Review: Sony XR-55A95L (A95L-Series) QD-OLED TV

The finish is top-notch. The back still has that nice square pattern and the screen has a dark silver metal frame, which is no more than a line at the front. The feet can be mounted in two positions, a normal low position and a higher position for use with a soundbar.

Functions

The XR-55A95L has a double TV tuner for digital TV (DVB-T2/C/S2) but only has one CI+ slot. Watching and recording another channel simultaneously is, therefore, only possible with channels that are not encrypted. In addition to Chromecast, you can also use Apple Airplay 2. The TV is also compatible with Apple Homekit. Sony has provided an excellent media player that knows how to handle all major video and sound formats. Bravia Core, Sony’s exclusive streaming service, remains available.

The XR-55A95L comes with the Bravia Cam in the box; you click it at the top of the screen. It can be used as a webcam with Google Duo, but it also has other functions. Are you concerned about your privacy? The camera has a slider that allows you to slide a cover in front of the lens. But what else can he do? It adjusts image and sound based on your seat, which does not always seem desirable to us, and the effect is not great. The option for gesture control does not seem to be a great asset to us; it is still a difficult way to operate a TV. The last two functions are indeed valid. If you have children at home, the camera can warn if they are too close (less than 1m) to the screen. To minimize consumption, the camera can turn off the TV when it detects that no one is in front of the screen, with an adjustable waiting time.

Sony XR-55A95L – Image processing

The XR-55A95L is equipped with the Cognitive Processor XR. But now that a new chipset has been used, we are checking whether you can expect the same excellent results to a large extent that is true. The upscaling is excellent, and you get a very nice image from all sources. With Reality Creation, you can slightly accentuate the detailed image if desired. The light sensor (Ambient Optimization Pro) adjusts brightness, tint curve and color temperature, but you can disable each of those options separately. For example, we prefer to switch off color temperature. The noise suppression in the lowest setting produces less effect than last year, if you have a source with a lot of noise, the ‘middle’ setting is a better choice. It still removes blockage caused by MPEG compression well. And for color bands in soft gradients, the ‘Smooth Gradation’ setting in the lowest setting continues to do a fine job, and only the most severe cases cannot be completely erased. You can then consider the ‘middle’ position, but that clearly costs detail. The deinterlacing showed a jagged edge a bit more easily on some test patterns. This may be visible on live TV content (1080i), in almost horizontal lines/edges. Finally, it appears that the TV may lose some color in very fine vertical detail, which was visible on test patterns. None of those problems were clearly visible with regular footage. Rather, these are small details that Sony can hopefully eliminate with later software updates.

The QD-OLED panel has a very fast response time, so the motion sharpness is very good. Somewhat surprisingly, we still see the same motion problems. Horizontal text tickers may jerk slightly as they slide across the screen. In very fast camera movements, many image errors regularly remain visible when you activate motion flow. We thought for a long time that this was due to the chipset, but now it seems to be due to the Sony algorithm. There is good news for movie lovers. Sony has split the motion flow setting between film (24fps) material and video (50/60fps), for example, sports material. You can activate the motion interpolation for both separately. This way, you can achieve maximum smooth images in sports while keeping the original frame rate for film. ‘MotionFlow / Brightness’ is a ‘black frame insertion’ (BFI) technique, but unfortunately, it works at 60Hz and then introduces visible flicker in the image. Leave it off; the gain in detail is too small.

Main settings

The results are excellent. The gray scale is neutral. And although it leans slightly towards magenta in the brightest shades, we saw no adverse effects on the color reproduction. The black of the QD-OLED panel provides excellent contrast and tactile depth. The black detail is slightly darker than desired, but more than enough nuance remains visible.

Sony XR-55A95L – HDR

Time to push the new panel to its limits. We select the Professional image mode, the 10% window, then deliver a peak brightness of 1,340 nits. The completely white field still delivers 275 nits. These are very good results and an average improvement of 41% compared to last year. It is almost 10% brighter than the Samsung 65S95C. It is 5% behind the LG 65G3, except on the all-white field, where it beats the G3 by 25%.

The color range is impressive; we note just under 100% P3 (99.97% if you want exact figures). And thanks to the ample brightness, this also provides a very large color volume. We expect beautiful HDR images.

Sony supports Dolby Vision but not HDR10+. However, it has long used its dynamic tone mapping for HDR10, mainly trying to preserve the intention of the image. That still works great. HDR10 images have very good black detail, beautiful color reproduction, and almost all white detail. Only images mastered at 4,000 nits or higher experience some loss of white detail. We didn’t find that disturbing at all. The TV delivers slightly more color intensity in bright tones than last year’s model.

Sony XR-55A95L – Gaming, Reflections, and Viewing Angles

The viewing angle of the QD-OLED screen is almost perfect; both color and contrast are excellently preserved. The screen does not seem to handle reflections significantly better compared to last year’s model. Please note that direct, strong light can affect the contrast.

Gamers might have hoped for a few extra features with the arrival of the Mediatek Pentonic chipset, such as more HDMI 2.1 ports or combining 4K120 and Dolby Vision. Unfortunately, that is not the case. The chipset can handle 4K120 Dolby Vision, but this must be done via a firmware update. Sony told us that the software will not be released until 2024 at the earliest, but there is no more exact date. When tested, the TV was NVIDIA G-Sync Compatible for VRR. The input lag occurred at 17.3ms (4K60) and 8.8ms (2K120). It’s not bad, but a few ms slower than the competitors. For games, now choose the content type Game, the Standard image mode, then offers the best image. You can then further adjust things via the Game menu. If you have multiple 4K120 gaming sources and want a soundbar, you can only connect one gaming source to the TV because ARC/eARC is on an HDMI 2.1 port.

Sony XR-55A95L – Sound quality

For OLED models, Sony continues to opt for the Acoustic Surface solution in which the screen acts as a speaker membrane. The configuration is similar to last year’s, with two 20W actuators and 2x 10W additional woofers for bass reproduction. It is a proven setup that also delivers great results on this model. The most important advantage, the sound comes straight from the screen to you. That increases the feeling of authenticity; dialogues come from the people on the screen. But the surround effect is also excellent, and the audio can move clearly across the screen. The sound is excellent; there are many volumes and a nice bass. In addition to Dolby Atmos, Sony now supports DTS in all its variants, including DTS: X. A short calibration can adjust the music to the room acoustics.