Missus and I have recently moved and are looking at purchasing our first TV. Obviously missed the boat with most major sales, but all retailers still seem to have the Samsung Q80T 65" QLED for $1995 (RRP $2695).
My question is how does this unit go for a first timer? Also, how does it compare to similar price points in a larger size (e.g. Samsung TU8000 75" Crystal UHD for $1995). Are the differences (200 Hz vs 100 Hz etc) noticeable?
Cheers :)
TVs aren't really the kind of thing that you replace often nor are they the kind of thing you get better at, and so there aren't really good "starter" tvs.
Get one that looks good to you. Unless you have specific interests (gaming, sport) or have a certain setting (late night with all the lights out, for example), you really just need to go with your eye. One thing that I encourage you to pay attention to that you might not otherwise think of though is sound. If you aren't considering speakers or a sound bar, make sure the set you get doesn't sound like everything is playing through a tin can.
Thanks!
Have you seriously looked at an OLED (organic LED) TV right next to any other type of LED (including "QLED" "nanocell" and whatever marketing nomenclature the manufacturers try to invent to differentiate their similar technologies)? Sure there are a few things to differentiate the various models in these categories, but on top of size, you essentially have 4 choices - 4k LED, 4K OLED, 8k LED and 8K OLED. 8K is great but it is probably out of your price range at this stage and there is virtually no content available for these sets yet anyway. It is probably the future though but it can wait. Hisense is also promoting a 100 inch laser tv, but that's also not in the range, so not worth addressing.
For me it was complete night and day when comparing OLEDs to LEDs a few years ago, so my opinion would be to go to a store and do some serious visual comparisons just to satisfy yourself that you're not making a mistake. Nothing much has changed in terms of the gap in my opinion. It's still fairly easy to see but it used to be a lot easier though when the stores used to run the same movie on all of the sets and you could do a proper comparison. Now you seem to have a lot of the manufacturers running their own content on the displays to possibly create some false impressions by selecting content, colours etc. that will best flatter their product and confuse the customer. Obviously some tvs were losing out to the competition when things were less curated. They also compartmentalise them more now by brand, technology, size and price point - perhaps to make the flaws less apparent. Back in the day it was much more common to see a high quality set next to a poor cousin. Do some googling or watch some clips on YouTube if you are curious and are unfamiliar with OLED and the differences.
I can understand the compulsion to buy the biggest TV you can with your budget but there are still some pros and cons to consider. I mean if it were all about size, then why don't most people just buy projectors instead? Big tvs can be unwieldy, difficult to take home and often attract higher delivery fees, you may need to spend much more on a suitable stand or cabinet (and they're usually expensive), you need to sit further away, it could have lesser picture quality and much of the stuff available on free-to-air and Foxtel that is shot in low resolution will look even more pixelated, as it has to be spread on the larger screen. I admit that there are still attractions of a bigger screen but you may find that you actually might be much more satisfied with a 55" or 65" OLED. There is a reason why many people are prepared to spend more money on a smaller tv. It is still a premium product that only a few percentage of Australian households own but the gap has narrowed somewhat and prices are often now paradoxically fairly competitive with higher quality LED's, like the models you're looking at. This is going back a year or two but I managed to get my LG E8 well under RRP for $1,900, and my LG B9 for $1,600 by utilising things I'd learned via OzBargain. OLED has a lot of advantages in terms of brighter colours, Dolby Vision as standard, better viewing angles, darker blacks, better contrast, sharper edges etc. I am more than happy with my choices.
That being said, I've noticed that there used to be a lot of sales on OLED TVs but there doesn't seem to be as many of these opportunities any more. It could be down to supply constraints but I actually have heard that there is a bit of a nation-wide and perhaps world-wide shortage because lots of people have been locked down in their homes and it has put a lot more emphasis on investing more of the budget on higher-quality home entertainment. The other thing propelling sales of these tvs is the attraction to gamers of the latest models. Apparently a lot of people are also saying that the LG 48" CX is now the best monitor available for both PCs and latest generation consoles, and this has only fueled demand further. LG actually makes all the OLED panels in it's factories and supplies them to Sony, Panasonic and Loewe to sell as their own. They each then try to differentiate their product by contributing their own operating systems, image processing technologies and stands, and doing promotional stuff like collaborating with certain Hollywood studios. Loewe is great but it is uber expensive (German), I haven't seen a Panasonic set in ages for some reason, and Sony's prices also tend to be at a distinct premium to LG's, so I'd suggest maybe focusing on the LG BX and CX models available at present.
Appreciate that I have gone way over the deep end with the length of this post by OzBargain standards and expressed some personal opinion against products that many people own and love, so I am prepared to cop a lot of flack. I know advice on OLEDs was also not really solicited but I just wanted to make sure you'd given it some thought and done the appropriate due diligence. I hope the effort that I've gone to point a few things out might be appreciated, as this is a fairly big-ticket item that will get a lot of use and your available choices might be worth a second guess.
OLED can't do HDR as well as other displays can it? Despite the LEDs being individually lit you don't get the brilliant effect of a flashlight being shone straight into the camera in a dark room, for example.
You'd be surprised how well OLED's can do HDR due to the true black and contrast ratio. OLED all the way if you can afford it.
It's a touch choice to make between deep blacks and bright lights. I'd think that good HDR with mini LED or a tightly arranged LED array would beat OLED every time these days.
@AustriaBargain: Agree that LED has a few positives to consider as well. My eyes just keep on telling me that OLED continues to be my personal preference. On the balance of this discussion and whatever further research SamuelIGT chooses to undertake, it will be interesting to hear his conclusion and what he actually gets in the end. Maybe he's already kinda sold on the 2 models he's comparing.
Detailed but super helpful response for a first timer. Thanks a lot mate! Really really appreciate it. Ill keep you updated when we make a final decision.
Don't overspend on the newest gimmicks if you are struggling for money. I went for a top of the range 4K Sony 65" (non oled) model and am totally happy with it. Other than a great screen, the important thing it has is a really fast Android TV operating system. All the important apps are built in and work faultlessly. It gets regular Android updates.
I had relatives over on boxing day and they kept commenting on how clear the cricket was compared to their LG 65". I've used the mouse on screen navigation menu on their LG and it was slow and a real pain. You can't beat a quality Sony.
The thing about owning a really good TV is that you notice how bad cheap to average range TVs are in comparison. Whereas if you never experienced the great TV in the first place, then the cheap big screen probably would do you fine because it's all you've ever known, it's probably better than the TV you bought six years ago from Big W too.
can you wait a few months? Most manufactures are showcasing their new TVs at CES on Monday (most already have) and something like Sony X90J will replace X900H with only a better processor and supposedly same price so maybe X900H will be on sale. I'd imagine same with other manufactures as they're launching mini-LED
I have a Q80T 75inch - i rate it as a tv got it during the black friday sale during the JB deal
Honestly got zero complaints but my last TV was a $400 (S**t box)