A few months ago I was invited to chat at the launch of a new range of LG televisions. I had a chance to get hands on with some of the gaming offerings from the electronics brands. With the new generation of consoles now firmly in the market, I get asked questions about the perfect television to pair with your new Playstation 5 or Xbox Series X.
So many of my friends have become new gamers, after being stuck at home for 18 months courtesy of a pandemic. New research shows that the time spent gaming has increased by 39% during the pandemic and Twitch viewership has grown by more than 50% from the first quarter of 2020 to the second. Basically, gaming is cool. High fives to those of us who knew that already. With all the new consoles on the market, it makes sense that you’d want to pair your console with a decent TV. I think the LG OLED TVs are a nice option to consider and will check all the boxes you have.
Let’s talk about OLED
In the past TVs tended to have slow response times, so the on-screen pixels took a while to change based on in-game actions. Obviously you wanted that quicker response rate. OLED TVs outperform a lot of gaming monitors because they don’t process any backlighting. Rather OLED tech uses self-lit pixels that deliver near-instantaneous response times as low as one millisecond. With OLED, you also no longer have to be concerned with input lag. So you suddenly have a television that can compete with your gaming monitor. OLED’s self-lit pixels also give you a really impressive amount of depth and vibrancy to the visuals in game, which can make for a far more immersive experience.
Those new consoles
When I did my YouTube video on the Xbox Series S I made it pretty clear that it didn’t matter how fancy your rig was or if you blew cash on the latest consoles – your gaming system would only be able to deliver a visual experience that was as good as the display you were using. OLED has support for 4K video with a 120Hz refresh rate, for a more vivid effect to the motion on screen and picture quality. The LG OLED C1 has four HDMI 2.1 ports as well (which you need!).
As we’re chatting about TVs best suited for gaming – the LG OLED TVs also offer the world’s first Eyesafe certified TV displays. This means they produce low levels of blue light while maintaining optimal colour performance. The benefit here is obvious: longer gaming time without the eye strain!
Other features that are particularly great for gamers is OLED’s Variable Refresh Rate (VRR), as well as its NVIDIA G-SYNC and AMD FreeSync compatibility. These adaptive syncing technologies reduce screen tearing, stuttering, and input lag by dynamically synchronising your monitor’s refresh rate to match every frame generated by your graphics card in real time. This results in a smoother and more realistic gaming experience – especially with the fast-moving visuals in first-person shooter or racing games. LG is the first to support NVIDIA G-SYNC for big screen gaming, and it’s one of the many reasons why gamers love OLED displays.
Your TV knows your games!
While OLED hardware is nothing short of revolutionary, there’s also a lot more going on inside LG’s OLED TVs. The latest Game Optimiser uses LG’s α9 Gen4 AI processor to detect specific game genres, such as first-person shooters, RPGs, and real-time strategy games, and optimises both the picture and audio for better gameplay. The interface also gives gamers finer control over gaming-related display settings, so you can customise to your heart’s desire.
Don’t forget the sound
Dolby Atmos delivers the most immersive, multi-dimensional surround sound by adding something conventional surround sound doesn’t have: a height channel. This allows sounds to be placed more accurately in a three-dimensional space, enabling up to 128 individual sounds to be placed precisely in different parts of your virtual surroundings. For first-person shooter afficionados, this offers a significant competitive advantage as it allows you to hear exactly where every footstep or distant gunshot is coming from. LG’s OLED TVs come standard with Bluetooth as well as a headphone port, so you can add your own headset with ease.
The right TV for you?
LG’s OLED TVs are a great choice if you’re looking for a gaming TV. They have bunch of innovative features, offer a variety of display options and I think, tick most of the boxes required when you want to splurge on a television which will be used primarily for gaming.
