Sony X90CH Series - 4K UHD LED LCD TV (Open Box)
$1,199.99
Condition: Refurbished; Open Box
Screen Size: 75"
Top positive review
342 people found this helpful
Great TV with upcoming HDMI 2.1 support (firmware update)
By Patrick AZ on Reviewed in the United States on June 14, 2020
Our family really loves this TV. My wife immediately noticed color and black level improvement over our previous displays (two Sony TVs & a Samsung). Definitely a big step up in quality & enjoyment for our home theater. PROS: MOTION: I really like the motion handling of this display. I notice more detail and clearer images during fast motion scenes (re-watched Bumblebee & Aquaman on 4K disk and was blown away by how much detail was missed compared to the old TV). Almost gets the balance between smoothness and 'no soap opera effect' perfect. PICTURE: Color is vibrant with nice saturation, black levels are great, shadow detail is good, the black bars on letterbox movies look great, and the Dolby Vision HDR highlights are really bright (re-watched The Mandalorian: Prisoner episode and was surprised at the brightness of the strobe lights and laser fire on board the prisoner ship). SPEAKERS: The TV's built in speakers sound great (after a few adjustments of the various settings). There are simulated surround settings, 7 band EQ slider adjustments, and a Dialog Enhancer setting that acually makes a difference. AUDIO: (see also cons below) My wife commented how the audio sounded better on our home theater set up. The Dolby Digital Plus output (over HDMI 3 ARC) sounds more detailed on our Sony STR-DN1080 Receiver compared to the Dolby Digital PCM output from our previous 2015 Sony TV. APPS: The apps launch quickly, menus are responsive, streams start fast, and 4K upscaling of 1080P content looks great too. I love the Apple TV box, but this TV almost negates the need for it with its very good app performance. REMOTE: the remote feels good, thin and slim in the hand with nice tactile button pushes, textured plastic back side, brushed finish plastic front side. Note: no backlight. SCREEN: Zero dead/stuck pixels on my panel CONS: AUDIO: A squeak noise happens whenever tapping the pause/stop/back buttons during playback of the internal TV Netflix App (Atmos content) over my Sony Receiver/Klipsch speakers (doesn't happen on the TV's built in speakers). Turning OFF 'Pass Through Mode' in the TV's sound menu seems to have stopped the squeak glitch. SCREEN: Slight darkening of the corners of screen on while displaying a light solid color (common with VA panels), but this is unnoticeable during actual TV viewing. Not a big deal at all to me, but worth mentioning. NOTES (as of Firmware v6.0132 dated June 2, 2020): *Movies Anywhere App: supports Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos *Disney+ App: supports Dolby Vision, doesn't support Dolby Atmos *YouTube App: supports 4K HDR *Amazon App: supports 4K HDR & Dolby Atmos, no Dolby Vision. A few problems I noticed are that the app is slow to load to the home screen, and there is a weird frame rate skip that can be distracting to some on certain selections. *Netflix App: supports Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos. The 'Netflix calibrated picture mode' looks too dull in my opinion. It auto enables the light sensor (too aggressively), and none of the settings can be changed within this mode. *my TV is on a wired 300 Mbps internet connection (for streaming stablility/quality/speed) *The built in Apps have a unique picture settings memory separate from each of the HDMI input settings *Dolby Vision picture settings have separate picture settings memory from non-DV sources unique to each input *I prefer to use 'Dolby Vision Bright' picture setting on all DV supported media, looks great *The Sanus VLT6 wall mount for the 85-inch tv size is awesome: easy to move around for access to ports & lots of adjustments for changing the position/leveling *Belkin Ultra High-Speed HDMI cables and Monoprice Ultra High-Speed HDMI cables are used in my setup (at least perhaps until 'Certified Ultra High Speed' cables hit the market) *After allowing permissions in the Google Home app, Google voice commands can be spoken into the remote to allow control of Nest Thermostat temperature settings. Also, Philips Hue Lights can be turned on/off/dimmed/brightened in your different zones. *The NEST tv app allows viewing of a NEST doorbell camera on the TV screen (as long as your NEST account wasn't migrated to your Google account). *The remote is IR out of the box, but BlueTooth mode can be activated in: Settings > Remotes & Accesories > Remote Control > Connect Via BlueTooth > Connect a new remote > then follow the onscreen directions. To switch back to IR mode, just repeat the steps again stopping at the [Connect a new Remote]. It seems only one remote can be connected via BlueTooth at a time, thereby setting it back to IR mode. Remote commands feel more responsive in BlueTooth mode, plus you don't need to point it at the TV. *Probably because the eARC firmware is glitched or not fully implemented yet (edit: I read responses from Sony reps in the Amazon Q&A section and eARC support will be added as a future firmware update, but I am leaving this information to help others in case they have a similar problem), I encountered the following issue. My Panasonic 4K Disk Player (DP-UB820) would not operate correctly when connected directly to one of the TV's HDMI ports (with Sony Receiver then connected to HDMI 3 ARC). Sound would stop on Sony Receiver (movie picture still playing, but with zero audio) after using stop/pause/search functions. Sometimes an error would flash briefly on screen, usually not at all, to "please use a compatible HDCP 2.2 device on current input" and then the TV would freeze up, go blank and become unresponsive followed by a screen of black and white horizontal lines. Next, the TV would turn off and become unresponsive to remote power button commands. After about 3 minutes or so the TV would reboot showing the SONY logo, the colored Google circles, the Android logo, then finally the home screen again. Note: Audio signals sent out from the TV through ARC (when it worked) was NOT in Dolby Atmos True-HD (lossless) format, but only as Dolby Atmos Dolby Digital Plus. FIX: Only after connecting the Panasonic Player directly to the Sony Receiver, then the Sony Receiver to the TV's HDMI 3(ARC) did disk movies finally work with no audio problems or TV resets. Dolby Atmos True-HD (lossless) audio worked great with no stop/pause/search glitches. CONCLUSION: We are very happy with this purchase. This a great TV for the price and I feel it is worth every dollar spent. Netflix and Movie viewing are awesome and I am looking forward to PlayStation 5 gaming on this display with the future HDMI 2.1 features (4k120, ALLM, VRR, eARC). These 2.1 features will be added to HDMI ports 3&4 *according to Amazon Q&A section Sony Reps. RTings.com should have a review up soon with a ton of great information for those interested.
Top critical review
343 people found this helpful
Arguably the most future proof LED this year
By Erich Maria Remarque on Reviewed in the United States on June 23, 2020
UPDATE: THERE ARE NOW NON-REMOVABLE ADS. Dropping my rating from 5 stars to 1 star. The Android TV Home app has added non-removable ads. Starting with Android TV Home version 2.1.3-320113730-f, there is now a massive ad area (taking up 30% of the main screen). The ads are called "Staff Picks" and advertise shows I don' care about on services I don't subscribe to (for example there are ads for Disney+ even though I don't intend to ever get that service). The "staff picks" ad banner is non-removable! Before this ad infestation I had my Android home set up perfectly (Android TV Home version 2.0 is not infected with ads). Now 30% of the screen is a massive banner. Imagine 30% of the real estate of 65" TV constantly changing ads every few seconds. Sorry but I didn't drop $1.5K on a TV to receive a massive billboard with it. Sony needs to pressure Google to make the "staff picks" ads completely removable. When the we are given the option to hide the ads, I will restore the original rating. ORIGINAL REVIEW: Got the 65" version of the X900H which has the better speakers (over the 55" version which is missing Sony Acoustic Multi-Audio). Absolutely love it. The sound coming from the built in speakers is crisp and clear. Have absolutely no need for external speakers. The picture is absolutely stunning as well. Watching Netflix UHD shows with this thing is awesome. Watched the "Our Planet" documentary... wow. The local dimming is stunning as well. No artifacts. Some technical details: Came with Firmware v6.0132 preinstalled which is the latest as of now. I directly plugged it in to my router using Ethernet, so no WiFi. Immediately connected to the internet and found an update for the remote control. Updated that, as well as the android apps using Play Store. I love the Android TV on this thing. Currently it's Android 9 (Pie). So no Android 10 yet. It's fast and very responsive. Hardware wise comes with: - Mediatek MT5895 SOC - Cortex A73 quad core @ 1.8GHz CPU - Mali G52 GPU - 3GB or RAM. - 4GB of internal storage and 1.5 GB of free space. Results in a pretty snappy UI. My understanding is that the SOC of the X900H (Mediatek MT5895) is considerably faster that the SOC of the X950H (the MT5893). Connected a wireless keyboard (Logitech K750 with unifying receiver) and it works well out of the box...except the ESC key wasn't being recognized as the "Back" function. Found a solution via an app called External Keyboard Helper Pro. Which basically takes over from the default Gboard and allows you to fully utilize the external physical keyboard. It's so convenient to search using a proper full sized physical keyboard instead of the onscreen one. Although the included remote is pretty decent, it does feel flimsy and has a cheap plastic feel to it. Voice recognition works well. But I just prefer typing. I have a share on my windows desktop and was immediately able to access that share via SMB from both X-Plore File Explorer and VLC. Overall I have zero real complaints (except maybe the remote cheap feel). I love everything about this TV. And the future proofing that comes with HDMI 2.1 and ATSC 3.0 is the final cherry on top of this excellent product.
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