LED TV vs LCD TV
LED TVs
are from a technical perspective a member of the LCD TV family. The display panel on the
LED is often a liquid crystal display similar to it's on other LCD TV.
The main difference concerning the two lies with diverse backlighting techniques which may affect what
display quality qualities considerably.
Conventional
LCDs have used some form of flourescent lighting from tubes to considerably more
sophisticated flat arrays of lights. LED TVs use Light Emitting Diodes to light the
LCD panel. Just with there being various kinds of flourescent lights in traditional LCDs
there's also different styles of LED backlighting.
There are LED
TVs including the Sony models which have a panel of LED lights behind the
LCD panel. Inside the Sony the LEDs are tri-colored which enable it to be
controlled in banks for an effect called "local dimming". This enables more dark areas of the picture to
possess the backlighting dimmed behind them resulting in greater contrast and black
levels.
In the Luxia line of
Samsung LED TVs, the LED lights are adjacent the edge of the panel and
this set up enables the really slim depth of these models. Without a chance to do local dimming these are
functionally comparable to classic LCDs so in this posting we will be assessing local
dimming LED TV to classic LCD TV.
LED TV vs LCD TV - COLOR ACCURACY
With white LED
backlights the change concerning the two systems isn't very important, but with RGB colored lights or a
color wheel to affect the backlight color the LED TVs offer an benefit in presenting realistic
color.
Benefit: Without colored
LEDs or another way to have an effect on the backlight color these two systems are nearly equal. With
colored backlighting LED takes the benefit.
Seeing
ANGLES
While conventional
LCDs have improved upon their useable watching angles through the years that is even now a
shortcoming of the technology itself as well as the best LCDs will have problems with
contrast degradation when viewed from angles wider than around 30 degrees off center. The
LED backlit LCDs we've seen have done an incredible job of solving this
issue and have seeing angles that rival plasma TVs.
Advantage: LED
TV
LED TV vs LCD TV - CONTRAST / BLACK LEVELS
Conventional
LCD televisions also have their backlight on when the TV is on. To create black or dark
areas the screen must prevent the light by twisting the crystals to a closed location, often leading to a
lower contrast ratio and a smaller amount fine detail in dark areas in the image. This can be a shortcoming
in LCD engineering that LED TVs with local dimming are trying to correct.
Using the manipulated backlighting the LEDs could be dimmed in dark areas of the picture to
create darker blacks and improved fine detail in dark scenes.
Advantage: Local dimming
LED TV tech has a clear advantage compared and black levels.
FUNCTIONAL CONSIDERATIONS
FAST-MOVING
VIDEO PLAYBACK
Displaying fast moving
video is a function in the answer time and refresh rate in LCD and LED
tvs. The kind of backlighting in the TV has no effect on the reproduction of fast moving
video. It would be best to compare answer times and refresh rates when making a purchasing
decision.
Benefit:
Even
LONGEVITY
Many companies are
claiming just about 100,000 hours lifetime for their televisions. LED backlit tvs are
brand new and don't have much of a track record but LED lights are typically long
lived.
Benefit: LED televisions do not have much history. They should have
an advantage since flourescent style backlighting used in traditional LCDs ever so
slightly change color hue with time. Light emitting diode tech ought not have as often degradation with
time.
POWER
CONSUMPTION
The local dimming LED
TVs we've run into have used quite a bit more electrical power than a conventional LCD TV in the same screen
size. This type of LED television approaches plasma displays in power usage. The edge lit LED televisions
use a smaller amount power than an LCD in the same size.
ADVANTAGE: Edge lit
LED then LCD then local dimming LED.