When you are ranking the Manufacturers of flat panel LED HDTV sets, Samsung is clearly the Industry leader. It has had the highest sales volume of all the manufacturers of flat screen TVs for quite a few years. For the first quarter of 2011, Samsung’s lat panel TV set sales were 30% more than its closest competitor. If you ever had the chance to see a Samsung HDTV in operation set you will not find that at all surprising.
The images you will see on a Samsung HDTV are stunning in their sharpness and brilliance. Combine that with the high level of technical design and the broad range of features that Samsung includes in its sets, and you have a very strong argument for anyone thinking about purchasing of one of these sets….and that’s without even considering the Active 3D capabilities of these sets!
Samsung’s 3D sets employ an “Active” 3D approach. This employs glasses with LCD lenses which serve like shutters. These lenses alternately lighten and darken for one eye or the other as the picture frame for the particular eye is being shown on the screen.. The other way of approaching the 3D problem is called “Passive 3D”. There is a very big difference between the two methods, and it becomes apparent in the perceived quality of the images that are you see on the sets.
Creating a 3D image requires that your left eye and your right eye must see an image which is slightly different, ones in which objects which are at various distances from you appear in a different place. To observe this effect, hold up one finger at arm’s length, and observe it with only your right eye, and then with just your left eye. As you do this, notice the position of the object when compared to other objects that are at a greater distance.
You will notice that when looking through your right eye, the object will appear to be to the left of certain objects in the background, but when looking through your left eye, the apparent position of the object will seem to have shifted to the right, relative to that same background object. This illusion is referred to as “parallax”, and it is the basic principle of the two systems used to create the 3D effect on a television or movie screen.
The main difference between the two systems, Active and Passive, lies in the technique used to direct the two stereoscopic images to the correct eyes. A three-dimensional effect will only be experienced if each eye sees only the appropriate image. As you may have already experienced, when looking at a 3D image without using the 3D glasses, you see a double image. To create the 3D image, your brain needs to receive an image from a slightly different perspective from each eye, and those images must maintain the correct image parallax effect.
Passive systems employ glasses with polarized lenses that work in tandem with polarizing filters that are built in to the TV screen. These filters polarize two sets of alternating horizontal lines on the screen in one of two different polarization patterns. Each eye then sees only one of the two sets of lines on the screen (and therefore sees an image that has only half the full-screen resolution!) that match the polarization of the lens left or right in the glasses that matches the screen polarization for those lines.
With an Active system, the glasses “actively” become opaque, then transparent, by controlling the LCDs that are used in the lenses. Each eye is blocked in sequence, as the stereo frame for the left or right eye is being displayed on the screen. The coordination is accomplished by synchronizing the glasses with a signal transmitted from the TV set. These frames are shown at the rate of 120 HZ, so that each eye sees 60 images per second. Because each eye perceives a full-screen, 1080i image, there is no downgrading of resolution in the 3D image.
The Samsung UN40D6400, like all Samsung 3D HDTV sets, uses the Active system. In addition to great 3D TV, this set has a wide array of other great features that will make it your complete media center. It’s screen uses LED edge lighting to provide the illumination for the picture (since LCD’s do not produce any light). This system replaces the fluorescent tubes (yes, really!) that were used in previous generations of LCD flat screen TV sets.
Samsung has a wide range something they call “Smart Apps” – small “applications” that run on their TVs. These Apps are small programs (similar to iPhone Apps) that actually run on the TV set. (It’s worth noting that these TVs have a large amount of processing power at their disposal.) Although some of these Apps must be purchased, the cost is pretty much pocket change, and there are quite a few free Apps. These Apps cover a very broad range of subject areas including Videos, Sports, Lifestyle, Education, Games, and Information. There are also some Apps that will allow you to browse the Internet, and to make use of services like Netflix, Pandora, Hulu Plus, and many others.
The Samsung UN40D6400 set has an interesting and useful feature called the “ConnectShare” Movie feature. This enables you to run videos, listen to music, or browse pictures from a USB Thumb Drive. Just insert the drive in the USB port on the TV, and you are ready to enjoy all of your media files.
Along with all the electronic features, Samsung has also designed this set to minimize the effects of the room environment on the TV screen. The set features their “Ultra Clear Panel” on the front of their screens. This panel has a specially treated surface that absorbs light from the room. This greatly reduces those distracting reflections that would otherwise be seen on the screen when there are windows or other lights in a bad position relative to the TV set, and which would interfere with your enjoyment of those crystal clear pictures.
Find out much more about the other great features of this Samsung LED 3D HDTV, including The Eco Sensor, the Wide Color Enhancer Plus, and many others. You will also find the full specs for the set, as well as owner reviews, and a list of accessories. There’s an an explanation of the best way to calculate ideal viewing distance for 3D TV. You can learn more about other great LED HDTV sets here.