Samsung has not rested on its laurels. The good reviews that its QD-OLED panels installed in both the Sony A95K television and the S95B of the South Korean brand itself have garnered have not caused it to settle. In the CES edition that has just been held in Las Vegas (United States) we have been able to see in action the new 77-inch matrixand we assure you that it has not left us indifferent.
It has not done so for a reason: the QD-OLED panels that Samsung is going to market in 2023 are not identical to those of 2022. The second generation of these matrices gives us, according to this brand, a significantly higher performance than organic panels integrated into the two televisions that I mentioned in the previous section.
Sounds good, especially considering that Sony’s A95K is the first TV we’ve given a 10 when evaluating its overall picture quality. During CES we have had the opportunity to participate in a very interesting exclusive technical session during which several engineers from this brand have explained to us in detail what innovations they incorporate the second generation QD-OLED matrices. And we anticipate that they are important.
They are brighter and more reliable. And they achieve it by pulling (a lot) ingenuity
One of the most impressive improvements introduced by Samsung techniques in the second generation of QD-OLED matrices is its maximum brightness delivery capacity. The panels of 2022 were, on paper, capable of delivering peaks of 1,500 nits, and the matrices that we will be able to get hold of this year will be capable of touching, according to this mark, 2,000 nits. It is impressive, especially if we bear in mind that until now OLED panels were barely capable of delivering 1,000 nits in limited regions of the matrix.
It is evident that this year both Samsung and LG have put the batteries with the brightness. And it is that the MLA technology (Meta-lit Lens Array) that this last brand has developed allows its 2023 W-OLED televisions to deliver, in theory, peaks of 2,100 nits. A few months ago it was unthinkable that an OLED television could reach 2,000 nits. In addition, Samsung promises us something important: its new QD-OLED panels deliver this brightness without degrading the color. It will be interesting to put them to the test when they fall into our hands with quality HDR content.
The QD-OLED matrices of 2023 rub, according to Samsung, peaks of 2,000 nits
Another improvement that the second generation QD-OLED panels offer us that is worth not overlooking is its reliability. And it is that, according to Samsung, its useful life is longer and they minimize the probability of static image retention occurring on the panel. In fact, according to this brand, its organic matrices for 2023 are twice as reliable as those of last year. Sounds good, but this is not all: they also consume less. Of course, we will check all this when one of the new televisions falls into our hands.
During the technical session in which we have participated, Samsung technicians have emphasized how hard they have worked to optimize color reproduction and maintain a high saturation level when the brightness output is increased dramatically. In fact, they have developed a new strategy to evaluate the brightness delivery capacity of the panel and the colorimetry together. And according to them, the new QD-OLED panels perform better in this area than their predecessors.
The improvements implemented in the second generation QD-OLED panels are the result of the combination of two different ingredients. The first of these is the physical structure of the matrix, in which the high-efficiency printed sheet of nanocrystals (or quantum dots, as Samsung calls them) stands out, which is responsible for color reproduction. The second ingredient is a video signal processing algorithm that uses artificial intelligence to refine it and align it with the viewer’s perception of image quality.
The last image that is worth stopping at summarizes the improvements that, according to Samsung, the new QD-OLED panels offer us if we compare them with the matrices of 2022. We can understand luminance intuitively as the amount of light that is capable of delivering a light source, and, according to this mark, the one linked to RGB primary colors is 130% higher to that of the previous panels.
The luminance linked to the RGB primary colors of the 2nd generation QD-OLED matrices is 130% higher than that of previous panels
In addition, its reliability is twice as high and its consumption is lower. During the technical session, Samsung engineers strove to be convincing, and to some extent they were convincing because they made sound arguments from a technical point of view. Still, until we get a chance to fully review a TV equipped with one of the new second-generation QD-OLED panels it’s wise to take all of this with a grain of salt. It does sound good though. Surprisingly good.
