I’m in the market for a new TV. My Sony x900F still works but I’m looking for something with better contrast, better near-dark scene detail, and less blooming (haloing around light images on a dark background). Panel tech has changed a lot since 2018 and I know more about the subject too.
What makes the decision difficult is that no single technology has solved all of the challenges of making the perfect panel type for movie watching. You can’t just unleash your wallet and come home with a TV that has no shortcomings.
Mini LED displays are brighter which leads to better detail in dark scenes, more impactful HDR, and better bright room performance.
OLED has the highest native contrast and the best colors.
Companies sometimes mess up the firmware which further muddies the waters.
Has anyone here peeked into the rabbit hole? Making a good display is about producing light in the correct color and volume so I figure it is somewhat flashlight/led adjacent.
Ultimately, I may just wait and see on the new TV since some of the top contenders are waiting on software updates to fix issues (A95L, Bravia 9). But I think this is an interesting topic to talk about.
There is a massive difference between a $100 TV and a $3000 TV. You can get a TV for a much or as little as you are willing to spend these days. You do get what you pay for though.
I keep reading about the newer tech for TVs. I have been using an LG B7 OLED for over 6 years now (about 6000 hours on it). I had it calibrated. It is still gorgeous. I get rave comments about it all of the time when I have visitors.
Yes OLED has issues like ultimate brightness and burn in. I have been careful with it, so have no evidence of burn-in. But in my dark room with backlight, I still haven’t seen anything out there that makes me want to switch.
I think the brain adjusts. It is real hard to decide unless you believe in the reviews and/or can set up two displays, fully calibrated, right next to each other under the conditions that you view in. IOW, if you get any of the higher end sets (that will meet your situational requirements… room lighting, etc.) You could be happy… Unless you are intent upon making yourself miserable by agonizing over what the reviewers say are defects.
The Best Buy in my area has an A95L and Bravia 9 on display side-by-side. Both look amazing, but they both look slightly more so or slightly less so depending on the scene.
A night scene in a dim forest looks almost lifelike on the B9 since I can actually see the details. It is hard to make out the details of that same scene on the A95L.
But on the other hand, the a shot of a natural daytime mountain vista shows less detail on the B9. The A95L also has deeper colors that never appear washed out.
Both would be a huge improvement on my current TV whic has a maximum contrast ratio of 5,725 : 1. It only has 48 dimming zones. The 65" B9 has 1512 dimming zones and a maximum contrast of 388,667 : 1. The OLEDs of course, have near-infinite contrast.
Forgot to mention, newer TVs with faster response time introduce Stutter to 24fps content like film. Unfortunately, OLEDS have the fastest response times meaning that you can’t have the best color and the best motion at the same time. The stutter is very noticable in panning shots. You can use tv settings to try and combat it but the result can be weird unnaturally smooth motion.
So to sum it up, I’m mulling over tangible differences, not immaterial stuff like what might happen to the TV after 10k hrs of use.
Just keep in mind that comparing displays in stores is not a real good indicator of how they can perform in your room and especially after a good calibration. So often they set them on that torch mode that is designed to simply catch your eye. So you can’t really see what they may be capable of. Black detail in particular is effected by the calibration.
In any case, unless they come up with a significant breakthrough it display technology before then, I will replace my current set with an OLED display (and just include in the budget for a few hundred bucks for a pro calibration).
Incidentally, I am not seeing, or at least am not bothered, by the level of stutter that may be present when feeding the LG a 24 fps movie in native mode. Although, it seems that some people are more bothered by different levels of stuttering than others.
Good luck in your quest! It is indeed a rabbit hole. As usual, anything available has compromises.
Try a Samsung Tv. I have a Samsung qled 4k tv and the quality is amazing. All colours are displayed well and look vibrant. Dynamic range is excellent especially for dark pictures with shadows. They seem to last a long time as well. I also have an older Samsung Hd smart tv, its still on the go.
I tend to peek into it about once a year out of curiosity, despite not owning a TV for many years now, and having no intention to acquire another one.
Rtings.com is a pretty good source for TV testing data. It is clear that mid range TVs being produced in 2024 have good performance. TV’s just a few years ago were not nearly as good for the price. Most mid range TVs now use full panel LED arrays instead of edge lighting, which is better for longevity and image quality. They also now have HDMI 2.1 and 120hz panels. Some non OLED TV’s have native contrast around 10,000:1, and much higher contrast with local dimming, for example the Hisense U8 [review] is looking good right now, with 10k:1 native and 280k:1 with local dimming enabled, having 1,600 local dimming zones. The 65" is ~$1,150.
Yep, I’ve read a lot over at rtings. The U8 vs the Bravia 9 is a good match-up. I’d say the U8 is like 90% of the B9 for about 1/3 of the price. It is neat seeing how things have progressed. The U8 has 2x the native contrast and nearly 50x theoretical contrast of my current TV which I paid a similar price for in 2018.
Personally, I think the blooming performance on the U8 may be a dealbreaker since I hate blooming bigtime. Still, huge bargain for the performance!
I started looking pretty deep into the rabbit hole last year when my ~2012 plasma TV died. This was from near the end of the plasma era, and it had been a pretty well-reviewed mid-level TV.
I was stuck going back and forth trying to decide what my best option was going to be, including considering some pretty good deals on lightly used OLED’s or new OLED’s one step up from from the base models for that tech (Eg - LG B-series). Among my hangups was deciding what to think about the complaints that motion smoothness still didn’t match what plasma TV’s had offered. That specific point of comparison is probably what prompted me to then think - why not see what prices are like on the plasmas that everyone is throwing away?
The end result was for the outrageous sum of $0 (zero dollars) I was staring at one of the best plasma TV’s ever made (Panasonic VT60), and one size up to boot! It originally retailed for $3000, which was a reminder how much TV’s tend to depreciate.
Granted, it did have screen burn in from use as an oversized computer monitor, but it’s completely invisible when actually watching most content (slightly visible if there is a large expanse of uniform color). It will also cost a modest amount more in electricity than a new OLED would (~$20 more per year), and doesn’t support HDR, but it looks so good it’s hard to feel like I’m missing out on much.
I’m not necessarily saying skip on a new TV and just get an old plasma. Really the point would be don’t get carried away chasing perfection, because you’re likely to spend a lot of money for small gains. Be realistic about what will actually satisfy you, set a reasonable budget, and just find a good model within that budget. While there are significant differences between the bottom end and the top end of the market, it’s easy to get caught up chasing perfection in small details that are difficult even for the very systematic reviewers at Rtings to quantify meaningfully.
In my case, once I was realistic with myself what my expectations were, I was able to focus more clearly on what might meet those expectations rather than on what was the absolute best, I stopped stressing about whether I should increase my budget, and found a model I’m happy with pretty quickly.
Yea, I keep going back and comparing the A95L and B9 to their more budget friendly counterparts. I can definitely think of other things to do with the price difference. On the other hand, this is a long term purchase and little things can start to bug you over time.
I’m basically jumping down the same rabbit hole. Even down to replacing a good old Sony.
And am looking at the same models.
One of my major pet peeves is Crushed Blacks. Which is often a problem with OLEDs more-so than LEDs.
Screw black bars if I can’t see the first few lowest shades of gray.
For my room and content the B9 is currently leading the pack.
Cost? Too darn much - but this is likely the last TV I’ll ever buy.
I don’t intend to have buyers remorse - if that’s even possible with AV gear.
Let us know what you pick and how you like it.
Speaking of AV gear, SVS is coming out with a new 17" subwoofer with dual 8" voice coils, and built in room correction and an f3 of like 11Hz or 8Hz depending on sealed vs vented.
I know exactly what you mean about crushed blacks. I hate it when a character steps onto screen in a black outfit and I can’t make out the folds of their clothes–they are just one big black outline. I also hate night scenes where I can barely tell what is happening. Due to the insane brightness levels of the B9, this should be a lot less common since the brightness curve won’t need to be squashed as much due to brightness limitations.
Just a heads up on some software issues I read about:
Apparently some users report the A95L has an issue with Dolby Vision right now. If you search for “A95L Dolby Vision issues” you should find it. This might not matter if you don’t use a player that supports DV or watch media in that format. HDR10 is basically always available alongside DV.
Some report that the B9 has “brightness pumping”, where it lags a little bit in providing light to a scene so you get a noticeable brightness boost a bit after a scene changes. I think I read that if you turn off tone-mapping this goes away.
I’ll definitely post an update when I pick something up myself.
Checked out that SVS sub very cool! It has projected $2500 msrp–honestly, I expected higher.
Hmmm Maybe if it is a long term purchase you might consider the long term… ?
The other part, things only bug you if you let them. Just don’t look for MINOR defects and they won’t bug you. As nothing is perfect in TVs they all will have something that can bug you if you insist on being bugged. IOW, my advice is to not let perfection (does not exist) get in the way of more than good enough. You aren’t doing brain surgery using the damn thing…
Sometimes something pops out for me and others could care less.
Once you see something, it’s hard to unsee it.
Like PWM freqs. that make me crazy, others don’t even notice.
But ya.’ can’t let FOMO keep you from dropping the hammer or in this case grabbing the remote.
All one can do is do the research, buy it, then don’t look back.
So, the Bravia 9 just got delivered.
Holy crap is this thing bright.
Gonna take me month to figure out all the menu options.
I’ll keep you posted.
All the Best, Jeff
Nice! Are you planning to have it professionally calibrated?
The brightness specs are definitely crazy. I think it doubles the brightness of my X900F.
I haven’t pulled the trigger yet. I was waiting for a black Friday sale.
Most of what I’ve read says that Sony TVs have better motion handling than other brands (software). However, Costco just released a Christmas catalogue with the LG G4 on sale. I’m tempted to give it a try since the LG G4 is a very close competitor to the A95L.
I’ll definitely be interested to hear what what your experiences with the B9 are like. What sources are you feeding it? What TV were you coming from?
