QLED TV offers innovative design, familiar LCD picture quality

that of Samsung

"QLED"

is a brand new term for many people, and the world's leading TV maker calls it "the next innovation in television". With the Q7 series, however, there is more innovation in design and features. features than in image quality.

The Q7, Samsung's cheapest (but still expensive) QLED TV, is a tour de force of stylish extras. Its impressive "invisible" fiber optic cabling combines with an external connection box to make clean installations more easy than ever. It can automatically control connected equipment using the TV remote, even if your stuff is stored in a cabinet. And its good looks, down to the remote, stand and even the back, is perhaps my favorite of all TVs to date.

The Samsung Q7 series doubles in design

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The design of the TV is so good that I gave it a “10” in this category and lowered design scores from other competing TVs I tested, including

LG C7 OLED TV

.But this QLED can't compare to this OLED in the category with the most weight in CNET's TV rating system: picture quality.

In side-by-side comparisons, the QLED TV's picture looked like many other LED LCD TVs. It's fine, especially in bright rooms, and will certainly satisfy most viewers. But in darker environments where expensive TVs should also meet the needs of picky home theater fans, it falls short of the best LCD TVs such as the

Vizio P-Series

, as well as OLED-based sets.

Editor's Note July 5, 2017:

The price of this TV has dropped significantly since it was originally posted, so its value score has dropped from 5 to 6, bringing its overall rating down from 7.3 to 7.6.Review has not changed moreover.

Sarah Tew/CNET

The magic of “invisible” wiring

Samsung has always made some of the most beautiful televisions, and the Q7 is another stunner. From the front, it's almost the whole picture, with a very thin black frame edged in silver, with a small chrome Samsung logo at the bottom .On the side, it doesn't have the ultra-thin profile of OLED, but it's still ultra-thin at 1.8 inches deep.

I'm a big fan of Samsung's new stand designs this year. The Q7 consists of a tubular bar in the front and an angled stand that leaves the TV appearing to be suspended in space. It's simple and attractive.

Sarah Tew/CNET

Even the back is well thought out, with textured horizontal lines and covers that hide two of Samsung's 2017 TV innovations. One is the new "invisible connection", a thin, white fiber optic cable that connects the TV and a separate One Connect box, where you plug in your AV equipment, antenna and USB devices.

It's not quite invisible, but it's thin and small enough that you could run it along a wall and it would be hard to spot, depending on the color of the wall. The Q7 comes with a cable 16 feet, which should be long enough for most people, and unused slack can be wrapped in the included rubber washer. Convenient! The TV power cable and thin wire can be hidden in a channel at the back of the stand, for the most discreet cabling of any TV I've seen.

Sarah Tew/CNET

The other innovation is an optional "gapless wall mount" ($150 for 55 and 65 inch sizes, $175 for 75 inch). the wall, allows easy leveling and is

relatively easy to install

.The TV is also compatible with standard brackets ($20 and up), although they will introduce a wider gap between the TV and the wall.

A TV smart enough to handle your gear

Samsung improved one of my favorite features from last year: the TV's ability to automatically recognize and control connected devices using its own remote and on-screen display. is an infrared blaster built into the OneConnect box, allowing its remote signals to reach equipment inside cabinets or otherwise hidden.

A

good universal remote

is more capable, but certainly not as easy to set up. Often, plugging in a device during the initial TV setup is enough for the Samsung to recognize it and fully configure control using the Samsung TV remote .This unique auto-configuration ability worked for most devices I tried, but there were exceptions, such as Nvidia Shield, Apple TV, and PlayStation consoles. is hardly "universal".

Sarah Tew/CNET

The set-top box control is particularly impressive, letting you ditch your cable company's selector for most controls. My Fios box was automatically integrated into the TV's home menu bar with its own Fios icon. on the TV screen allows me to select the box's own guide (also accessible by pressing the 'channel' button on the remote), its DVR recordings, its main menu or to change channels, all at the using the Samsung TV remote control.

The TV remote can also pause and fast forward through commercials, although it relies on a pop-up menu instead of dedicated buttons (although Samsung has added skip forward and back). You can also dial ads directly. channel numbers and access special keys such as A, B, C, D and "Last" using other pop-ups. If pop-ups are too tedious, voice commands such as "Watch channel 570 ", "ESPNHD" and "Pause" also work.

Sarah Tew/CNET

You'll have to plug your stuff directly into the TV, so if your setup includes an AV receiver, it won't work. Ultimately, I'd stick with my

Harmony

, but people with simpler systems that use supported devices can use Samsung's sleek remote to control everything.

Correct app support, new voice commands

Carrying on the same design from 2016, Samsung's Tizen-based smart TV system is very good for a TV, but its app coverage isn't as comprehensive as Android TV's (on

Sony sets

) Where

Roku-TV

.

4K streaming

with HDR is available on Netflix and Amazon, as well as the Fandango-powered TV Plus app, but Samsung's Vudu app does not currently support 4K or HDR. YouTube app supports 4K. Other major apps like Hulu, Plex, and both HBO (Go and Now) are also built in, but if you want more, you'll probably still need to connect a

external device

like a Roku or an Apple TV.

Sarah Tew/CNET

I like that app tiles and connected devices both appear in the same menu bar at the bottom, and you can arrange them to your liking. Click the Home button and you can browse content from apps such as Netflix and Hulu while your current video continues to play in the background. The menu even offers suggestions and, on some apps, lets you resume what you were watching previously.

If you want to avoid the menu altogether, you can try speaking into the remote. Commands such as "Netflix", "Hulu", and "YouTube" worked fine for launching apps, but "Amazon" launched the website instead - I had to say "Amazon video" to launch its app. You also can't use voice commands within an app. In a cool twist, settings like "Movie Mode", "Game Mode" and even specific settings such as "Backlight 8" can also be adjusted via voice.

Key TV Features

Display technology

LCD LED

LED backlight

Perimeter lighting with local dimming

Resolution

4K

HDR-ready

HDR10

Screen shape

Apartment

Smart-TV

Tizen

From a distance

Standard

Questions and answers

Samsung's biggest added bonus is QLED, which stands for "Quantum Dots Light Emitting Diode". Quantum dots are microscopic molecules which, when touched by light, emit their own different colored light. In 2017 QLED TVs from Samsung, the dots are contained in a film and the light that hits them is provided by an LED backlight. This light then passes through a few other layers inside the TV, including a liquid crystal (LCD) layer, to create the image.

Samsung uses quantum dots in much the same way

over the past two years in SUHD TVs

as the

KS8000

and

JS8500

, but claims that its 2017 dots provide better color and more brightness. There is a new proprietary structure that "consists of a metal core, a graded ZnSeS layer, and a metal shell," says Samsung. In my book, the current generation of QLED TVs are basically bloated LED LCD TVs, not a separate type of display like OLED. Check out the article below for more.

The Q7 has a

edge-lit LED backlight with local dimming

, and unlike Vizio, Samsung doesn't disclose the number of dimming zones. The upgraded models like the Q8 and Q9 are said to have more zones, but it's hard to speculate whether this will improve their image quality. The super expensive Q9, for its part, has an extra called "Elite Black+ with Infinite Array", which might work better.

The set supports

high dynamic range (HDR)

contained in the standard HDR10 and the next

HDR10+

formats only. It lacks the Dolby Vision HDR support found on most competing HDR TVs. I haven't seen any evidence that one HDR format is inherently "better" than the other, so I certainly don't see the lack of Dolby Vision as a deal breaker on this TV - instead it's

just one more factor to consider

.

Like most other 4K TVs

the Q7 uses a native 120Hz panel. It offers Samsung's Motion Rate 240 processing with

black frame insert

improve

motion resolution

.

Sarah Tew/CNET

Cabinet compatible connectivity

4x HDMI inputs with HDMI 2.0a, HDCP 2.2

3x USB ports (2x version 2.0, 1x version 3.0)

Ethernet port (LAN)

Optical digital audio output

RF input (antenna)

Remote port (RS-232) (EX-LINK)

This list is mostly solid unless you have a legacy device that requires analog video (component or composite) or audio. The Q7 is one of the few TVs that doesn't offer at least one analog input, audio or video.

All of these connections are housed in the separate OneConnect box, which is larger than last year's and fitted with infrared emitters. It also has its own power supply, separate from the TVs, so you will need to plug it in as well. the invisible wiring system, the box makes storing all your equipment in a cabinet easier than with any other TV.

And if you opt for a wall installation of the wire, which does not carry electricity, you may be interested to know that Samsung is in the process of receiving wall certification, although there is no time limit to receive it .LG's proprietary wallpaper OLED TV connection, which carries energy,

is not certified in the wall

.As always, you should consult a professional for in-wall installations to ensure everything is up to your local code.

Here is where I mention that Samsung

SmartThings Extend Control Key

, promised last year, does not have an early May release date. Samsung has not confirmed to CNET whether it will eventually be released.