Week 296 was posted by Charanjit Chana on 2023-06-26.
Buying a TV might well be a horrible experience, but now that's over with I can look forward to not having to do that again for a while now.
We went for a Philips OLED TV, the 48OLED807 specifically.
I had actually settled on an 4K HDR LED TV before stepping into a Sony store and actually seeing OLED directly side-by-side. At first it wasn't obvious to me how black the blacks were but once you see it, it's hard not to notice. That meant my plans were scuppered and it was back to figuring out which TV would be best.
We had an oversized LED TV. It was good, colour reproduction was great but it wasn't anything special.
We also have an older Philips Ambilight TV at home which is nice, but not fantastic. The Ambilight feature feels more like a gimmick on that particular model but on the OLED TV it does often make the picture more immersive.
Our first plasma TV was a 51-inch model that fit our TV space perfectly, including the border it would equate to a 53-inch OLED TV today. Our LED TV was 55-inches and was the exact width of the space we have making it look huge.
I'd have preffered a 50-inches model but it was either go big again or go reasonable at 48-inches. 48 it is and the TV fits our space beautifully.
Colours galore
Yes, the blacks are black. Really black. But the colours are wonderful. Colour reproduction is not only really good, as it was on our last TV, but it's vivid too without being awful. Hard to explain but the picture always looks great regardless of the source.
It's really a great TV, I would buy it again but there are some things to be aware of...
Grips with my Philips OLED
Nothing is ever perfect in the world of technology. I have a few issues with the Philips 48OLEDTV. I would expect the same issues on the larger versions so worth being aware of if they matter to you.
1. Ambilight positioning
Ambilight is a lovely feature but the screen extends up above the rest of the hardware. The ambilight LEDs are bright enough but because they're lower down the light they cast is not as even as it is at the bottom.
2. Speakers are awful
I was lead to believe the speakers were pretty good. So much so that I contemplated ditching our 5.1 AV setup. Safe to say that's not going anywhere. The sound is just awful and flat. I had high hopes and wondered if we could achieve a 7.2 setup by combining both but there's no point, the 2.1 from the TV is too bad to be usable for us.
3. Random black screens
Our Apple TV is probably at fault here, or more accurately apps on the Apple TV. As frame rates change, the TV goes blank as it figures out what to do. Only takes a second or two but the sound stops, sometimes the video pauses and it's annoying. YouTube is the worst offender as different videos have different frame rates available and then there are the plethora of ads to deal with. When it happens too often in a short space of time it all ends up in a loop in any app so you end up having to turn it off and on again.
4. The remote is awful
As ever, manufacturer's remotes are awful, but this is no exception. It has a backlight, access to key features but is twice as big as it needs to and just looks bad. Samsung make the nicest, simple, remote I've seen but I'll stick with my all-in-one.
5. Can't directly choose an input
I found out are last TV actually supported the ARC feature of HDMI, and so do all of the cables I have. Bit late to find that out now, but I thought that would make our overall home entertainment setup easier. What a fool. Philips decided that you should not have a static list of inputs. Instead they move up and down in priority as you use them. Generally they stay the same but not always. Nightmare for our all-in-one remote, but have implemented some annoying work arounds. When it works, it's glorious. When it doesn't, I get complained at. A lot.
Overall though, it's a great TV and I would recommend it to anyone if it fits their budget. For anyone looking at this TV, this was the video that ultimately stopped me setting on the fence and made me go for it: