Sony Bravia KDL-55HX850 3D LED HDTV Review

Resolution & Formats

The Sony Bravia KDL-55HX850 has a native resolution of 1080p and displays all standard NTSC formats.

Viewing Angle

This TV's total viewing angle of 17.8° is nothing special. In a battle of viewing angles, the 55HX850 was easily beaten by the Sharp LC-60LE847U and the Samsung UN55ES8000. The 55HX850 did do better than its mid-range friend, the Sony 46HX750, which only produced a measly 12.32° total viewing angle.

Motion Performance

The 55HX850 did produce some blurring when images were moving across the screen. When we had vertical lines moving around, the lines did become slightly jagged. As far as color trailing, this TV produced none.

Sony's motion processing features do get rid of any blurriness and jaggedness, but that means nothing when it comes to actually watching a movie or TV show. There are five motion processing options, listed under the Motionflow setting: smooth, standard, clear, clear plus, and impulse. Smooth and standard produced the most obvious examples of the Soap Opera Effect. Clear, clear plus, and impulse all lowered the backlight when toggled on.

Screen Uniformity

The uniformity on the 55HX850 was good. With an all white screen, there was a small amount of shadowing in the corners. On an all black screen, a bit of light did bleed into the picture from the corners – a common side effect of edge-lit LED TVs. The center of the screen, whether it was black or white, was clear.