Execs
- Attractive design
- Largely excellent image high quality
- First rate sound high quality
Cons
- Might be sophisticated to make use of
- Makes use of a 2016 OLED panel
- Enter lag barely excessive
Key Specs
- Evaluate Value: £2800.00
- Native 4K OLED display screen
- HDR10 assist
- Three-sided Ambilight
- Android good TV system
- In-built ‘soundbar’
What’s the Philips 55POS901F/12?
The 55-inch, £2,800 55POS901F/12 is the debut OLED TV from Dutch model Philips. And with it we get the prospect to see the gorgeous image high quality potential of OLED married to Philips’ famend Ambilight expertise for the primary time. For probably the most half, the outcomes are each bit pretty much as good as I’d hoped they’d be.
Watch: OLED vs QLED
Philips 55POS901F/12 – Design and Construct
The 55POS901F/12 is kind of the looker. The vast majority of its rear is mind-blowingly skinny, whereas the intensive metallic end on the entrance and rear set a premium, futuristic tone.
Philips has opted to construct the 55POS901F/12’s audio system, inputs and processing into the TV fairly than an exterior field, that means that the underside of the display screen protrudes a lot additional out to the rear than the remainder. This takes away a few of the “magic” of the in any other case ultra-thin design.
As with most Philips TVs, the 55POS901F/12’s design doesn’t cease on the edges of its body. Philips’ Ambilight system casts colored swimming pools of sunshine, able to monitoring the content material of the pictures you’re watching, a ways past the highest, left and proper edges by an array of LEDs mounted on the TV’s rear.
I’m conscious that Ambilight can sound fairly gimmicky, however in actuality it’s a function that may make the viewing expertise a lot extra immersive. Particularly now that Philips has turn into so expert at matching the placement and tone of Ambilight’s colors to the on-screen photos.
The 55POS901F/12’s construct high quality is excellent. I’m normally nervous about man-handling a TV as ultra-thin as this one, however right here the bodywork feels robust – the method of attaching the ft didn’t give me any heart-in-mouth moments in any respect.
Associated: Finest TV 2017
The one potential drawback with the 55POS901F/12’s design is the way in which the ft sit proper underneath the underside corners of the display screen. It means you’ll want a furnishings stand that’s a minimum of as extensive because the show.
The 55POS901F/12 ships with two distant controls: a plasticky “fundamental” distant, and a complicated unit that boasts a beautiful weighty really feel, a full QWERTY keyboard on its rear, and a contact pad at its coronary heart.
I sometimes resorted to the essential distant, although – mainly as a result of the choose and motion buttons on the superior distant make it far too sophisticated to make use of with out making frequent errors.
Philips 55POS901F/12 – Setup
The 55POS901F/12 is difficult to arrange should you actually wish to get the very best from it. That is all the way down to a barely over-aggressive out-of-the-box strategy to footage, mixed with the extent of the onboard video processing.
I by no means presume to completely dictate the way in which you must arrange your TV, however there are some things I’d advocate.
First, I’d use the Commonplace image preset fairly than Film. Whereas Film turns off many of the Philips processing engine, thus delivering what is perhaps thought-about probably the most correct image, it merely doesn’t look pretty much as good as a fastidiously tweaked Commonplace setting.
This is applicable notably to HDR content material, the place the image turns into uncomfortably darkish, has shadow element crushed out of some darkish areas, and turns into markedly much less dynamic and sharp.
Having chosen Commonplace, and preferring to go away Philips’ Extremely Decision function on, you must cut back the Sharpness setting from its default of stage 5 all the way down to 4. This may cease the picture’s eye-catching sharpness tipping over into noise.
I additionally counsel leaving customary Noise Discount off with all HD and 4K sources, and turning MPEG NR off with good 4K sources – though you may depart the latter on its lowest setting when watching HD digital broadcasts.
I additionally discovered it helpful when watching HDR – though not SDR – to shift the brightness up from its default 50 setting to round 58; flip the Excellent Distinction function off; and set the Distinction Mode to Finest Image.
The place movement is anxious, I’d counsel protecting LCD Clear Movement on, however Excellent Pure Movement off – a minimum of with 4K sources, the place PNM tends to make areas of small element look noisy throughout motion.
Whereas I’d advocate experimenting with the Color Enhancement function, be warned that even on its lowest setting it will possibly sometimes trigger a pinkish/purple tone to creep into areas of HDR color banding. For extra on this banding, learn the Efficiency part.
Lastly, the place Ambilight is anxious I counsel Comply with Video, however with Ambilight brightness diminished to stage two or – at a push – three, and its saturation set to its impartial “0” level.
Associated: Finest TV
Philips 55POS901F/12 – Options
The mix of a top-of-the-line Philips Excellent Pixel processing engine with the high-contrast, self-emissive joys of OLED instantly seems to be engaging. As does the potential to wed the wealthy colors related to OLED to Philips’ distinctive Ambilight system.
Past these headline details, the 55POS901F/12 inevitably helps each a local 4K decision and excessive dynamic vary (HDR) playback. The HDR playback ought to profit from Philips’ processing know-how – based mostly on the expertise of the superb 65PUS7601 LCD TV – with some superior “mapping” of the HDR10 format.
The 55POS901F/12’s brightness peaks at round 640-650 nits, revealing that it’s based mostly on a 2016 OLED panel fairly than one of many new 800-nit (roughly) 2017 panels seen at CES. It is a disgrace, however Philips does have a knack of getting the utmost impression from any brightness accessible to its panels.
Constructing the 55POS901F/12 round a 2016 LG OLED panel ensures that the TV can obtain as a lot as 96% of the so-called DCI-P3 color vary that’s at the moment focused by many of the present HDR sources.
A key function of the 55POS901F/12’s design is the built-in soundbar connected to the display screen’s backside edge. This sports activities an array of forward-facing micro-drivers for mid-range and treble duties, whereas woofers on the rear ought to serve up extra bass than you sometimes get with super-thin TVs.
The 55POS901F/12’s good options come courtesy of a combination of Google’s Android TV and some of Philips’ personal apps. The mannequin I examined carries the Android Marshmallow platform, which offers highlights of Netflix, Amazon, Google Play Films, Google Play Music, YouTube, the BBC iPlayer and Wuaki.television.
Sadly, neither the Android or Philips app providers at the moment present entry to any of the UK’s massive 4 catch-up TV providers past the BBC iPlayer. Additionally, whereas the Netflix app helps 4K and HDR, on the time of writing the Android Amazon Video app helps solely 4K, with no HDR.
As with many different TVs I’ve examined that use Android TV, the 55POS901F/12’s menus run sluggishly in locations.
I’ve already lined a very powerful picture-processing instruments of the 55POS901F/12 within the Setup part, so all that’s left to do right here is point out a few options that the 55POS901F/12 lacks. Particularly assist for 3D playback and the Dolby Imaginative and prescient HDR format. Although Philips has confirmed that its OLED TV shall be getting an replace to assist the ‘HLG’ broadcast HDR format in some unspecified time in the future sooner or later.
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