Samsung Un55B8000 Led - Finally An Lcd Competes With The Best Plasmas
The SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED is Samsung's current flagship model and is the successor to the LN55A950.
Picture Quality
A full LED backlit LCD offering a stunning 7 million:1 contrast seperates the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED from other LCDs by reaching deep into pitch black, formely only possible with plasmas. Some LCDs turn off pixels to achieve inky blacks - ok for still pictures, but too slow to work with most video - basically a gimmick to inflate contrast numbers.
The SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED however, masters the darkest blacks and brightest whites to produce a bold three dimensional effect or "pop." In a dark room, the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED outperforms every LCD on the market, shy of the coveted pioneer plasmas. In a moderate to bright environment however, the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED absolutely dominates.
The highly reflective screen can be annoying for those with unfortunately placed light sources or windows without blinds. A matte screen, as on the LG 55LH90, might be a better fit for some, but a matte screen diffuses the light causing the entire screen to lose those desirable inky blacks. I can't say one is better than the other, but for a TV that can produce such dark blacks, I think the glossy screen makes more sense.
Motion handling is the best of any LCD I've seen thanks to seperate blur and judder adjustments and very few motion artifacts. Blu ray discs will exhibit perfect cinema-like panning or, if you want, a more smooth and clear pan similar to a home video. My verizon fios hd occasionally shows judder when there should a smooth flow of movement. The b8500 can help minimalize this, but it is not powerful enough to eliminate it and if set poorly, it can be made worse.
After some quick, basic calibration colors are vivid and mostly accurate. Noise and artifacts are very minimal on 720p and nonexistant on 1080p. Haloing (i.e. white text on black background cause background to lighten near text) is only visible rarely unless viewing from greater than 30° off center and increases in severity as viewing angle increases. Viewing from greater than 30° off center vertically or horizontally also causes a slight loss, contrast and color depth. Viewing from greater than 50° off causes a significant loss in contrast and color, creating a flat image and showing major haloing effects. The ideal viewing range is within 15° of center, though if centered vertically, image is barely degraded at all up to 30° off center. Ideal viewing distance is roughly 8 to 14 feet for 720p and 5 to 10 feet for 1080p, though don't take those numbers too seriously, you can obviously enjoy this tv from just about any distance. At 4 feet or less though, the 46" model is a better choice.
Ease of Use
The preset picture modes are all quite good for those who aren't picky and just want to watch their tv and the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED does a decent job of assigning settings automatically based on the input. Of course, high-end buyers are more likely to calibrate sources to their liking or hire a pro. The tv will remember settings for dynamic, natural, standard and movie profiles for each source. That gives you a lot more flexibility than only having one or two, but it is complicated by a confusing lockout of various settings depending on how the source is identified.
You can change the name of a source and find more or less settings available for adjustment, but how this works should be clearly documented. Also, there is a little lag when navigating menus, making constant adjustments of the many, many, many settings somewhat slow and annoying. The layout of the menus themselves and the amount of adjustments available is wonderful. The remote control works using RF so you don't have to point the remote at the tv. The remote is a little bulky, but offers all the buttons you'd want for operating the television easily. The scroll wheel is inaccurate for navigating menus and only really works as a directional pad.
Design
While, I prefer the touch of grey on some other samsung, the small blue light on the bottom of the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED is stylish, attractive and best of all, can be turned off. The bezel is attractive, thin, and highly glossy, but can be distracting when it picks up too many reflections. The 1.6" thick screen is amazing, but how often do you look at the side of your tv? The 61 lb. weight without stand is quite light for a 55" tv, but again how often will you move it? It does seem to use fairly little power and creates much less heat than a plasma tv. The swivel stand works well, also quite attractive with a brushed gunmetal finish.
Sound
I did not play around much with the sound as I use a 5.1 setup. I assume most people purchasing this tv will use external speakers, but the internal ones sounded just fine for what they are.
Comparisons
Competing models include the LG 55LH90/55LHZ, Toshiba 670u, Pioneer 500m/600m, Samsung 52B750/55B650/58B860, Sony xbr8 and Panasonic V10. My personal experience with display models showed the plasma screens to perform poorly in bright environments. Given the open layout and 20' ceilings of my living room, plus my wife's preference for at least dim lighting, this ruled out plasmas. The 58B860 in paricular lacked the light output to produce bright enough whites in all but a pitch black environment. The 55LH90 seemed to be the closest competitor and much cheaper, with the xbr8 and 52B750 being close behind. The LH90 however, seemed to produce too many motion artifacts, couldn't deliver quite as much "pop," along with a slew of more minor negatives.
Misc.
Upgrading from a Syntax Olevia 37 hvs (matte screen LCD), this tv has truly blown me away. While the perfect (OLED?) TV is still out of reach, the b8500 leaves little room for improvement. Input lag, a major concern for video gamers, runs under a tolerable 40ms according to my Rock Band 2 manual calibration with game mode turned on. With game mode off, the input lag increases to 140ms, which is easily noticeable. If running through a receiver, try component -> component instead of component -> hdmi for least lag. Game mode disables some processing but not the LED backlighting.
The picture with game mode on even using a component connection (1080p) is incredible, though in need of some anti-aliasing on occasion. Turning off extra processing not disabled by game mode seems to have little effect on further decreasing lag, but I tend to turn them off. Auto motion is disabled in game mode, so expect some minor blur/ghosting.
The SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED also has a ethernet port for connecting to the internet and your home network (including DLNA or Anynet). A cd included with the tv helps you play media from your PC. Widgets will automatically update to display weather, sports, news, etc., but are a little slow and less convenient than popping open a laptop. Still, it's a good idea to plug in the tv to your router at least occasionally for firmware updates.
Conclusion
For those in the market for a 55" HDTV, the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED is the most versatile and polished product out there. While a couple extremely high end plasmas beat out the b8500 in a dark room, no other LCD performs as well and the plasmas quickly lose out as you increase ambient light. The attractive and practical design and feature rich menus complete this incredible package. While the 55LH90 is easy to recommend to those focused on price vs. performance or in love with matte screens, the SAMSUNG UN55B8000 LED is clearly a step up and would make a remarkable addition to any loving home. Prices should come down as we head into the holiday season and onto the super bowl, however these seem to be selling as fast as they arrive for now.
UPDATE: After upgrading to firmware 1008, I experienced a sort of "crop circles" phenomenon caused by a malfunction in the smart LED backlighting. If you search online, you'll find several reports as it is a very widespread problem. I have posted a picture exhibiting the problem above. It can be fixed easily by turning your tv off and on again, but may reappear occasionally. I'm guessing it will be fixed by firmware update eventually, but no word from Samsung. Regardless, I'm still very pleased with my purchase. If the crop circles weren't so easy to fix, I'd probably be fairly upset with the problem. However, it was subtle enough only to notice against a still, uniform and light background.
2nd Update: Crop circles have not returned yet. I expect them to from time to time, but it seems more of a random thing than a problem that takes time to set in. Forum posters seem to have received word from Samsung that this issue is resolved and they are starting to roll out firmware updates (for now just as usb sticks to those reporting the problem)
As for calibration, I used Spears & Munsil High-Definition Benchmark Blu-ray Disc Edition [Blu-ray] to get my brightness, contrast and sharpness set properly. I came up with very similar numbers to what I've seen others post. Contrast 87, Brightness 47, Sharpness 30 (though I couldn't tell much difference fro 0 to 30). Setting the color space requires pro equipment, so I looked online for some numbers and they seemed to work better than default. Of course, it's a great idea to get your set calibrated by a pro because optimal color settings are not going to be the same between most b8500's. I use dynamic profile for daytime, standard for game mode, natural for sports (and some other tv shows), and movie for everything else.
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