Samsung has become an industry leader in the HDTV market over the last decade. They are the second highest seller of televisions in the United States and are always on the cutting edge of technology. Samsung was the first to release edge-lit LED LCD televisions and are still continuing to bring innovation to the market. Their most elite high-end LED-lit LCD model for 2011 is the UND8000, a 3D television set with local dimming technology. The UND8000 series is available in the 46″, 55″, 60″ and 65″ models.
Design
Samsung has consistently been appreciated for some of the most attractive HDTVs every year because their products are incredibly slim and have a modern look about them which separates them from the HDTV sets manufactured by other brands. This year, they have taken their minimalist design a step further with the UND8000 wherein this series shows a distinctive, visually striking layout which lessens the edging around the panel, as they have incorporated a nearly “all-picture” look with a bezel that is only 0.2 inch thick. For the 55” model, the distance from the edge of the image to the edge of its screen comes with a measurement of 0.375 inch.
To realize how astonishing it really looks, one must see it in person and it arguably is the best looking HDTV yet. At first, the picture may seem to be floating in thin air due to the barely visible nature of the chrome bezel. The panel itself is only 1.2” deep and the set almost disappears when viewed from the side. Samsung has stuck with the four-legged chrome stand from last year’s high end sets, but personally, I am not the biggest fan of the stand; however, it does match the chrome bezel. Samsung has set a new standard in terms of design, making other HDTVs look downright bulky.
Features
Samsung have packed the UND8000 with a long list of features. One thing that really sets the 8000 series apart from lower end edge-lit models is its local dimming capability which Samsung has named as “micro-dimming”. This allows different zones of the picture on the screen to be controlled individually in order to create greater contrast, deeper blacks, precise color, brilliant visual processing, as well as enhanced 3D image quality. Samsung has stuck with the active shutter 3D technology and to take advantage of that, two pairs of 3D glasses now come bundled with the UND8000 series TV sets. However, you should check about the availability of the 3D glasses before you actually make the purchase because the 3D glasses are only available as long as the stocks last.
Other features include a 240Hz refresh rate, dejudder processing, built-in Wi-Fi, web browser and apps. In 2011, Samsung has introduced “SmartTV”, that allows you to search for content across the app store, the web and your own home network through the Smart Hub Internet Portal. Popular options include Yahoo Widgets, Netflix, Hulu Plus, Vudu, games and many more. At the moment, apps that are missing in this series are Yahoo Weather, Finance, News, Flickr, and Twitter. Most probably, the latest “Yahoo Hot Apps” option shows optimism that additional applications are to come soon.
However, the UI of the Smart Hub is not user friendly and the included search option is a waste of time. The new double-sided Bluetooth keyboard with a screen can be both used as a standard remote device as well as a QWERTY keyboard to help you navigate through the Web browser.
Performance
The UND8000 offers one of the most detailed 2D and 3D picture adjustment suites allowing for some very personalized customizations. Color accuracy and black levels are excellent as the UND8000 produces some of the brightest, high contrast pictures and some of the deepest blacks that you will see on any LCD TV.
This series offers three local dimming (Smart LED) settings as well as Cinema Black setting. The latter serves as an automatic control to dim the letterbox bar part of a motion picture with an aspect ratio format of 2.35:1.
It also excels at motion processing and allows very little motion blurring while also handling 24p content with ease. However, the UND8000 has a serious issue with picture uniformity. The deep black levels and accurate colors tend to diminish towards the edges of the picture. Fine points in shades were unclear to some extent due to poor off-angle viewing while the smooth panel mirrors several ambient lights. This is common among edge-lit LED sets but the problem seems to be worse with the UND8000 series than with lower model Samsung sets. This could be due to the nature of its extreme design. While the middle of the picture looks excellent, there is a noticeable difference with the rest of the picture, especially during dark scenes. In addition, vertical and horizontal banding can occur at times while playing certain content.
3D performance in the UND8000 series has improved so drastically (especially when compared to last year’s models) that it has even surpassed the performance of high end plasma sets. However, the 3D glasses from 2010 won’t work on the 2011 models as they are not inter-compatible. Cross-talk has been greatly reduced while contrast and black levels are both excellent. Power consumption by the UND8000 is also appreciably low.
Conclusion
The Samsung UND8000 is without a doubt the most visually stunning HDTV on the market today. It also offers a very complete and compelling set of features like SmartTV, which provides a wide variety of content in a convenient format. Its picture quality can be outstanding, with deep blacks, great contrast and accurate colors. 3D quality has also been significantly improved. For its price however, the poor picture uniformity is a big downfall. Ultimately, the UND8000 has many great features, but its overall picture performance doesn’t quite match up to its stunning looks.
