Sony XBR-75X940E

[gadgtfreek]

First impressions, coming from a 65" E6 OLED (keeping in mind no pitch black room viewing yet):

• Doesn't look big sitting there, but dang when its on from 9.5 feet, took a little getting used to. Going to be great during movies.
• As expected, motion is much better than the OLED. After some testing I settled on Standard MotionFlow mode, which is what I used on my 930C when I had it. Saw a little artifacting on Smoothness 3 (Still not near as much as an LG's TruMotion), and it did not present in live content on Standard, so knowing Standard is 650 lines of motion rez, Ill just go with it. Now it is a tad soapy, but I actually prefer that, so YMMV.
• Video processing in familiar content streaming and Directv is very surprising. I see less noise in the lower quality feeds than on a 65" OLED, but they do not generally do as well as an LCD in that area. The cool thing is, the content is blown up 10" more and mostly looks as good or better. On Amazon and Netflix high quality streams from an X800, I think the image is cleaner than the 65" was.
• HDR on Netflix and Blu-ray looks great, and it def has the nit power.
• Styling wise its a lovely display, and I love the wire hiding panels and the way they disappear in the stand legs.
• Screen uniformity on mixed content looks great.
• Really happy with Cinema Pro mode out of the box, I read they were pretty dang accurate in these modes, and it appears so. Chad B should be here next month for my cal.

Now for the warts:

• Picture is a little flat compared to the OLED (some scenes), but it was fully expected by me. You can't really trump zero blacks on pixel with the ability to light the one next to it, FALD can't do it.
• View angle... My wife and I are lucky enough to be right out in front and eye level, so its lovely. I did some moving around, and I'd estimate if you have a 7 cushion couch, the center cushion as well as 2 to each side (5 total) would get a excellent view from 10 feet, but 6 and 7 on the outer edge start to wash. I think this is better than my 930C.

This thing is a beauty, no doubt it is a way to go if you want larger than 65" and can't afford a 77" OLED. And it is obviously better than LG's OLED in a few ways. Can't wait to watch King Kong or GITS UHD this weekend and check out the dark room performance. I used to use my 930C in a dark room, and other than some flashlighting it did a good job, so I imagine this one will do fine.

Few pics of the setup and the wire management.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Watched episodes 4, 5 and 6 on Amazon of their series Lemans in UHD. Started getting dark so I cut all the lights out and closed the blinds, because 4 and 5 were night racing. I swear this tv is like a wall of image in the dark, and it is going to be so good with football. I had to cut Brightness down from 25 to 20, going to throw a test disc in later and check my black level setting.

I tried to nitpick, but I just can’t see the zones working, I mean this is well designed. I guess it is a combo of the number of zones, their response time, and the base black level the panel itself can hit when turning on pixels and turning them off. No banding in the bright white skies either on day shots, leaves a very clean look.

This is full screen, last big test will be some letterbox stuff this weekend. Still liking Standard for MotionFlow.

 

[teachsac]

For non HDR viewing, I have brightness at 11.

S~

 

[gadgtfreek]

I think I am probably still a little high, but I've grown to like 45-50 footlamberts for all the time SDR. I think my 930C was 15, so I imagine Chad will end up knocking it down a little once he tests it, to get me around 45. I may lower it again after we watch some more.

Once it got real dark I went through some demo stuff (LG Colors of Journey, LG Chess and Samsung Chasing Light) and test patterns. The HDR demo files were very good, lacking a little pop from the OLED in certain scenes, but man they still looked great. When the wine glass splashes in LG Chess against the black background, WOW.

Using HDR10 and SDR test patterns I noticed the following:

• Custom Pro was well over 1000 nits, but you only got 2000 nit and 4000 nit tone mapping in Custom Home for whatever reason.
• 50 black level was appropriate for HDR mode, Gamma left in stock 0.
• With SDR patterns, I found 90 contrast to be fine with regards to clipping, and Black Level needed 49 not the stock 50, using Gamma -2 (2.4 gamma).
• Of course wide mode full and the full pixel setting shows 0 overscan, which is what I want. I noticed these are blocked out with 2160p and only adjustable with lower incoming resolutions. Fine with me as long as it is pixel for pixel.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Seems that CInema Pro and Cinema Home HDR tone map the same, both go high, you just have to tinker with the Contrast setting in Cinema Pro.

Edit:

In a stock mode, no calibration, use Cinema Pro for SDR and Cinema Home for HDR. The HDR tracking in Home is closer to the reference line.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Dolby Vision added to product page

Sony X940E / X930E 4K HDR TV with Slim Backlight Drive+

 

[gadgtfreek]

Did some more testing today.

For SDR, 49 Black Level is correct with Gamma -2 on all my test discs, so I am leaving it there. I also have moved down from 20 to 15 Brightness now in SDR, 20 was a little too much still.

For HDR, in Cinema Pro, I found the same as another user, that decreasing contrast a few clicks gets you more nits. At 90 contrast it clips 80-100%, its like one bar. If you drop to 85, 80% is great and 90 and 100% are one whole bar. This change also affects the nit test pattern, where instead of stalling out around 1400 or whatever, it tracks up to 2000 nits. Everything else is still pretty straight forward between the two:

HDMI Signal Format Enhanced

Wide Mode Full
Auto Wide Off
Auto Display Off
Display Area Full Pixel

Light Sensor Off
Brightness 15 (Max in HDR)
Contrast 85
Gamma -2
Black Level 49 SDR (50 HDR)
Black Adjust Off
Contrast Enhancer Off
Local Dimming Medium
Xtend Dyn Range Off SDR (HDR Max)
Color Temp Expert 1
Live Color Off
Reality Creation Off
Noise Reduction Off
Smooth Gradation Low
Motionflow Standard
CineMotion Low

 

[teachsac]

I was thinking of the 940E or Z9D and then putting the 940C in the bedroom. Unfortunately, just won't fit, so I am waiting for until next year to see what comes out in 65".

S~

 

[gadgtfreek]

Im loving the screen real estate.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Watched several episodes of last chance u in 4k tonight, man, the PQ is outstanding.

 

[frank c.]

Watched several episodes of last chance u in 4k tonight, man, the PQ is outstanding.

I have to agree about this TV, just bought the same one for my condo, excellent TV indeed. Just bought the UBP-X1000ES 4K ultra HD Blu Ray player for it yesterday, excellent combo....

 

[gadgtfreek]

Watched Kong Skull Island, 940E passes the dark room test marvelously IMO. I never noticed the bars, but if I stared at them there might be a zone that bled over at the bottom or the top of the screen in one spot, if there was something bright in a dark scene.

I never would notice if I didn't stare at the spot, and the day scenes they look black all the time. Did not even use my backlight.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Just a follow up on pic settings. One thing I do not like is that when using say Cinema Pro for SDR and HDR, certain things have to be changed each time because they carry over (why Sony, why???). So, I reread an informative post in the AVS ZD9 thread with his pattern observations, and used the 1080p disc I have and Masciola's HDR patterns to check stuff out, and here is how I will run everything until Chad B can make it out. Using Pro for SDR and Home for HDR to make life simple:

Wide Mode Full and Display Area Full Pixel (not applicable with a 2160p input)
Enhanced mode on for HDMI inputs

Setting---Pro(SDR)---Home(HDR)

Brightness---15---Max
Contrast---90---95
Gamma---(-2)---0
Black Level---49---50
Black Adj---Off on both
Contrast Enh---Off on both
Local Dim---Medium on both
X Dyn Range---Off---High

Color---50 on both
Hue---0 on both
Color Temp---Expert 1 on both
Live Color---Off on both

Sharpness---50 on both
Reality---Off on both
Noise Red---Off on both
Smooth Grad---Low on both

Motionflow---Custom Smooth 3 Clear 0 on both

Video Options---All 3 on Auto on both

Light Sensor---Off (only applies to SDR)

 

[gadgtfreek]

Watched Resident Evil Vendetta tonight, basically like watching a video game but had its moments. PQ was odd at times, but in the city during the day about midway it was fantastic, and the last 20-30 minutes at night, on the building with the final monster, it was gorgeous. The 940E looks superb in a room with no lighting, I mean I have a 6500K LED strip I am still going to try, but man it looks good.

Also demoed the scene in B v S where they fight. The glow and pop of Batman's eyes were great, some parts the OLED would win, but others the 940E takes all the way. From the fire to the gunshots, they were super bright and detailed, much brighter than my E6, and when they are on the roof, the lightning was starting to get to me. Every time it flashed I had to blink, I was like "damn".

Can't wait to demo more stuff when I get time, and I settled on Motionflow Custom, 3 and 0 over Standard.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Chad B is due around mid Sept for cal, will post results then.

Also saw this today:




I think Ill just cut wifi off, I dont need it looking for things and I would prefer to have control over FW updates anyways. I disabled the Samba thing even though I never see it, and the limiting of background processes is cool.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Chad B is set for 9/13, will post data here when done. Just added a Shield TV for Amazon and Netflix 1080p, UHD and HDR, and it works well for me.

At this point not much else to report, so going from OLED to 940E, here are my final impressions:

• Cleaner image than my 2016 OLED
• Way worse view angle, but everyone knows that
• Not quite the dark room pop, but I have yet to watch an HDR movie with the lights on and this thing amazes me how well it does black in a dark room.
• Video processing and motion are by far better than the OLED on ALL content
• Not one regret taking the larger screen

Now we just need to DV update.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Smooth Gradation really does a good job. I found some higher quality content that had posturization in a light blue sky as well as banding, and swapping from off to low cleans it right up.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Well, Chad got delayed by the storm, and since these are a little less complicated to calibrate (SDR white balance results are mapped to HDR by the display, you don't calibrate HDR mode really), I ordered a meter and software from Spectracal.

They showed me an apk to sideload their mobile forge pattern generator app onto the tv, which is very cool.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Sony KD-75XE9405 4K LCD TV Review

 

[gadgtfreek]

Toy is in