LG 55LE5500 review – Below par picture quality

Pros:

• Color is accurate
• Matte screen minimizes glare
• Lots of interactive and streaming features
• Plenty of picture controls
• Sleek styling along with 1.1 inch panel
• Energy efficient

Cons:

• Local dimming is imprecise and hence causes stray blooming and illumination
• Black levels are not that dark
• Dark areas ting a bit blue
• Dejudder is adjustable but it doesn’t work well
• Difficult to discern the benefits of 120 Hz

Bottom Line:

You might like the feature set and design of this panel but the quality of picture is not as good as others in the competition.

Manufacturer’s specifications:

LG 55LE5500 is a 55 inch LCD TV, panel without stand is 51.4 inches x 1.2 inches x 31.4 inches and weighs 63.5 lbs. With the stand, the panel is 51.4 inches x 13.6 inches x 34.1 inches and weighs 76.1 lbs. The display format is 1080p, pixel response time is 2.4 ms, refresh rate is 120 Hz, image aspect ratio is 16:9, viewing angle (vertical/horizontal) is 178 degrees, additional features include Sleep timer, TruMotion 120 Hz technology, XD Engine and Swivel Stand. Video interface options include Composite, Component and HDMI. Input video format options include 1080/60p, 1080/30p, 1080/24p, 1080p, 1080i and 720p.

The LG 55LE5500 has 2 x left/right speaker set up with output of ten watts each. Total output is 20 watts. Audio controls include sound mode, balance, treble and bass. Connectors include 2 x Component video input ( RCA phono x 3 ) – Rear, Network ( RJ-45 ) – Rear, Composite video/audio input ( RCA phono x 3 ) – Rear, 2 x USB 2.0 ( 4 pin USB Type A ) – Side, Digital audio output (optical) ( TOSLINK ) – Rear, Audio line-in ( Mini-phone stereo 3.5 mm ) – Rear, Headphones ( Mini-phone stereo 3.5 mm ) – Side, 2 x Composite video/audio input ( RCA phono x 2 ) – Side, 3 x HDMI input ( 19 pin HDMI Type A ) – Rear, Serial – Rear, VGA input ( 15 pin HD D-Sub (HD-15) ) – Rear, and HDMI input ( 19 pin HDMI Type A ) – Side. LG gives a one year warranty for this TV.

Design:

LG 55LE5500 is about 1.1 inch thick which is even slimmer than LE8500’s 1.4 inch thickness. This difference is due to the edge lit and full array of LED backlighting used on the two TVs. This TV has a black glossy frame along with purplish red touches on the outside which provides a subtle accent as compared to the darker and full red frame of the Samsung UNB7000 series. But we don’t think it will go well with your interiors. The bezel is quite thin and this makes the TV quite compact.

Inside Dope:

LCD has been aggressively challenging plasma TVs lately owing to their multizone LED back lights which brighten or dim the different screen areas independently. This is more commonly known as ‘local dimming technology’ and we are big fans of it owing to the deep black level performance but there are small trade offs like blooming or stray illumination. This is the case of LG 55LE5500, we found that the issue of stray illumination was largely seen. Most people don’t know what exactly dimming is. This technology means that the TV used LED back lights for illuminating the panel from edge instead of from behind. There are lots of perks on this TV and it includes accurate color, good performance in bright rooms, sexy thin frame and lots of Internet features but if you are too particular about the image quality, look elsewhere.

LED modules, on the LG 55LE5500, are arranged around the screen’s edge and it is similar to what we have seen on Samsung’s UNC8000 series. But it still manages to deliver well on local dimming. ‘LED Plus’ here is actually LGs edge with local dimming back light feature and the manufacturer says this 55 inches has twelve addressable segments. The 8500 series, on the other hand, give full array local diming and has more than 200 zones. This is the reason why the LE5500 is miles behind perfection.

LG 55LE5500 comes with LG Wireless Media Box which lets you connect gear like HDMI wirelessly. This is of great help during custom installations. There are loads of internet options on this TV and hence built in Wireless feature would have been better. But this TV doesn’t have one so you will have to get some wireless bridge or purchase a dongle. We hooked up LG’s dongle and it worked quite well.

LG 55LE5500 gives you an array of Netcast features which is quite good. You won’t find anything missing here apart from Slacker radio or Pandora. Video quality on Vudu and Netflix was quite good from both the wireless dongle and Ethernet. We did not test DLNA or USB network streaming.

There is nothing new about the non streaming Internet features. Except for Picasa, everything is by Yahoo Widgets. When we reviewed this panel, the TV gave us 11 widgets to access. Yahoo has improved its platform, the responses are now snappier and widgets load relatively quickly. But there is still scope for improvement. The main widget takes about twenty seconds to load and people who lack patience will get frustrated easily. Selection of Apps and its usability was not as good as Vizio or Samsung.

LG 55LE5500 gives you a Games platform which is a separate offering and they are not the Yahoo Widget games. They are pretty much basic; you get games like Whack a Mole and Soduku which are quite frustrating to play on a big TV. The TV also has Skype and you will need to purchase a microphone separately for that. We didn’t get to test this feature since it is not released yet. LG boasts of the best array of user menu controls for picture and it has been improved even more now. You can now adjust the dejudder processing, it is something that Samsung first did this way back in 2010. You also get settings specific for gamma (2.4, 2.2 and 1.9), they are given in the great ten point IRE system in Expert menu. You don’t get THX modes, they are reserved only for the more expensive models. There is a substitute in the form of Cinema and you can adjust it, unlike THX.

Just like last year’s panels, all the picture modes which are adjustable can be separated for each of the input. The Picture Wizard has been improved and it consists of some test patterns which help newbies adjust simple controls and you get an idea of what the picture will look like.