Sony A8 (AH8) OLED TV Owners & Discussion Thread

No screensaver activating when watching catch up. Screensaver kicks in ok on all other sources except catchup using inbuilt app.

Any ideas?
 
Quick question for A8 owners, as my finger sits on the trigger.

As far as I can tell, the TV has two inbuilt Freeview tuners, meaning I can hook up an external hard drive to record one programme while watching another.

Is this correct and, assuming it is, does that all operate smoothly? There's no real mention of this in reviews. Sony's website indicates there are two digital tuners and HDD recording function.

Just want to be sure I'm not missing the small print somewhere and will need an external solution such as a Manhattan or Humax PVR.

If anyone can advise quickly that would be really appreciated. Thanks.
 
Quick question for A8 owners, as my finger sits on the trigger.

As far as I can tell, the TV has two inbuilt Freeview tuners, meaning I can hook up an external hard drive to record one programme while watching another.

Is this correct and, assuming it is, does that all operate smoothly? There's no real mention of this in reviews. Sony's website indicates there are two digital tuners and HDD recording function.

Just want to be sure I'm not missing the small print somewhere and will need an external solution such as a Manhattan or Humax PVR.

If anyone can advise quickly that would be really appreciated. Thanks.
Yes hdd,s and ssd,s work fine from the usb #3 port I have a crucial ssd 2.5 inch 240gb drive hookedup and it works flawlessly.
 
The only thing I’m really worried about with the A8 is some say it’s dark compared to a LCD especially in HDR. I currently have the XH9505 and love this tv. I do have to wait until May as this tv is going into the conservatory then. Nobody thinks the Extra £1k is well spent on the new TV?

Cant comment on the Aj 90 but it’s said to be brighter by a reviewer on another site than his 65a8.
But I wouldn’t worry about HDR on the A8!
I have a XE94 which is a light cannon around 1300nits so I myself was apprehensive.I bought the 65A8 and the 65XH9505.............the 9505 got sent back sure it was a great tv but for me the A8 was the much much better tv all things being equal especially side by side.
I have no issues watching films in HDR on the A8 it’s certainly bright enough.
Depends if you want to spend extra for the new tech and a brightness increase.
How long will u keep the tv for?
 
Cant comment on the Aj 90 but it’s said to be brighter by a reviewer on another site than his 65a8.
But I wouldn’t worry about HDR on the A8!
I have a XE94 which is a light cannon around 1300nits so I myself was apprehensive.I bought the 65A8 and the 65XH9505.............the 9505 got sent back sure it was a great tv but for me the A8 was the much much better tv all things being equal especially side by side.
I have no issues watching films in HDR on the A8 it’s certainly bright enough.
Depends if you want to spend extra for the new tech and a brightness increase.
How long will u keep the tv for?
The TV will be kept for several years i would imagine. Its indirectly replacing a 37" Sony which i bought to watch HD on!! I'll be keeping it until the next breakthrough is mainstream whatever it is, possibly 4k. Absolute minimum of 5 years i would imagine. I'm more likely to go for the AJ80 than the 90 at thos moment in time. Think £2700 is too much.
 
I have noticed recently (Possibly coinciding with the update to my Sony A8H) that blacks now appear to be slightly raised when using Dolby Vision from the Apple TV 4K to the Sony.

This is a very well known issue with LG OLED's but I'm surprised it's now happening with the Sony A8H as I thought the Dolby Vision protocols the TV's used were completely different. Letterbox bars in Dolby Vision movies are very slightly raised above black which is obvious in a dark room.

The internal TV apps are all fine and my panel uniformity is fantastic, so I assume this issue is likely just due to the Apple TV 4K. I just wonder what has caused it as unless the TV has gotten brighter since I first bought it a month ago, it never happened before (And still only happens with Dolby Vision content from the Apple TV 4K).

Is there anyone else with a Sony A8H and an Apple TV 4K that confirm if they are seeing this issue? Especially with Dolby Vision content purchased from the itunes store?
I noticed blacks are slightly raised on HDR content too.
Dropped the black level down from 50 to 46 seems to have improved it.
 
The only thing I’m really worried about with the A8 is some say it’s dark compared to a LCD especially in HDR. I currently have the XH9505 and love this tv. I do have to wait until May as this tv is going into the conservatory then. Nobody thinks the Extra £1k is well spent on the new TV?
No problem here with brightness on the A8 with HDR, it’s bright enough!
 
I noticed blacks are slightly raised on HDR content too.
Dropped the black level down from 50 to 46 seems to have improved it.

Thanks. Have you specifically noticed it with your apple tv 4k as well? It seems the internal apps are ok. I don't know why all these years later the Apple TV still struggles to do Dolby Vision correctly.
 
Thanks. Have you specifically noticed it with your apple tv 4k as well? It seems the internal apps are ok. I don't know why all these years later the Apple TV still struggles to do Dolby Vision correctly.
I'll give it a look that was with a 4K HDR Blu-ray disc but I'll check Apple too
 
I'll give it a look that was with a 4K HDR Blu-ray disc but I'll check Apple too
Thanks. It happens specifically in my case with Dolby Vision titles on the Apple TV 4K. I really noticed the above black letterbox bars in The Invisible Man during very dark scenes in a dark room. If you walk right up to the TV you notice the pixels are not turned off where the letterbox bars are, but just a very dark grey.
 
The TV will be kept for several years i would imagine. Its indirectly replacing a 37" Sony which i bought to watch HD on!! I'll be keeping it until the next breakthrough is mainstream whatever it is, possibly 4k. Absolute minimum of 5 years i would imagine. I'm more likely to go for the AJ80 than the 90 at thos moment in time. Think £2700 is too much.

In that case I would say regardless whether you get the A8,AJ80 or AJ90 they will blow you away.
 
What's the difference between the KE55A8BU and the KD55A8BU, RS have both for the same price.
 
Yes hdd,s and ssd,s work fine from the usb #3 port I have a crucial ssd 2.5 inch 240gb drive hookedup and it works flawlessly.

Thanks for that.

After a lot of fence sitting, I bought a Sony A85 this morning for £1,169.10.

With the current 10 percent price reduction offered on A8 OLEDs, it seemed too good a deal to pass up.

The alternative would have been an A90J, which I'm sure will beat the A85 for HDR viewing, but that incremental performance boost for improved specular highlight detail doesn't seem worth more than double the cost of the outgoing model.

Gotta wait a few days for delivery. I'm always nervous with TV purchases, just in case I get a set with poor uniformity. Bought from RS, so at least I know I'm covered if there are issues.

Fingers crossed this is all good. Assuming everything's OK, next step will be a pro-calibration, once that's possible again.
 
What's the difference between the KE55A8BU and the KD55A8BU, RS have both for the same price.
I don't know. I've been having a look and there is no mention of the KE on the Sony website but it is listed as a model number in the A8 reference manual along side the KD models.

On Richer Sounds the comparison shows a difference in energy consumption:

Energy - HDR kWh/1000h
KD 120
KE 116
Energy - HDR rating
KD G
KE G
Energy - kWh/1000h
KD 131
KE 111
Energy - Label Rating
KD G
KE N/A

In the Sony reference manual the energy consumption figures are listed for the KD models but not the KE models, even though both models are mentioned at the beginning of the reference manual.

That's about as much as I've been able to find short of asking Sony.

I've got the KD55A8BU and very happy with it.
 
I don't know. I've been having a look and there is no mention of the KE on the Sony website but it is listed as a model number in the A8 reference manual along side the KD models.

On Richer Sounds the comparison shows a difference in energy consumption:

Energy - HDR kWh/1000h
KD 120
KE 116
Energy - HDR rating
KD G
KE G
Energy - kWh/1000h
KD 131
KE 111
Energy - Label Rating
KD G
KE N/A

In the Sony reference manual the energy consumption figures are listed for the KD models but not the KE models, even though both models are mentioned at the beginning of the reference manual.

That's about as much as I've been able to find short of asking Sony.

I've got the KD55A8BU and very happy with it.
It's probably just the stand or the remote.
Sometimes stores get a slightly different model number to make it harder to price match.
The panel itself will be no different.
 
It's probably just the stand or the remote.
Sometimes stores get a slightly different model number to make it harder to price match.
The panel itself will be no different.
Stand and remote are denoted by the number after the 8 (85/87/89) not the letters at the beginning, for instance 55A85BU comes with the illuminated remote, the 55A8BU comes with the standard remote.
 
Stand and remote are denoted by the number after the 8 (85/87/89) not the letters at the beginning, for instance 55A85BU comes with the illuminated remote, the 55A8BU comes with the standard remote.
In that case it will be just to make it harder to price match with different sellers
 
I noticed blacks are slightly raised on HDR content too.
Dropped the black level down from 50 to 46 seems to have improved it.
I haven't my A8 very long, but I think you are increasing the black content by going from 50 to 46. It's very odd, but the black decreases and the screen gets brighter. when you go above 50.
Anybody else notice this? You'd think it would be the other way round.
 
In that case I would say regardless whether you get the A8,AJ80 or AJ90 they will blow you away.
I’ve currently got an XH9505 49” that will soon go into the conservatory. Love the picture on that. Will the A8 be a significant upgrade on that?
 
I haven't my A8 very long, but I think you are increasing the black content by going from 50 to 46. It's very odd, but the black decreases and the screen gets brighter. when you go above 50.
Anybody else notice this? You'd think it would be the other way round.
Black bars on wide-screen image look a lot better set at 46 to my eye.
I'm getting my TV professionally calibrated on April 6th see what he comes up with.
 
Thanks for that.

After a lot of fence sitting, I bought a Sony A85 this morning for £1,169.10.

With the current 10 percent price reduction offered on A8 OLEDs, it seemed too good a deal to pass up.

The alternative would have been an A90J, which I'm sure will beat the A85 for HDR viewing, but that incremental performance boost for improved specular highlight detail doesn't seem worth more than double the cost of the outgoing model.

Gotta wait a few days for delivery. I'm always nervous with TV purchases, just in case I get a set with poor uniformity. Bought from RS, so at least I know I'm covered if there are issues.

Fingers crossed this is all good. Assuming everything's OK, next step will be a pro-calibration, once that's possible again.
I've got an A8 and I've never used slides to check uniformity. Neither I nor my wife can see any uniformity issues viewing various content so haven't bothered, I'd suggest to anyone to do the same.
Enjoy a fantastic TV 👍
 
Got my 55" A8 setup now. Watching in Custom mode and still images look great :) Motion on Netflix content doesn't look quite as good as on my (old, smaller, 1080P) LCD, though - somehow doesn't seem so smooth. Any tips on the motion enhancement settings? Not really had the chance to play yet.

Any suggestions for good sources of streaming HDR content? Just been using Netflix so far.
 
Got my 55" A8 setup now. Watching in Custom mode and still images look great :) Motion on Netflix content doesn't look quite as good as on my (old, smaller, 1080P) LCD, though - somehow doesn't seem so smooth. Any tips on the motion enhancement settings? Not really had the chance to play yet.

Any suggestions for good sources of streaming HDR content? Just been using Netflix so far.
For Motion, set Film mode to auto, Motionflow to custom, adjust smoothness to taste. The higher the number, the more smoothness (motion interpolation) and introduces soap opera effect. Personally I'd like a setting between 1 and 2. 1 still has ever so slightly too much stuttering for me and 2 has too much soap opera effect so I've settled with 1. Try them out and see which works best for you.

Clearness does black frame insertion. I've not found it to have a great deal of effect on motion stuttering BUT I have found it to help with shadow posterization in lower quality content, so I have it set to 1 in custom preset for SDR, Min (off) in Dolby Vision and when watching HDR10 I use cinema profile which is an exact copy of my custom profile but with clearness set to Min (off).

For streaming HDR sources, as well as Netflix you have Amazon Prime Video for HDR10 and Disney + for Dolby Vision as well as some HDR10 with the addition of Star. BBC iPlayer has some HLG content. Many of the pay per view services such as Google Play offer HDR versions.
 
For Motion, set Film mode to auto, Motionflow to custom, adjust smoothness to taste. The higher the number, the more smoothness (motion interpolation) and introduces soap opera effect. Personally I'd like a setting between 1 and 2. 1 still has ever so slightly too much stuttering for me and 2 has too much soap opera effect so I've settled with 1. Try them out and see which works best for you.

Clearness does black frame insertion. I've not found it to have a great deal of effect on motion stuttering BUT I have found it to help with shadow posterization in lower quality content, so I have it set to 1 in custom preset for SDR, Min (off) in Dolby Vision and when watching HDR10 I use cinema profile which is an exact copy of my custom profile but with clearness set to Min (off).

For streaming HDR sources, as well as Netflix you have Amazon Prime Video for HDR10 and Disney + for Dolby Vision as well as some HDR10 with the addition of Star. BBC iPlayer has some HLG content. Many of the pay per view services such as Google Play offer HDR versions.
After months of tweaking I have come to the same conclusion and set Smoothness to 1 for all. Judder on Dolby Vision is fairly evident with smoothness 1 but I have adjusted to it after finding #2 gave too much SOE.

As per bluenova mentioned clearness 0 or 1 have little difference on internal Apps.

I went and tried Netflix mode for the 1st time yesterday purely out of curiosity and really liked the picture even though the general consensus is not to use it. Now im fighting with myself whether to stick with it or not!!!! May just try it for a week and see how I get on..

Enjoy
 
After months of tweaking I have come to the same conclusion and set Smoothness to 1 for all. Judder on Dolby Vision is fairly evident with smoothness 1 but I have adjusted to it after finding #2 gave too much SOE.

As per bluenova mentioned clearness 0 or 1 have little difference on internal Apps.

I went and tried Netflix mode for the 1st time yesterday purely out of curiosity and really liked the picture even though the general consensus is not to use it. Now im fighting with myself whether to stick with it or not!!!! May just try it for a week and see how I get on..

Enjoy
I found Netflix mode to be dark tbh so switched back to custom mode.
 

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