Early testers are excited – in fact

This year, Samsung announced its first new QD-OLED TVs and monitors. The first tests on devices with the new panel technology are now available – and they are positive, but not entirely without criticism. Therefore, QD-OLED has great strengths and offers some great features. However, the first devices don’t seem to be without small weaknesses that you should be aware of if you’re looking to go with a tech-enabled TV or monitor. Are you going to hit directly or wait for the next generation? Decide for yourself!

My colleague Sven has already explained what exactly QD-OLED is in this article: Quantum-Dot-OLED: That’s why the technology is better than OLED. In short, it’s Samsung’s answer to LG’s OLED screens, which have been very acclaimed in recent years. Samsung combines OLED panels with its own Quantum Dot technology to get the most out of it.

To get an idea of ​​how well everything works, we took a closer look at the first tests of the gaming monitor with a QD OLED panel and those of the first TV:

Alienware widescreen with QD OLED panel

As far as we know, the Alienware AW3423DW is the first monitor with Samsung’s new panel technology and also the first monitor tested by various editorial offices. Indeed, opinions differ here. Some are full of enthusiasm, while others testify to the screen’s slight weaknesses.

colleagues from hiace online They discovered a very special problem with the screen: they could see color margins on hard edges and color transitions that shouldn’t really be there. For example, the screen shows black squares that fade to white with a red border, other transitions have different borders, as shown in the image:

According to Heise, these unsightly seams are caused by the pixel arrangement of the QD OLED panels. Other technologies align the three colors red, blue, and green that make up a pixel. However, in the Samsung panel, they are arranged in a triangle. Red and blue are at the bottom, and green sub-pixels are on top of this.

His colleagues at Hayes wrote: “The effect of color should have caught our attention – we were amazed the first time we turned it on.” However, the editors also write that the effect is especially noticeable with still images, with moving images, such as games, with difficulty.

It’s hard to say how pronounced the seams actually are. However, Heise’s editorial team explains the problem in a video. Here the seams can only be seen when the image is enlarged strongly. We cannot judge whether you can see the seams from a distance during daily work or at games.

Apart from this issue, Heise Online testifies that the screen has good picture and, above all, rich colors.

Tech YouTuber is more than excited

Canadian YouTube tech star Linus Sebastian of Linus Tech Tips is constantly excited about Samsung’s QD-OLED technology. Above all else, color representation in games throws him off his feet with the Alienware display. He does not say a word about the fringe of color that Hess noticed. Maybe he didn’t notice it at all because it’s simply not noticeable in motion pictures?

Above all, Linus praises the new panel’s HDR capabilities, which display colors in a high-contrast and realistic way. In addition, the panel provides an almost all-round viewing angle. In addition, QD-OLEDs are known for their very short response times, which makes them particularly interesting for gaming. YouTube also points this out favorably. You can find the full review here:

Alienware’s QD OLED display with widescreen form factor costs around €1,300 directly from Dell and, according to the manufacturer, could be delivered in August.

S95B: Lots of praise and quiet criticism for the first QD OLED TV

When you watch TV, you usually sit much farther away than you would in front of a screen. Color tips shouldn’t be much of an issue from a distance. At least we didn’t find any reviews that explicitly complained about it. But there is another quiet point to criticize TVs with Samsung panel technology.

Youtube HDTV Test We took a closer look at Samsung’s first QD OLED TV and found that Samsung uses quite a few tricks when it comes to displaying panel colors in Cinema mode. Samsung advertises that QD OLED screens are much brighter than those in regular OLED TVs. If you look at the S95B compared to a “traditional” OLED TV, this appears to be the case.

However, strictly speaking, the SB95B QD-OLED panel doesn’t just make the picture look brighter in cinema mode, but rather makes it look like one. In order to achieve this, the palette saturates many colors, and by comparison, the image looks much brighter than it actually is.

This is especially important if you value the true color experience in Cinema mode. It is designed to display colors as the film producers intended. With Samsung’s little trick, you don’t get an accurate color screen as expected, but you do get an artificially saturated picture. You can watch the full video of the tester here:

However, if you don’t care about watching movies and series the way the producers intended, it’s not a big deal. Overall, the TV offers clear advantages and generally comes out well with most of our testers. In the end, what matters is that you like the image.

Samsung currently sells the TV for about 2,300 euros for the 55-inch version and about 3,200 euros for the 65-inch version. According to the manufacturer, sales in Germany will start in mid-May 2022.

Conclusion: What do you think of the first QD-OLEDs?

Both the monitor and TV with Samsung’s QD OLED panel display a very good, high-contrast picture, which displays HDR content very well and is brighter than OLED competition.

However, slight criticism of both products also shows that the new panel technology does not make everything perfect. Using the screens, we will see how annoying the color fringes really are in everyday life and if Samsung can and will improve it.

The same applies to oversaturation of the TV. Samsung can even fix the software problem, even if the advertising promise of a brighter screen is likely no longer feasible. The first QD OLED devices are sure to get a lot of attention and we’re excited to see their performance.

If you still prefer LG’s tried and tested OLED technology and want to control it with Alexa, here’s how it works:

You? What do you think of the first QD OLEDs? Can you live with small weaknesses? Or would you rather wait for everything to run smoothly? Tell us in the comments!