TV upgrade - worth paying for OLED?

Belenus

Interested in a LG  OLED TV that is on offer in Curry's ATM. It's reduced to £1100, but although not very money saving I'm not put off by the price. 

If you are willing to spend over £1,000 on a new TV, why not get Feeesat installed as well? 

Is your property suitable for that?

MattMattMattUK

OLED is great, but I am not sure that many people get the benefits from it. Yes the picture is generally better, the blacks deeper, the colours richer, but if you just watch normal TV then save the money and go for a good non-OLED TV. 

JJ_Egan

What would Freesat give the user over normal Freeview ??

coffeehound

JJ_Egan said:

What would Freesat give the user over normal Freeview ??

A lot more channels of varying quality. Some freeview regions offer very few channels

Sandtree

Username03725 said:

OLED gives a richer colour, and like virtually all TVs sold now it will be 4K at least so there's no realistic option of finding a new tv that's not 4K even if you wanted to.

I'm not sure this is true... if you look at the tech press on mobile phones they state that OLED does look richer because 1) the diodes are closer to the surface and 2) because the screens are brighter. In TVs however LED are brighter than OLEDs and so assuming we are comparing like for like (ie both have HDR/Dolby Vision etc) LED will typically appear slightly richer.

Where OLED is in a league of their own is in the dark areas... OLEDs self illuminate and so an area is black no light is produced, LEDs have a backlight and shutters to control the amount of light coming out of each pixel and inevitably there is leakage even if the shutter is closed. Better LED TVs have zones of backlighting so if the whole area is dark that backlight can be dimmed therefore reducing the leakage more.    

coffeehound

Sandtree said:

LEDs have a backlight and shutters to control the amount of light coming out of each pixel and inevitably there is leakage even if the shutter is closed.    

Blimey, actual mechanical shutters?  Do they wear out or break down often?

Thinking about it, more likely LCD panels?

Sandtree

coffeehound said:

Sandtree said:

LEDs have a backlight and shutters to control the amount of light coming out of each pixel and inevitably there is leakage even if the shutter is closed.    

Blimey, actual mechanical shutters?  Do they wear out or break down often?

The shutters are electronic not mechanical. "LED TVs" replaced "LCD TVs" but its a bit of a con as both TVs use liquid crystal displays to control the light that goes through each pixel and what actually changed was how the lighting behind the LCD was provided... it resulted in thinner displays and over time allowed a movement away from edge lighting that typically used to result in the left and right sides being brighter than the center of the screen. 

The shutters/LCD can break though even though its electronic and result in "stuck pixels" which will be a red, green or blue dot depending on the colour behind which the LCD shutter is stuck in transparent/open mode or "dead pixels" where the LCD shutter is stuck in black mode so always black/dark grey.

When LCD/LED TVs first came about they were more prone to these issues and the first job when unboxing one was to make sure there werent any stuck or dead pixels... people reported having lots of fights with retailers/manufacturers as to if 1-2 stuck pixels near the edge of the screen was actually a "fault" or basically within acceptable tolerance.

As always, the tech has moved on a lot and its a much less common problem plus the pixels have gotten smaller (and by association the individual LCD shutters) and so probably less noticable even when faulty. 

neilmcl

Sandtree said:

Username03725 said:

OLED gives a richer colour, and like virtually all TVs sold now it will be 4K at least so there's no realistic option of finding a new tv that's not 4K even if you wanted to.

I'm not sure this is true... if you look at the tech press on mobile phones they state that OLED does look richer because 1) the diodes are closer to the surface and 2) because the screens are brighter. In TVs however LED are brighter than OLEDs and so assuming we are comparing like for like (ie both have HDR/Dolby Vision etc) LED will typically appear slightly richer.

Where OLED is in a league of their own is in the dark areas... OLEDs self illuminate and so an area is black no light is produced, LEDs have a backlight and shutters to control the amount of light coming out of each pixel and inevitably there is leakage even if the shutter is closed. Better LED TVs have zones of backlighting so if the whole area is dark that backlight can be dimmed therefore reducing the leakage more.    

I don't agree with that, light output doesn't equate to richness of picture, there's way more to it than that. The only advantage an LED screen has with it's brightness levels is being able to be used in very bright environments, but the differences are marginal for most living rooms.

coffeehound

Sandtree said:

The shutters are electronic not mechanical. "LED TVs" replaced "LCD TVs" but its a bit of a con as both TVs use liquid crystal displays to control the light that goes through each pixel and what actually changed was how the lighting behind the LCD was provided... it resulted in thinner displays and over time allowed a movement away from edge lighting that typically used to result in the left and right sides being brighter than the center of the screen. 

The shutters/LCD can break though even though its electronic and result in "stuck pixels" which will be a red, green or blue dot depending on the colour behind which the LCD shutter is stuck in transparent/open mode or "dead pixels" where the LCD shutter is stuck in black mode so always black/dark grey.

When LCD/LED TVs first came about they were more prone to these issues and the first job when unboxing one was to make sure there werent any stuck or dead pixels... people reported having lots of fights with retailers/manufacturers as to if 1-2 stuck pixels near the edge of the screen was actually a "fault" or basically within acceptable tolerance.

As always, the tech has moved on a lot and its a much less common problem plus the pixels have gotten smaller (and by association the individual LCD shutters) and so probably less noticable even when faulty. 

Interesting, thanks.  So in fact OLEDs remove a layer of complexity there so could prove a little more reliable, to that particular failure mode anyway . .

Sandtree

neilmcl said:

Sandtree said:

Username03725 said:

OLED gives a richer colour, and like virtually all TVs sold now it will be 4K at least so there's no realistic option of finding a new tv that's not 4K even if you wanted to.

I'm not sure this is true... if you look at the tech press on mobile phones they state that OLED does look richer because 1) the diodes are closer to the surface and 2) because the screens are brighter. In TVs however LED are brighter than OLEDs and so assuming we are comparing like for like (ie both have HDR/Dolby Vision etc) LED will typically appear slightly richer.

Where OLED is in a league of their own is in the dark areas... OLEDs self illuminate and so an area is black no light is produced, LEDs have a backlight and shutters to control the amount of light coming out of each pixel and inevitably there is leakage even if the shutter is closed. Better LED TVs have zones of backlighting so if the whole area is dark that backlight can be dimmed therefore reducing the leakage more.    

I don't agree with that, light output doesn't equate to richness of picture, there's way more to it than that. The only advantage an LED screen has with it's brightness levels is being able to be used in very bright environments, but the differences are marginal for most living rooms.

I would certainly say it makes for a more vivid picture which is why the first thing the likes of Currys do on a new display TV is turn the brightness up to max and OLED can look a little dull in comparison when side by side in that environment. Richness is slightly harder to articulate or quantify 

I personally would certainly go for OLED over LED in all but the brightest rooms (eg a conservatory) and OLED brightness has improved notably over the last few years