Update 7.6.2015 by Caleb Denison: LG has dropped the UPP for the
65EG9600 to $7,000 since this article was published. The article has
been updated to note the new price
Each year for the past 10 years, a group of highly-regarded TV
reviewers, top ISF-certified calibrators, enthusiastic videophiles, and
an interested public have converged at Value Electronics in Scarsdale,
NY to pit the industry’s best TVs against each other and pick a winner.
That’s not exactly what happened this time around. Robert Zohn, Founder
and President at Value Electronics, moved the event up on the calendar
and out of his store to coincide with CE Week in Manhattan. Held in a
private room at the Altman Building, the event was considerably larger,
with higher attendance and, therefore, a bigger pool of voters. The
verdict?
LG’s EG9600 4K UHD OLED took the crown, hands down.
The LG OLED had some tough competition this year, namely the
Samsung JS9500 SUHD TV,
and Sony’s X940C. In fact, Zohn told Digital Trends that it was
effectively a tie for second place. “All of the TVs performed
exceptionally as these are the flagship models from LG, Panasonic,
Samsung and Sony,” said Zohn. “LG’s 65EG9600 OLED won in 5 of the 7
categories. Samsung and Sony scored so very close it would be only fair
to say they tie for 2nd place.”
Apparently, while some folks didn’t like the curved screen on the
Samsung, for example, others were opposed to the Sony’s large
side-mounted speakers. In the end, however, all agreed both LCD-based
televisions were outstanding — just not outstanding enough to take the
trophy.
What put the OLED over the top this year was the same thing that
cinched the top prize for last year’s LG 55-inch 1080p OLED: perfect
blacks. The OLED is unique in its ability to pull off this trick while
still offering outstanding brightness, resulting in tremendous contrast —
an aspect most experts agree is the most critical factor in picture
quality.
Experts noted a few flaws with the LG OLED, and wound up honing in on
one issue in particular: slightly dimmed edges on the far left and
right sides of the panel. In fact, some reviewers dug in deep to expose
the issue and make it clearly visible to onlookers. One presenter used a
notoriously difficult scene from a Harry Potter film to make the dimmed
edges more apparent.
Related: Samsung vs. LG cage match: Watch their best TVs fight no pay per view needed
But the general audience’s vote wasn’t swayed. If the slightly dimmed
edges were visible to them during casual viewing at all, it wasn’t
enough to influence their decision. The LG EG9600 OLED took lead honors,
with its excellent off-axis performance, vibrant color, and excellent
webOS 2.0 user interface all helping to dazzle onlookers. And the pros
agreed: “I was happy to see the pro voting results closely matched the
general attendees,” Zohn said.
Of course, the shootout does little to take price into consideration,
so the notion of value doesn’t play a role. If it did, it’s possible
that voters might have been swayed a different direction. Presently, the
65-inch version of LG’s EG9600 OLED goes for $7,000. A comparably sized
Samsung JS9500 SUHD comes in at $5,000, and the Sony X940C, which is only available in a 75-inch version, runs $8,000.
And for good measure, here’s our side-by-side comparison of these two flagship televisions:
OLED Winner