The Samsung Galaxy S4 just started to reach consumers, but reports about issues are already surfacing: the new smartphone apparently has some screen issues.

Samsung's new Galaxy flagship smartphone is certainly one of the most anticipated handsets of 2013, marking one of the biggest smartphone launches this year. After shortage issues got many pre-order customers on edge and several carriers and retailers had to delay shipping, it now seems that some users' handsets have display issues and smearing.

It's quite common when a new smartphone makes its debut to hear about a few minor issues or bugs affecting some units, and the new Samsung Galaxy S4 is no exception. An XDA Developers thread started on April 27 is rapidly expanding, with many owners reporting a problem with the smartphone's display. The image accompanying this article comes from the user who originally started the thread, and shows highlights of the most affected areas.

As it turns out, users scrolling through content using a relatively large screen experience a smearing of the display, as well as a purple tint to the letters on the screen.

"Ok I picked up my new galaxy s4 today, I've owned all the galaxy s handsets and been pleased with them," writes the user who started the thread on the XDA Developers forum. "However I noticed some weird screen issue earlier, basically while scrolling dark greys on blacks smudge/smear purple."

"A test for this is in settings, on anything grey if you slowly scroll up and down the grey bits go purple. Does anyone's else phone suffer from this? I've never noticed this on previous phones, but not sure if my handset is faulty or whether it's just how the galaxy s4s are."

The thread has 35 pages at the time of writing, and increasingly more owners come up with a number of possible causes. Some suggest it's the firmware, others blame the screen itself. Either way, the issue does not seem to affect all owners of the Samsung Galaxy S4.

Affected users reported this problem for both versions of the Samsung Galaxy S4, and the issue seems to worsen when turning down the display brightness. Some users even complained that it's like owning a cheap LCD TV with smearing and bad motion blurring. Does your Samsung Galaxy S4 have similar issues?