This article is now available as a video!
There are a lot of glowing reviews of the latest flagship TV from Samsung, the S95B. Samsung Display’s new and much awaited QD-OLED technology brings extra brightness and colour volume to the inky blacks of regular W-OLED technology, but if you scour the TV reviewer videos, AV websites and shopper reviews you’ll find a surprising number of less than positive aspects reported too.
I’ve summarised those I’ve found so far below but leave a comment if there’s anything I’ve missed.
Starting with a thread of 15 issues based on this TV YouTuber’s findings:
I’ve lumped these problems, plus those from other sources, into a set of categories:
Physical e.g. size
Only comes in 55 and 65 inch sizes: https://www.samsung.com/uk/tvs/oled-tv/s95b-55-inch-oled-4k-smart-tv-qe55s95batxxu/
11/ Panel can be bent in shipping: https://www.amazon.com/SAMSUNG-55-Inch-Quantum-Built-QN55S95BAFXZA/product-reviews/B09VHBXY63
15/ Bright lights near the screen make blacks grayish
8/ Cleaning with water can leave spots, though this might help: https://lifehacks.stackexchange.com/questions/17639/how-to-remove-water-stains-from-tv
User Interface e.g. OS and remote
13/ Tizen OS is laggy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tizen
“an uninspiring smart platform”: https://www.reviewed.com/televisions/content/samsung-s95b-oled-tv-review
Small remote with no back-light: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/reviews/samsung-55-class-s95b-oled-4k-smart-tizen-tv/6502216
Picture Processing e.g. black crush, blown highlights, colour accuracy, upscaling, motion handling, HDR modes.
9/ Out of the box, filmmaker mode is brighter than movie mode and shadow details are too dark: https://www.samsung.com/us/support/answer/ANS00079295/
10/ In some modes eotf is pushed too bright affecting mid tones
Inaccurate or oversaturated colour and luminance:
1/ Colour fringing with dark objects against a light background: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chromatic_aberration
3/ Shadow details can be crushed or overly bright: https://www.howtogeek.com/728797/what-is-black-crush-on-a-display/
4/ Dark scenes can trigger dimming (tho not the only OLED to do this)
2/ Low bit rate content shows aliasing and smoothing artefacts: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spatial_anti-aliasing
14/ Smooth gradation can show posterization: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posterization
5/ Motion can show ghost trails
12/ Motion interpolation introduces artefacts: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_interpolation
No Dolby Vision HDR mode: https://www.reviewed.com/televisions/content/samsung-s95b-oled-tv-review
Quality Control e.g. bugs
Screen cuts off the edge of images: https://www.amazon.com/SAMSUNG-55-Inch-Quantum-Built-QN55S95BAFXZA/product-reviews/B09VHBXY63
6/ Auto colour gamut and auto input switching are unreliable: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamut
7/ Picture settings reset unexpectedly
Longevity – OLED tech is based on organic materials which wear out
Brightness – QD OLEDs can get bright but are nevertheless still much less bright than some LEDs
It’s the brightest OLED we’ve tested to date but S95B doesn’t get as bright as some of the brightest LCD/LED TVs:
https://www.reviewed.com/televisions/content/samsung-s95b-oled-tv-review
Value – price to performance is not the best
Cheaper LEDs like the Sony X95K and its kin have as many strengths and come in larger screen sizes
Finally, trust your eyes – look at some footage of a real life scene and see which TV looks more realistic and involving. And if the measurements of the TV you prefer are worse than some other TV then the measurements are measuring the wrong things – things that don’t necessarily reflect our perception.
And beware the shills and bots lurking in the comments – you need look no further than those in my last video to see the kind of unsubstantiated hype they come out with!
Image credits: cottonbro
GI Chow 