bought
Dacor, in its first incarnation, known as Stanthony not long before Samsung in 1933. They rebranded to Dacor, also known as Distinctive Appliances Incorporated in 1965. They design, manufacture, and distribute ultra-premium kitchen appliances. They even earned the endorsement of the Le Cordon Blue culinary institute in Paris, France. Why does this matter if we’re talking about Samsung? Because Samsung acquired Dacor in 2016 for the cool price of $150 million.
Things They’re Good At
Now, both brands have some things that they do REALLY well.
Samsung has Fridges that range from $650 at the most basic, all the way to roughly $9,000. They can serve all sorts of people at all different price points. At the high end, you’re looking at their Chef Collection line, which is where you have ALL of the bells and whistles, including WiFi connectivity and the ability to track what you have in your fridge. The one most people are looking at right now, though, is the Family Hub with the built-in tablet, which claims to be able to organize your life right from your kitchen.
Dacor, although it doesn’t have any tablets, is known for their refrigerators. At the low end, they start at $3500 and go all the way to $19,000. Their focus is on design and high-end materials that are meant to last.
Samsung has also worked with companies such as GE and Kenmore. While neither company owns or is owned by Samsung, they do occasionally purchase them and rebrand them. For Kenmore look for serial numbers beginning with 592, 401 or 402 . For GE, look for models PFSS6N and PFSF6N, which are both French door models.
Things They’re Not
Of course, having all of these bells and whistles can mean that you end up with more things that can go wrong. Some of these are problems we covered earlier this month. Others are unique to the brand.
We’ll focus exclusively on Samsung’s own fridges, and go into two different sections, the refrigerator itself and the tech.
Refrigerator Side
Refrigerator not cooling
Water Dispenser not working
Not Defrosting
Noisy
Defrost drain is clogged
The Freezer being cold but the Fridge is Warm
Freezing food in the Fridge
Ice maker overflowing
Freon Leakage
Ice maker not working
Let’s take a closer look at those last two.
The freon leakage is actually the most common problem that we found in this roundup. Since Samsung’s fridges are all "closed systems," this means that if there is a leakage, your refrigerator is toast. As recently as late last year this was still a problem people were running into with newly purchased fridges. The ice maker not working has been a more recent problem. Samsung even has an ongoing lawsuit about it with the latest news being that mediation of the suit failed in June of 2019. Let’s hope that these are things Samsung fixes in the future.
Tech Side
Defective Motherboard on purchase
Large Name Apps becoming outdated and Samsung not Fixing it
Stops Receiving Security Updates
The first two aren’t the end of the world and can be replaced, with some difficulty. The latter two, though, mean that either the functionality of the fridge is compromised or that your home and privacy are. If a company stops providing updates to the apps, which you bought the refrigerator to use, it stops being a ‘smart’ fridge. If, however, it has stopped receiving security updates? It means that anything your fridge is connected to, like your google calendar or your email is then vulnerable.
Note that all of our research was dug from the depths of the internet, primarily forums where people were discussing the issues they had run into, such as Reddit, StackExchange, and others.
Bear in mind, these are only some people. Just like not everyone is going to have the same problems buying a new car off the lot, not everyone is going to run into issues with their Samsung fridge. We at ARS want to let you know some of the problems that can occur when purchasing a Samsung or Dacor fridge so that you're well prepared when purchasing one yourself. While we are not associated with either Samsung or Dacor, we do service them if and when you need us.
Takeaways:
Samsung is a brand with a long and storied history that has always pushed at the boundaries.
Dacor is just as old and has built a name on their dedication to excellence.
Samsung has some flaws right now, but they seem to be putting time and research into how to improve.
If you need help taking care of your Samsung or Dacor fridge, we’re the ones to call.
Would you like to learn more about which brands are owned by which companies? Let us know in the comments! We’d love to hear what you thought of this week’s post.
If you’re having issues with your Samsung fridge and freaking out about the holidays, reach out and schedule an appointment, we’ll be happy to help you get things running smoothly.