Low MPRT strobing LCD TVs (mostly Samsung, some Sony - lots of RTINGS BFI Test image comparisons)

[Baron of Sun]

Makes sense. I guess on the image above from the Bravia 9 II the TV was set to "High", considering the crazy low MPRT of about 1 ms. Anyone knows by how much the MPRT is decreased when using "Low" and "Medium"?

[roginthemachine]

Looks more like somewhere between 2-2.5msec MPRT, not 1 msec. Very good but not better than what Samsung LCDs can pull off.

[JimProfit]

Yeah it's very good for a TV but not the tippy-top.
However, it is already a better compromise for HDR+BFI, the base brightness is much higher to begin with, and with a less aggressive strobing more of that brightness is left intact at least.

Too bad about the matte coating though, that's a tough sell for me.

[strayan]

I still find something about plasma display panels mesmerising. Crystal clear completely flat (‘true level’) sheet of glass in front. The pixels just seem to emit a different kind of light. I wish someone could explain the science behind it and how to recreate it with commercially available technology.

My two most used tvs are NEC and Sony PDPs from 2005/6. Full of burn-in now, a bit dimmer, but when I go looking at TVs in current showrooms I’m just not that impressed with the matte coatings and fake looking colour and even the undulations in the screen surface. That junk ain’t Japanese precision made.

[JimProfit]

Plasmas were great, today there's at least a debate around LCD VS OLED depending on what you do, but back in Plasma's heyday there was no way you would buy an LCD if you had the bread for Plasma.

The older Sony Motionflow Impulse LCD TVs from the early-to-mid 2010s completely flew under my radar because my Kuro was so ultimate at the time I bought it. Even if those had great motion clarity, the contrast ratio wouldn't have compared.
When MiniLED LCDs have a lot of dimming zones, now we're starting to talk about competing with (though not equaling) Plasmas and OLEDs.

In fact I didn't really grasp the problem with sample and hold displays until much later, because my last-gen Kuro was among the best Plasmas when it comes to motion, and any decrease in clarity VS CRT was at least compensated by the massive increase from 15khz to 1080p.
And I did my PC gaming on CRT monitors, I only really used LCDs for browsing and studying until ULMB came around, I learned more about motion clarity, and I decided it was time not to daily drive those old CRTs anymore (to save them for special occasions).

Plasmas are even more unlikely to come back than CRTs, so both OLED and LCDs have to get better and use tricks to approximate the better parts of those discontinued tech.

My GX with Motion Pro High has clearer motion than 90% of plasmas (but right in that ballpark), and 4x their max resolution.
Sadly the resulting image is dimmer than my Kuro and it doesn't have that incandescent pop you see in certain scenes.

My Samsung LCDs also have the resolution advantage, and with LED Motion are both brighter and clearer in motion than any Plasma.
But while they can potentially have great blacks due to local dimming there is some residual smokiness in many scenes, from the backlight fighting itself between deep blacks, mid tones, and bright highlights at the same time. It's faint, not like N64 fog or anything but it's not OLED.

I have some F'n amazing screens, but none of them does everything perfect. With modern LCD and OLED we could come much closer to perfect than what we have and it's frustrating.

I hope someday soon we get ultimate brightness VS motion control, at any refresh rate, and that everyone has low-lag interpolation, and that LCDs have more dimming zones, that RGB Mini-LED bridges the gap further. It's not just the HDR brightness arms-race, I really hope that display engineers read forums like these than emphasize other important issues.

Edit: And I hear your point about matte screens, I'll avoid them as much as I can. And I agree that a thicker piece of glass on CRTs and Plasmas is even better than the glossy screens that we have now.

[roginthemachine]

Had a chance to check out the R95H at my local TV outlet. Sadly, when checking the RTings Motion test on YouTube at 60fps, with BFI on, I can confirm the ghosting is atrocious. Difficult to tell if the strobing depends on brightness or not, because at all brightness levels the ghosting makes the image very unclear. This was on the latest firmware 1204. That’s a no for the R95H!

[Clear Motion Seeker]

I have some F'n amazing screens, but none of them does everything perfect. With modern LCD and OLED we could come much closer to perfect than what we have and it's frustrating.

I hope someday soon we get ultimate brightness VS motion control, at any refresh rate, and that everyone has low-lag interpolation, and that LCDs have more dimming zones, that RGB Mini-LED bridges the gap further. It's not just the HDR brightness arms-race, I really hope that display engineers read forums like these than emphasize other important issues.

The most frustrating aspect of this issue is that the hardware is already here and more than sufficient to provide good motion clarity, vibrant brightness level and an very low strobing effect by using good algorithms (blur buster and retrotink are the proof that bfi doesn't have to be a basic solution of just putting one black frame between each image).

The issue is only software (and maybe a bit hardware with LCD's grey-to-grey time response that will Always show a tiny amount of ghosting, especially the VA panels), which means we could have the perfect display right now if engineers wanted so. But the problem is that they would give you the perfect screen and thus, it wouldn't be interesting for manufacturers as a good part of their marketing plan is to present some improvements every year with their new model...while keeping room for other improvements for the following years and giving you the FOMO effect or that you need to upgrade your current TV.

But honestly, if you look at a G6 oled, honestly the (almost) perfect TV is already here : you could get all the quality of a giant CRT screen minus its inherent flaws.

With their engineer teams, it wouldn't take that long for them to put a very customised bfi menu, similar to what retrotink allows you to do. Unfortunately it's not gonna happen, even though Nvidia might have an influence in the motion clarity area in the next years.

If only we could hack those displays...the problem is that their firmware is coded at low level.

[JimProfit]

Rolling-scan BFI on OLED requires specific hardware. And the best implementation we've seen yielded a x4 blur reduction at 60hz. So basically on the level of a very good plasma. That was 6 years ago, with no guarantee its coming back to TVs soon.

As much as I'd like to replace my G1 and GX with a G6 or better yet an S95H with the coating removed, I can't justify splurging for an OLED with worse motion than I currently have, even if I'd get a much brighter panel.
I will either wait for a new rolling-scan model or, at the very least, for a 240hz panel so that I can at least figure something out with software.
All things considered, I'm glad I found a couple of great, relatively inexpensive LCD that I really like, that will tie me over until we have something such an OLED again.

Right now my default is Samsung LCD, and I switch to G1 when the game doesn't have a lot of fast camera panning, but benefits from the perfect contrast (a long wire runs along the wall towards the second screen in my bedroom, from the same computer).

That's because games usually move a lot, so it would take a really, really gorgeous game for me to say "**** my LCDs and their excellent strobing, I need OLED".

Though I'm the first to admit that something like modern Resident Evil feels a bit foggy on my Mini-LEDs. Blacks can look fantastic, but complex scenes will cause the local dimming to struggle, covering the not-fully-black zones with a bit of backlight haze.

Now, if had a 2500+nits peak>400+nits full OLED with a x5 multiplier (so resulting in a 300hz equivalent 500nits peak image at 60hz) I would probably use that as the default gaming option.
That could possibly make me reverse my priorities, daily driving an OLED once again and moving to a great strobing LCD display -only- in the most motion-crucial situations.

Also, If 1440p OLED monitors reach the symbolic 600hz mark and software allows me to have a 10x boost in motion clarity in 60fps games, with no real drawbacks, I might likewise ditch the LCD monitors, even though they have been the absolute (modern) kings of motion.
I have a hard time dealing with the poor contrast and only really use them to configure my games, play quick pickup-and-play stuff while working, or the occasional competitive fps with my buddies.

I can't emphasize how much better looking the Samsung LCDs are compared to my LCD monitors. High zone count does bridge much of the gap, in some scene my two Samsung LCDs are indistinguishable from OLED and we're already reaching the point where it takes a trained eye to spot which scenes don't measure up.
Take an OLED snob and find a good OLED demo on Youtube and see if you can trick them. I did that once with the basic ribbons screen saver though honestly he just didn't look hard enough .

[Clear Motion Seeker]

Even without a 120hz bfi hardware function, they could integrate a better algorithm similar to what a Sony TV can achieve at 60hz, which emulates some kind of rolling scan effect.

Given the huge amount of brightness in both SDR and HDR with current models, it wouldn't be an issue.

But they don't, because mass market values marketing numbers, fancy design and gimmick functions, much more than actual and pure performance as well as customisation profile that are rather professional oriented.

[JimProfit]

Even without a 120hz bfi hardware function, they could integrate a better algorithm similar to what a Sony TV can achieve at 60hz, which emulates some kind of rolling scan effect.

Given the huge amount of brightness in both SDR and HDR with current models, it wouldn't be an issue.

But they don't, because mass market values marketing numbers, fancy design and gimmick functions, much more than actual and pure performance as well as customisation profile that are rather professional oriented.

I am not aware of any OLED whose BFI mode goes beyond doubling the motion clarity of a given refresh rate, apart from the LGs from 2019, 2020 and 2021 (perhaps a select few Panasonic models?).
I don't know for sure and I'd love to be wrong, but can't seem to find anything that supports this on RTINGS.
If we had panels with higher native refresh, it would certainly be possible to do 4 refresh per frames at 60fps on a 240hz panel, I'd take that.
What's infuriating is, we shouldn't have to wait for the next HDMI revision to have higher refresh panels, they could make one solely for the benefit of interpolation and BFI (Takes up to 4K144hz, up-convertible to 4K288hz for example).

Here's a couple of 60hz BFI pursuit shots on various OLEDs, which all look pretty much the same (GX Motion Pro High at the bottom to emphasize the difference in clarity):