I just bought a Philips 37PFL9603D (which is yet to be delivered) and just noticed a new model that has just come out Philips 37PFL9732D10 for around 100Chf more. Putting all the 'nice' little extra's aside like Multimedia Slots, extra Ambilight etc.. the only main differences I can see is that the Contrast Ratio's are different, but the differences seem vast. Can someone help explain how the ratio works.. and if you believe it is worth the extra 100Chf? It's not in stock at the moment and so not sure if I should hold my order until the later model comes in.
If you’ve ever wondered why contrast ratios claims of LCD monitors can swing so wildly from product to product, here’s the explanation:
There are “dynamic contrast ratios” and then there are “static contrast ratios”. Static contrast ratios is defined by the ratio of the brightest part of an LCD screen to the darkest part of an LCD screen that can be simultaneously displayed on the screen. Dynamic contrast ratios are measured by the darkest dark from one image to the brightest bright from another image being displayed at different times.
This is achieved by dynamically altering the brightness of the entire screen or darken the entire screen when scenes are mostly bright or are mostly dark. This increases the “blackness” of the screen during dark scenes and it increases the brightness of the lighter scenes.
This effectively allows LCD makers to claim a larger dynamic contrast ratio of “3000:1′′ as oppose to a static contrast ratio of “800:1′′. While this technique can definitely improve the video quality for some mostly bright scenes or mostly dark scenes, you can’t actually get that level of contrast on the screen and the actual contrast ratio is not altered.
So when you see these inflated contrast ratio scores, you’re not being lied to but the numbers are confusing. Having an LCD that dynamically shifts brightness is a desirable feature but it isn’t a substitute for true contrast ratios."
The only model that states the Static Contrast ratio is that latest model which is 1200:1 but there is no mention of the static ratio for the one I bought. So I only have the Dynamtic Ratio to go by. I'm starting to think that the 8000:1 dynamic ratio is a typo and perhaps they meant 80000:1...
There's another difference that is quite important: the 9603 has been launched this year while the 9732 is already one year old. This year, the model that is equivalent to 9732D is the 9703D and for this one the price is obviously higher ...
Brilliant.. so i actually got a later model. For some reason in the shops catalogue the 9732 has only been put on with a higher price of around 100Chf.. so I just assumed that it was the later model. Thanks for clearing that up..