Sony XBR – 75X850D Review: Another High-performing Sony TV?

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Sony XBR – 75X850D: At First Glance

Based on popular consensus, Sony’s X850D series seems to be one of the most value-packed series amongst its 2016 4K TV lineup. This series allegedly offers a near-perfect blend of picture quality, futuristic engineering, and incredible value.

As far as I’m concerned, anyway, the name Sony is synonymous with “high-performing TV”, so I wouldn’t be surprised if all of these were to be true. For us to confirm the performance of these TV series, we have evaluated the 75-inch version.

In case you are wondering, this review also applies to the other screen sizes including the 55 and 65-inch sizes since they have identical specs – according to the manufacturer. Only the 85-inch sized screen uses a different panel, so its performance may differ.

With all things being considered, can the XBR – 75X850D live up to the Sony pedigree? We will find out soon enough.

Sony XBR – 75X850D: Design, Dimension & Weight

One thing’s for sure, the Sony XBR – 75X850D has an incredibly clean and sharp-looking design. Sony’s designers have really done a fantastic job here.

The TV’s thin bezels and its sharp angles give it a simple, yet classy look. This has to be Sony’s way of saying they are not moved by the curved-screen trend that Samsung and LG have adopted.

There’s no point in hopping on the trend anyway. Sony has perfectly nailed its design layout after all. 

Their design layout still focuses on simple and straightforward approaches as seen on this Sony XBR – 75X850D TV. One of the most obvious design features Sony has maintained on this TV is the matte-black finishing.

This design pattern makes the Sony XBR – 75X850D look almost the same as the previously released XBR series – the X850C. However, 75X850D looks cheaper than the X850C model.

Don’t feel disappointed yet, the Sony XBR – 75X850D still feels solid. The sad thing, however, is that Sony has gotten rid of most of the metal finish on the TV.

For instance, the Sony XBR – 75X850D’s metal frame and stand are now entirely built with plastic. However, this doesn’t mean they feel weak now.

As I stated earlier, the Sony XBR – 75X850D is still sturdy. In fact, the TV’s stand weirdly feels more solid than the way it felt when it was built with metal.

Although this silver plastic stand may wobble if you push the TV a little, the Sony XBR – 75X850D feels really firm standing on it. Aside from the incredible support it offers, this stand also sets the TV up at an angle that makes it look attractive.

Another design feature that brings that spark of brilliance to the Sony XBR – 75X850D is its thin metallic strip display frame. Unlike the gold strip on Sony’s higher-end TVs, the Sony XBR – 75X850D’s bezels are coated in chrome plating.

These bezels provide the only bright spot aside from the blue power LED under the logo situated at the center of the TV’s bottom bezel.

Overall, the almost non-existent bezels on the Sony XBR – 75X850D give it a simple and impressively sleek design. This XBR – 75X850D’s sleek design is even more impressive when you look at it from the side.

In fact, the XBR – 75X850D is almost as slim as the XBR – 65X930D that measures 1460.5 x 36.6 x 841.5 mm. For comparison, the Sony XBR – 75X850D measures 1677 x 49 x 969 mm.

It would have been nice if the Sony XBR – 75X850D was lighter. Though it is not so heavy, it is just heavier compared to the XBR – 65X930D.

While the XBR – 75X850D weighs 33400 g, the XBR – 65X930D weighs 28900 g.

All things being considered, I would regard the Sony XBR – 75X850D as a relatively slim and light TV. The TV’s slim form factor will help it maintain its sleekness even if you decide to mount it on a wall with its VESA 400×300 mount.

However, you should know that you will block some connections on the TV’s back if you decide to mount it on a wall. Asides from that, the TV looks fantastic on a wall just as it does on its stand.

Overall, this TV’s design is simple, elegant, and functional which is why it scores an eight in this design review.

Sony XBR – 75X850D: Display Features

It is quite surprising that the Sony XBR – 75X850D doesn’t feature the most important factor that has constantly improved the image quality on LCD TVs. To be precise, the Sony XBR – 75X850D’s 75-inch LCD display is not equipped with a local dimming feature.

Theoretically, the absence of local dimming features usually leads to lighter black level display and lower contrast. According to what the test results say, this theory holds true.

With a native contrast of 1,248:1, black colors on this TVs display aren’t very deep and they might appear a little gray when the environment is dark. Fortunately, thanks to the TV’s HDR feature, this won’t be much of an issue if you turn on a few lights in your room.

Sadly, the maximum brightness on the Sony XBR – 75X850D is not enough to fully enjoy its HDR effects because it doesn’t support local dimming.

Nonetheless, its 420 nits brightness is still enough for the HDR effect to deliver great picture detail, bright color, and nice contrast. 

In case you don’t know much about HDR, they essentially increase luminosity and contrast. In practice, this feature improves shadow detail and, in particular, sun-highlighted effects.

Thanks to this HDR effect and its 4K UHD resolution of 3840 x 2160, the color rendition on the XBR – 75X850D is as good as you’d expect on a Sony TV. Colors aren’t oversaturated, and grayscale uniformity is excellent, resulting in a really smooth image.

For clarity, grayscale uniformity simply means the evenness of colors on the display. Taking this into account, the XBR – 75X850D has an excellent even backlight uniformity.

It gets even better when the HDR effect combines with the TV’s TRILUMINOS display technology for a wider color range. In this case, the color depth increases, even more, resulting in notably brighter and more realistic colors.

This helps the wide-gamut color technology that has been fantastic for Sony over the years remain superb on this TV. If you are not familiar with what color gamut means, it is just a definition of the number of colors or the range of colors, a TV can display. 

On the color gamut test for color space used in HDR contents, the Sony XBR – 75X850D had a color gamut of 85.94%. Although it didn’t achieve the above 90% score mark for good performance, its score is acceptable since it is very close.

Besides, the 4K Processor X1 engine and 4K X-Reality PRO Upscaler on this TV give you more pleasant reasons to love its display. 

Everything you watch appears as fantastic as it possibly can thanks to the 4K Processor X1. Depending on what you’re watching, the color contrast and clarity can all be optimized. 

Meanwhile, the 4K X-Reality Pro engine ensures to analyze and match different sections of each scene in whatever you’re watching with an image database. The image database helps to manage texture, contrast, and color independently to enhance detail.

In addition, the 4K X-Reality Pro engine does an excellent job of up-converting and smoothing HD signals to the panel’s native resolution. 

Moving on, it’s almost as though there’s an endless treat of pleasant features on the Sony XBR – 75X850D. In addition to all the previously mentioned features, Sony also equipped this TV with a Motionflow XR 960 refresh rate technology.

Consequently, this technology equips the XBR – 75X850D with a 120 Hz refresh rate. This technology allows you to enjoy enhanced clarity when you are viewing fast-moving action sequences in sports or movies.  

Also, it helps to reduce blurs as much as possible. To discover the exact rate of motion blur on this TV, I considered the response time test. 

Basically, response time is the time it takes for a pixel to change from one color to the next. This test checks how quickly a display’s pixels can fully transition from one color to another.  

In this test, a duration less than 14 ms is considered ideal. As for the XBR – 75X850D, it offers a response time of 10.3 ms which is considerably good.

Given its good response time rate, one would also expect the TV to offer a good input lag. In simpler terms, a television’s input lag is the amount of delay from the time a source produces pictures and the time the image is presented on screen.

The input lag test I considered here checks for the lowest input lag the TV is capable of achieving with a 4K resolution at a 60Hz input signal. On this test, a value less than 25 ms is considered the most ideal.

Unfortunately, the XBR – 75X850D didn’t perform well on this test. It achieved a rate of 57.4 ms which is quite high even for casual gaming. 

On the bright side, this lag doesn’t really matter for watching movies. So unless you’re a gamer you don’t need to worry about the TV’s high input lag.

Lastly, the viewing angles you get on the Sony XBR – 75X850D is one of the best you can get on a mid-priced 4K TV. Color saturation and contrast only start to decline when you move towards 15 degrees off the center of the TV. 

Also, thanks to the screen’s semi-matte panel type, the TV doesn’t reflect much light in the room. Overall, the Sony XBR – 75X850D’s display features and performance is nothing short of excellent.

Even though there are a few shortcomings, there are just enough pleasant features to give you your desired viewing experience. As a result, Sony XBR – 75X850D scores an eight in this display review.

Sony XBR – 75X850D: Sound Features

The Sony XBR – 75X850D comes with a complex sound output that efficiently serves its purpose. To give more detail, this TV is equipped with a 7.5W + 7.5W + 7.5W + 7.5W bass reflex speaker.

This sound system produces a fantastic sound quality. 

The speakers come with a preset ClearAudio+ feature that optimizes the TV’s sound for a more immersive experience that feels like the sound is all around you. This feature enables you to watch movies, hear music, conversations, and surrounding effects with more clarity and distinct separation.

This feature nicely defines voices from background noise for very good sound quality.

One of the ways through which Sony XBR – 75X850D maintains sound quality is through its Digital Sound Enhancement Engine (DSEE) technology. 

This technology helps the TV restore lost high frequencies from the information thrown away during digital audio compression. In other words, the XBR – 75X850D is capable of restoring the natural sound in low-resolution Internet video and other heavily compressed audio files.

In addition, the XBR – 75X850D uses a computer model to assess and adjust the imperfections in speaker response. It does this by “sampling” the speaker frequency with more precision.

Sampling in this context means that the sound data is supplied back to the sound system to balance any surges or drops in the speaker’s natural response. The result of this process is a clean, natural audio with smooth and even frequency production.

To back up this notion, I retrieved its frequency response and total harmonic distortion test data. In simpler terms, frequency response defines how accurately a system reproduces each frequency of an audio content.

Meanwhile, total harmonic distortion is a measure of the effect the sound amplifier has on the sound output. To put it simply, it is the measure of the change in the original signal that a sound system has already produced.

For the frequency response test, I checked the amount of deviation in the TV’s frequency response while it produced sound at its maximum volume. In this test, an Std. Dev. values less than 4 dB are the acceptable good values.

The test gives room for a noticeable value difference of 2 dB. What this means is that if a TV’s Std. Dev. value is 2 dB excess of the standard 4 dB, it is acceptable. 

This is exactly the case with the Sony XBR – 75X850D. It recorded an Std. Dev value of 6.2 dB which is very much within the acceptable range.

As for the THD test, the test result I retrieved checks the overall amount of the TV’s harmonic distortion measured at maximum volume. On this test, only values less than 0.100 are good.

Although the XBR – 75X850D got good results at lower volumes, its harmonic distortion at maximum loudness wasn’t good. At maximum volume, the TV’s THD was 4.78 which is way above the 0.100 standard value.

Another little shortcoming with the speaker is its volume capability. Though its volume capability is adequate, it isn’t excellent. 

You will need to increase the TV’s volume setting to 50% before it can fill a large room with its sound. Nonetheless, the speaker on this TV is not bad at all.

For these reasons, the Sony XBR – 75X850D scores an eight in this sound review.

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Sony XBR – 75X850D: Ports and Connectivity Features

The Sony XBR – 75X850D comes with a lot of port and connectivity options. Firstly, this TV offers 3 USB ports on one of its sides.

Furthermore, the XBR – 75X850D features 4 HDMI ports. These HDMI ports come with the HDMI audio return channel (ARC) feature.

The ARC eliminates the need for additional composite audio by connecting your TV and audio system with a single High-Speed HDMI cable. 

Connecting an ARC-compatible audio system to the XBR – 75X850D will enable you to send audio from the TV to a subwoofer speaker for example. You will also be able to view and listen to movies and other content sent from an external audio system to the XBR – 75X850D.

Aside from the regular ports, the XBR – 75X850D also features some AV ports. It features 1 x Component Video Input (Y/PB/PR) on its back.

In addition to that, it also offers 2 x Composite Video Input (Hybrid w/Component). Lastly, you get an RF (Terrestrial / Cable connection Input).

For connectivity, the Sony XBR – 75X850D features a 1 digital optical audio output, a version 4.1 Bluetooth as well as a wired (RJ-45) and wireless LAN. The TV also comes with a stereo headphone output with which you can connect a soundbar, Subwoofer, or other audio systems.

Furthermore, the remote on the Sony XBR – 75X850D is quite good. It is a black matte touchpad remote with very nice and fast responsiveness.

The entire button and surface of this remote have a nice rubberized feel that’s pleasant to touch. It’s just quite unfortunate that this remote is relatively too large, has too many buttons, and lacks backlighting.

On a positive note, this remote features a voice search button that allows you to speak commands to the TV. This search feature doesn’t require you to aim at the TV to work.

The remote also features an Infrared (IR) Blaster that enables you to use your Sony TV remote to control other gadgets in your home. With the TV remote controller, you can control your cable box for example.

Moreover, as I mentioned earlier, you do not need to aim it at the TV to perform most functions such as power on/off, volume up/down, or the Home button with voice.

It is important to mention that before you use the voice function of the remote, you need to use the TV’s configuration menu to manually activate the mic button.

In conclusion, the Sony XBR – 75X850D scores an eight in this section for the plenty of port and connectivity options it offers.

Sony XBR – 75X850D: Smart Features

The X850D comes equipped with Google’s Android TV operating system, Android TV. This operating system features apps like Netflix, Amazon Instant, Pandora, Hulu, Vudu, SiriusXM, iHeartRadio plus many other less popular apps.

To name a few of the featured but not so popular apps, the TV comes pre-installed with HBO NOW, Pluto TV, Starz Play, EPIX, Fusion, and many more. If this selection is still looking like a limited one, think about how many more options you will get when you explore Google Play Music, Games, and Movies.

Aside from the entertainment options this TV’s smart feature offers, it also offers quite a number of smart features. 

For instance, the voice search on this TV gives you access to the power of Google search. It allows you to find content across several services without having to waste time typing.

Also, Sony’s Android TV platform directly provides Home Automation control through a Logitech Harmony Hub. With the touch of a button on the TV’s remote, you can control and automate your lights, security cameras, and other IoT (internet of things) devices. 

Overall, the operation speed this TV’s smart feature offers along with its features are remarkable. As a result, Sony XBR – 75X850D scores an eight in this smart features review section.

Frequently Asked Questions

Conclusion

The Sony XBR – 75X850D certainly has a lot to offer. It has 4K resolution, high dynamic range (HDR), a 4K Processor X1, and a few other display technology features that enable it to produce superb picture quality.  

In addition to that, its sleek and simple appearance will blend in with most room designs. To top it all, its Android-based smart TV operating system is one of the best there is with loads of awesome features.

If all of these features look sufficient enough for you, then you wouldn’t be making a mistake if you decide to buy the Sony XBR – 75X850D. To be honest, this TV offers enough value to balance its price point.

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