Is LED TV different from Smart TV? Comparative characteristics of LCD and LED TVs

When choosing a modern TV, most buyers do not fully understand how LED differs from OLED models, and what strengths and weaknesses each of these technologies has. It’s not difficult to get confused here, since both terms sound almost the same and are widely used by marketers, each promoting their own direction in the development of television technology.

What is LED andOLED

In fact, both words mean that televisions use special semiconductor devices - light-emitting diodes (LED - from English L ight- E mitting D iode), which begin to glow brightly when electric current flows through them. They can be thought of as miniature light bulbs that emit red, white, green or blue, depending on the chemical composition of the crystal or phosphor. Over time, a separate group of LEDs appeared, using the same principles, but built on organic polymers. Therefore, an additional letter O was added to their name - organic (OLED). These devices are made in the form of polymer films, and therefore are extremely thin and flexible.

At first glance, there is little difference between the consonant concepts led and oled, and it lies only in the manufacturing technology and physical properties of the diodes. However, their areas of application in modern televisions differ radically. First of all, the designation LED TV does not mean at all that the image in it is created by point LEDs. They only illuminate a conventional liquid crystal matrix, replacing large, wasteful and short-lived fluorescent lamps. It would be more correct to say LCD TVs with LED backlighting, but the term, first voiced by Samsung, has taken root and is widely used in the market today.

True LED screens, built from arrays of multi-colored LEDs, due to their relatively large sizes, are used today only as information boards in stadiums, train stations, concert halls and presentations. But in OLED TVs, organic elements deposited on a flexible base actually make up a pixel matrix, which can be used to produce a color image. This technology makes it possible to make TV receivers with ultra-thin and even curved screens.

LED andOLED models: what are their strengths and weaknesses?

To make the right choice between LED and OLED TV, you need to consider and weigh all the strengths and weaknesses of each technology. As evaluation criteria, we will take the most important technical indicators of TV receivers.

Brightness . LED TVs are leading in this category. They can easily use the LED backlight of the screen at maximum brightness. But the service life of their organic analogues (especially blue ones) directly depends on the intensity of the pixel glow. Therefore, it is not recommended to set the screen brightness to the highest level on OLED TVs.
Contrast and depth of black. This is an unconditional victory for OLED technology. The most painful problem with LCD TVs is the inability to achieve natural black color on the screen. Even if the liquid crystal, which works like window blinds, is completely closed, some light will still leak through it. Because of this, dark areas of the image on the screen acquire a characteristic purple or gray tint.

OLED TVs do not require matrix backlighting, since their screens themselves consist of an array of light-emitting elements. Therefore, every pixel in a dark area of the image simply does not light up, guaranteeing true black color. Because of this feature, OLED screens also demonstrate higher contrast: the range between the darkest and lightest areas of the screen is much wider than their LCD counterparts.
Screen luminosity uniformity . The clear leader is OLED. The side type of matrix backlight, which is most often used in modern LCD TVs, has one negative effect - it does not allow uniform illumination of the entire surface of the screen. When the panel is completely darkened, illuminated areas are observed along its perimeter, which are especially noticeable in the evening. For OLED TVs this problem does not exist.
Color gamut. Today, some premium LED TV models offer images with a wider color gamut than their organic competitors. For example, leading manufacturing companies use multicolor LED backlighting based on Wide Color LED and Triluminos phosphors, as well as Quantum Dots technology for this purpose. So far, the winner in this category is LED TV.
Viewing Angles . OLED devices are the leaders here, the image on which does not fade or change color even at critical viewing angles. In modern LED TVs, these indicators depend on the technology of constructing the LCD matrix. For example, IPS screens show a decent picture when viewed at an angle of up to 178º, but the simplest TN panels become dark already at 90º.
Energy efficiency. It's hard to pick a winner in this category. The level of energy consumption of an OLED TV depends not only on the brightness setting, but also on the scene shown on the screen. For example, when showing night landscapes, the TV will consume much less energy than when showing the sunny shores of Miami Beach. In LED TVs, this parameter is more stable, since it depends only on the brightness of the screen backlight, which was initially set. Therefore, formally they can be considered more economical.
Service life . Today, LED technology is ahead in terms of durability, since white backlight LEDs can operate steadily for up to 70-100 thousand hours. Organic devices still have much shorter service life; for example, the fastest-wearing blue OLED phosphor lasts no more than 7 thousand hours. Red and green LEDs last longer, but this does not make much sense, since the overall color rendering of the pixel is seriously distorted.
Price . Of course, LED TVs are still much cheaper. Suffice it to say that a decent 50-inch LCD model with LED backlighting can be bought today for about $500, and top-end devices that can compete with OLED counterparts by using the most advanced technologies will cost a maximum of $8,000. Today, OLED TVs are rapidly becoming cheaper, but still their price is still approximately 5 times higher than the cost of LED devices (with the same diagonal).

As you can see, there are significant differences between LED and OLED technologies. LED TVs impress with their price, wide selection of diagonal solutions and long service life. OLED models offer fast response speeds, unlimited viewing angles and realistic color gamut, especially in dark details. In addition, they are thinner than LCD models and can have a curved screen shape. We should also not forget that OLED is a young, promising and actively developing technology for building televisions, while LCD models, even with LED backlighting, have practically exhausted all their possibilities for moving forward.

Maybe we can skip all this nonsense about molecules, liquid crystals, diodes, light and how cool and interesting it all works? Brrr... The flow of technical crap that fills every article about LCD and LED displays makes me shiver. You want to know what the difference is between these two technologies and which one is better from the buyer's point of view, right? So let's find out.

Which is better, LED or LCD?

Without a doubt, LED displays are considered superior to classic LCD screens in almost every way except price. Why classic? Because LED is a type of LCD technology in which the backlight is implemented a little differently from conventional LCD displays, but you can find out more about this in the second part of the article. For now, let's take things in order.

Image quality

LED TVs have much better black levels and contrast than their LCD counterparts. The same applies to color rendition. But this does not mean that LCDs are poor in color accuracy, they just lose a little compared to LEDs.

As for the viewing angle, it is more or less the same for both, since the viewing angle depends on the glass that the manufacturer inserted into the screen. The better the quality of the glass, the better the viewing angle.

Energy consumption

If power consumption is an important factor for you, then a TV with an LED display is the best choice, since its power consumption is approximately 40% lower than that of LCD screens.

Size

In terms of size, LED TVs are thinner than their LCD counterparts, although not very significantly. However, if you like it lighter and thinner, then the choice is obvious.

Computer games

Are you planning to connect a game console to your TV? In the long run, LCD looks like the better choice. The fact is that the Head-Up Display (HUD), used in games for a long time, can create a ghostly image on the screen. This effect can also be called “burning out”.

For those who don’t know, a HUD is a static image in a computer game that is constantly located in the same place on the screen for a long time. For example, it could be time, a sight, a map, life or magic points, in general, that element that practically does not change.

So, burn-in is less likely on LCD displays than on LED displays.

Durability

LED screens are considered to be more durable than LCD screens. Perhaps I also agree with this and add my vote for the LED display. My monitor is already 7 years old, and pah-pah, it still works like a clock, despite the fact that it is turned on almost constantly.

UPDATE: I found information online that the expected service life of LED displays when used for 8 hours a day is 30 years. In the same situation, the service life of the LCD is 20 years. If you think about it a little, you can say it much simpler - an LED will last 30% longer than an LCD screen.

How do you like this MEM? I came up with it myself; I sculpted it in Photoshop for half an hour.

Environmental impact

When recycled, LEDs have less of an environmental impact than LCDs.

Price

If, roughly speaking, every penny counts, then the choice is obvious - residential complex. Devices with LCD displays have become much cheaper since LED appeared on the market.

Drawing conclusions

Considering the pros and cons of both, it becomes obvious that LED TVs are a more advanced display technology than LCD, having slightly better image quality, energy savings and a thinner body design, but more expensive.

LCD TVs remain in production, and what's more, the demand for them is very good. The fact is that in addition to the affordable price, the technology of classic LCD screens has been improved by manufacturers in recent years, the backlighting method has become more advanced, but at the same time TVs have remained an order of magnitude cheaper than LED.

Not everyone can notice the difference between LED and LCD, are you sure that you are one of those who can? And if not, then why pay more? Go to a large hardware store; there are usually many TVs and monitors displayed there, showing the same content at the same time. Look, try to find the differences between LED and LCD, and then everything will fall into place.

What is the difference between LED and LCD

Yes, at the beginning of the article I said that I don’t want to fill your head with technical texts, so I described the pros and cons of technology as simply as possible in the first part of the article. But, if you want to delve into more detail, then please love and favor, the next few paragraphs are just for you.

The basis of LCD displays are liquid crystals. LCs have the properties of liquids and solid crystals, having molecules of the same structure, but having the fluidity of a liquid. In an electric field, a liquid crystal can change the orientation of molecules, which has opened up opportunities for the use of liquid crystals in many areas, including the creation of screens.

An LCD display is made by sandwiching liquid crystals and transparent electrodes between two polarizing filters through which light passes. Some time ago, the typical LCD display had CCFL lamps to illuminate the crystals. These lamps are cousins of the “curly light bulbs” that many people use to replace incandescent lamps.

CCFL (left) and curly bulbs (right)

Screens with this lighting worked well, but had some disadvantages, such as requiring a high voltage AC power supply for lighting.

Once LEDs became bright enough, they replaced CCFL lamps in most TV and computer monitor displays. Indeed, in addition to the fact that the LEDs operated at low voltage, they covered a very wide range of brightness. If you look at regular LCD displays, you will see a fairly low contrast ratio, around 1000:1. The same CRT usually had 15000:1; DLP and plasma fared a little better.

As a result, over time, CCFL lamps in screens, like the “curly bulbs” in my house, switched to light-emitting diode (LED) lighting.

In the new generation of LCD displays - LED, the brightness of each LED can be controlled separately, which makes it possible to control the brightness of the screen locally. As a result, the contrast ratio in such screens has become dynamic, and can vary from 10,000:1 to 1,000,000:1. Not bad, right?

So we have come to the answer to the question of how an LCD screen differs from an LED screen, and what an LED TV means. LED displays are a hybrid of LCD and LED (light-emitting diode) technology, and they differ from classic LCD screens in the way the display backlight is implemented. Well, how this is expressed, what are the pros and cons, can be found at the beginning of this article.

By the way, there are also full-fledged LED displays consisting of organic light-emitting diodes, this technology is called OLED. But more about this some other time.

Today, LED backlighting has, for many, turned out to be an additional feature that often complicates the choice of a particular device, since you need to think about the advantages of each individual option in order to make an informed decision.

Indeed, when buying a TV, you don’t want to end up making the mistake of buying something that is actually yesterday’s technology that makes no sense to use in today’s realities. Fortunately, there are actually no serious difficulties in this issue, and its importance is quite exaggerated.

Advantages and disadvantages of LED as such

Each version of LED technology has its own advantages, namely:

Higher degree of efficiency.
The ability to create televisions with fairly thin screens.
Complete absence of mercury content in LEDs.

These advantages are considered in relation to other backlight technologies that were previously used in other types of TVs.

It is worth noting several disadvantages that are typical for all types of LED backlighting:

Initially, this type of backlight does not improve the viewing angles of the LCD.
Thinner models with edge lighting may suffer from uneven screen illumination.
LED backlighting can ultimately cause unwanted local dimming of the image on the screen.

Of course, such shortcomings in the vast majority of cases are eliminated in various models of monitors and televisions, as the technology is continuously improved. At the same time, you need to correctly understand that not only the backlight affects the quality of the picture on the TV.

The high image quality that modern TVs allow you to watch was largely due to the fact that developers began to use LED backlight technology. At one time, the advent of LED TVs was able to produce a real revolution in the market, because the new backlight provided a significant improvement in color rendering quality, and also significantly increased the brightness of the image. However, many people have a well-founded question about what is better to choose - Edge LED or Direct LED. After all, each option has its own advantages and disadvantages, which must be taken into account in the selection process.

What are their main differences?

Today, all existing major TV manufacturers use only two types of backlights - Edge LED or Direct LED.

They differ from each other in the number, as well as in the geometric arrangement of LEDs. Depending on how the latter are located, the characteristics of the matrix may change, and each type of backlight has its own characteristics and advantages. It is for this reason that when choosing a TV, in each individual case you need to weigh all these points and think about what is better to choose - Edge LED or Direct LED. Next we will look at the features of each option.

Edge

The use of this backlight involves the distribution of LEDs on the sides of the screen. In this regard, this technology is often called side lighting.

Advantages of Edge

This technology has several advantages:

An extremely thin matrix, and in connection with this, the TV itself.
Relatively high brightness.
Acceptable contrast level.

The main advantage of using this technology is that the TV can ultimately become ultra-thin, which is often a deciding factor in favor of choosing such devices. Today, there is a clear trend towards the fact that when choosing between Edge LED or Direct LED, people often give preference to the first option for the reason that modern manufacturers produce ultra-thin screens with this technology.

It is also worth noting the fact that the lateral distribution of LEDs provides a high degree of energy efficiency.

Disadvantages of Edge

The technology also has certain disadvantages:

Glare at the edges of the screen.
Problems with backlight uniformity on certain models.

If you choose Edge LED, then you should immediately be prepared for the fact that the cost of such a TV will be slightly higher, since they use a specialized reflective surface, which is necessary for an extremely even distribution of the backlight, as well as eliminating any noticeable differences in brightness. If we talk about what the disadvantages of this technology are, it is also worth highlighting the presence of certain highlights at the edges of the screen, and when playing, for example, a bright snowy landscape near the edges of the screen, the snow will be much brighter compared to the image in the center.

In dark scenes, you can also quite often pay attention to the effect of a kind of flare, and, in particular, this is due to the fact that the LEDs are located around the perimeter of the screen, and the brightness in this area is quite logical. It is worth noting the fact that different TVs exhibit light in different ways, so there is always the possibility that you will be able to find a device that has the minimum possible picture differences. If the TV has such a function as local dimming, then in this case you can completely forget about what glare is, and that they can spoil the mood from watching certain moments.

Direct

The Direct LED backlight type provides for the distribution of LEDs over the entire area behind the matrix.

In this case, local dimming technology can be used extremely effectively and quite conveniently, when the processor sets the brightness level of certain groups of LEDs, thereby increasing the contrast level, while ensuring extremely uniform illumination.

Advantages of Direct

Considering the advantages of Direct LED technology, it is worth highlighting the following:

Uniform illumination.
Quite a high contrast level.
No glare at the edges.
Acceptable brightness level.

Disadvantages of Direct

Also, LED Direct backlight has some disadvantages compared to its analogue:

Higher power consumption.
Not such a thin matrix thickness.
Relatively large Input Lag.

What to choose?

As mentioned above, there is no precise definition of which specific option is more relevant in a given situation. In this case, you can pay attention to many factors, choosing between which option is more optimal - Direct LED or Edge LED: where the picture quality is better, where more energy is consumed, in the end, which TV has a more attractive design in itself.

Thus, if the thickness of the device does not matter to you, and you have no intention of using it as a monitor for various computer games, then Direct backlight technology is quite suitable, but if you are a fan of extremely thin devices, then in this case Edge is the optimal choice. It is better to independently compare the performance of each backlight in the store so that you can decide for yourself which particular option is more acceptable. According to users of such TVs, in the end, the choice of backlight is largely a matter of personal taste.

Is it time to buy a new TV? You are probably choosing between different technologies, and you are wondering what is the difference between LCD and LED? This means that you should definitely get acquainted with this article, which dots all the i's.

What is the fundamental difference between LCD and LED?

This is the main question for many people who are planning their home theater. Just yesterday we were considering the possibility of purchasing a cathode ray tube (CRT) television or even a projector. And today we see other names: LCD, DLP, OLED, laser TVs. LED (light-emitting diode) TVs also appeared. Let's figure out what these letters mean and which of them indicate the best purchase.

LED TVs are also LCD TVs. Just a slightly different type. To be completely correct, the real name of this technology is “LED-backlit liquid crystal televisions,” but this is too long a name and most people simply won’t remember it, so we usually only see three letters - “LED.”

Liquid crystals are used to control the brightness of individual dots on both types of TV screens. Without going into details, such a display consists of two sheets of polarizing material, between which there is a solution of liquid crystals. When an electric current passes through liquid crystals, they become ordered, which changes their ability to transmit light. You can imagine each such crystal as a shutter, which can be open or closed.

Thus, both LED and LCD TVs use LCD technology. You may ask: “So what? Are they no different from each other? There is a difference and it lies in the way the backlight is generated - the light that has to pass through the liquid crystals. This is how LCD differs from LED. While regular LCD TVs use a fluorescent lamp as their light source, LED TVs use a series of small LEDs that turn electricity into light more efficiently.

Advantages of LED

TVs that have, among other characteristics, the abbreviation LED, have a number of advantages.

Firstly, LEDs can be significantly smaller than fluorescent lamps, which means the matrix has a smaller size and weight. As a result, the thickness of the entire TV can fit into one inch.
Secondly, LED TVs are more energy efficient. But most importantly, they can produce deeper blacks, which gives the picture extra depth.
Several fluorescent lamps are used to illuminate the entire screen and cannot be switched off in specific areas. At the same time, to create a completely black color, we need to completely turn off the backlight. LED displays have this ability, in which you can “turn off” individual pixels and areas of the image.

This results in deeper blacks and increased contrast. Let's imagine that the starry sky is displayed on the screen. It should be almost completely filled with black, and only a few points (stars) have high brightness. Traditional LCD screens are not capable of displaying such images efficiently. And if it is possible to completely turn off the backlighting of entire areas in the image, then it will greatly benefit. As a result, we see a truly black sky, on which only a few points glow.

Don't waste your money

I would like to warn buyers that not all LED TVs have this ability. If those LED TV models that can turn off the backlight in local areas are comparable in image quality to plasma ones, then those that can only illuminate the entire field with LEDs at the same time are very close to conventional LED TVs. Therefore, having figured out how LCD and LED TVs differ, you should remember that the latter can also produce images of very different quality. Before you shell out a considerable amount of money for an LED TV, you should make sure that it has the advantages described above.

However, even if you buy an LED TV that cannot dim certain areas, you will still get
several advantages. The TV will be lighter and thinner, which means this model will be easier to mount on the wall. It consumes less electricity. The picture is more vibrant than with a conventional LCD. However, I consider all these advantages only as a free addition to the main thing. If your budget is limited, and therefore a plasma TV is not considered as an option, then an LED TV can replace it. Otherwise, I would recommend choosing "plasma". They may be too power hungry and they may look bulkier, but the picture quality on their screen can't be beat by any other type of TV. I recommend choosing a regular LCD screen only if you don’t have enough money for other options.