I've read numerous posts on upscaling but perhaps there is some recent updated info out there with you folks. I'm planning on getting a Sony A9F 65" in the next couple of months. I had a Sony 940D 75" briefly 2 years ago. To my eyes, the 940D did not display 1080P material (Netflix, BluRay, Amazon Prime) as well as my beloved Panasonic GT 50 60" Plasma, so I returned the 940D.
It's now 2 years later. Those of you with plasma backgrounds or anyone really, do you feel the newer top of the line OLEDS (or LCDs) at least equal native 1080P sets in displaying 1080P material? Reviewers often say the 4K sets do a batter job with 1080P then the older sets, but my poor old eyes haven't seen that yet. The displays in Best Buy frankly look crappy with 1080P input, but I understand there are a lot of settings to adjust. I'm very comfortable with all that. I love the added brightness and deeper blacks of the latest sets. This time around, there will be 3 new variables: it's 2 years later, i'll be trying an OLED instead of an LCD, and I'll be going 65" instead of 75", so PQ should be better.
Also what about adding a video processor or scaler (like DVDO mini)? I want to get the brightness and blacks, color improvement, etc from the newer sets, but at least not lose the PQ 1080P that I have now on my plasma. Thank you in advance, I've lurked on AVSforum for 15 years, what would we do without you guys??
Former plasma owner here. Out of all the things that I can complain about going from plasma to OLED, 1080p upscaling is not one of them. I think it looks great most of the time.
Thank you for replying! Now I have to ask, what else don't you like about OLED? My biggest concerns are upscaling and motion processing, which is related. How are action scenes? I only watch film, not much sports or news. I'm aware of potential dangers with burn in (hey, I've owned plasmas.), banding, uniformity.
It seems the newest 2018 panels suffer less from these issues with some clunkers being posted. Your level of tolerance will determine of you can deal with these issues.
I finally am able to add some to this upscaling discussion. I had always wondered how 1080p sources look on a 4K display... vs a 1080 display. I am from the school that it's better to watch something in it's native format for best quality. I wanted to see if this theory held up for 1080p sources. I have alot of regular Blu-rays.. so that factors into my decision on when I upgrade from my Plasma.
Today I was able to do a useful side by side comparison. It was a bit of a unique test.. since I have a late model 1080p Panasonic Plasma and a 4K LG OLED (B7A) in the same room. I was able to run the HDMI signal through a splitter.. so I could send the same signal to both sets from my Blu-ray player.
I watched two movies. Samsara and Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Both are well mastered discs. I used Samsara for sharpness testing, and Star Wars for overall image and also black level comparison.
So in my opinion and in my testing, I found the 1080p Plasma to look a bit Sharper than the LG OLED. From normal distance.. it was close and the Plasma just had a slight edge. When I got closer to the screen.. I could see that the image on the OLED did look a little bit soft. It makes sense to me.. since it's blowing up the image.. but I had heard some options that 1080p Blu-rays looked sharper on a 4K set. In my opinion.. they looked sharper on the 1080p Plasma.
I looked at some text too (from the menus, and also from credits in the movie). The same thing applied. The text looked a little softer on the LG 4K OLED vs the 1080p Plasma.
This is all just my opinion and just what I saw from my test of the 2 calibrated monitors in a dark room.
Now all that being said... there were certainly things I liked better about the OLED vs the Plasma. Black levels were the main thing. Much better on the OLED.. but that's pretty obvious. Image was a little bit brighter on the OLED.. but this is just SDR content and I know the OLED can display more contrast and dynamic range than the Plasma.
Also I'm sure that native 4K content (or native HDR content) would look superior on the OLED. I have watched some 4K Netflix content on the LG.. and it does looks great. Sometimes I can see compression artifacts.. but still a really nice and sharp image.
I'm still a huge OLED fan and I know it's only a matter of time before I pull the trigger on a 65" LG OLED. I know the image is great on the OLED.. and in my opinion it's the best technology out there now (maybe besides a Laser projector.. but I haven't seen one of those in a home theater yet). So I'm just saying that in my opinion... 1080p content looks best on a 1080p set. Not bad on the 4K set.. but side by side it's just a bit sharper (since there is no scaling going on).
That's all just my take on it.. for whatever it's worth. Thanks.
I finally am able to add some to this upscaling discussion. I had always wondered how 1080p sources look on a 4K display... vs a 1080 display. I am from the school that it's better to watch something in it's native format for best quality. I wanted to see if this theory held up for 1080p sources. I have alot of regular Blu-rays.. so that factors into my decision on when I upgrade from my Plasma.
Today I was able to do a useful side by side comparison. It was a bit of a unique test.. since I have a late model 1080p Panasonic Plasma and a 4K LG OLED (B7A) in the same room. I was able to run the HDMI signal through a splitter.. so I could send the same signal to both sets from my Blu-ray player.
I watched two movies. Samsara and Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Both are well mastered discs. I used Samsara for sharpness testing, and Star Wars for overall image and also black level comparison.
So in my opinion and in my testing, I found the 1080p Plasma to look a bit Sharper than the LG OLED. From normal distance.. it was close and the Plasma just had a slight edge. When I got closer to the screen.. I could see that the image on the OLED did look a little bit soft. It makes sense to me.. since it's blowing up the image.. but I had heard some options that 1080p Blu-rays looked sharper on a 4K set. In my opinion.. they looked sharper on the 1080p Plasma.
I looked at some text too (from the menus, and also from credits in the movie). The same thing applied. The text looked a little softer on the LG 4K OLED vs the 1080p Plasma.
This is all just my opinion and just what I saw from my test of the 2 calibrated monitors in a dark room.
Now all that being said... there were certainly things I liked better about the OLED vs the Plasma. Black levels were the main thing. Much better on the OLED.. but that's pretty obvious. Image was a little bit brighter on the OLED.. but this is just SDR content and I know the OLED can display more contrast and dynamic range than the Plasma.
Also I'm sure that native 4K content (or native HDR content) would look superior on the OLED. I have watched some 4K Netflix content on the LG.. and it does looks great. Sometimes I can see compression artifacts.. but still a really nice and sharp image.
I'm still a huge OLED fan and I know it's only a matter of time before I pull the trigger on a 65" LG OLED. I know the image is great on the OLED.. and in my opinion it's the best technology out there now (maybe besides a Laser projector.. but I haven't seen one of those in a home theater yet). So I'm just saying that in my opinion... 1080p content looks best on a 1080p set. Not bad on the 4K set.. but side by side it's just a bit sharper (since there is no scaling going on).
That's all just my take on it.. for whatever it's worth. Thanks.
What was the size difference between the displays? That could be the difference in image sharpness. With 1080p content on a 4k display, all you have to do is display the information for 1 pixel as a 4 pixel block, and it's exactly the same as native 1080p.
That does makes sense that different sets would have different upscaling quality. I shouldn't say this test would apply to all UHD OLED sets. Our LG 65" B7A did a decent job.. but in terms of sharpness.. the 1080p Plasma looked better to me. But other aspects of the image quality were certainly better with the OLED. And other models might do a better job with the upscaling.
I guess my takeaway is that my Panasonic Plasma is still doing a really nice job (especially when it's on it's own.. and not sitting next to the OLED). 1080p material still looks really good to me on the plasma. I might wait a bit longer to pull the trigger on a new OLED. Plus with all the new talk of higher resolutions, HDR formats, and new color spaces, things are still quite a bit in flux. Although the true blacks of a OLED are really really great.
Unless you're allergic to aliasing and either have a sufficiently large enough screen size, a low enough source content resolution, or a close enough viewing distance that said aliasing is noticeable.
With 1080p content on a 4k display, all you have to do is display the information for 1 pixel as a 4 pixel block, and it's exactly the same as native 1080p.
Sony and Panasonic TVs apparently can do this, but it requires you to manually change the picture mode to something other than the default.
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