I don't even know what a television is any more.

August 25, 2024 7:23 AM

Our TV is old, and isn't showing blacks very well any more. I haven't even thought about TVs in 15 years. What do I need to know?

What I thought would be a pretty simple search for "good TV for blacks" (I like horror movies, black is important!) has led me through a baffling array of QLED and OLED options, and while I'm perfectly happy with a "stupid" TV with an nVidia Shield for Plex, every TV now seems to be bundled with some sort of built-in streaming platform.

I'm not a cinephile (although I like movies). Our needs are simple. Do I really need to worry a lot about OLED/QLED/built-in software, or is any reasonably recent TV pretty good? Is software ignorable -- can I just opt to have a recent TV act as a "dumb" TV with my Shield, or will I be forced to use built-in software and have to also figure out what plays nice with Plex?

posted by Shepherd to Technology (15 answers total)

I cannot speak for Plex, but our 12-year-old Samsung television died a month ago. We replaced it with a lower-end-of-the-middle-range Samsung QLED. Yes, the options are bewildering these days. We use various A/V hardware plugged directly into the HDMI ports and have not once had to touch the apps & streaming software biz that came with the TV. We have fiddled with the display and audio settings, of course, but none of the built-in streaming stuff.
posted by cupcakeninja at 7:31 AM on August 25

If you care about blacks the only choice is OLED. QLED is basically LCD.

You don’t have to use any tv’s built-in streaming apps. I don’t even have my OLED connected to wifi. HDMI hasn’t changed, just plug in your Shield and go (although depending on how old yours is, you might want to replace it with a 4K model.)
posted by rhymedirective at 7:39 AM on August 25

Agree that OLED is the choice if you care about black blacks.

Can't speak for anyone else but we have an LG "smart TV" that has never been connected to a network connection, nor had any of the "smart" features configured. We connect our hardware via HDMI and that's that.
posted by Alterscape at 7:53 AM on August 25

I'm going to third the recommendation to look at OLED right now if great contrast and deep blacks are important to you. My 8 year old LG OLED still delivers remarkable contrast and picture quality, and I suspect it might not have to be replaced for many more years. You don't need to use the streaming features. We have an Apple TV connected to it, looks amazing.

I would lean on the RTINGS.com reviews of best TVs to determine what fits your budget. They do truly excellent, in-depth TV reviews.
posted by eschatfische at 8:09 AM on August 25

The site for modern Tv reviews, if you want to just take a look for reference, is Rtings. Here's a direct link to their Best of 2024, which includes a "which TV is right for me" tool.
posted by griffey at 8:09 AM on August 25

Side-comment: as alluded to above, whatever you end up buying, check online to find out where the various "smart" feature settings are located so that you can turn them all off. For example, make sure you disable "automatic content recognition" (they obfuscate it under a variety of different names) -- that tells the manufacturer exactly what you're watching, so that they can sell that info to advertisers.
posted by aramaic at 10:01 AM on August 25

I also suggest Rtings.com, tho they have paywalled some features. I settled on a Sony X950H (LED) and a Hisense 55U6G (QLED). I actually subjectively prefer the Hisense picture quality. On both you can definitely see the backlighting grid a bit at night with a black background and white credits, but normally it's not noticeable. The most important thing for me was lack of reflectivity in daytime.

I would avoid the built-in smart TV features -- even though it might work ok today, it'll be laggy and buggy tomorrow.
posted by credulous at 10:30 AM on August 25

Head to Costco or somewhere and look at the screen differences. It’s the best way to know what really matters regarding price vs quality for you personally. (We ended up with an LG 4K OLED, fyi)
posted by artdrectr at 1:53 PM on August 25

Re TV purchase guidance, the prices have now gotten to the point where a 65-inch isn't that expensive, and we just bought one. OMG it is huge, maybe a little too big for our modest living room. So consider that a 55-inch might be plenty.

Re smart TV features, simply don't let the new TV connect to your wifi network. Ignore the TV's smart features.

Or if you must, e.g. to update the firmware, then disable that network setting after the update. If the TV won't let you remove the network config (only change it) then block the TV in your wifi router.

These so-called smart devices are notorious security holes for households, eventually providing a base for hackers to launch attacks on your other more important devices. Of course, if you already have an Echo and a Nest and a Ring, then nevermind you clearly don't care :)
posted by intermod at 1:55 PM on August 25

Bought a LG 4K OLED a few years back. When it dies, I'll buy another one. Beautiful TVs, beautiful deep dark blacks. The only real trouble with OLED sets is that they can be pretty reflective in sunlight.
posted by kbanas at 3:44 PM on August 25

Black is a contrast effect. Your screen cannot produce black light; your eyes interpret an area as black when bright things are around it. Make sure the screen itself isn't lit by light sources in the room, as that will lower contrast.

LCD displays rely on a backlight, which is visible in the 'black' areas. OLED displays emit light, so the contrast is greater— thus, the blacks are better.
posted by zompist at 3:57 PM on August 25

Nth-ing that OLED is the gold standard for black levels. The marketing here is (often intentionally) confusing because LEDs (the light source) can be involved in two ways: tiny ones making the actual pixels (OLED) or bigger ones making a backlight that shines through an LCD (essentially everything else, including QLED). The former has better blacks because individual pixels can be fully turned off.

It's worth pointing out that all TVs have gotten a *lot* better in 15 years and the difference between your old tv and a budget LCD is probably much greater than between a budget LCD and an OLED. I'd still go OLED though if you can swing it.
posted by davidest at 3:11 AM on August 26

i have an LG C-series OLED and have never been disappointed in it. (basis - i work with testing a lot of monitors, and a lot of people who work with testing a lot of monitors, and the majority of my coworkers have all bought an LG C-series OLED.) costco usually has a pretty good deal on them - when i bought mine it was an extended warranty and a year of hulu for free.
posted by koroshiya at 1:05 PM on August 26

Head to Costco or somewhere and look at the screen differences.

Although a slight caveat on this: display TVs are typically set to a specific "store mode" which sets the maximum brightness, most vivid color etc, so that the TV looks good (a) in the store's environment and (b) in competition with other TVs on display. This may not necessarily be particularly representative of how you'd use the TV! Display TVs are likely also playing point-of-sale clips that play to the TV's strengths and/or minimize its weaknesses -- for example, no panning over large mostly-light backgrounds as those tend to make problems with backlight uniformity more apparent.

(otherwise, what everyone else said; OLED for black blacks, RTings for reviews)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 6:12 PM on August 26

We bought a Samsung a couple of years ago, for about $350 at Costco. It's a smart TV, but we just ignore the built-in software. It flashes a request to connect for about ten seconds every time we turn it on, but the notice clears itself and the TV works just fine, and the only connection it has to the outside world is a Roku box and our Blu-Ray player.

It's not an OLED or anything, but it's fine for our needs.
posted by lhauser at 7:19 PM on August 26