WATCH ABOVE: Steve Makris tells us about some fancy TVs and also has some neat tech toys to give away.
Today’s cutting-edge flat panel and curved TVs are years ahead of what you see on your screen today, but are they worth their steep price tag?
Samsung’s top 65” curved SUHD sells for $7299 and LG’s 65” curved UHD OLED, arriving in Canadian stores in the second half of this year, is currently priced even higher, at $9,000 in other markets. I have been running both, side-by-side, at home for two weeks before showing them live today on my Global TV Sunday Morning News Father’s Day Tech Talk special.
Do they walk the walk? Yes. Are they worth the money? Not yet.
Don’t get me wrong. These 4K (four times sharper than today’s HD TVs also called UHD or Ultra HD) show stunning images with bright whites and deep blacks. They can improve lower quality resolution video from DVD, Blu-ray, and standard or HD quality TV subscriptions. 4K TVs are pixel hungry, the equivalent of an eight-megapixel camera per frame. Digital photos from better smartphones look amazing. So is 4K-phone video, if you have the patience to get it to the TV by transferring it to a USB 3 stick from the phone. But all these examples are a drop in the bucket compared to the current DVD, Blu-ray and HD TV content.
Top TV makers like Samsung, LG, and Sony have pushed the envelope to make you forget you are watching a TV screen. Watching upcoming UHD movie samples of even more stunning life-like HDR movies (high dynamic range) from 20th Century Fox on these top TV models from two metres away is like watching real life, through a curved window. There are no visible screen dots, excellent detail in the deepest shadows, and brilliantly accurate colours, including challenging reds. And of course, they show amazing 3D.
What makes them special and so expensive? They are both good at what they do but use very different technologies.
Samsung uses the tried and true LCD (liquid crystal display) – similar to laptop screens. The LCD screen requires backlight to show the tiny RGB (red-green-blue) points that make a TV picture. Cheaper models use sidelight LED lights that cross the entire screen through an intricate series of prisms. Better TVs, like the Samsung 65JS9500 I tested, have LED lights across the entire screen like a grid. Called full backlight array, it allows for “local dimming” where a small group of LED lights light up even brighter, resulting in realistically lit windows, lamps or street lights. Conversely, groups of LED lights go dark in dark scenes. This requires more processing, adding to the cost of a top tier TV, typically $1,000.
This Samsung SUHD model also incorporates an additional thin etched-like layer called Nano Crystal Technology which radiates LED light even more for a wider contrast picture.
Despite Samsung’s claims, I found that even in the curved screen model I tested, the optimum viewing spot is three chairs in front of the screen. If the viewer stands up or sits further to the side, the visual quality of the picture drops, effectively turning thousands of dollars of TV to a sub-standard experience. Although Samsung noticeably improved wide-angle viewing on its best LCD panel screen, it can’t compare to LG’s next generation OLED TV.
LG, which also makes traditional LCD/LED and plasma TVs, is the only company making large screen OLED TVs. Samsung and Sony dropped out, choosing to improve on LCD technology instead. OLED (organic light-emitting diode) display technology is common in smartphones, camera screens and tablets, but it’s costly to make in large TV panels. But the visual advantages are impressive. OLED RGB (red-green-blue) cells create their own bright RGB light when current passes through them. They don’t require backlight like LCD panels. When no charge passes through OLED cells, they simply turn off to show pitch black, something even the Samsung SUHD TV can’t quite match. This ability to produce a wider contrast range in “normal” or “natural” viewing mode makes the LG OLED viewing experience stand out, especially when it is viewed next to a competitor. The Samsung I tested came closest to the OLED experience when selected in “dynamic” view mode. But that forced higher contrast didn’t look well on all TV content. Additionally, the OLED advantage is that the display is thinner than smartphones and can be viewed from any angle with no loss of image quality.
The LG 65EG9600 I tested, despite it being an early pre-release model with a Korean country code setup and remote control, impressed. Even so, I had to fiddle around with different rich black settings for regular TV broadcast, movies and still photos. When this LG OLED arrives in stores, it will simply stand out with its deep blacks in a sea of older technology LCD panels.
Sony uses similar technology to Samsung’s on its top tier LCDTVs and has expanded to Android TVs offering a smart phone Internet experience, similar to Samsung’s proprietary online smartness and LGs Web OS 2.0. But TVs smartness has nothing to do with how good the inherent picture quality is.
So where do you get 4K TV content today? Sony is coming out with 4K Blu-ray, re-worked Blu-ray content. You can play your own smartphone 4K movies onscreen and watch short UHD content online. 20th Century Fox is converting 4K movies to an even better viewing quality HDR (high dynamic range) which shows even more colour richness, with expanded contrast and details in the shadows, much like HDR mode in better phone cameras. Samsung privately shows short stunning UHD HDR clips of Exodus: Gods and Kings and Life of Pi from 20th Century Fox. Realistically, HDR is more than a year away.
Most TV makers, including LG, are in the process of upgrading their 2015 TVs via software to HDR playback capability.
I like the idea of watching big-screen TV closer, like in a movie theatre, with no visible colour pixels, an advantage 4K has over HDTV. But we are years away before 4K TV becomes common place. Most TV content creators think HD TV is good enough and easier to transmit and handle.
That is the main reason I am suggesting you keep your money in your jeans for a while longer. Radically new technology always commands a high launch price. The consumer eventually dictates the price of new technology: if a product is in demand, higher production eventually allows prices to plummet.
But if you have deep pockets, you will be amazed with next generation big screen TV.
Best TV? The Samsung SUHD delivered as promised and is available at shops like Best Buy. It’s already HDR capable and incudes features like a flip-up web cam and comprehensive wireless connection options with its family of smartphones, tablets and speakers. Make sure you check out the right model at stores. The pre-release model LG OLED UHD shows so much more potential in unlimited angle viewing and deep blacks to be a front runner later this year. It’s not just the price. If you are willing to dish out more than $7,000 for one brand now, then wait for the next generation OLED this fall.
FATHER’S DAY GIFT SUGGESTIONS
Let’s start with our five give-aways worth a total of $1,800!
Make sure you tune into my Global TV Sunday Morning News Father’s Day Tech Talk segment to catch the entry word for each prize.
-Epson’s portable PowerLite Home Cinema 730HD has remarkably sharp and rich colour, even in lighted rooms. It has built-in speakers and easy out of the box set-up. Make any wall in your home a movie theatre experience.
-The Samsung Galaxy Tab A 9.7-inch Android Lollipop Tablet with S-Pen stylus, 5 megapixel rear camera, 2 MP front, 2GB RAM, 16 GB storage with additional micro-SD slot memory expansion. It comes with a stylus and can be shared in the family with multiusers.
-The much acclaimed ASUS Zenfone 2 5.5-inch Gorilla Glass smartphone runs on a new Intel four-core Atom processor with a first-time 4 GB of memory for smooth multi-tasking without missing a beat. No competitor can match this performance in a no-contract phone for $379. It comes with 64 GB of memory – no typo here folks, two SIM slots, micro SD expansion slot and 13 MP rear camera with cutting edge shooting and editing features, including Adobe Photoshop-like curves. It comes unlocked and works with all cellcos, who oddly, don’t sell it. Buy it online here or visit one of the two Memory Express stores in Edmonton.
-The new Roku 3 streaming media player, with remote control and ear buds, makes any TV smart. Plug and play in your TV’s HDMI slot for YouTube, Netflix, Cineplex Store and more than 1,400 streaming channels.
-Globalstar Spot Gen 3 Satellite GPS Messenger keeps track of your goings on when off the grid. It sends messages to friends/ co-workers that you are OK, shares your travel progress and in a life threatening emergency, it sends out a global S.O.S call with your location.
BEST FOR DAD
These are top-tier gifts for deserving dads:
-The LG G4 smartphone available in Canada June 19, is many things, from an ultra-comfortable slightly curved optional leather-clad smartphone which will last into the next day with a 3,000 mAh removable battery to a brilliant IPS Quantum Display to no side buttons, now cleverly placed below the rear camera lens where your index finger happens to be. Smart. It sports an 8 MP front selfie lens but my favourite feature as a professional photographer is its main true 16 MP rear camera. Sure, it has all the auto modes for beginners but its manual shooting mode rocks. You see the changes you make on your exposure, colour balance and more for professional looking pictures. Oh yes, it also shoots in high quality RAW/DNG mode, keeping all non-compressed picture information you can edit and correct long after you shot it, like professional cameras. Available at Bell, Rogers, TELUS, Videotron and WIND Mobile.
-Samsung’s very new high-tech R7 Radiant speaker is unique in design and function. It radiates the entire audio spectrum evenly in a room and connects via Bluetooth with most devices or Soundconnect with select Samsung 2012 TVs and up. You can also use Samsung’s Apps Store or Android Multiroom App to connect as many single or multi R7 speakers as you want in your home with WiFi. It has amazing sound, the first audio product from Samsung’s newest Audio Research Lab in Los Angeles. Check out my recent visit at the Audio Research Lab.
For more Father’s Day gift suggestions, check my personal blog here.
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