I guess I must be the last person to know this (as it seems all my friends already know to avoid this brand). Anyway, had a Samsung RL52TE for a little over 3 years (just past the warranty period) and it has stopped working. The freezer area still works, but the fridge area does not cool anymore.
I opened the bottom drawer of my freezer to find a huge block of ice covering the entire floor of the freezer (see attached for photos).
I searched online and it seems many Samsung refrigerators share this problem:
Samsung Fridges Slammed On BBC's Watchdog...
"Consultant engineer Malcolm Robbins who was featured on the show said that, "This fridge has a fundamental design fault because water which drains from the evaporator coil during defrost cannot escape. Ice forms on the coil, grows back to the fan, hits the fan blades and stops the fan running. After that the fridge won't work." Mr Robbins went on to say that he didn't think it was right that customers should have to pay for repairs and that the fridge was not 'fit for purpose'."
Called the Samsung Hotline, they would only send someone if you agree to pay them. I explained that this was clearly a design flaw with class action lawsuits happening in the US over this issue, and articles/videos detailing the problem, but of course they aren't flexible. Time to complain to the consumer protection board. In the meantime we'll be replacing this piece of crap with a Hitachi brand fridge.