RIP - My Samsung 55inch Plasma went pop yesterday...
Discussion
black armbands have been issued
we managed to get 6 years of really good use out of the thing before it finally popped its clogs yesterday. have avoided all upgrades of the telly in that time although I was tempted by last years Panasonic 902 LCD.
I have ended up going for the Sony A1 65 OLED, fingers crossed it won't disappoint this plasma junkie.
I will let you know my findings when it has arrived in the home.
The main advantage of the OLED will be the black levels (absolute black rather than dark grey) although the Samsung Plasma was near reference level (for its time) in its colour reproduction so I was very keen to get this feature nailed for the OLED and just accept that the motion reproduction will be 'different' and I may not like it.
One of the things that I learned is that for the absolute best colour reproduction of gradients you need Dolby Vision and a Dolby Vision source, the Panasonic does not have DV and I could notice the difference between it and a HDR source. Without Dolby Vision the Panasonic had a slight edge but I think once I get the Sony calibrated the differences will be minimal.
Not a big problem here and now but I am off down the shops to get an Apple 4k box so I have at least one source of DV content to test with as my Nvidia Shield does not support it.
I have also been told that my apple movie collection, whilst small, is automatically upgraded to 4k and HDR/DV as part of the Apple package.
The main advantage of the OLED will be the black levels (absolute black rather than dark grey) although the Samsung Plasma was near reference level (for its time) in its colour reproduction so I was very keen to get this feature nailed for the OLED and just accept that the motion reproduction will be 'different' and I may not like it.
One of the things that I learned is that for the absolute best colour reproduction of gradients you need Dolby Vision and a Dolby Vision source, the Panasonic does not have DV and I could notice the difference between it and a HDR source. Without Dolby Vision the Panasonic had a slight edge but I think once I get the Sony calibrated the differences will be minimal.
Not a big problem here and now but I am off down the shops to get an Apple 4k box so I have at least one source of DV content to test with as my Nvidia Shield does not support it.
I have also been told that my apple movie collection, whilst small, is automatically upgraded to 4k and HDR/DV as part of the Apple package.
The panel on my Samsung 55" plasma went pop in year 5 of ownership. Luckily I'd bought it from John Lewis (which comes with a 5 year guarantee). A quick phone call to John Lewis customer services and they had a nice man round to fit a new panel within a few days. Didnt cost me a penny.
I'll be buying my next one from John Lewis again I think.
I'll be buying my next one from John Lewis again I think.
Carl_Manchester said:
The main advantage of the OLED will be the black levels (absolute black rather than dark grey) although the Samsung Plasma was near reference level (for its time) in its colour reproduction so I was very keen to get this feature nailed for the OLED and just accept that the motion reproduction will be 'different' and I may not like it.
Specifically whats 'different' about motion?My 10 year old panny has survived a couple of house moves and a home reno but had a couple of moments a while back which lead me to think I might be having to consider its replacement, ideally before we get to slightly urgent distress purchase stage.
I've not really looked that closely, but of what I see nothing looks as natural as plasma. Although when most people run their tellies with far too much brightness/colour and probably allsorts of processing on its hard to be fair.
Give me a week and I will give some concrete answers of my own as I need to see more content. If you want some technical discussion about what the current Sony OLED's provide then have a look at the first video link below, motion is about half-way though.
If you are really into this sort of stuff as I am, I can't recommend Vincent Teoh enough, the mans youtube channel is genius. Be careful though you might lose a couple of hours.
Sony A1 review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pa08j30Cbww
Panny vs. Sony 2017 OLED shoot-out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6as03nFVE78
Dolby Vision vs. HDR10: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voePq29-U6M
This is worth a watch too if you're considering an Oppo to go with it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbKCZpQN72c
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbKCZpQN72c
hairyben said:
Specifically whats 'different' about motion?
took me a while but i found the technical explanation that Vincent gave. The answer is at 7 minutes 47 seconds.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6as03nFVE78
hairyben said:
Specifically whats 'different' about motion?
Have not read the other responses, so I might be duplicating, but this explains very well:https://www.blurbusters.com/faq/oled-motion-blur/
New telly arrived today. Very happy to have it, early days and I need to go through my usual movie collection with all the new Dolby Vision films I have acquired thrown in.
Luckily, stranger things 2 has arrived in all its Dolby Vision glory on Netflix. Time to do some serious couch potato and give this Apple 4k box a work-out.
Once I am done with my testing I will post some thoughts.
A few hours later......
Well I had a mooch around all the 4k HDR/DV content I had available, after some fiddling around and watching various bits and pieces, which included 1080p Blurays, UHD Blurays as well as Netflix 4k HDR and Amazon 4k content.
I was looking for problems, I really was, halos, back-light bleed, smearing, ghosting, solarisation, bad colour gradients, flickering.
The only thing I found was slight banding in the opening sequence of 'Ghost In the Shell' 4k HDR.
Even the motion, which I was so worried about appears to be a none issue. If I could describe the motion I would say it looks luxuriously fluid, sometimes this can be interpreted as artificial however 99% of the time so far I am really enjoying the motion.
I had to wait a couple of hours before I got into my stride with the set however, you really need a top notch source material and frankly, most modern film transfers don't seem to have this mojo.
That aside, my socks were completely blown off by 'Mad Max: Fury Road', running on the Apple 4k box using the Dolby Vision version running in HDR mode.
I have watched various versions of the film before deciding that this presentation, via the Apple 4k box is just incredible. Well done Apple for finally getting it right and in regards to this Sony telly and its picture quality well, where can you go from here ? LG and Sony have created something special with the A1.
Couple of pics showing the Dolby Vision Logo from the Apple 4k box (only able to display HDR atm on this set though).
The CPU inside this set does not have the oomph that the Nvidia Shield has so for all those who use Kodi, don't get too excited at the prospect of using the Shield as a spare room box, you will still need it.
One thing I also noticed is that if you want to really get into 4k, you need access to U.S content so to that end I have also created U.S based media accounts and are using them also via the Apple 4k box. I found plenty of cheap 4k movie codes online and Apple will also upgrade your current HD movie collection to 4k for no extra charge, assuming there is a 4k version available.
That means, if you can snag a cheap Itunes HD code off the internet in USD and not via the itunes store in the U.K, you are golden as it will give you access to the 4k version for a fiver rather than (in some cases) £14.99.
If you are looking to build a cheap 4k movie collection I can highly recommend going the U.S only route and for the Apple 4k TV it takes seconds to switch accounts between U.S and U.K so you can easily have two separate movie libraries.
Luckily, stranger things 2 has arrived in all its Dolby Vision glory on Netflix. Time to do some serious couch potato and give this Apple 4k box a work-out.
Once I am done with my testing I will post some thoughts.
A few hours later......
Well I had a mooch around all the 4k HDR/DV content I had available, after some fiddling around and watching various bits and pieces, which included 1080p Blurays, UHD Blurays as well as Netflix 4k HDR and Amazon 4k content.
I was looking for problems, I really was, halos, back-light bleed, smearing, ghosting, solarisation, bad colour gradients, flickering.
The only thing I found was slight banding in the opening sequence of 'Ghost In the Shell' 4k HDR.
Even the motion, which I was so worried about appears to be a none issue. If I could describe the motion I would say it looks luxuriously fluid, sometimes this can be interpreted as artificial however 99% of the time so far I am really enjoying the motion.
I had to wait a couple of hours before I got into my stride with the set however, you really need a top notch source material and frankly, most modern film transfers don't seem to have this mojo.
That aside, my socks were completely blown off by 'Mad Max: Fury Road', running on the Apple 4k box using the Dolby Vision version running in HDR mode.
I have watched various versions of the film before deciding that this presentation, via the Apple 4k box is just incredible. Well done Apple for finally getting it right and in regards to this Sony telly and its picture quality well, where can you go from here ? LG and Sony have created something special with the A1.
Couple of pics showing the Dolby Vision Logo from the Apple 4k box (only able to display HDR atm on this set though).
The CPU inside this set does not have the oomph that the Nvidia Shield has so for all those who use Kodi, don't get too excited at the prospect of using the Shield as a spare room box, you will still need it.
One thing I also noticed is that if you want to really get into 4k, you need access to U.S content so to that end I have also created U.S based media accounts and are using them also via the Apple 4k box. I found plenty of cheap 4k movie codes online and Apple will also upgrade your current HD movie collection to 4k for no extra charge, assuming there is a 4k version available.
That means, if you can snag a cheap Itunes HD code off the internet in USD and not via the itunes store in the U.K, you are golden as it will give you access to the 4k version for a fiver rather than (in some cases) £14.99.
If you are looking to build a cheap 4k movie collection I can highly recommend going the U.S only route and for the Apple 4k TV it takes seconds to switch accounts between U.S and U.K so you can easily have two separate movie libraries.
Edited by Carl_Manchester on Friday 27th October 23:21
Thanks for the update. Always good to hear 'real world' reviews from actual end users.
Sounds like you may have some kind of motion interpolation switched on. I think Sony call this 'motion flow'. Hard core videophiles will tell you to switch it off, but I hear it's really good on Sony kit so keep it on if you like it!
Sounds like you may have some kind of motion interpolation switched on. I think Sony call this 'motion flow'. Hard core videophiles will tell you to switch it off, but I hear it's really good on Sony kit so keep it on if you like it!
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