LG Usher in New TV Era: Flat & Flexible 4K OLED Incoming

Earlier this week, we were invited by LG UK to a technical briefing at their Slough headquarters, where we were able to spend time with the Korean manufacturer’s TV engineers and assess the company’s latest OLED TVs including, for the first time, a final version of the 65-inch 65EC970V curved 4K Ultra HD model.

LG 65EC970V

We were also given the opportunity to compare LG’s new 1080p 55EC930V OLED TV and last year’s 55EA880W (minus the outer Gallery frame) against 4K LED LCDs from other television brands. It turned out to be an interesting comparison since the extra resolution made little difference to picture quality on screens of this size, making you wonder if a UHD (ultra high-definition) 55-incher is actually necessary.

OLED vs LCD

The first thing we noticed with the OLED televisions was the intense colours, which just leapt out of the inky black background, leaving the LED LCDs in the dust. Scenes that contained both bright and dark objects gave the LED local dimming systems real problems: the backlight needed to be set higher for the brighter areas, but that led to the surrounding darker portions becoming washed out. A star field is a good example of this – the LED TVs covered the whole area with a mist due to backlight leaking through. In isolation, you may not notice but next to the OLED where black was black, white was white, and there were no halos or light pooling, the LCDs had nowhere to hide.

LG EC970V

Moving on to the 65in LG EC970V, we got more of the same – all the contrast and colour intensities combined with an indiscernible dot structure. With HD content, we could see some blocking around curved and diagonal lines, but native 4K content was a match made in heaven for this display. It’s a great piece of furniture too with its pencil-thin panel and narrow bezel. The 65EC970V actually looked cosmetically better than its 77-inch brethren due to the bigger screen featuring a black strip along the bottom to accommodate the forward-firing speakers.

Connections

This year’s LG panels still have a gloss finish which the company said is preferred by consumers. The South Korean giant had previously made a matt-finished LCD panel which didn’t prove popular, so there’s no plan to make non-reflective screens using something like Sharp’s moth-eye filter technology.

According to LG, the panel life for these OLED sets is 30,000 hours – this is the industry standard measurement for how long before the panel reaches half its brightness. It’s a worst-case scenario, and will be better if the TV is operated at lower than peak contrast and cell light settings.

There has been a lot of discussion regarding the motion capabilities of the LG 55EC930V, and while we’ll reserve judgement until a full assessment under test conditions, the signs are encouraging. Both LG’s 1080p and 2160p OLED TVs run internally at 100Hz or 120Hz, so any input must match those scanning rates. With [Trumotion] engaged, content is interpolated to p60 by adding new frames between the originals, which is then double-scanned by the panel. With [Trumotion] off, regular television content at i50/ i60 is double-scanned to 100Hz or 120Hz.

For 1080p/24, we watched the Blu-ray of Skyfall, and did not see any motion issues apart from the problems associated with the low frame rate of the source, which is not the fault of the TV.

A small number of 2013’s OLED televisions had issues with stuck or dead pixels. LG explained that the main cause appeared to be very small particles getting left behind on the panel, interfering with the OLED material that’s just 600 nanometres thick. The company has improved its panel-washing process to deal with the problem, so hopefully this (and next) year’s OLED TV models will be better on this front.

LG has invested heavily in OLED research and development (R&D), and that shows no sign of slowing down. There will be a second OLED production line coming onstream in the second half of 2015, and we get the feeling that is just the beginning.

LG’s research data showed that televisions over 42″ will soon account for 40% of the overall market, with 55″ being the fastest-growing segment. There won’t be any OLED television smaller than 55 inches for now, but the great news for video enthusiasts is that LG is promising flat-screen OLEDs for next year in 55in and 65in sizes, along with a bendable 77in version, which are all expected to make appearances at CES 2015. No release dates were given, but the flat OLED displays can be produced on the same line as the curved panels, so they are not reliant on the second production line being operational.

In summary, it seems that the future of TV is bright, black and colourful, spearheaded by LG’s awesome-looking OLED TVs. Although we’ve reviewed one before, we can’t wait to get another one in for testing.

14 comments

  1. Thanks for the report and good news regarding the flat models, though I am not sure if I’ll be able to wait another year until those finally hit the markt.

    >Moving on to the 65in LG EC970V, we got more of the same – all the contrast and colour intensities combined with an indiscernible dot structure.

    Are you talking about the Screen Door Effect some ppl are seeing on the EC930? Great if it can’t be seen anymore due to the smaller pixels.

    >With HD content, we could see some blocking around curved and diagonal lines, but native 4K content was a match made in heaven for this display.

    Sounds like the upscaling capabilities aren’t that great? I mean, practically all content is still Full HD, so this is very important.

  2. @Yappa: Thanks for your kind words.

    Is it being described as Screen Door Effect (SDE)? What’s more obvious on the 1080p sets compared to the 4K ones is the horizontal film-type patterned retarder (FPR) lines.

    Re upscaling, it could’ve been the source. We’ll make a proper judgement when we get one in for review.

    Warmest regards
    Vincent

  3. I see the passive 3D scanlines of my Sony 50W685 when it’s displaying bright screens, but it’s only a very minor annoyance. I am not sure how this so called SDE compares or if some ppl simply mean the same.

    I sure hope that it won’t be long until you get review samples of the LG 55EC930 and later the LG 65EC970.

  4. Fingers crossed for no discoloring on the sides and no disappearing near blacks (up to 3IRE) with the 65″ and 77″. And please no DNR.

  5. Yeah, I have seen one EC930 and it had a very obvious color shift (green / yellow) once you moved away from the sweet spot in front of the television.

    Hope you examine this in your review.

  6. They should have invested in a 65″ or 70″ FullHD flat oled, that would have been a great replacement for the plasmas and would have crush any 4k LCD, but no, they had to insist in the stupid curve and only 2 sizes, one of the beeing 4K exclusive.

  7. @KAZ my impression is that LG was forced to do 4K TVs early instead of full HD because other TV manufactures are trying to push 4K as an alternative to OLED which they stupidly say consumers are not ready for. The reality is Manufactures are not ready for OLED, being that LG will release Flat OLED TVs next year ..again shows it was a marketing ploy to make OLED look different when the prices were high ….would expect prices to be lower by next year… I believe the target is to have a premium price at 10% above LCD.. will be interesting to see if the market will go for OLED or continue to buy inferior LCD TVs (including LED in this as its the same tech).

  8. I really want not-reflective flat OLED TV in sizes between 42 and 50 inches, glossy finish is popular only because LCDs have poor blacks.

  9. As I mentioned in the article, LG did try it but your average Joe didn’t like them.
    Frustrating isn’t it?

  10. Gloss finish screens? Noooooooo…

    Argh! My Pio plasma has a glossy finish and it is the worst thing about an otherwise excellent TV. I will NOT buy a new TV if it doesn’t have at least some attempt at anti-reflection.

  11. It looks like 2015 will be the year I upgrade our 2010 63″ Samsung plasma to a 65″ OLED, but it has to be flat.

  12. What’s wrong with glossy finish screens? I thought we all watched TV in a dark room. Turn off the lights, folks. Turn them off!

  13. @Paul
    The TV emits light and this is not only reflected back, but makes it mirror your whole room and yourself, if you don’t have a black suit on.

  14. I did not read this article…… Vons Hiber