LG SM9000: At First Glance
LG has risen to the top of the television industry since entering the 4K television market in 2012. The brand has made a name for itself as a manufacturer of high-end 4K televisions with exceptional performance.
So, in 2019, LG released the SM9000, a high-end television that offers a 4K NanoCell display and various amazing features. However, like most LG 4K NanoCell televisions, the LG SM9000 is pretty expensive.
To be more specific, when this review was published in February 2022, this television had a price tag of $2,059.99. The LG SM9000 is obviously pricey, but does it offer enough features to justify its price tag?
There’s only one way to get an answer to that question – keep reading.
LG SM9000: Design, Dimension, and Weight
As expected from a $2000+ television, the LG SM9000 comes with a sleek design including some amazing design aesthetics. To start with, the television’s display is surrounded by slim bezels that measure only 0.43-inch.
Furthermore, these bezels are made of plastic and feature a matte-black finish. However, due to their extreme slimness, LG wasn’t able to include their logo or any inscription on any part of the bezels.
On a positive note, the LG SM9000 comes with a sturdy plastic stand with a matte-black finish. Moreover, this stand has a crescent shape stature and features a hole at its back that serves as a cable management system.
Also, due to the sturdiness of the stand, the LG SM9000 will wobble only a bit when nudged with force. Besides, the stand doesn’t have a wide footprint, meaning you won’t need a fairly large table to place the TV on.
Turning over to the back, you will discover that the LG SM9000 has a plain back panel. To give more detail, this back panel features a black finish and it is quite slim like the display bezels.
Therefore, the television will look perfect and not bulge out of the wall if wall-mounted. Speaking of wall-mounting, the LG SM9000’s back panel features four 300 x 300 mm VESA mount holes for mounting the TV on the wall.
With all that being said, let us now discuss the dimension and weight of the television. The LG SM9000 measures 1455.4 x 63.5 x 835.6 mm (W x D x H) and weighs 26399 g.
To be honest, even for a 65-inch television, this LG television is quite heavy. In fact, the TV is heavier than most 65-inch television such as the Samsung UN65MU8000 and Philips 65PFL5504/F7.
To be more specific, the Samsung UN65MU8000 and Philips 65PFL5504/F7 weigh 23400 g and 18098.3 g respectively.
In conclusion, the LG SM9000 offers a sleek design with slim bezels and a cable management system. However, this television is relatively heavy compared to most of its competitors.
Thus, I will offer the LG SM9000 a rating of eight out of ten in the design review section.
LG SM9000: Display Features and Picture Quality
Considering the display, the LG SM9000 employs a 65-inch NanoCell display with 4K UHD (3840 x 2160) resolution. This television’s display should be able to render a wider range of colors compared to other display types because it is a NanoCell display.
Besides, because this NanoCell display has a 4K resolution, the colors, and pictures that the display produces will be realistic and accurate. Unfortunately, due to the fact that the display is made with an IPS panel, it offers a poor contrast ratio.
To be more specific, this display comes with a native contrast ratio of 942:1. The contrast ratio is the proportion of luminance between the brightest white and the darkest black that a display can generate.
In addition to that, a high contrast ratio indicates that the display can produce deep blacks. Sadly, because the LG SM9000’s display features a poor contrast ratio, it won’t be able to produce deep blacks.
In other words, the blacks produced by the display will tend to look more like gray. Hence, the LG SM9000 might not be the ideal television for watching films with lots of darks or shady scenes.
Also, the television isn’t the best choice for dark room viewing. On a positive note, this television’s display supports local dimming.
Local dimming is a picture technique that enhances the contrast ratio of a display by dimming the display’s backlight layers. Thus, with the help of local dimming, the blacks that the LG SM9000’s display produces should be slightly darker.
However, the blacks wouldn’t be as dark as they would if the display actually comes with a high contrast ratio.
That said, as a display made with an IPS panel, the LG SM9000’s display offers wide viewing angles. Hence, when viewing the LG SM9000 at extreme angles or off-center, the display’s picture quality and colors will remain accurate.
In addition to its wide viewing angles, the LG SM9000’s display offers a decent maximum brightness of 437 nits. Therefore, you should be able to conveniently use the LG SM9000 in a well-lit or bright area.
Moreover, when using this television in bright areas, you don’t have to worry about reflection. This is because the television’s display comes with a semi-gloss coating that prevents and reduces the density of reflections and screen glares.
Moving on, the LG SM9000’s display supports numerous HDR formats including Dolby Vision, HLG (Hybrid Log-Gamma), and HDR10. For clarity, HDR (High Dynamic Range) is a picture enhancement technology that improves the brightness and color accuracy of a display.
Basically, HDR adds more highlights to pictures to give them more clarity and make them appear realistic and lifelike. Therefore, when viewing HDR-supported content on the LG SM9000, the picture quality will more realistic, bright, and sharp.
In case you are curious, HDR-supported content can be found on streaming apps like HULU and Amazon Prime Video. In addition to its HDR compatibility, the LG SM9000’s display offers an impressive response time.
To be more specific, this display comes with a response time of 13.6 milliseconds. Therefore, the LG SM9000 is great for watching fast-motion content like sports, as the display will produce minimal blur trails.
For clarity, response time is the amount of time that it takes a display to switch colors. Apart from its impressive response time, the LG SM9000’s display also offers a low input lag of 13.8 milliseconds.
Briefly, input lag is the time that a display takes to register signal input from an external source, such as a wireless gamepad. Therefore, thanks to its display’s low input lag, the LG SM9000 is ideal for gaming.
In summary, apart from its poor contrast ratio, there is basically nothing to hate about the LG SM9000’s display. Moreover, the display comes with a low input lag that makes it suitable for playing video games.
Therefore, I will offer the LG SM9000 a rating of nine out of ten in this display review section.
LG SM9000: Sound Features
For sound, the LG SM9000 comes with a pair of 20-watts down-firing speakers. These speakers are very loud and produce an impressive sound quality.
As one would expect from a $2000+ television, the LG SM9000 features two built-in subwoofers. Therefore, this television will be able to produce a significant amount of bass.
As a result, the LG SM9000 is ideal for watching bass-heavy movies or playing bass-heavy songs. In addition to its impressive bass production, this television features a sound technology called ClearVoice.
This sound technology allows the LG SM9000’s speakers to deliver precise and distinguishable dialogue. Therefore, when watching a movie on this television, you will be able to clearly hear the conversation between two or more characters.
Apart from ClearVoice, the LG SM9000 also comes with other sound technology such as Dolby Atmos and Dolby Surround Sound. Dolby Atmos enhances the sound production of the television’s speakers allowing them to produce immersive and cinema-like sounds.
Dolby Surround Sound, however, creates an illusion that sound is coming from different angles of the television. Thus, improving the sound production and quality of the television.
That said, now let us talk about how well this television performed on a THD test. For clarity, THD (Total Harmonic Distortion) is a test that determines how much distortion a sound device is capable of producing.
Furthermore, according to this test, a score of 1% or less means the sound device produces a minimal amount of distortion. However, if the score is above 1%, it means the sound device can produce a significant amount of distortion.
Fortunately, the LG SM9000 recorded a score of 0.888% on the THD test. Therefore, even at a maximum volume level, the distortion that this television will produce will be very minimal.
Hence, you don’t have to worry about distortion when planning to watch a loud or noisy movie on the LG SM9000. For the record, distortion in this context is the deformation of sound frequencies, resulting in the production of less-appealing sound quality.
In conclusion, the LG SM9000 offers impressive speakers that are loud enough and deliver excellent sound quality. Moreover, this television features numerous sound technology that allows it to deliver an appealing sound and viewing experience.
Therefore, in this sound features review section, I will rate the LG SM9000 a nine out of ten.
LG SM9000: Port and Connectivity Features
To begin with, the LG SM9000 comes with a sufficient number of ports. To give more details, these ports are divided between the right side and the back of the television.
Moreover, the right-facing ports include two USB ports and four HDMI ports. As with most LG televisions nowadays, one of these HDMI ports supports ARC (Audio Return Channel).
Therefore, using the HDMI-ARC port, you should be able to connect HDMI-supported audio devices or a soundbar to the television. In addition to the right-facing ports, the LG SM9000 features an Ethernet port, another USB port, and an RF port directly on its back.
That’s not all, you will also find a digital optical audio out and a composite video input on the back of the television. Concerning wireless connectivity, the LG SM9000 offers a built-in 802.11 ac WIFI and Bluetooth 5.0.
Having stated all the ports and connectivity of this television, let us now discuss the TV’s remote. The LG SM9000 features an LG magic remote control, like most modern LG televisions.
To give more detail, this remote is somewhat long and features a glossy-black finish. Furthermore, the remote has a round-shaped navigation button with a scroller in the center.
This scroller enables you to control a pointer on the television’s screen. Apart from the navigation button and scroller, the LG SM9000’s magic remote features two dedicated buttons.
These dedicated buttons allow for quick access to streaming services such as Amazon Prime Video and Netflix. Moreover, as a magic remote, this remote control comes with a built-in microphone for voice input via Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant.
Besides, at the bottom of this television’s remote, you will find a white “LG” logo for brand recognition.
In summary, the LG SM9000 offers sufficient ports, wireless connectivity like Bluetooth, and a magic remote that supports voice input. Thus, I will offer this television a rating of nine out of ten in this ports and connectivity review section.
LG SM9000: Smart Features
As with most LG televisions, the LG SM9000 comes with an operating system called the webOS 4.6. This operating system offers a simple, easy-to-navigate interface that operates smoothly.
Furthermore, there is a dashboard below the interface of this OS that provides easy access to numerous streaming services. Among the streaming services that you will find on this dashboard are HULU, Netflix, Sling TV, Now TV, and Amazon Prime Video.
Unfortunately, there are ads on this operating system. Therefore, when trying to navigate the OS’ interface, you can be caught off-guard by a pop-up ad.
To make things worse, these ads on the operating system cannot be disabled. On a positive note, the webOS features the LG content store where you can download additional streaming services.
In conclusion, the LG SM9000 features a decent OS that offers a seamless interface and lots of streaming services. However, the interface of this operating system features ads which can be annoying and frustrating.
Therefore, I will rate the LG SM9000 an eight out of ten in this smart features review section.
Frequently Asked Questions
The LG SM9000 was released in 2019.
When I wrote this review article in February 2022, the LG SM9000 had a price tag of $2,059.99.
As with most expensive high-end LG televisions, the LG SM9000 features a magic remote control.
LG stands for “Life’s Good”.
Yes, it does. The LG SM9000 comes with Bluetooth 5.0.
Conclusion
The LG SM9000 is an expensive 65-inch 4K television that offers remarkable performance. Specifically, this television comes with a 4K NanoCell IPS display that has exceptional picture quality and wide viewing angles.
Furthermore, this television offers an outstanding sound performance. Also, the LG SM9000 comes with a sufficient number of ports as well as a magic remote control that supports voice input.
However, the display of this television offers a poor contrast ratio which doesn’t make it ideal for dark room viewing. Also, the operating system of the television features annoying ads on its interface.
Notwithstanding, this television offers an overall brilliant performance for both movie lovers and gamers. Therefore, if you can afford its $2000+ price, the LG SM9000 is definitely worth buying.
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