On the Los Angeles Conference Middle, two 85-inch TVs sat aspect by aspect contained in the Nanosys assembly room at Show Week — a yearly business-to-business conference specializing in the expertise that goes into shows of all sorts. One TV was a mini-LED panel with tremendous quantum dots, and the opposite was an RGB LED — this yr’s hottest TV development. Each TVs had been exhibiting the identical content material on the similar time to focus on the variations between the 2 applied sciences — or extra particularly, to indicate the potential failings of RGB LED backlights when in comparison with tremendous quantum dot (SQD), which makes use of blue LEDs for the backlight.
I ought to most likely point out that Nanosys made the quantum dots within the first TV.
The TV on the best, with the Nanosys tremendous quantum dots, was labeled because the TCL X11L — the striped decrease grille confirming as a lot — and the opposite was most definitely the TCL RM9L. Nanosys wouldn’t verify as a lot, however I’ve seen the RGB LED TVs from Hisense, Samsung, LG, and Sony in individual, and it wasn’t any of these. Jeff Yurek, vp of promoting at Nanosys, knowledgeable me that each TVs had been in Filmmaker Mode and shade was set to native to permit each to hit the most important gamut attainable.
As a fast refresher, RGB LED TVs use crimson, inexperienced, and blue LEDs grouped into zones to create a coloured backlight primarily based on the picture displayed on display screen. Theoretically, this offers the TV extra vibrant and saturated colours than mini-LED TVs just like the X11L with blue backlights, without having to rely solely on the quantum dots. The primary potential issue is that the coloured gentle offered by the backlight will bleed into adjoining pixels or zones that differ in shade, leading to what’s referred to as shade crosstalk. Virtually, this might trigger the crimson of a vibrant shirt or hat to trigger the pores and skin of the wearer to have a reddish hue. And that’s precisely what this demo confirmed.
Throughout the whole demonstration, the identical video feed went to each TVs. One slide confirmed three rows: two rows of bins with the first and secondary colours — blue, inexperienced, crimson, cyan, magenta, and yellow — and the third with a skinny white cross on a black background beneath every coloured field. The highest row of bins would then alternate between a stable field and one with a white cross inside it. On the RGB LED TV, because the white cross appeared within the prime row, it was straightforward to see the colour of the world across the cross get a bit lighter and fewer saturated. The colour crosstalk didn’t simply occur throughout the prime row of bins; the field shade from the center row additionally visibly bled into the underside row of crosses. This exhibits within the TVs’ BT.2020 color gamut measurements as properly, with the introduction of the white cross diminishing total BT.2020 protection, most dramatically with the blue and inexperienced shade factors.
However until you’re a measurement nerd like me, you don’t watch stable blocks of shade in your TV for enjoyable. The impact can be current with pores and skin tones — one thing that, as people, is definitely observed. Simply as the colour of the blocks bleeds into the white cross, so does a coloured background into pores and skin tone; nonetheless photos of a lady’s face with a coloured background brought about her pores and skin tone to shift towards the background shade. To verify my eye wasn’t inflicting the colour bleed, versus the TV, I used a scope to focus only a portion of the girl’s face, blocking out the remaining from my view. I may nonetheless inform which background shade was displayed by the change in hue of her pores and skin.
The SQD TV didn’t exhibit any shade crosstalk. It additionally had higher distinction, which comes all the way down to the variety of dimming zones. The X11L is marketed as having as much as 20,000 eating zones, though according to Rtingsthe 85-inch mannequin has 14,400 — nonetheless a powerful quantity. The RGB LED TV used on this comparability has, I used to be advised, round 8,000 dimming zones. One cause the quantity is decrease is as a result of every dimming zone on an RGB TV, at a minimal, must have three LEDs — a crimson, a inexperienced, and a blue — and people take up house. However when the backlight consists of solely blue LEDs, a single LED could be a dimming zone, giving a lot finer management.
All of that is perceptible in precise content material. Throughout an motion scene with fast motion and quick cuts, I may nonetheless pick variations as vibrant colours affected these surrounding them, significantly with pores and skin tones. And in night time scenes, the distinction distinction was notable. If the RGB LED TV was within the room by itself, with out the SQD TV for comparability, I don’t assume the colour crosstalk would look as evident. Our eyes can alter shortly to visible points, and we cease noticing them. However taking away the comparability doesn’t take away the issue.
This isn’t brand-new data. Business consultants have been involved in regards to the potential for shade crosstalk in RGB LED TVs for the reason that expertise debuted at CES 2025. These issues have grown as extra RGB LED TVs arrive available on the market this yr. LG Show, notably a maker of OLED panels that are in direct competitors with RGB LED, produced videos a number of weeks earlier than this yr’s CES, highlighting the issues.
After all, each Nanosys and LG Show have vested pursuits in downplaying RGB TV tech. The efficiency of 1 RGB LED TV additionally doesn’t inform the story for all RGB LED TVs. I didn’t discover any crosstalk points after I reviewed the Hisense UR9though the extra I see different RGB LED TVs, the extra I believe the Hisense could also be bypassing the problem and falling again to white backlighting, not RGB, each time there have been lots of colours on display screen. Additionally the processing capabilities of the upcoming Sony RGB LED TVs may make shade crosstalk a nonissue on these units. And we’re nonetheless proper at the start of the RGB LED TV story. Because the expertise continues to develop and refine, these points must be mitigated. However for 2026, SQD at the very least seems to be to have the higher hand.
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