HDTV News

7th Jan 2009 – Samsung has announced three new lines of LED backlit TVs at the CES show. The new TVs will range in size from 40 to 55 inches and will be in 3 different model lines: the LNXX B8000, LNX B7000, and the LNX B6000 ranges. All will be marketed under the new Luxia name. No details on pricing were released, but the new models will be available in the 1st half of 2008.

Samsung claims that all of the new models will meet the new Energy Star 3.0 standards, will provide over 40% energy savings, and are Mercury free. Mercury is used in the florescent backlights of most HDTVs, which can pose an environmental risk when the product is recycled. Samsung also claims that the new LED backlight will provide better contrast ratios, but did not release any specific information on the contrast ratios that the new backlight will allow for. The new models are also not offering the local dimming that some other high-end LED backlit models provide, where the individual LED backlights can be dimmed if the content on the screen is dark. Local dimming is offered on Samsung’s flagship 70-inch LCD screen that was released in 2007. All of the models in this range will also include Ethernet connections, and support Samsung’s Internet@TV platform, which allows access to widget-based content, such as weather and financial news form providers such as Yahoo and Flickr.

The 3 new ranges are as follows:

LNXX B8000 – The flagship models in the new range, the B8000 models will be available in 46 and 55-inch sizes, with chrome styling and are about an inch thick. boast Auto Motion Plus 240Hz motion processing, which Samsung claim will produce smoother motion. We haven’t reviewed a Samsung model that uses the faster motion processing yet, so we can’t comment on their specific claims, but 240Hz processing does generally produce faster, smoother motion.

The Luxia LNXX BX8000 - view our photo gallery of
all of the Samsung LED Backlit models here

 
LNXX B7000 – This mid-range set of models will be available in 40, 46 and 55-inch sizes, and share the same thin profile of the B8000s; they are around an inch thick.  Samsung describes the design as being semi-transparent Ruby with a dewdrop-like lighting effect. The B7000s include  Auto Motion Plus 120Hz processing, which is slower than the 240Hz of the B8000 range, but it is faster than the 60Hz of standard HDTVs.

The LNXX BX7000 - view our photo gallery of
all of the Samsung LED Backlit models here

LNX B6000 – The B6000 models will be available in 40, 46 and 55 inch sizes, and have the same 120Hz Auto Motion Plus processing as the B7000, as well as their svelte profile; the models are around an inch thick.  

The LNXX BX6000 - view our photo gallery of
all of the Samsung LED Backlit models here