Samsung QN90A ,QN85A owners thread

[dillihifi]

by the way when all are writing volumes about what an accurate picture looks like I am yet to receive an answer to my question in different TV (both OLED and Mini LED and LED) threads if anybody has got his TV professionally calibrated ?

If so how to to go about it. Rather than debating what the default settings are should we not have some sort of discussion and find out if any tools or software is required to get the most out of the purchased TV.

Secondly this is an Mini LED owner's thread why the clutter ? would it not be better for a different thread for comparisons if it exists

 

[lightgamer]

Whites do look yellowish in the accurate modes but keeping the white balance slightly to the cooler side fixes it to a certain level and your eyes get used to it. Do note even though they are not accurate as well but the cinema and other modes compared to standard try to achieve an accurate picture to a certain level.

Yes, that's what I usually do too. If I see it being too yellow, I check with rtings too and then dial in the 2-point white balance to either add some blue or subtract some red and green (the latter helps with SD content green cast in dark scenes too).

And more over for a long comfortable viewing the warm picture mode feels much better for me. I normally don’t look much to these reviews and prefer checking the TV’S in person.

The accurate white balance is somewhere in the middle of accurate and the standard/vivid mode unless you have a well calibrated TV (which are becoming more common).

These videos do help to get an idea about the product but for me I always spend a month auditioning tvs side by side at multiple showrooms.

If possible, I also do that. This year I don't think it will be possible for me due to COVID but I've seen the C9 at friend's house and showrooms multiple times to know what to expect from C1.

I had to resort to the screenshot as I couldn't upload the original pics as it kept saying the file size was too big. Your tip is well appreciated. Anyways these pics are not accurate representations.

You can resize the photos very easily. In windows if you have Microsoft powertoys installed it's a one click solution. Else also most gallery apps allow it.

I want to know your views on those couple of YouTube videos by Patrik which I put out comparing Samsung vs Sony...

I've seen so many comparisons of QN90A already from major YT channels. My conclusion is simple: OLED for bedroom and QN90A otherwise.

It's the closest an LCD has ever come to matching OLED in dark room performance and 1800+ nits of peak brightness mean it'll fight bad lighting well too.

I'd get the QN90A over any other TV if the pricing was equal. However, I prefer having two TVs for different purposes so I'm probably gonna go with OLED for bedroom and the MI Q1 75" for the living room unless the pricing of QN90A improves significantly.

 

[Love4sound]

by the way when all are writing volumes about what an accurate picture looks like I am yet to receive an answer to my question in different TV (both OLED and Mini LED and LED) threads if anybody has got his TV professionally calibrated ?

If so how to to go about it. Rather than debating what the default settings are should we not have some sort of discussion and find out if any tools or software is required to get the most out of the purchased TV.

Secondly this is an Mini LED owner's thread why the clutter ? would it not be better for a different thread for comparisons if it exists

Professional calibration is expensive even in the us and I have never come across any one doing it in India. You can do it your self if the tv supports calman calibration but the software and tools required are again very expensive.

 

[lightgamer]

by the way when all are writing volumes about what an accurate picture looks like I am yet to receive an answer to my question in different TV (both OLED and Mini LED and LED) threads if anybody has got his TV professionally calibrated ?

There are basically no colour calibrators in India. You can import a colourimeter and calibrate using software like AutoCal, but that's an expensive endeavour.

If so how to to go about it. Rather than debating what the default settings are should we not have some sort of discussion and find out if any tools or software is required to get the most out of the purchased TV.

The easiest way is to just use the recommended settings by rtings (they post for every TV). For the QN90A you can find it here. It's free, takes almost no time to do and will get you 95% of the way there.

If you have an Apple display(iPad, recent iPhone, Macbook Pro) as well, you can do a quick eye test later on and check if the white balances match or are at least close enough. Apple calibrates every single product they make very well.

 

[Love4sound]

If possible, I also do that. This year I don't think it will be possible for me due to COVID but I've seen the C9 at friend's house and showrooms multiple times to know what to expect from C1.

Yeah I understand. Lg usually offers home demo. May be you can give it a try

 

[Jayaesh1]

I can throw in numerous other videos but that would be unnecessarily littering and repetitive.

While we should accept every others view point and not dismiss them them willy nilly but this guy B The Installer is known for his constant U Turns , flip flops n driven by popularity contests.This is the same guy who last year said Q90T was better than CX or that QN85A n Q90T are considerably brighter than QN90A.

I or Nobody else is suggesting that QN90A has better blacks or is even equal to an OLED pure black but that it comes closest a FALD has ever come to an OLED.

The one of the many reasons I opted for QN90A is that I wanted a true allround TV which gives me a taste of both the world's and not just be a darkroom champ or only a brightness king .

If I am to borrow metaphors from Cricket then it was like choosing between an all-rounder like Ben Stokes or a Test specialist like Pujara, both are very good but my preference is for all round ability of Ben Stokes .

 

[dillihifi]

There are basically no colour calibrators in India. You can import a colourimeter and calibrate using software like AutoCal, but that's an expensive endeavour.

The easiest way is to just use the recommended settings by rtings (they post for every TV). For the QN90A you can find it here. It's free, takes almost no time to do and will get you 95% of the way there.

If you have an Apple display(iPad, recent iPhone, Macbook Pro) as well, you can do a quick eye test later on and check if the white balances match or are at least close enough. Apple calibrates every single product they make very well.

As rtings points out the the white balance and the colour calibration varies from panel to panel otherwise everybody's panel would have had the identical uniformity but it is not so and there will be differences. Never saw any detailed settings for white balance using the 100 point or 20 point IRE. I know that calibration is expensive even in the US and it all now boils down to what your perception of accurate is (maybe it is better than mine) but ultimately when I do not have a properly calibrated TV using a colurimeter and Calman I should not be passing sweeping judgements on what is the correct rather it is all to do with perception and to each his own.

Maybe Apple does all that and if eyes were to be relied upon then .......

At least a thread where we can share our knowledge and find out DIY tools to do it in a cost effective manner is the need

 

[lightgamer]

As rtings points out the the white balance and the colour calibration varies from panel to panel otherwise everybody's panel would have had the identical uniformity but it is not so and there will be differences

The differences are not as high as you think. DSE is different because even minor differences in panel look very obvious to our eyes.

However, the colour accuracy is generally close enough panel to panel, especially with expensive TVs since they have lower tolerance for errors and variance.

Unless you receive a lemon, the displays will be within a small variance wrt white balance and colour accuracy especially with expensive TVs.

Never saw any detailed settings for white balance using the 100 point or 20 point IRE.

The link I shared literally shares all the 20 point settings for that TV.

when I do not have a properly calibrated TV using a colurimeter and Calman I should not be passing sweeping judgements on what is the correct rather it is all to do with perception and to each his own.

I shared literal objective takes, not subjective. White point reference is 6520K. There's nothing subjective about it.

BTW, I have looked at reference monitors and know exactly how accurate white is supposed to look like.

Also any Apple product will give you a good idea as every screen they put out is calibrated within 2-300K.

At least a thread where we can share our knowledge and find out DIY tools to do it in a cost effective manner is the need

There's no way to do it without a colorimeter. No way to do it DIY because even if you do it using some other equipment(say your phone's camera), the sensor output itself needs to be calibrated to reference.

Unless you have a reference calibrated hardware, it's impossible to do because you need to measure the error from reference.

 

[dillihifi]

The differences are not as high as you think. DSE is different because even minor differences in panel look very obvious to our eyes.

However, the colour accuracy is generally close enough panel to panel, especially with expensive TVs since they have lower tolerance for errors and variance.

Unless you receive a lemon, the displays will be within a small variance wrt white balance and colour accuracy especially with expensive TVs.

The link I shared literally shares all the 20 point settings for that TV.

I shared literal objective takes, not subjective. White point reference is 6520K. There's nothing subjective about it.

BTW, I have looked at reference monitors and know exactly how accurate white is supposed to look like.

Also any Apple product will give you a good idea as every screen they put out is calibrated within 2-300K.

There's no way to do it without a colorimeter. No way to do it DIY because even if you do it using some other equipment(say your phone's camera), the sensor output itself needs to be calibrated to reference.

Unless you have a reference calibrated hardware, it's impossible to do because you need to measure the error from reference.

It seems that you want to impress that you know exactly what is reference quality calibration just by your experience of looking at reference panels. I see that none of you have a properly calibrated TV and ultimately if you go through what i wrote is that it is your perception of accurate which maybe 99.999% accurate but I still think the measurements are better any point of the day, there is no subjectivity involved.

Further what I meant by DIY was by either pooling the knowledge and understanding what are the tools one needs for calibration and I understand there are some software which are quite reasonable but you would still need a colourimeter. Maybe with the Apple iphone pro's camera's supporting dolby vision we may get an app for the same otherwise it seems that apple TV 4K gives has some sort of calibration of the TV. Nowadays in the audio aspect people are experimenting with REW and UMIK, others are the built in audessy, yapo, etc for making the sound as accurate as possible to reference.

In my view as long you do not have a professionally calibrated TV you PQ cannot be termed as accurate (however well yours may be towards accurate) but in absence of certification the value diminishes similar to Gold.

 

[Donivlapog]

I can throw in numerous other videos but that would be unnecessarily littering and repetitive.

While we should accept every others view point and not dismiss them them willy nilly but this guy B The Installer is known for his constant U Turns , flip flops n driven by popularity contests.This is the same guy who last year said Q90T was better than CX or that QN85A n Q90T are considerably brighter than QN90A.

I or Nobody else is suggesting that QN90A has better blacks or is even equal to an OLED pure black but that it comes closest a FALD has ever come to an OLED.

The one of the many reasons I opted for QN90A is that I wanted a true allround TV which gives me a taste of both the world's and not just be a darkroom champ or only a brightness king .

If I am to borrow metaphors from Cricket then it was like choosing between an all-rounder like Ben Stokes or a Test specialist like Pujara, both are very good but my preference is for all round ability of Ben Stokes .

Well, you brought the discussion up! That's why a few stood in defence of OLED including me. Why is it that, lately, I have been drawn to comparison traps so easily. I gotta learn how to love the things I have bought and not fight for its supremacy over peer products in industry. Is my bread buttered by anyone in the internet to commision my time comparing apples to oranges? Utter waste of web space trying to compare one over the other. So yes. QN whatever is the Earth shattering brand new toy to buy, but I don't have to dislike one in order to like the other. And what would you gain by getting a couple of nods that your TV is great? Any better kick than silently watching a great film over a couple of beers?

 

[lightgamer]

It seems that you want to impress that you know exactly what is reference quality calibration just by your experience of looking at reference panels. I see that none of you have a properly calibrated TV and ultimately if you go through what i wrote is that it is your perception of accurate which maybe 99.999% accurate but I still think the measurements are better any point of the day, there is no subjectivity involved.

I don't really understand what you're getting at. I never claimed my TV is accurate or calibrated. It's absolutely not. All I'm saying is that new TVs seem to be more accurate to white balance than old ones (based on rtings review and NOT my personal view).

Maybe with the Apple iphone pro's camera's supporting dolby vision we may get an app for the same otherwise it seems that apple TV 4K gives has some sort of calibration of the TV.

What does Dolby Vision have to do with it? iPhone sensor data is nowhere close to being matched to reference as they process the image a lot.

it seems that apple TV 4K gives has some sort of calibration of the TV.

Yes, but that's because Apple internally converts the sensor data and they have matched it to reference. You don't have access to it.

Also the Apple TV 4k doesn't calibrate your TV. It adjusts the Apple TV signal itself so won't work for any content out of it.

In my view as long you do not have a professionally calibrated TV you PQ cannot be termed as accurate (however well yours may be towards accurate) but in absence of certification the value diminishes similar to Gold.

And I never claimed that my TV is accurate or calibrated either. I just said what I do to adjust my settings.

Not sure where you're getting that idea.

 

[Jayaesh1]

Well, you brought the discussion up! That's why a few stood in defence of OLED including me. Why is it that, lately, I have been drawn to comparison traps so easily. I gotta learn how to love the things I have bought and not fight for its supremacy over peer products in industry. Is my bread buttered by anyone in the internet to commision my time comparing apples to oranges? Utter waste of web space trying to compare one over the other. So yes. QN whatever is the Earth shattering brand new toy to buy, but I don't have to dislike one in order to like the other. And what would you gain by getting a couple of nods that your TV is great? Any better kick than silently watching a great film over a couple of beers?

Well, you brought the discussion up! That's why a few stood in defence of OLED including me. Why is it that, lately, I have been drawn to comparison traps so easily. I gotta learn how to love the things I have bought and not fight for its supremacy over peer products in industry. Is my bread buttered by anyone in the internet to commision my time comparing apples to oranges? Utter waste of web space trying to compare one over the other. So yes. QN whatever is the Earth shattering brand new toy to buy, but I don't have to dislike one in order to like the other. And what would you gain by getting a couple of nods that your TV is great? Any better kick than silently watching a great film over a couple of beers?

Fully agree n brilliantly put you've hit the ball out of park .

 

[Jayaesh1]

Fully agree n brilliantly put you've hit the ball out of park .

Why are my Emojis not showing up ...i am yet to fully comprehend the software format here, no offense to hifivision but both AV n AVS forum's are so much simpler n straight forward for a lay user like me.

 

[dillihifi]

I don't really understand what you're getting at. I never claimed my TV is accurate or calibrated. It's absolutely not. All I'm saying is that new TVs seem to be more accurate to white balance than old ones (based on rtings review and NOT my personal view).

What does Dolby Vision have to do with it? iPhone sensor data is nowhere close to being matched to reference as they process the image a lot.

Yes, but that's because Apple internally converts the sensor data and they have matched it to reference. You don't have access to it.

Also the Apple TV 4k doesn't calibrate your TV. It adjusts the Apple TV signal itself so won't work for any content out of it.

And I never claimed that my TV is accurate or calibrated either. I just said what I do to adjust my settings.

Not sure where you're getting that idea.

Well I was mistaken as I thought the iphone pro camera being good so could substitute for a colorimeter. Well thats settled.

As regards the explanation given by you for apple tv I still am unable to understand how it works was thinking of getting one but now seems I have a lot of reading to do.

 

[Kumar101]

I can throw in numerous other videos but that would be unnecessarily littering and repetitive.

While we should accept every others view point and not dismiss them them willy nilly but this guy B The Installer is known for his constant U Turns , flip flops n driven by popularity contests.This is the same guy who last year said Q90T was better than CX or that QN85A n Q90T are considerably brighter than QN90A.

I or Nobody else is suggesting that QN90A has better blacks or is even equal to an OLED pure black but that it comes closest a FALD has ever come to an OLED.

The one of the many reasons I opted for QN90A is that I wanted a true allround TV which gives me a taste of both the world's and not just be a darkroom champ or only a brightness king .

If I am to borrow metaphors from Cricket then it was like choosing between an all-rounder like Ben Stokes or a Test specialist like Pujara, both are very good but my preference is for all round ability of Ben Stokes .

These reviews and others I've seen show how good the QN90A is, nature docs especially look truly amazing. I really love my Q95T even tough this years models have surpassed it.

Enjoy your new TV.

 

[lightgamer]

Well I was mistaken as I thought the iphone pro camera being good so could substitute for a colorimeter. Well thats settled.

If that was possible, I'd have calibrated my TV as well.

As regards the explanation given by you for apple tv I still am unable to understand how it works was thinking of getting one but now seems I have a lot of reading to do.

So how Apple TV calibration works is like this:
1. You put the iPhone front camera in front of the TV when you put it in calibration setting.

2. The Apple TV cycles through test colour patterns and records the colours from iPhone.

3. Apple TV then converts the iPhone's raw signal to reference colours using their trained algorithm. Smartphone sensors don't really capture colours as is. There's noise, processing and the hardware/software is tuned to map a photograph and not one solid colour outside focusing length.

4. Now Apple TV 4k knows what your TV shows vs what it gives, so it adjusts output to make it more accurate. Say if your TV is slightly warmer, Apple TV will send slightly cooler signal so that it looks accurate.

Needless to say, this won't work outside of Apple TV as your TV's settings are not changed.

The only company that can get end to end calibration working is Samsung and Sony (if anyone cares about Sony phones) since they can control TV settings too.

 

[Rane-2020]

If that was possible, I'd have calibrated my TV as well.

So how Apple TV calibration works is like this:
1. You put the iPhone front camera in front of the TV when you put it in calibration setting.

2. The Apple TV cycles through test colour patterns and records the colours from iPhone.

3. Apple TV then converts the iPhone's raw signal to reference colours using their trained algorithm. Smartphone sensors don't really capture colours as is. There's noise, processing and the hardware/software is tuned to map a photograph and not one solid colour outside focusing length.

4. Now Apple TV 4k knows what your TV shows vs what it gives, so it adjusts output to make it more accurate. Say if your TV is slightly warmer, Apple TV will send slightly cooler signal so that it looks accurate.

Needless to say, this won't work outside of Apple TV as your TV's settings are not changed.

The only company that can get end to end calibration working is Samsung and Sony (if anyone cares about Sony phones) since they can control TV settings too.

It's interesting to see how it will work in practice. Because apples TRUE TONE feature never works.it always makes the screen warm regardless of the surrounding.

 

[dillihifi]

If that was possible, I'd have calibrated my TV as well.

So how Apple TV calibration works is like this:
1. You put the iPhone front camera in front of the TV when you put it in calibration setting.

2. The Apple TV cycles through test colour patterns and records the colours from iPhone.

3. Apple TV then converts the iPhone's raw signal to reference colours using their trained algorithm. Smartphone sensors don't really capture colours as is. There's noise, processing and the hardware/software is tuned to map a photograph and not one solid colour outside focusing length.

4. Now Apple TV 4k knows what your TV shows vs what it gives, so it adjusts output to make it more accurate. Say if your TV is slightly warmer, Apple TV will send slightly cooler signal so that it looks accurate.

Needless to say, this won't work outside of Apple TV as your TV's settings are not changed.

The only company that can get end to end calibration working is Samsung and Sony (if anyone cares about Sony phones) since they can control TV settings too.

so in theory it seems like if you have a apple TV you can watch in calibrated mode irrespective of the TV all the more reason to get one I think but again it seems the weakest link will be the iphone camera.

 

[lightgamer]

so in theory it seems like if you have a apple TV you can watch in calibrated mode irrespective of the TV all the more reason to get one I think but again it seems the weakest link will be the iphone camera.

That will depend on how good this works. Also even after calibration with a colourimeter it doesn't mean the TV will be perfectly accurate, as you can see in the post calibration results on rtings.

Also you need an iPhone X or newer (with the faceID camera). And borrowing from friend probably won't work as I'm sure it'll require it to be registered to the same account (that's how Apple works).

 

[dillihifi]

That will depend on how good this works. Also even after calibration with a colourimeter it doesn't mean the TV will be perfectly accurate, as you can see in the post calibration results on rtings.

Also you need an iPhone X or newer (with the faceID camera). And borrowing from friend probably won't work as I'm sure it'll require it to be registered to the same account (that's how Apple works).

Well I understand that even after using a meter also the equipment can go so far but no further

As regards the iphone well thats Apple always trying to tie you into their ecosystem.