Product test
LG's G5 tested: When OLED suddenly dazzles
by Luca Fontana
Sony's A95L: the king of televisions
20.12.2023
Translation: machine translated
LG held the throne for a long time with its G3. But now it's time to change the guard: Sony's A95L is the best TV I've ever tested.
Before we get to the test: If you want to buy a new TV, you first have to fight your way through a jungle of features and technologies. Want to see the big picture? And a few recommendations? I'll help you through the jungle.
So, now to the test.
This is one of the product tests I look forward to the most every year: Sony's flagship TV. Not because the TV manufacturer from Japan scores with its own new panel technologies. It usually buys these from its competitors LG or Samsung. But because it supplements them with its own processors and often improves them as a result.
"The image technology is one thing," Sony people have often told me, "but how the individual pixels are controlled and the image is processed by the processor is something completely different."
Let's see, literally, what Sony's new flagship can do.
Design and sound: I love Sony's trademark - and I can't use it!
The second option, on the other hand, is perfect if you don't have a soundbar. Simply slide the panel down along the feet until the gap between the panel and the furniture closes. The feet are then barely visible looking forwards and backwards away from the screen. It almost looks as if the panel is sitting directly on the furniture.
Very clever. And nice. If I didn't have a soundbar, this would definitely be my choice. Like here in the digitec shop in Dietikon.
Other than that, Sony remains true to what most other manufacturers imagine a television to be. Modern. Slim. Narrow edges. Nothing out of the ordinary - and that's a good thing. Televisions are supposed to be televisions, I think.
Acoustic Surface ensures good sound
About the soundbar: If it were up to Sony, you wouldn't necessarily need a soundbar for the sound. For years, the Japanese company has relied on its in-house sound technology "Acoustic Surface Audio+": four drivers installed behind the TV do not vibrate air like conventional speakers, but the panel itself:
- 2x actuators (20 watts each)
- 2x subwoofers (10 watts each)
Strictly speaking, a 2.2 system. But Sony doesn't want to be specific. Thanks to "3D Surround Upscaling" - a nicer term for digital sound manipulation - more speakers are simulated than are physically present. That's why the system also supports Dolby Atmos.
What can I say? I'm still amazed at how well this system works: No other TV creates such a voluminous and equally powerful sound image with its conventional internal speakers. I would even go so far as to say that "Acoustic Surface Audio+" easily replaces a mid-priced soundbar. But if you want surround sound - real surround sound - you can't get around a home cinema system.
Sony knows this. That's why there's this feature, which is not new but is still up to date: the TV can be used as a centre speaker within a hi-fi system. This means you don't need a dedicated centre speaker or soundbar. Or you can go straight for the HT-A9 sound system. Four speakers create a 360-degree sound stage - no matter where you place them.
About the connections. They are behind the TV and on the side:
Measurements: QD-OLED flexes its muscles
What comes next goes deep into the subject matter. If you're not interested in tables and diagrams, you can skip all that and scroll straight to the chapter "The picture: powerful yet natural". From there, you'll find my subjective impressions with lots of video material.
The best values for all types of content were achieved in "Dolby Vision" mode. The measurements listed below therefore always refer to this mode. Except for gaming, for which you should always use the "Play" mode.
The maximum brightness
Let's start with the brightness measurement. As I said, unlike its OLED competitor LG, Sony relies on Samsung's Quantum Dots for the A95L. In simple terms, they ensure that the millions of pixels in the display produce colours without having to accept any loss of brightness. I have explained the physics behind this here.
Another advantage of quantum dots is that they produce a picture that is at least as bright with even more intense colours than LG's OLED technology with less energy input. This should reduce the risk of burn-in. In theory, at least.
So let's see what the practice says in the brightness test. In the chart, I compare it directly with LG's flagship, the G3, Samsung's S95C, which also uses a QD OLED panel from its own factories, and Sony's A95K, the predecessor of the A95L.
There are two axes: the vertical axis stands for brightness, the horizontal axis for the section in which the brightness is measured. At two per cent of the entire screen, i.e. selectively and with very small image areas, Sony's A95L achieves an excellent overall value of 1458 nit in Dolby Vision mode by OLED standards. If I measure in the TV's Brilliant mode - the brightest but worst calibrated mode - the measuring device even achieves an incredible 2089 Nit!
A year ago, values like that would have blown my mind. Not anymore, because LG's G3 has built a similarly bright TV despite its "outdated" technology - at least in certain spots and in small image areas. For example, the sun in the evening sky.
What do these measurements tell us? Well, when it comes to the maximum difference between the brightest and darkest pixels - the contrast - Sony and LG are ahead of Samsung. However, when measuring the entire picture area - the overall brightness - Sony, Samsung and LG perform almost equally and achieve a very solid 250 nit. If you were to place all the TVs next to each other, you probably wouldn't notice any major differences in brightness.
The white balance
To measure the accuracy of the white balance, I need two tables:
- Grey scale delta E (dE)
- RGB balance
The greyscale dE shows how much the greyscale generated by the TV deviates from the reference value. The RGB balance shows in which direction the grey levels generated by the TV deviate from the reference value. Why is this important? Let's take a look at the specific A95L example:
If you were to place the TV directly next to a reference monitor, this would mean:
- Value is 5 or higher: Most people recognise the difference to the reference monitor.
- Value between 3 and 5: Only experts and enthusiasts recognise the difference.
- Value between 1 and 3: Only experts recognise the difference, enthusiasts do not.
- Score below 1: Even experts don't recognise the difference.
Any value below five is a very good value for a non-calibrated television. And Sony's A95L almost achieves what only Samsung's S95C did among the televisions I tested: keeping the incorrect deviation below the aforementioned value of five throughout - i.e. at every brightness level. On average, Sony's QD OLED TV achieved a very good dE value of 2.55. LG's G3 also achieved a good 3.19. Samsung's S95C undercut Sony's value with a dE of 1.77.
#
The colour gamut
We continue with the measurement of the colour gamut, the coverage of the most common colour spaces. These are:
- Rec. 709: 16.7 million colours, standard colour space for SDR content such as live TV and Blu-Rays
- DCI-P3 uv: 1.07 billion colours, standard colour space for HDR content, from HDR10 to Dolby Vision
- Rec. 2020 / BT.2020 uv: 69 billion colours, still hardly used in the film and series industry
The large "colour blob", including the darkened areas, shows the full range of colours that can be seen by the human eye. The brightened area on the left shows the BT.2020 colour space, and the same on the right, simply the smaller DCI-P3 colour space. The white boxes show the actual limits of the respective colour spaces. The black circles, on the other hand, show the limits actually measured during measurement.
The measurement resulted in the following colour space coverages:
- Rec. 709: 100% (good = 100%)
- DCI-P3 uv: 99.78% (good = >90%)
- Rec. 2020 / BT.2020 uv: 91.54% (good = >90%)
The A95L achieves excellent 99.78 per cent coverage in the important DCI-P3 colour space. However, all OLED televisions do well in this category: LG's G3 achieved 98.67 per cent.
Sony's A95L also covers the BT.2020 colour space very well at 91.54 per cent - and that is not a matter of course. Even LG's G3 with its MLA panel "only" achieves 74.12 per cent. This speaks in favour of the future viability of QD OLED technology.
The colour error
The colour error, i.e. the colour fidelity. Unlike the gamut above, it does not describe whether, but how accurately colours are displayed in a specific colour space.
The measurements are good - and no surprise. Not after I measured the already very well calibrated white balance. Because the more accurate the white balance, the more accurate the resulting colours. In figures: Sony's A95L has an average dE of a good 4.16 in "Dolby Vision" mode, but I'm not over the moon: LG's G3 achieved an even lower dE value of 1.97 - Samsung's S95C undercut both: 1.33 in "Filmmaker mode".
However, all three TVs - Sony and LG in "Dolby Vision" mode, Samsung in "Filmmaker mode" - perform at a high level. Without a trained eye, the differences are almost indistinguishable.
Reflections
It is not possible to measure reflections on the screen per se. However, some of you have written to me and asked me to include them in my tests anyway. Good idea. To test this, I'll recreate a completely normal situation in the living room: first a photo in the evening. Behind me is the oven, next to the TV is the floor lamp. The light from the floor lamp is reflected by the window of the oven behind me and thrown back onto the TV.
And here is the result:
Sony's A95L doesn't do badly in comparison with LG's G3. Both cope well with the reflection hitting the dark image directly, even if LG's panel looks a little more anti-reflective.
The reflections are much more difficult to deal with during the day without closed curtains, blinds or shutters. Then, when there is also light on the panel from the side. Nevertheless, I have to say that Sony's QD OLED panel does a much better job than the mini LED panel on the Sony X95L:
Interim conclusion after the measurement
Sony's new QD OLED generation makes me happy. It has not only improved greatly in terms of overall brightness, but also impresses with an incredibly reference-worthy picture - straight out of the box, without calibration. At least if you use the Dolby Vision mode. In theory, Sony has created a TV that is more than a match for LG's G3. Let's now take a look at the practice.
The picture: powerful yet natural
The measurements above attest to the TV's good colour space coverage with very high colour fidelity. In theory. What does it look like in practice? I compared Sony's A95L with its two main competitors, LG's G3 and Samsung's S95C. Both South Korean TVs are in the same league as Sony's flagship in terms of both price and technology. But who will win the race?
Colour reproduction
I have a very similar feeling about "James Bond - Skyfall", when James and the young quartermaster Q look at the picture of a proud old battleship in an art museum, which is disgracefully being towed to the scrapyard. An allusion to the ageing secret agent, of course.
Sony's picture is also the most convincing here - even though LG's G3 definitely looks the most natural. At least if I only pay attention to the skin tones. However, Sony has a nice, pleasant and warm tone here, which appeals to me personally the most. With Samsung, on the other hand, a slight red cast creeps into the picture. I already criticised this with earlier Samsung TVs.
Black Crush and Shadow Details
How does Sony perform in dark scenes? The first scene from "Blade Runner 2049" is used for this test. Sony, LG and Samsung's (QD) OLED televisions are wonderfully dark. If you film against the light, it is normal for details to disappear in black silhouettes - known as black crush. LG has the most of this. Could be intentional. The fact that Sony and Samsung have less black crush could also be due to the QD OLED panel.
Also: The director deliberately filmed against the light because he wanted the dark areas of the picture to be really dark.
Brightness gradations
A final image test: Detail reproduction in bright image areas. Pay attention to the sun in the background in the following "Jurassic World" example: Even in such a bright image area, the gradations of Sony's A95L are still so fine that the sun can easily be recognised as a sphere in the firmament. This is much less the case with LG and Samsung.
The processor: at the usual high level
The processor is the brain of the TV. Its main task is to receive, process and display image signals. Processing means that the processor recognises poor picture quality and enhances it. It does this, for example, by removing noise, enhancing colours, smoothing edges, making movements smoother and adding any missing pixel information.
Motion processing and Judder
At the start, I make it really difficult for the processor. Specifically: Judder, a phenomenon that all TVs have. Especially with long camera pans. Sam Mendes' "1917" is full of such smooth, slowly flowing camera movements and is therefore perfect for the judder test. When comparing with other manufacturers, pay particular attention to whether the vertical bars in the barn run smoothly through the picture or stutter.
Next scene from "1917". Here, too, Mendes' camera work poses an immense challenge for most processors. Especially with hard edges against a blurred background, for example around the helmets of the two soldiers. Here, both the processor and the pixels have to react incredibly quickly.
Sony's processor performs very well, even if it doesn't flex its muscles quite as much as LG, for example. But that's complaining at a high level: the picture flows, but never looks unnatural. Even with Samsung in the second comparison, I think.
Reaction time of the pixels
Next, the Apple original "For All Mankind". I want to see how long it takes a single pixel to change colour. If this doesn't happen fast enough, it looks to you as if the image is streaking - the effect is called "ghosting". When panning the camera across the surface of the moon, pay attention to the text displayed at the bottom left.
In summary, the example speaks in favour of Sony's outstanding processor. On the other hand, the video also shows the excellent pixel response times that are so typical of OLED televisions. This is why they are also considered exquisite gaming monitors. LCD televisions are usually at a disadvantage in this respect.
Upscaling
Now the most difficult test. Here I want to see how well the processor upscales less high-quality sources. Blu-rays or good old live television, for example. Or "The Walking Dead". The series was deliberately shot on 16mm film to create the feeling of a broken, post-apocalyptic world with old-fashioned grain and image noise.
Gaming: Input lag and game mode
When measuring the colour correctness in "Game Mode", I achieved an average Delta E of a good 5.21 (see "Colour Error" above if you are interested in the details of this topic). This is not a reference image level. But it's one of the better values I've measured on a TV in "Game Mode".
- 2x HDMI 2.1 connections (4K120Hz, HDMI 3+4)
- Both with Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM)
- Both with variable frame rates (HDMI Forum VRR)
- One of them with eARC (HDMI 3)
To this end, Sony - just like Samsung, LG, Philips, TCL and Panasonic - has entered into a partnership with major gaming studios. The result: HGiG - HDR Gaming Interest Group. According to the manufacturer, this should ensure that HDR is displayed as intended by the game developers. For example, when playing "Spider-Man: Miles Morales" on my Playstation 5.
What Sony conjures up is a picture with absolutely accurate colours. I also notice that black is really black, the edges look sharp and the picture doesn't blur even with fast and jerky camera pans. Look at Miles' dark silhouette against the light, the detailed textures of snow-covered New York or the clearly visible details in the clouds at the end as he swings. This is what a good "game mode" looks like.
Smart OS: Google TV
Apropos - the annoying film and series recommendations on the home screen can also be switched off. It's very simple:
A little treat: Sony itself has added a kind of art mode. Instead of switching off the TV, you can display a few beautiful pictures with the date and time. This is intended to replace the rectangular black hole in the living room that a switched-off TV would otherwise be when the power and brightness are low.
Bravia Core is also back - and it rocks!
80 megabits per second!
At Sony, this is called "Pure Stream". And where the processor is not occupied with overly demanding decompression, it can use its resources to actually make the image significantly prettier. I have carried out detailed image and comparison tests in my review of Sonys X95L. Here is a small foretaste in video form:
The purchase via credits and the Bravia library look like this:
What is still missing for Bravia Core to become the ultimate streaming service is content from other film studios. However, the challenge lies in the technology: for Pure Stream to work, the content must be stored on special Sony servers. According to those responsible at Sony, this is a huge technical and licensing mess that is difficult to resolve with other studios. But they are working on it.
Conclusion: Sony takes the lead
TV heart, what more could you want?
Cover photo: Luca Fontana
Luca Fontana
Senior Editor
Luca.Fontana@digitecgalaxus.chI write about technology as if it were cinema, and about films as if they were real life. Between bits and blockbusters, I’m after stories that move people, not just generate clicks. And yes – sometimes I listen to film scores louder than I probably should.
TV
Follow topics and stay updated on your areas of interest
