TV Alphabet Soup

OLED, QLED, UHD — Which is Best at Best Buy?

I don’t watch much TV—a movie a week and perhaps a few series of what Netflix, Amazon Prime or PBS have to offer. I say that because as a casual viewer, a 55-inch $500 4K TV should be all that I need. Your neighborhood Costco warehouse has pallets of them under all brands. Try standing in line at checkout and you’ll see three products: toilet paper, paper towels and a $500 flat-screen TV.

But I’ve never been one to buy a lesser TV, even though most of them are leagues above those in the same price range just five years ago. Through the years, I’ve had high-end Panasonics and Samsungs. The last Panasonic I bought lured me with its 3-D feature. Never mind that there wasn’t much 3-D content, and less content even now, five years later. While it had the 3-D gimmick, its blacks were pixilated. So, $1,500 out the window. I got $300 for it on Craigslist. Next I bought a high-end Samsung. The screen was wildly bright. Colors were saturated. But the blacks disappointed. How in the world could blacks be pixilated at that price point?

All brands have alphabet soups letters for their features. Is UHD better than 4K?  What about NANO and OLED? What’s NeoQLED 8K all about? And why wouldn’t you choose Crystal UHD over all the rest? Ah, but it was OLED that won me over. OLED stands for Organic Light Emitting Diode. Scholarly papers, such as the one that was published in the Scholars Journal of Engineering and Technology compared OLED with simple LED. So now you need an engineering degree to shop for a TV.

Even though I’m not ashamed to say that I showroom-shop TVs at Best Buy, I used to get them from an online store back east. Shipping is free, and even though they now have to charge sales tax, their prices used to be hundreds below Best Buy’s. That has changed.

The LG was the same price at Best Buy as it was at the web store on the East Coast. Delivery and installation are free at Best Buy while the web firms give free delivery only. Best Buy also offers free tech support and was offering a cash rebate.

These days, I can shop and buy a TV set at Best Buy or Costco.  But be warned, the picture you see at Best Buy has been fine-tuned to produce the absolute brightest, sharpest display. When you get the TV home, the settings are default, which do not produce the optimum picture. If you want Best Buy to come out and adjust your picture, you’ll have to pay the Geek Squad as much as $150. That includes not only adjusting the picture, but unpacking and installing the TV and your components. Not a bad deal for an un-geek.

If you want to save the fee for the Geek Squad, all you have to do is go online. In a Google search bar, type in the exact model of your TV and the word “settings.” What you will get is volunteer geeks’ instructions for optimal adjustments. On your TV remote, go to “settings,” which usually is represented by a gear. Go to picture, which will open up settings for color, saturation, brightness and sharpness. I’ve done it for every flat screen I’ve owned. The difference between the default setting and the adjusted settings is amazing. If you’re not happy with the new settings, you can always go back to default settings and use another geek’s suggestions..

So, which 55-inch flat screen did I wind up buying?

An LG OLED. Out of the box, the picture was stunning. With some tweaks I found online, the display was even better than the same LG model in the Best Buy showroom.

Yes, I spent $1,500 for the LG, but 18 months in, the picture is still breathtaking. Colors pop out, and in dark scenes, an errant pixel is nowhere to be found.

Am I watching more TV now? No, but when I do watch, I’m blown away by the picture.

Summary
Cut to the chase, and get an LG OLED set.