Why Plasma HDTVs are better than modern 4k OLEDs for 7th gen

[tongshadow]

So recently I got a Plasma, for a very attractive price, because I detest LCDs and wanted to see if the technology really is all it's cracked up to be. It's a 43" E series Samsung, one of the later models, and it's capable of "only" HD resolutions, native panel resolution is 1024x768. This may seem very low for today's standards but turns out it's absolutely perfect for HD-era consoles, like the PS3 and Xbox 360. When I saw how perfect 1024x768 (widescreen) made the Xbox 360 look I felt like I just had to share my findings here

The HD-era was a very weird time for console gaming, we had three competing technologies: CRT; LCD; and Plasma. Marketing gimmicks, coupled with outright misleading campaigns, only made matters worse for consumers. So if you lived in this era you might have different perceptions and opinions about HD-era graphics and visuals from others. In my case, I used an early 1366x768 32" LCD, so games always felt washed out, blurry and blocky. Now, this is a stark contrast to the previous generations where pretty much everyone was gaming on CRTs, so they were all looking at similar experiences. Well, after all these years it's safe to say the HD Plasma was the best choice... and STILL is. But why?

Plasmas are long gone, but like CRTs they still have a legion of fans. CRTs are still revelant due to their unique display properties and ability to properly handle standard resolution analog sources. Plasmas, however, ar believed to be a product of its time and surely better options exist now, right? Many consider OLEDs to be the natural evolution to Plasmas displays. OLEDs are brighter, can achieve higher resolutions and display the coveted true black levels only Plasmas could. So why should we bother with such "outdated" displays? The answer is: If you still play on the Xbox 360 and PS3 (maybe WiiU too?).

OLEDs have amazing capabilities, but the 4k panel coupled with poor scaling solution results in a less than stellar picture from 720p sources. HD-era graphics are known to have a "jagged" look, that when upscaled results in a very soft picture. Motion resolution is comparable to LCDs despite all advancements in other areas, and because consoles run at 60hz, the blurriness is really noticeable in motion, after all, it's 16.6ms frames of persistence. This can be minimized with BFI/strobing solutions however. So, here are pictures of my Samsung 43" Plasma vs the LG C2, on the Xbox 360.

https://i.imgur.com/tRnXN6g.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/eNrFQCV.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/qfK0Nql.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/5ESVvTm.jpeg

In my eyes, the Plasma is the clear winner here. It handles 720p/Widescreen 1024x768 sources perfectly, no scaling is needed so the resolution is displayed at its sharpest. I also really like the way Plasmas cells emit light, compared to the stale OLED emissions. Motion clarity is also superior on the Plasma, the 600hz subfield driving ensures little to no persistence exists when displaying frames in motion. Some may argue that an HD CRT could achieve the same results, but these displays are rare and it's impossible to ignore the scalability limitations of this technology. Convergence, focus, purity and geometry will never be as good as a Plasma, and HD CRTs often only come in very large sizes, making them too impractical.

So, yes, Plasmas are worth revisiting if you're fond of this particular generation. They have other uses, but this is not the topic to talk about it right now.
Just like many get CRTs solely for older console generations, this is another case where it's worth using a particular display technology for a generation. I went from LCDs to OLEDs (while using hi-res PC CRT monitors), never paying attention to Plasmas due to them being "obsolete" technology, but now I see they are still good. So, please, give Plasma a chance if you havent yet

[Guspaz]

There's always scaling going on. The PS3 doesn't have a full built-in scaler, so your TV is going to have to scale 1280x720 to 1024x768 or 3840x2160 either way, losing some resolution in the process on the Plasma, which is suboptimal (not that many games hit full 720p to begin with). The 360 is slightly better off, as it has a built-in scaler and can go from the render resolution directly to 1024x768 without a second scaling step, but there too you're potentially losing detail from the panel's lower resolution.

You didn't specify, but I suspect that you didn't do an apples-to-apples comparison here. I'd imagine you set your 360 to 1024x768 output on the plasma, and 1920x1080 on the OLED. That would do the scaling on the 360, but your TV probably has higher quality scaling (and with various controls over the scaling such as the sharpness and various other settings), so a more direct comparison would have been the console outputting 1024x768 and/or 1280x720 and then tweaking the TV's scaling-related settings as appropriate.

I don't believe your photos represent the best that's possible on the OLED, and I can see a significant reduction in detail in the plasma shots that I would consider unacceptable. A good example is the very first photo, where the pattern of serration on the knife is completely destroyed on the plasma. You can tell it's serrated, but not the shape of the serration.

[fernan1234]

OLED TVs do suck at scaling 720p in particular, even though you'd think otherwise for 4K TVs. The scalers they use are optimized for 1080p only.

A lower than full HD resolution source will generally look better on a panel with a native resolution that matches it, obviously, but also if it's very close to it like 720p on a 768p panel.

Motion is an important consideration too. OLED TVs up to this point have been WOLED LG panels which are a joke in brightness especially for SDR and with BFI enabled. Things are looking much better with new Samsung QD-OLED panels (the new LG MLA panels may also get as bright, but still WOLED crap). Size is also a problem, as the smallest panel currently is 55''.

Still wouldn't go out of my way to get an old Plasma, but I can see the appeal.

[DejahThoris]

Size is also a problem, as the smallest panel currently is 55''.

42" for sensible pricing, 32" if you're willing to /really/ shell out. But yes, it'd be nice to have more smaller options.

[eccoboy]

I still have my Sony CRT that I bought in 2004 and my Panasonic plasma that I bought in 2008. I like my consoles paired with TVs from the same era.

[Taiyaki]

Yeah I can see the appeal here too but to be fair for most people it's not going to be a big difference. Also most recent high end OLED's do handle motion very well in my opinion compared to models from 4~5 years ago.

[orange808]

Add a video processor and upscale to 4k. Plasmas were laggy. Everything was laggy back then.

[bigbadboaz]

Bah, if you pick a "prime" plasma like the late-years Panasonics that's not gonna be such a big issue. The main problems are power consumption, weight and the simple reality that most people can't have multiple large panels to switch off from.

Plasma had certain clear advantages even while getting shown the door, and fifteen years later it still doesn't look like that's gonna change in the near future.

[Bassa-Bassa]

There's always scaling going on. The PS3 doesn't have a full built-in scaler, so your TV is going to have to scale 1280x720 to 1024x768 or 3840x2160

Weren't there plasma sets using 1360×768? Though the actual question would be if any of those did have a true 1:1 mode with 768p sources or scaling was always involved no matter what.

[tongshadow]

There's always scaling going on. The PS3 doesn't have a full built-in scaler, so your TV is going to have to scale 1280x720 to 1024x768 or 3840x2160 either way, losing some resolution in the process on the Plasma, which is suboptimal (not that many games hit full 720p to begin with). The 360 is slightly better off, as it has a built-in scaler and can go from the render resolution directly to 1024x768 without a second scaling step, but there too you're potentially losing detail from the panel's lower resolution.

You didn't specify, but I suspect that you didn't do an apples-to-apples comparison here. I'd imagine you set your 360 to 1024x768 output on the plasma, and 1920x1080 on the OLED. That would do the scaling on the 360, but your TV probably has higher quality scaling (and with various controls over the scaling such as the sharpness and various other settings), so a more direct comparison would have been the console outputting 1024x768 and/or 1280x720 and then tweaking the TV's scaling-related settings as appropriate.

I don't believe your photos represent the best that's possible on the OLED, and I can see a significant reduction in detail in the plasma shots that I would consider unacceptable. A good example is the very first photo, where the pattern of serration on the knife is completely destroyed on the plasma. You can tell it's serrated, but not the shape of the serration.

1024x768 Widescreen is the optimal mode for this Plasma and only the 360 gives this option, but for comparison sake I used standard 720p, which isnt a huge difference from that optimized mode.
PS3/360 are 720p consoles and should be used as such, very few games are native 1080p and even if they are, internally downscaling from 1080p to 720p produces good results. Here's a good source of what games truly support 1080p: https://forum.beyond3d.com/threads/list ... ons.41152/
I also picked 2D sprite based games to more easily show how each display treats 720p sources, and it's a known fact the LG OLEDs scale in a blurry manner, Try from MLiG mentions this on his review of the C2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7K2tSrnxqVk

Spoiler

Bah, if you pick a "prime" plasma like the late-years Panasonics that's not gonna be such a big issue. The main problems are power consumption, weight and the simple reality that most people can't have multiple large panels to switch off from.

Late energy-star efficient 42" models had power consumption similar to LEDs, close to 150W~200W. The early models were indeed power hogs though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qIkLlAhf9g

Weren't there plasma sets using 1360×768? Though the actual question would be if any of those did have a true 1:1 mode with 768p sources or scaling was always involved no matter what.

51" models had square cells, so these HD sets were mostly 1366x768. 42" models had retangular cells and were 1024x768.
My Plasma will happily accept 1024x768 and display it perfectly without any scaling. But because it's a 4:3 resolution on a 16:9 display, everything looks stretched, wider. So in order to correct the AR, the source should send a stretched 1024x768 signal, and that's what the Xbox 360 does with 1024x768 (Widescreen).

[Guspaz]

I also picked 2D sprite based games to more easily show how each display treats 720p sources, and it's a known fact the LG OLEDs scale in a blurry manner, Try from MLiG mentions this on his review of the C2:

Spoiler

I disagree with that. 720p on LG OLEDs is definitely a big drop in sharpness as compared to 1080p, but it's not nearly as bad as is depicted in those photos, indicating that most of that blurryness in Try's video is coming from poor scaling done by the console, not the TV.

Here is a 240p image (240p test suite) output at 720p by an Analogue Super Nt, on an LG 77C1. Taken from an input with the PC label in game mode. All three are dramatically sharper than the example photos you've posted from MLiG. Forgive the moiré and my camera messing up the colours, the goal was just to show the sharpness, not the image quality. And I'd also note that even here, I'm losing sharpness from the console pre-scaling the image, as it was set to 4:3 and not 1:1, so it's doing horizontal interpolation. I should have disabled that for my photos, but even with the Super Nt adding some blurryness of its own, it's still much better than the MLiG example.

100% sharpness:

Spoiler

50% sharpness:

Spoiler

0% sharpness:

Spoiler

I would say that 100% sharpness looks good for 240p content output via 720p, but does induce a slight amount of ringing (not sure if it'd be visible from couch distance), while at 50% you're not getting quite the same sharpness, but the ringing is mostly eliminated.

[orange808]

You can also add a Darbee and get some sharpening without ringing. The latency is too small to detect with a Time Sleuth.

Furthermore, I don't believe any plasma had under one frame of lag on top of the inherent latency at the raster (created by the refresh rate). So, adding a currently available 4k upscaler (one frame of lag) is the same lag (or better) than a plasma.

The downside is, a good video scaler will cost you over $500usd and it will become mostly obsolete when the Tink4k arrives.

[eccoboy]

I have Darbee in my Oppo player and it's a complete joke in my opinion. The "effect" that it adds is so tiny that if someone turned it off I would never notice.

Regardless of whether plasma is better or worse than OLED for PS360, plasma displays have a unique look that I think makes them still worth having. Even though it is technically old and outdated, I still want to buy one of the legendary Kuros. Prices on Craigslist are still a little too high and I don't have space for one at the moment anyway.

[Bassa-Bassa]

Weren't there plasma sets using 1360×768? Though the actual question would be if any of those did have a true 1:1 mode with 768p sources or scaling was always involved no matter what.

51" models had square cells, so these HD sets were mostly 1366x768. 42" models had retangular cells and were 1024x768.
My Plasma will happily accept 1024x768 and display it perfectly without any scaling. But because it's a 4:3 resolution on a 16:9 display, everything looks stretched, wider. So in order to correct the AR, the source should send a stretched 1024x768 signal, and that's what the Xbox 360 does with 1024x768 (Widescreen).

And you do that with pixel graphics like Blazblue's? Blazblue and the likes are natively 1280×768 (though apparently the 1280×720 mode just crops some lines instead of downscaling the full frame, so I guess you could call it native as well), but for 1024×768 and correct AR, the console's scaling for sure, so even if your plasma isn't processing the picture, you still don't have actual 1:1 mapping.

[cfx]

.

[tongshadow]

I disagree with that. 720p on LG OLEDs is definitely a big drop in sharpness as compared to 1080p, but it's not nearly as bad as is depicted in those photos, indicating that most of that blurryness in Try's video is coming from poor scaling done by the console, not the TV.

Here is a 240p image (240p test suite) output at 720p by an Analogue Super Nt, on an LG 77C1. Taken from an input with the PC label in game mode. All three are dramatically sharper than the example photos you've posted from MLiG. Forgive the moiré and my camera messing up the colours, the goal was just to show the sharpness, not the image quality. And I'd also note that even here, I'm losing sharpness from the console pre-scaling the image, as it was set to 4:3 and not 1:1, so it's doing horizontal interpolation. I should have disabled that for my photos, but even with the Super Nt adding some blurryness of its own, it's still much better than the MLiG example.

100% sharpness:

Spoiler

50% sharpness:

Spoiler

0% sharpness:

Spoiler

I would say that 100% sharpness looks good for 240p content output via 720p, but does induce a slight amount of ringing (not sure if it'd be visible from couch distance), while at 50% you're not getting quite the same sharpness, but the ringing is mostly eliminated.

Interestingly enough the sharpness these OLEDs perform are on par with of those 4k HDMI gaming upscalers:
https://youtu.be/AQAiZ96FZwI?t=748
I'll agree some people may like the results but for me, sharp interger scaling would be the best way to handle 2D sprites and lower res content, in general. However, I've only seen it done properly by my GPU. I just wished manufacturers would at least entertain the idea to give it as an option.

Weren't there plasma sets using 1360×768? Though the actual question would be if any of those did have a true 1:1 mode with 768p sources or scaling was always involved no matter what.

51" models had square cells, so these HD sets were mostly 1366x768. 42" models had retangular cells and were 1024x768.
My Plasma will happily accept 1024x768 and display it perfectly without any scaling. But because it's a 4:3 resolution on a 16:9 display, everything looks stretched, wider. So in order to correct the AR, the source should send a stretched 1024x768 signal, and that's what the Xbox 360 does with 1024x768 (Widescreen).

And you do that with pixel graphics like Blazblue's? Blazblue and the likes are natively 1280×768 (though apparently the 1280×720 mode just crops some lines instead of downscaling the full frame, so I guess you could call it native as well), but for 1024×768 and correct AR, the console's scaling for sure, so even if your plasma isn't processing the picture, you still don't have actual 1:1 mapping.

Minor scaling would only occur on the horizontal axis, so even if it's not 1:1, it still looks very good. Even on 2D games.
In general, a proper 1366x768 Plasma would give you less to think about, but they're only available at 50"+ sizes.

[nissling]

OLED TVs up to this point have been WOLED LG panels which are a joke in brightness especially for SDR and with BFI enabled.
[...]
Still wouldn't go out of my way to get an old Plasma, but I can see the appeal.

This is pretty amusing.

If you're currently using a plasma and think it's bright enough, there's absolutely no reason whatsoever to be worried about lack of brightness when buying an OLED.

[Konsolkongen]

HDTVtest did a video demonstrating why OLED is superior to Plasma a few years ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLdkiyYeod8

[tongshadow]

The superiority of blurry motion.

[Konsolkongen]

The superiority of blurry motion.

He said that the camera's shutter speed had to be set a specific way to make the Plasma look good, but that it made the OLED look blurrier as a consequence.

Plasma had great motion, but I don't miss the blue blur on fast moving objects. With Black Frame Insertion you can get superior motion on OLEDs, if you can tolerate the flicker (I can't personally, but some can). It does drop the brightness a lot so it doesn't make sense for HDR, but for SDR it would still be brighter than a Plasma.

[fernan1234]

This is pretty amusing.

If you're currently using a plasma and think it's bright enough, there's absolutely no reason whatsoever to be worried about lack of brightness when buying an OLED.

I don't use a plasma and only ever had one for about a few days many years ago. The point is that WOLEDs in particular are severely limited in brightness when using BFI to improve on sample-and-hold motion blur.

but for SDR it would still be brighter than a Plasma

I wonder if that would be the case for WOLED vs the brightest Plasmas. For SDR last time I checked WOLEDs peak at around 140nits on a 100% window due to ABL, which means that when you enable BFI @60Hz for 60fps gaming (consoles), for example, you're halving the brightness. 70nits is pathetic compared to CRT, and probably not favorable also compared to a good plasma. Add 100% scanline filters when using retro scalers and such and you're killing the brightness even more. This is why full screen/sustained brightness is so important, though this issue is addressed quite nicely with the introduction of HDR-flagging on retro scalers (though WOLED TVs still have the problem of adding lag when using BFI).

[nissling]

I haven't tried every OLED out there but I did review the LG 42LX3 for a magazine a few months ago. It's basically a 42C2 with bendable panel. SDR would at maximum reach 420 nits with APL25 and 230 nits full field. This was with peak brightness set to high and OLED brightness at max. BFI at its highest setting would essentially cut the maximum brightness in half, which ends up at 115 nits. In reality however you most likely won't get such high APL as it requires the entire screen to be white. Even APL75 will give you far less ABL. Also retro games are usually presented in 4:3 which in turn also lowers the APL and makes ABL even less obvious.

A CRT is normally supposed to maintain 100 nits worth of brightness at 700mV input but keep in mind that those measurements specify a certain amount of light per square meter. Even if a 42" OLED seems tiny by modern standards, it's still significantly larger than an average sized CRT. Even with the same nits readings, the OLED will output more light in total.

[Konsolkongen]

I wonder if that would be the case for WOLED vs the brightest Plasmas. For SDR last time I checked WOLEDs peak at around 140nits on a 100% window due to ABL, which means that when you enable BFI @60Hz for 60fps gaming (consoles), for example, you're halving the brightness. 70nits is pathetic compared to CRT, and probably not favorable also compared to a good plasma. Add 100% scanline filters when using retro scalers and such and you're killing the brightness even more. This is why full screen/sustained brightness is so important, though this issue is addressed quite nicely with the introduction of HDR-flagging on retro scalers (though WOLED TVs still have the problem of adding lag when using BFI).

The Plasma he used in that video is arguably the best Plasma ever made... :/ He also says that the Plasma only did 35 nits full field, only half of what a common WRGB OLED with BFI does, that would be twice as pathetic as you claim OLED to be

[fernan1234]

The Plasma he used in that video is arguably the best Plasma ever made... :/ He also says that the Plasma only did 35 nits full field, only half of what a common WRGB OLED with BFI does, that would be twice as pathetic as you claim OLED to be

Oh wow it's that bad? Then yeah nevermind, bin them all.

[fernan1234]

A CRT is normally supposed to maintain 100 nits worth of brightness at 700mV input but keep in mind that those measurements specify a certain amount of light per square meter. Even if a 42" OLED seems tiny by modern standards, it's still significantly larger than an average sized CRT. Even with the same nits readings, the OLED will output more light in total.

You would think this until you see a well calibrated CRT displaying 240p versus a WOLED with BFI + full scanlines displaying the same 240p picture via SDR. The difference is significant, and sad. But again, flagging the scaled signal as HDR is a game-changer at least for this particular brightness issue with old sources.

[tongshadow]

He said that the camera's shutter speed had to be set a specific way to make the Plasma look good, but that it made the OLED look blurrier as a consequence.

Plasma had great motion, but I don't miss the blue blur on fast moving objects. With Black Frame Insertion you can get superior motion on OLEDs, if you can tolerate the flicker (I can't personally, but some can). It does drop the brightness a lot so it doesn't make sense for HDR, but for SDR it would still be brighter than a Plasma.

I have both displays, at 60hz the Plasma is clearer. The "blue" (I notice it's closer to green) trail is due to different decay rates on each color, but still preferable to sample and hold blur and less noticeable, in my opinion.
We have enough evidence and testing of how an OLED looks in motion, here's how the latest 240hz OLED LG Monitor is the UFO Test:



BFI would have helped, yes, but unfortunately it's solely dependant on the manufacturer. If you were to buy this monitor to play 60fps locked games, that's the level of blur you can expect.

I haven't tried every OLED out there but I did review the LG 42LX3 for a magazine a few months ago. It's basically a 42C2 with bendable panel. SDR would at maximum reach 420 nits with APL25 and 230 nits full field. This was with peak brightness set to high and OLED brightness at max. BFI at its highest setting would essentially cut the maximum brightness in half, which ends up at 115 nits. In reality however you most likely won't get such high APL as it requires the entire screen to be white. Even APL75 will give you far less ABL. Also retro games are usually presented in 4:3 which in turn also lowers the APL and makes ABL even less obvious.

A CRT is normally supposed to maintain 100 nits worth of brightness at 700mV input but keep in mind that those measurements specify a certain amount of light per square meter. Even if a 42" OLED seems tiny by modern standards, it's still significantly larger than an average sized CRT. Even with the same nits readings, the OLED will output more light in total.

I have my LG C2 calibrated to 100~110nits, and I dont see any issues whatsoever with ABL. A small window and fullscreen white produce the same luminance levels. This is how I know when people use their OLEDs way above optimized levels, the screen noticeably dims when going from low to high APL levels.
To reach similar luminance levels with BFI@60hz, my OLED Pixel setting is 80~85.

The Plasma he used in that video is arguably the best Plasma ever made... :/ He also says that the Plasma only did 35 nits full field, only half of what a common WRGB OLED with BFI does, that would be twice as pathetic as you claim OLED to be

Oh wow it's that bad? Then yeah nevermind, bin them all.

That's only a problem if you enjoy watching a full white screen, but Plasma ABL control is heavily reliant on software implementation as well.

[Konsolkongen]

I have both displays, at 60hz the Plasma is clearer. The "blue" (I notice it's closer to green) trail is due to different decay rates on each color, but still preferable to sample and hold blur and less noticeable, in my opinion.
We have enough evidence and testing of how an OLED looks in motion, here's how the latest 240hz OLED LG Monitor is the UFO Test:



BFI would have helped, yes, but unfortunately it's solely dependant on the manufacturer. If you were to buy this monitor to play 60fps locked games, that's the level of blur you can expect.

Plasma motion is definitely one of its strengths, and the ghosting was not a problem in most games for me either

On my LG CX I cannot get BFI to look any good at all. Whites become too gray and the image is so dull that it's unusable in my opinion. I had a 65" C1 for a short while (had it replaced, and then returned because of garbage screen uniformity ), and on that set BFI looked incredible. I saw no perceivable loss in brightness when enabling BFI in an SDR game (Sonic Mania), and even though I do find the flicker a bit hard on the eyes it did look amazing, with better motion than I ever saw on a Plasma. fernan1234 reminded me of the increase in inputlag when using BFI, and while I could probably get used to it in a game like Sonic Mania, I found Doom 2016 unplayable, and that was the main reason why I ended up not really using it at all. Such a shame, but I can still play fine with sample and hold-blur.

[nissling]

I have my LG C2 calibrated to 100~110nits, and I dont see any issues whatsoever with ABL. A small window and fullscreen white produce the same luminance levels. This is how I know when people use their OLEDs way above optimized levels, the screen noticeably dims when going from low to high APL levels.
To reach similar luminance levels with BFI@60hz, my OLED Pixel setting is 80~85.

This is not in line with what my test results showed. ABL was equally agressive regardless of what OLED Pixel brightness setting with full field maintaining aprox 55% of the light output as APL25. I always opt for 80-100 nits but the LG OLEDs shifts very strongly when comparing such test patterns. Even with the setting at 0 there was still no way to get rid of the ABL unless you disabled it through the service menu.

A friend of mine reviewed the 42C2 for the same magazine and had a very similar experience. For gaming and movies this is usually not an issue, but for desktop usage it quickly gets annoying.

[bobrocks95]

I was always under the impression that SDR content was mastered for a peak 100 nits and anything a TV is giving you above that is only useful if you have it in a bright room or are enabling BFI or scanlines that darken the overall brightness?

Either way I'm not sitting there watching a sustained 100% white screen. Comparing numbers for that is essentially completely worthless, like buying a CPU for games based on artificial benchmark scores.

[nissling]

I was always under the impression that SDR content was mastered for a peak 100 nits and anything a TV is giving you above that is only useful if you have it in a bright room or are enabling BFI or scanlines that darken the overall brightness?

Pretty much yes. But if you are a professional reviewer you must examine how a display performs with various settings to get an idea about its benefits and drawbacks in various use cases.

Either way I'm not sitting there watching a sustained 100% white screen. Comparing numbers for that is essentially completely worthless, like buying a CPU for games based on artificial benchmark scores.

You're missing the point. Lots of people use OLED TVs as computer monitors and for certain tasks, ABL will be abysmal. Going from 100 to 65 nits just by opening an Excel sheet or Word document is going to drive you nuts. The burn in protection will also dim static elements on screen which become extremely in Windows or macOS. You won't have this issue when playing video games or watching movies, but desktop is a completely different thing.

Burn in protection algorithms can also cause the image to dim down when using scanline filters. This is especially true if you're using HDR10. I've played around plenty with HDR through RetroArch on my Panasonic OLED and it's crazy just how much brightness you lose over time due to the shaders. Just bringing up the menu on the TV and then go back again makes it very obvious. Strangely the burn in protections on the very same TV have been very unobtrusive in just about any other scenario.