I bought a Sony KDF42WE655 42" LCD back in 07/2005. I've been told that life expectancy of the lamp was about 2 years. Lately, it seems the set has been a little slow in powering up, and the screen stays dim a little longer than it used to when doing so. Anticipating that the lamp may be wearing out, I went ahead and ordered a replacement lamp (XL-2100) from Crutchfield just last month.
Lo and behold, the lamp finally did fail last night - the Power/Standby indicator would just flash, and eventually the Lamp indicator came on. OK, no problem, I have a new lamp and a Service manual.
But when I removed the front cover and removed the lamp cover, I noticed the plastic surrounding the lamp was warped, obviously from heat - almost as though it had started to melt.
I can only see one fan - directly behind the lamp holder, blowing out the rear of the set - and it seems to be functioning normally, slightly dusty but easily cleaned. The Service Manual indicated that there may be as many as FOUR fans in this unit.
Should I be worried? How hard is it to disassemble this TV for a closer look?