Samsung Q8DN (QE55Q8DN) Review & Comments

Phil Hinton

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Thanks.

So does this TV suffer from the same brightness cheating as the Q9 highlighted by another reviewer (by not following the REC 709 curve thereby artificially brightening all TV sources). Also does it also suffer from the over aggressive local dimming which results in loss of detail in dark scenes (e.g. The Star field in Gravity actually showing less stars than on other TVs.)

Sorry for all the questions, I'm just curious :)
 
Quote from review:

"If you want absolutely contrast and blacks for movie watching in a dim viewing room, with the occasional gaming session, then OLED is the choice for that use case. If however you have a normal living room with bright lighting during the day and at night, you game for hours at a time and are concerned about possible image retention, then an LCD TV is more suited to your use case."

Where's the evidence that playing games on an OLED is somehow inferior or something you shouldn't do to often for fear of damaging the screen? I've had mine for over a year now and play games regularly, I've had no screen issues, lag issues, or frankly anything that supports this view that there is a problem with gaming and OLED. Is there evidence for this or is it just theoretical?
 
Thank you Phil,very good review and timely.
Will appreciate your help on these questions:
1. Oetf tracking corrected...great news!!!!. Is it via firmware update or simply by not selecting the motion enhancer feature?
2. Agressive dimming crushing blacks still there like q9? (Asked above)
3. How will you compare this tv via xf9. Ratings say it is brighter. Xf9 seems more accurate out of the box (OS biggest pitfall unless oreo improve things)
4. This tv is priced VERY BADLY versus q9 and xf9. Would you say it is a bargain for lcd if priced £500-£600 less than Q9fn?
5. Looks like Q8dn needs calibration big time to get best from it...seems like a must from the measurement ?
6. Do you know if q9 oetf tracking is also accurate now ?

Thank you in advance for your help in addressing above questions.
 
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Thank you Phil,very good review and timely.
Will appreciate your help on these questions:
1. Oetf tracking corrected...great news!!!!. Is it via firmware update or simply by not selecting the motion enhancer feature?
2. Agressive dimming crushing blacks still there like q9?
3. How will you compare this tv via xf9. Ratings say it is brighter. Xf9 seems more accurate out of the box (OS biggest pitfall unless oreo improve things)
4. This tv is priced VERY BADLY versus q9 and xf9. Would you say it is a bargain for lcd if priced £500-£600 less than Q9fn?
5. Looks like Q8dn needs calibration big time to get best from it...seems like a must from the measurement ?

Thank you in advance for your help in addressing above questions.
Already asked the same questions.
 
Thanks.

So does this TV suffer from the same brightness cheating as the Q9 highlighted by another reviewer (by not following the REC 709 curve thereby artificially brightening all TV sources).
No it follows things as they should be when set up correctly. You can see that in the graphs in the review and the text. I believe that the reviewer was highlighting HDR PQ curve variance, (not Rec709). It is bang on here with the Q8DN.

Also does it also suffer from the over aggressive local dimming which results in loss of detail in dark scenes (e.g. The Star field in Gravity actually showing less stars than on other TVs.)

Sorry for all the questions, I'm just curious :)
The fact that you are asking this says to me you didn't read the review. Please refer to the section in the review which does indeed talk about these issues.
 
Quote from review:

"If you want absolutely contrast and blacks for movie watching in a dim viewing room, with the occasional gaming session, then OLED is the choice for that use case. If however you have a normal living room with bright lighting during the day and at night, you game for hours at a time and are concerned about possible image retention, then an LCD TV is more suited to your use case."

Where's the evidence that playing games on an OLED is somehow inferior or something you shouldn't do to often for fear of damaging the screen? I've had mine for over a year now and play games regularly, I've had no screen issues, lag issues, or frankly anything that supports this view that there is a problem with gaming and OLED. Is there evidence for this or is it just theoretical?
The context is that it is possible to get image retention and in very rare cases screen burn from overdoing it with activities like gaming, where there are static images on the screen for a long period of time and in bright picture settings. It usually also happens when proper care is not taken to look after the TV properly. In no way does that infer that OLED is not a good device for gaming on, but rather care should be taken to properly look after the panel so that it doesn't become an issue. Some people don't want to look after the panel or have the possibility of retention, so for them, LCD is perhaps a better choice. It's all about being balanced in what we recommend within our reviews.
 
Thank you Phil,very good review and timely.
Will appreciate your help on these questions:

Thank you in advance for your help in addressing above questions.

I have answered most of those questions in the review or above. Also while the out of the box readings are slightly off, the actual viewing experience wasn't that bad and I doubt anybody other than those with a keen eye would notice any issues.
 
The fact that you are asking this says to me you didn't read the review. Please refer to the section in the review which does indeed talk about these issues.
Hi Phil
I did read the review, so from your answer I would infer that unless you are using the highest local dimming setting it doesn't suffer from the same issue as the Q9.

Thanks :)
 
No it follows things as they should be when set up correctly. You can see that in the graphs in the review and the text. I believe that the reviewer was highlighting HDR PQ curve variance, (not Rec709). It is bang on here with the Q8DN.


The fact that you are asking this says to me you didn't read the review. Please refer to the section in the review which does indeed talk about these issues.
So the Q9 could be "fixed" with a firmware upgrade if it hasn't already happened. Now all Samsung need to do is to "fix" the broken price model and they could blow Sony out of water. As it stand's they are still not worth it.
 
Hi Phil
I did read the review, so from your answer I would infer that unless you are using the highest local dimming setting it doesn't suffer from the same issue as the Q9.

Thanks :)
Sorry, but it has been known for many users to just pop here and ask without reading the review or just skimming it. The dimming is aggressive in all modes and can't be switched off. In the highest setting, it actually does suppress image detail, but not so much in the mid and min settings, but it is still aggressive and also at times slow. I have the Q9 here at the moment, but I am off on holiday tomorrow so won't get a chance to do any testing until I get back. But on the Q8 I didn't see any issues as long as the contrast enhancer is switched off.
 
Yes, the Q8DN pricing does it no favours against the Q9FN and in our opinion, the Q9 would be the better choice given more zones and other things like the one-connect box while the pricing is so similar.
 
I have answered most of those questions in the review or above. Also while the out of the box readings are slightly off, the actual viewing experience wasn't that bad and I doubt anybody other than those with a keen eye would notice any issues.
for the record, I also read the review in details but wanted to know more about the agressive dimming and what you would think of the q8 if it was priced right versus q9 and xf9.
You answered the former very well. The latter, is indeed a difficult one. Thank you for your review, very detailed.
Édit: you just answered the latter too :)
 
Quote from review:

"If you want absolutely contrast and blacks for movie watching in a dim viewing room, with the occasional gaming session, then OLED is the choice for that use case. If however you have a normal living room with bright lighting during the day and at night, you game for hours at a time and are concerned about possible image retention, then an LCD TV is more suited to your use case."

Where's the evidence that playing games on an OLED is somehow inferior or something you shouldn't do to often for fear of damaging the screen? I've had mine for over a year now and play games regularly, I've had no screen issues, lag issues, or frankly anything that supports this view that there is a problem with gaming and OLED. Is there evidence for this or is it just theoretical?


Your question doesn't really match up with the quote you provided. He didn't say it was inferior for playing games in that quote only that in a bright living room environment with bright lighting if you game for hours and are concerned about image retention the LCD is suited more.
 
going to be a really tuff sell at that price unless you really really want those extra nits.
 
Your question doesn't really match up with the quote you provided. He didn't say it was inferior for playing games in that quote only that in a bright living room environment with bright lighting if you game for hours and are concerned about image retention the LCD is suited more.

What I'm saying does match up, but I don't want to de-rail what should be a discussion about this new tv, so I'll leave it there.
 
Could be a good set to pick up after CES 2019, when prices become more “viable” for most. Doesn’t help that they messed up their european range from the outset.

This might make the edge lit Q8 a bargain in next few months.
 
"Q Colour technology refers to the use of quantum dots, which were introduced in 2017"

Quantum dots were introduced in 2016 KS series.
 
Good to hear viewing Football mentioned , but that banding could be seen (even if in the reviewers view minor) once seen you will always see it .. if i was confident the QF9 would have been banding free , i may well have tried one.
 
"The context is that it is possible to get image retention and in very rare cases screen burn from overdoing it with activities like gaming, where there are static images on the screen for a long period of time and in bright picture settings. It usually also happens when proper care is not taken to look after the TV properly. In no way does that infer that OLED is not a good device for gaming on, but rather care should be taken to properly look after the panel so that it doesn't become an issue."
Is that a fair comment from a reviewer - in particular, "..overdoing it..."? When people game, in your example, they do so to get to their best possible place and don't want to stop and have in the back of their mind I need to stop at X, whatever that is - the over do it point? There are similarly people who have reported burn in from viewing news feeds, children's TV etc., should they also instinctively know this "overdoing it" point and that they are not acting "properly"?
 
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"The context is that it is possible to get image retention and in very rare cases screen burn from overdoing it with activities like gaming, where there are static images on the screen for a long period of time and in bright picture settings. It usually also happens when proper care is not taken to look after the TV properly. In no way does that infer that OLED is not a good device for gaming on, but rather care should be taken to properly look after the panel so that it doesn't become an issue."
Is that a fair comment from a reviewer - in particular, "..overdoing it..."? When people game, in your example, they do so to get to their best possible place and don't want to stop and have in the back of their mind I need to stop at X, whatever that is - the over do it point? There are similarly people who have reported burn in from viewing news feeds, children's TV etc., should they also instinctively know this "overdoing it" point and that they are not acting "properly"?

I would have thought it was common sense really. I'm surprised that it would need explaining in more detail. If you are going to use an OLED panel in picture modes other than the accurate ones and at an increased brightness over those, you should be aware that you may have issues with retention, when gaming with static onscreen HUDs, the same as with news or channel logos. Protection is built-in to all new OLED TVs to help combat those issues as well. However, some users are concerned with such things and this puts them off the idea of an OLED and they want brighter HDR images that OLED cannot yet produce, so an LCD is a better option. Again, it is about being balanced in an appraisal and trying to cover all possible use cases for forum members when reviewing an item. So yes, it is absolutely right that I mention these things. If there needs to be any further discussion of this point, please start a thread in the OLED forum as this is a review thread for an LCD TV, so let's not derail it with OLED chat, please.
 

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