Korean arch-rivals Samsung and LG ahead of the curve

The Korean arch-­rivals are now spruiking even newer technologies that promise better colour accuracy and depth.

TV arch-rivals ahead of curve

If you believe LG and Samsung, 4K is old hat. The Korean arch-­rivals are now spruiking even newer technologies that promise better colour accuracy and depth, with blacker blacks and more striking contrast. 4K is now naked without these.

But you almost need a degree in physics to understand the ins and outs of Samsung’s new SUHD or super UHD technology, and LG’s rival ColourPrime LED ­displays. And what is quantum dot and wide colour gamut? You’ll be scratching your head if you try to get the salesperson at Harvey Norman or JB HiFi to explain it in depth.

I’ll keep the physics lesson brief. SUHD adds a layer of nanocrystals called quantum dots (that’s crystals about 100 billionth of a metre on one side) to Samsung’s UHD LED screen for better colour accuracy and it says displays are 2.5 times brighter than last year. Got that?

LG’s ColourPrime adds “advanced phosphors” to the LED panel — the stuff that glows — which increases the range of colours and deepens reds, greens and blues. There’s also “ultra luminance technology” to enhance the lightest and darkest parts of the picture. Got that too?

Put it all together and you have a JGTTSASFY situation: “just go to the store and see for yourself”. I’d recommend you do.

Samsung Series 9 JS9500 65-inch

Apart from being a TV, it’s also attractive new-age furniture. The display has an ultrathin aluminium frame bezel, a curved screen and a stand that makes you think the TV is almost floating.

Despite the hype, I’m yet to be convinced a curved screen offers more than aesthetic appeal. If you sit close enough to it, there’s a slight illusion of being at the cinema — but unlike the cinema, it’s not immersive. Still, Samsung believes it’s on a winner with curved screens.

This year Samsung has totally revamped its smart TV interface. Last year its TV interface comprised five prescriptive screens. It has ditched these for a configurable sliding menu of cards at the bottom of the screen. It’s powered by Samsung’s proprietary Tizen operating system and not unlike LG’s menu system.

The menu is divided into featured, recent and favourites and you can pin your most-used apps to the favourites section. Gone are some features of yesteryear, such as a variation of 3D, which let two people sitting next to one another on the same couch view different shows simultaneously.

The other big change is the evolution kit, a card you plug into the back of 2013 and last year’s models to make it something like this year’s. The evolution kit has morphed into a “one connect box”, which sits separated underneath the TV and has a single connector to the set.

This has several benefits. First, it’s easier to mount a TV on a wall without a plethora of leads sticking out the back. All the connections you need: HDMI, USB and so on, are around the box, and so are the TVs smarts, such as its 8-core processor, which is no longer housed in the TV itself. Buy a new connect box next year and you’ve virtually got a new TV.

For customers who bought an earlier Samsung smart TV with the older style evolution kit slot, Samsung says it will produce those older kits too. Otherwise the company could be overwhelmed by livid customers who bought their TVs two years ago on the promise of upgradability.

Other features include multi-link, which lets you use apps and games on the screen while watching TV and two remotes including one with a useful trackpad.

Despite Tizen being a new operating systems for TVs, Samsung offers a decent range of apps. There’s Netflix, YouTube, ABC iView, Plus 7, Plex, Quickflix, AFL Game Analyser and soon, BBC News. Foxtel’s Presto is yet to be available, the same for Stan.

During my trial I watched Netflix content with excellent 1080p full HD clarity although we await the day that Netflix is available here in 4K. Samsung is throwing in a free Netflix subscription to new customers.

LG UF950T 65-inch UHD TV

This is another beautiful 65-inch 4K smart TV with a thin light metallic bezel, but with a flat rather than curved display. Unlike Samsung’s model, the guts of the smart TV such as its quad core processor remains in the set, but the three USB and four HDMI ports are on the side, which makes for easier mounting.

Last year I raved about how simple, intuitive and configurable LG’s smart TV interface menu is. It’s a series of oblong shapes across the bottom of the screen which you can set up as links to selected apps. Active ports such as links to your Xbox, PlayStation or Bluray player, show as a bunch of rectangles on the left and the complete list of configurable items to the right.

LG has updated its TV version of WebOS to drive its 2015 range and thankfully, this year’s interface is basically the same as before. It’s also combined its magic remote and regular remote into one device. When you point it to the set, a pink tear-shaped dot appears on screen and you can easily navigate options at the flick of your wrist. When watching video, a click when positioning the cursor lets you navigate to a new section of video. It’s like operating a PC.

LG is yet to bring OLED 4K TVs to Australia so in this case the TV uses what LG calls its ColourPrime technology, which it defines as adding “advanced phosphors” to add extra colours to the TV’s colour palette. Reds in particular were deeper with ColourPrime. With a wider colour space, some colours seemed more saturated and others looked about the same. The subtle colour differences also meant finer texture and sometimes more detail where there was adjacent finer colour variations.

LG also promotes “ultra luminance technology” with this display, which accentuates blacks and whites which were extremely bright. White on black in fact was glary.

Voice control was very accurate. You basically talk to the remote rather than the set. Be careful to tell it to load the Netflix app, otherwise a Netflix search brings up a browser web search.

The UF950T has a quad core processor, twin tuners, a Harman Kardon speaker system, which produced quality sound, and a navigable onscreen user guide. LG’s set offered quality upscaling of HD content and I liked watching 3D on 4K with passive glasses.

LG too has a fair range of apps. I counted 99. Premium apps include Bigpond TV, ABC iView, Netflix, SBS on Demand, Facebook, YouTube, Quickflix, AFL Game Analyser, but again no Stan and Presto at this stage

Both sets offer fantastic quality, it’s tough to pick a winner at all, but LG’s is $3500 cheaper, which gives it the nod.