New Sony 55 & 65 AF9 OLED is it worth waiting for ?

[Ayahuasca]

I'd just buy and if HDMI 2.1 becomes a must have then sell the OLED you have and get a newer one when they become available. They seem to be getting heavier and heavier discounts each year and on top of that the discounts are coming earlier and earlier in the yearly life cycle. People got the LG OLED 55E7 for just above a grand this year in a deal which is a phenomenal price considering that's the model with a very good integrated soundbar attached to it.

 

[Mallers]

Hi, can the AF9 be used upright, with a stand presumably, or will it only operate on its A frame? I like the 55 in. but due to placement of my centre speaker id need it (the tv) raised a bit, and i dont think im going to be able to get it to lean back. Plus, i dont like it leaning back either!

 

[Psycho Sonny]

sony don't even make OLED's. so who's panel is this? LG or panasonic?

i would stick to main manufacturers of OLED's tbh. sony tends to be overpriced. good but overpriced on tv's. they don't make any of the panels in their tv's so they are buying them all in at an inflated cost.

 

[jpaul]

[ did panasonic start making oleds again ?]

good to see sony being open about oled firmware fixes
Sony responds in OLED TV dimming case (plus measurements)

 

[mmj_uk]

TBH it sounds like Sony don't trust OLED reliability.

AFAIK all current OLED panels are manufactured by LG.

 

[mmj_uk]

Damn I came across this and it's worse than I expected. I thought it was just the static elements like channel logos and HUD's being dimmed.

How did Sony expect to get away with that? any kind of dimming on a TV drives me mad. I'd rather have poor blacks on an LCD than the backlight fluctuating.

 

[jpaul]

Damn I came across this and it's worse than I thought.

isn't that/May pre the new firmware , but, as you say dynamic/global dimming was not discussed in earlier article;
need to audition such tv's armed with an appropriate piece of usb media.

I don't know if sony has higher transient nits than an lg oled - is there an obvious trade-off on design choices ?

 

[Broken Hope]

sony don't even make OLED's. so who's panel is this? LG or panasonic?

i would stick to main manufacturers of OLED's tbh. sony tends to be overpriced. good but overpriced on tv's. they don't make any of the panels in their tv's so they are buying them all in at an inflated cost.

All OLED TV's use LG panels, it's just the processing that's different between manufacturers.

 

[jpaul]

isn't that/May pre the new firmware , but, as you say dynamic/global dimming was not discussed in earlier article;
need to audition such tv's armed with an appropriate piece of usb media.

afterthought youtube/it was probably last years panel ... but now with a9/c8 you get (was it) 40% more redlife

 

[mmj_uk]

isn't that/May pre the new firmware

I dunno I've only just heard about it really, it probably was May going by the date but it beggars belief that Sony thought they could get away with advertising x nits etc and then implement that kind of dimming. Are other OLED brands doing it or just Sony?

 

[mmj_uk]

For 4K gaming you're probably best off waiting for HDMI 2.1.

The reason being 4K+HDR+60fps gets downgraded from RGB 4:4:4 to YCbCr 4:2:2 to be able to work over HDMI 2.0. The difference is probably barely perceptable visually but as it's a big long term investment you'll probably regret it.

Just an update to this as I've been reading a few articles and it might be that most recent TV's will be firmware upgraded to support 4K 60fps/4:4:4/10bit, the current HDMI 2.0 is 18Gb/s using 3 data channels but apparently HDMI has had a fourth data channel since the dawn of time that's only been used for clock signalling. If they activate it 24Gb/s will be possible.

 

[chaparral]

Just an update to this as I've been reading a few articles and it might be that most recent TV's will be firmware upgraded to support 4K 60fps/4:4:4/10bit, the current HDMI 2.0 is 18Gb/s using 3 data channels but apparently HDMI has had a fourth data channel since the dawn of time that's only been used for clock signalling. If they activate it 24Gb/s will be possible.

From the stuff I been reading HDMI 2.1 uses a completely new chipset and supports up to 48Gbps.

 

[mmj_uk]

From the stuff I been reading HDMI 2.1 uses a completely new chipset and supports up to 48Gbps.

Yeah but you don't need to support all of the features of HDMI 2.1 to be HDMI 2.1 certified, from what I've read you can call your hardware HDMI 2.1 even if you only support one feature as long as you list what HDMI 2.1 features are supported.

HDMI 2.0 is 3 data channels at 600mhz (18Gb/s) whereas HDMI 2.1 is 4 data channels at 1200Mhz (48Gb/s), I doubt current chipsets will support 1200mhz (48Gb/s) but the fourth data channel has existed all along and has just not been used for data. Utilising that will be 33.33% more bandwidth.

 

[mmj_uk]

This was a good article:
https://hdguru.com/tv-shoot-out-experts-dont-fret-over-missing-hdmi-2-1/

Since day one of HDMI 1.0 there have been four high-speed channels built into the interface. That fourth high-speed channel will be turned on for the first time as a legitimate high-speed channel with 2.1. Up until this point it has just been a clock ticking along syncing up the Reds, the Greens and the Blues. It hasn’t had to do much.

Other than that, the feature sets [of HDMI 2.1] are vastly available right now from a lot of the manufacturers. eARC, or Enhanced Audio Return Channel, will bring the ability to pass through Dolby Atmos from your display panel back into your AV receiver or sound bar over the HDMI cable.

The HDMI Forum sets minimum compliance tests but where HDMI 2.0 had a list of things that would be required, HDMI 2.1 for the first time brings in digital compression — it allows for built-in compression in the spec. So if we are at 6 Gbps per lane, when we add a fourth channel we are at 24 Gbps. So, we are talking about the ability to pass 4K/120 using compression and as long as you can support 4K/60fps 4:4:4 or 8K 4:4:4, you are able to call yourself HDMI 2.1.

 

[Ayahuasca]

Firmware update wouldn't bring the variable refresh rate though would it? Still 4K 60fps/4:4:4/10bit isn't to be sniffed at if we can get it without upgrading

 

[jpaul]

Firmware update wouldn't bring the variable refresh rate though would it?

since that can just be a change to clock channel data vfr could be enabled from firmware
- substantiated https://www.notebookcheck.net/The-Xbox-One-X-is-the-first-device-to-support-HDMI-2-1.313664.0.html.

... can see hdmi2.1 compatability being like the hd/fulllhd marketting obfuscation, or samsungs hdr1500



Also, without discussing compression, the 4th channel is used for graphics data too, only neede 20.05Gb/s for 4K 60fps/4:4:4/10bit, so existing max clock rates/phi's should be adequate,
but - I guess it wall all only benefit games unless you use madvr to up-scale/frame-interpolate.


.... pity they seem to have 2.1 hdmi spec under lock&key

 

[Ayahuasca]

That's good to know although I'm not sure how likely all of this is, HDMI 2.1 will be touted as a massive selling point and manufacturers may refuse to do it in the hopes people just upgrade and buy the new models that have it.

We may see a delayed firmware release where it's done a good few months after the 2.1 models have landed.

 

[chaparral]

HDTVTest review added to first post

 

[chaparral]

I Bought one today..

 

[coolsurfer]

I Bought one today..

Nice!
I have also bought one though its little 55" brother for our kitchen in our new build. We've yet to order sofa's for the lounge so will order the 65" in Jan or Feb.