This really is an amazing TV! I saw it the other day, playing Monsters Versus Aliens. I'm not such a fan of the film itself, but the colours were rich enough to make me want to lick the screen! (Sort of).
@TR: any comment on how it performs with normal, non HD, broadcasts? How does the picture look blown up or using the various framing options? Wouldn't a 16:9 TV programme get 'lost' in all the black bars?
Also, another shop was running the disaster film 2012. Again, incredible pictures. But in one scene with the foreign heads of state, the Philips didn't display the subtitles, whereas the 16:9 sets did. Does the 21:9 format get rid of subtitles altogether? (Not much fun for fans of foreign cinema) Can it be set to display them whilst keeping the 21:9 format or is a special (i.e. Philips DVD or Blu-ray player) needed?
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It may seem like an odd conclusion to derive from looking at this product but I could really see myself wanting something like this as a PC monitor if they scaled it down and increased the resolution. Given that I use my desktop mostly for either browsing, writing or watching films it would be fantastic to be have room for 3 simultaneous windows so I can browse, write notes and use Word/Tweetdeck/Kindle at the same time, and then be able to use the whole screen estate for films later. Granted it's not a large market and I'd be one of a few to want it but if someone made an affordable ~27" 21:9 monitor I'd struggle to stop myself buying it.
@Ripsmorter: But in one scene with the foreign heads of state, the Philips didn't display the subtitles
Did it have black bars down the left and right, if not then they most likely set the displaymode to zoom or something similar, this then would crop the top and bottom. With 16/9 material there is no way of displaying fullscreen without either having the black bars, or cropping, or worst of all stretching (IOW: make people look fat) :)
I'm surprised you don't anywhere in the review address what this TV is like with regular 16:9 programming.
Not many people would consider having both a 16:9 and 21:9 58" TV in their living rooms; and though this TV obviously targets the movie fanatic, they are still likely to watch a fair measure of regular 16:9 news, sports, drama, etc. Perhaps also to connect a games console.
Philips says, "For 16:9 we use highly advanced auto-formatting technology to stretch the 16:9 content progressively out to fill the 21:9 screen. This technology achieves this result with minimal distortion to the image."
Trusted Reviews says nothing.
So how offensive is their "highly advanced auto-formatting" when stretching 16:9 programming to fill a 21:9 display? Is it best turned off, and then is this TV really not suitable except as a dedicated movie TV?
Also, your statement about "manipulating the image's geometry at its left and right edges" when viewing 2.35:1 Blu-rays encoded as letterboxed 16:9 is surely confused. These sources will be upscaled without geometry manipulation; anything else would defeat the purpose of having a TV with a native cinema aspect ratio.
Although it won't be helpful for TV broadcasted films with subtitles, some Blu-Ray/DVD players can shift the subtitles up on screen to get around the issue of them dropping off the bottom. I have an Oppo BDP-83 and it has this feature in newer firmware revisions.
No so alone a88. I would also love a (say?) 30" version as a PC monitor. It would beat using two monitors as I do now.
But, it would have to be ips, or at least va quality screen. TN sucks. Ergo not that cheap. Incidentally I have to say I'm surprised and dissappointed there's no IPS or VA screen with 3d capability.
I think in future we'll see curved oleds in this size. It makes sense to me.
Credit to Ripsnorter because the very worrying subtitles issue affects even those who can live without them.
Many film distributors cut down on home video costs by using prints before any text - translations, on screen place names, etc. - are part of the final image, and just have it all handled by player generated captions, rejigged appropriately for each region. That's important because unlike the original text, player-generated captions aren't just hideous to look at but are much more frequently placed in the black bar area. And obviously, the implications for anamorphic foreign films are especially bad.
Yeah, I'm curious of that too. The predecessor claimed the same thing. And I'm thinking: it's either gonna be distorted like hell or you're gonna lose a lot of picture information to the left and right. Maybe they do a little of both and reviews of the former model stated that 16:9 looked okay.
Still, I actually like contemporary TV shows better than movies and they're all shot in 16:9, so I'd rather have a 65" 16:9 TV than this one. And that 65" 16:9 TV will probably be just as wide as a 58" 21:9 model, so I'd have the best of both worlds...
The Philips displayed 2012 with no black bars whatsover. The 16:9 ones had them top and bottom as usual. I can't say what ratio the film had on the lu-ray that was playing.
@GoldenGuy.
Thanks. I watch a great deal of foreign cinema and will always go for subtitles because I want to hear the original language. Unlike most people (read, Americans) I've no problem watching and reading at the same time. But if the Philips cannot display subtitles in a meaningful way, either from disc or TV, then it's a complete no-deal for me. I can't believe this hasn't occurred to Philips.
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