Tour & Design

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The front of the TV is dominated by screen, which exactly how things should be. The bezel is just 8.5 milimeters thick, so it doesn't detract from the TV with its bulkiness.

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Back**

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We unfortunately weren't able to get a good shot of the back of the TV.

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Sides**

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The 55LE9500 is very thin: just 0.92 inches thick. The left side has a handful of ports, some of which had Korean labels. We're therefore not quite confident that we saw a finalized US version of the set. The right side has no features.

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Stand/Mount**

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The stand and its pillar are either made of glass or plastic that looks a lot like glass. It's a very minimalist design, and looks pretty classy. We're fans.

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Aesthetics**

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This is a nice-looking HDTV. Its glass base, thin screen, and barely-there bezel certainly spell 'attractive' in our book. That's right: the TV is so good looking, we've written a book—apparently some kind of spelling dictionary—and in that book, we've constructed the word 'attractive' from the Sharp 55LE9500's features, presumably using some kind of HDTV-themed heiroglyphics.

That's how good it looks.

Performance Features

Display Size & Technology

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The LG 55LE9500 is a 55-inch LCD. It uses LG's Full LED Slim technology, which means the screen has 240 local dimming segments. Local dimming is when the TV turns off a section of its backlights, which allows for deeper blacks. The main problem with local dimming is it also dims any bright details in the same segment. With 240 segments, however, it's getting harder and harder to write off localized dimming as a buzzword feature that doesn't actually improve picture quality. Although we thought the model we saw had some crushed blacks, the show floor isn't an ideal location for judging picture quality. We'll reserve our judgment until we can get some objective, scientific data.

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Formats & Resolution**

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The TV runs 1920 x 1080, which is 1080p. That means the TV will be able to display Blu-ray discs without any artifact-inducing processing.

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Brightness, Blacks and Contrast Ratio**

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As mentioned above, the TV has localized dimming. This is neither a good nor bad feature, though most TVs border on the bad. Typically local dimming doesn't have 240 zones to play with; most have fewer than a dozen zones. This means that any bright details caught up in the to-be-dimmed zones will also be dimmed. This results in a loss of detail, because the bright details will be  harder to see. This feature doesn't really increase the TV's contrast, since everything in a given zone is being dimmed.

Of course, this rhetoric is only applicable if a TV has the average amount of dimmer zones. Since the 55LE9500 has a full 240 zones, we're not so sure if its localized dimming will be a picture quality godsend, or if it'll just be the next evolution of a mediocre feature. We're definitely excited to get the TV into our testing lab once we get back from CES.

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Color**

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We didn't notice anything particularly noteworthy that had to do with color. The footage we saw was a bit oversaturated, but that's not surprising for a TV at CES. Manufacturers tend to think oversaturation is the bee's knees, so they set their TVs to Vibrant and crank it to eleven.

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Motion & Refresh Rate**

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The TV features a 480Hz refresh rate. That's pretty fast. Even when displaying 3D content, you'll still be able to see a 240Hz refresh rate in each eye.

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Viewing Angle**

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The TV looks to have an average viewing angle for an LCD. We got a few steps away from dead center and we definitely noticed a drop in contrast ratio.

Connectivity & Media

• Yahoo!
• Picas
• CinemaNow
• YouTube
• VUDU
• Pandora
• Accuweather.com
• Netflix
• Skype

The TV also supports DLNA, which will allow you to stream media off your computer, or other DLNA-supporting device.
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Placement**

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The ports are all in a cluster on the right side of the TV's back, and include both side-facing and back-facing ports. The RF input is actually down-facing, which could be somewhat of an awkward battle for those with screw-on coaxial cables. The stand didn't seem to rotate either, but since the ports are so close to the edge, this isn't a terrible problem.
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Audio**

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We weren't able to properly test the TV's audio on the show floor.

Controls, Menu & Remote

Remote

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The 9500 uses a unique 'Magic Wand' remote system, which was unfortunately not available on the show floor. Until we're told otherwise, we'll assume the remote literally uses magic, because we'd love to control our TV with some Final Fantasy-esque device that merges technology and sorcery.

Steampunk wizardry aside, the Magic Wand basically sounds like a Wiimote. In fact, LG even says it 'mirrors a 'Wii-like' experience.' Basically, it has a few physical controls and uses a gyro and accelerometers that allow you to use the device as a mouse.
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Controls**

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The on-set controls are located on the bottom right corner of the TV, in a staggered pattern.

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Menu**

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We weren't able to grab any menu shots of the LE9500 specifically, but we were able to snap a few pictures at the Magic Wand display.

 

 

Conclusion

 

Series Comparison

LE9500 Series

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This fabulous series only has two sizes in it: the 47-inch and 55-inch. If you want a smaller TV, you'll have to forgo a lot of the LE9500's featureset, like Magic Wand compatability or 3D-ready capability.