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Samsung UN55B8500
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When Chris from Cleveland Plasma called to let me know he finally had a new Samsung local dimming LED LCD ready to review, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. Samsung's other LCDs have always impressed me as best in their class, though with a few quirks and irritations. I had calibrated a first generation Samsung local dimming LED set a couple of years ago, and I was fascinated by it's promise but let down by it's color. Since then, the company has made big improvements in their menu system, allowing much better color fine tuning.The 8500 is a very sleek looking TV. It's super thin, the lines are sharp and clean, and there is more screen/less wasted space than on a typical LCD panel. It's glossy screen looks very dark, even in high ambient light, if you can get past the mirror-like reflections.
I made a few initial observations before beginning the calibration. The screen uniformity was excellent, with none of the dim edges or color shifts of some LCDs. Off axis performance was a bit disappointing; as I moved off to the sides, I could see shifts in the color, especially on people's faces. That's something all LCDs struggle with, though some brands seem to hold flesh tones and overall picture much better than others. The 8500's performance in this regard could be an issue, depending on your seating layout.
I started the calibration by measuring it's performance out of the box in standard mode and movie mode. I used CalMAN Professional with an Eye One spectroradiometer for the measurements. In both modes, measured performance was abysmal, showing that manufacturers continue to tune their sets to what they want you to see rather than the video standards. Gamma in standard mode was the biggest offender, whereas movie mode suffered from a strong green tinge in the grayscale. Attachment 1 is standard; 2 is movie.
I entered the service menu and activated 2 new modes that did not show up in the user menu before: cal day and cal night. It's great to have the capability to calibrate a no compromise day and night mode. After calibration, these modes can be locked to eliminate any chance of nosy friends or curious kids from messing up the settings.
Like other recent Samsung displays, after calibration the 8500 comes out of black slowly. That means dark objects will be a little hard to see, reducing shadow detail but increasing the sense of contrast.
There was only a faint amount of cloudiness, or haloing, around objects; that is a side effect of the local dimming LED configuration. In the 8500's case, it was only visible with certain images in a totally dark room, and it was never enough to call attention to itself or be bothersome. For the most part, the local dimming worked extremely well, keeping unlit areas of the screen very dark even while displaying bright objects in other areas. With a 0% (black) signal, the 8500 was totally dark, even in a dark room.
The grayscale tracking, or purity of the whites at various brightness levels, was not something to stand up and cheer about. It had a distinct blue hump in the middle brightness region, and no combination of contrast, gamma, or white balance adjustments would eliminate it. This was clearly visible with test patterns, though it will only occasionally be detectable with real program material.
Color decoding, on the other hand, was amazingly good. The 8500 has the right adjustments to get it dialed in with precision, and that pays huge dividends with color naturalness and fleshtones. No neon green football fields or chronically sun-burnt faces with this display!
Gamma performance was above average, with the transition from dark to bright images being performed with only minor imbalances. This should result in a good sense of depth and naturalness.
Pans and motion seemed very good and super smooth, though possibly too smooth. There are controls to adjust that to taste, but I was not bothered by any panning irregularities enough to adjust them. I noticed no motion problems with fast moving objects, though I did not try sports out on it.
Watching 1080P/24 sources, the image looked absolutely fantastic! There was tons of pop to the image; this is not a bland looking TV! There was a very good sense of dimensionality, and people looked natural. I was very impressed with the contrast in the image. Detail and resolution looked perfect, and there was no graininess or other distractions. There were a couple of times when I felt I was seeing the effect of the lackluster grayscale tracking, but I was looking intently for it.
The 8500 is definitely a reference grade set, sharing company with the highly revered Pioneer Elite Kuros and the giant-killer LG LH90. I had calibrated a steady diet of Elite Kuros in the past week, and I just happened to have an LG LH90 that I calibrated sitting right beside the 8500. While I couldn't see the same image on both the LG and the 8500 at the same time, I did take the opportunity to watch the same scenes on both one right after the other. Both are 55" local dimming LED backlit LCDs.
Some physical differences between the LG and Samsung were immediately apparent, even with both of them turned off. While the Sammy's glossy screen tends to pick up glare, the LG's matte screen mutes and diffuses glare. On the other hand, if I ignored the glare, the Sammy's screen looked darker with the lights on. The LG looked a little chunky and much larger than the Samsung, even though both sets were 55".
I found certain test patterns that tend to show up the cloudy halo effect of local dimming LCDs. Even though in my initial review of the LG I had not noticed the effect until far off axis, I have since found that viewing these test patterns in a dark room will cause the effect to be easily noticeable on the LG. I felt the Samsung performed better in this regard; even though I could see the effect on both sets, it was more pronounced on the LG. The ANSI (checkerboard) contrast measurement is a good way to measure this effect. Using a Chroma 5 meter, which is very good with low light measurements, I measured the ANSI contrast ratio of the LG to be a very good 2,050:1. However, the Samsung was so good in this regard the meter could not give a reading even at it's longest exposure time! That means that the Sammy's ANSI contrast measured over 30,000:1, which is world class. Only the Pioneer 9G Elite Kuro approaches this performance. What this adds up to in the real world is this: the Sammy will have superior contrast with more "pop" when watching in a dark room.
The LG's shadow detail was slightly better, with dark images being a bit easier to see and better balanced than on the Samsung. Uniformity was better on the Samsung, with the LG showing a tiny color shift on one side of the screen and very slightly dark corners. These were not nearly severe enough to be visible with normal program material, though. One thing that will be noticeable in many rooms is the superior off axis colors of the LG. It did lose contrast as I moved from side to side, but colors held up even to extreme angles on the LG.
Both the LG and the Samsung are a bit smoother than the Pioneer Elite Kuro, both in freedom from graininess and panning.
The Samsung's measured grayscale tracking and gamma fall short of the LG and Kuro, but it's color decoding is close to perfection. What that means is, for the most part the Samsung's colors are beyond reproach. However, if you know what to look for, occasionally you'll see a color tone in something that looks a little shifted- a side effect of the lackluster grayscale tracking.
Overall, I believe the Samsung to be solidly in the top 3 TVs I have seen, with slightly stronger performance overall than the LG LH90, which I hold in very high regard. It has a different set of strengths and weaknesses compared to the recently discontinued Pioneer Elite Kuro, though I don't think it surpasses that holy grail. It's super thin, sleek, energy efficient, with oodles of pop and contrast. Highly recommended!
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