Toshiba 46UX600U LED LCD Television Review

46UX600U Features and Build Quality

Toshiba has come a long way since it opted to pursue better quality televisions and displays over thinner models. Now, it seems, they have accomplished both. What's most impressive about the new Toshiba 46UX600U is that, at just 2-inches thick, it's the thinnest design for a Toshiba flat panel yet. It's "Air Lagoon" design also helps make the TV look even thinner than it already is and enhances the aesthetic of this attractive display.

Features

At just under $1700, the Toshiba 40UX600U is positioned as a mid-to-high-end product that goes up against the mainstream offerings of all of the major players - and holds it own extremely well. It even matches the price of Vizio's XVT472SV series, but exchanges 120Hz and network features for the 240Hz of the competing display (which has no network or widget-style streaming applications). Let's run through several of the key features:

• ARC (Audio Return Channel)
  This is one of the first displays on the market that features the new HDMI 1.4 spec Audio Return Channel (ARC). This allows the set to decode ATSC and QAM channel information and then send up to Dolby Digital Plus across the existing HDMI cable back to your ARC-compatible A/V receiver. That means no more running an additional coax or TOSlink cable back to your audio receiver.
  
• VUDU Apps/Widgets
  The Widgets feature of the 46UX600U are really just video podcasts that are brought int through a system that seems to be branded as "VUDU apps". They do include such services as Pandora, Flickr, Picasa, Facebook and Twitter, but for the most part they seem to be video podcast channels. YouTube gets called up as a separate application and Netflix, the popular media streaming and DVD/BD rental service is completely absent. In addition, there seems no way to download additional apps of any kind, save for those installed during routine software updates.
  
• Gaming Mode
  The 46UX600U comes with a Gaming Mode whereby the television will bypass most of its video processing circuitry to cut off 48ms of lag that would otherwise take place when using the display. This helps tremendously when gaming requires as little lag as possible. Games that involve music syncopation , such as those from the Guitar Hero and Rock Band franchises make this a very necessary and useful feature.
  
• ClearFrame 120Hz Processing
  ClearFrame is 120Hz processing that performs frame interpolation, rendering an additional frame in between each real frame of video. When combined with the Film Stabilization mode it works to eliminate motion judder. We never saw a significant effect to increase resolution during motion as we've seen with similar systems, but the thing is - the picture always looks good. I mean real good on this television. While there was very little visible improvement with the system on or off, the end result is that the TV simply has an amazing picture.
  
• Expert Mode
  You can accurately set tint and hue controls by disabling the red and green colors on this set, plus you can check for color decoder errors using a SMPTE bar pattern. This is a great feature to have an exceeds even Samsung's "Blue Only mode".
  
• Auto Brightness Sensor
  When the Auto Brightness Sensor feature is set to 'On', the TV will automatically optimize the backlighting levels to suit ambient light conditions. There is even a Backlight Adjustment Pro feature that allows you to customize the backlight level of the display in various ambient light conditions. In this way you can ensure the backlight is fully up during your home's version of daylight hours (if, for example, you never get full sunlight).
  
• DynaLight
  Not as convenient as a local dimming system, this feature dims and raises the black levels in accordance with the content on the screen. This results in an artificially enhanced contrast ratio that is generally pleasing for most viewers who do not have adequately light-controlled rooms.
  
• Dolby Volume
  This technology is designed to provide a natural dynamic control to reduce volume peaks, but without losing the detail present in a soundtrack. It certainly works, however it also affects the natural dynamic range of the soundtrack and we found it greatly affected intelligibility of dialogue. We suspect the effect varies from room to room, so experiment on your own to see what your preference is for your location.
  
• InstaPort
  Designed to eliminate the 5-6 second delay inherent in switching between HDMI inputs, this technology reduces the amount of time it takes to lock on to a different HDMI source signal. We continue to like the way this works and we noticed a snappier response when switching between inputs.
  

Delivery and Build Quality

The Toshiba arrived truck freight and seemed well-packed. We were surprised at how narrow the box was that it shipped in, having been used to a much wider set previously. When we unboxed it and got a look at its narrow dimensions and beautiful styling, we were very pleasantly surprised. The 46UX600U comes with a glass border that gradually blends into the background, dubbing it "Air Lagoon". The design also helps make the TV look even thinner than it already is and really enhances the aesthetic design.

While it comes with a stand, this set really demands to be installed on a wall in a "floating" configuration. With the wires hidden, this is a beautiful television and one that will work well with almost any flat panel mounting system on the market. At 2-inches thick it will also have the correct depth with which to match up to most soundbars and on-wall speaker systems.

There are two locations where the display's inputs are to be found:

On the rear we have two down-firing HDMI inputs, an optical TOSlink output, RF antenna/cable input, an HD15 PC input and an 1/8-inch analogue audio connection

On the side, Toshiba's 46UX600U has two additional HDMI inputs, two USB inputs (one is dedicated for the included WLAN adapter), SD card, and composite/component video inputs, This is also where the hard controls are for channel, volume, menu and input.

We verified that the Toshiba 46UX600U correctly retains independent picture controls for each input (something that all but the most cost-cutting generic displays will do). The backlight can also be configured for each input independently, which can be a good or bad feature depending upon your desired use of the television.

46UX600U Menu System, VUDU Apps and Widgets

The menu system is slightly improved from what we remember of the last Toshiba interface however one nagging quirk remains. While the controls, once activated, correctly hide the main menu, allowing an unobstructed view of the main picture, the system times out after just 5 seconds. That means that it allows you just 5 seconds to make an adjustment before reverting to its middle-of-the-screen menu system. It is always hard, at least for a perfectionist like me, to make an evaluation in this short amount of time so we'd love to see this increased to ~20 seconds in the future with the option to remove it immediately via the 'Return' button.

Picture

The Picture menu contains the primary color and video processing settings you'll use. Basic picture controls like Backlight, Brightness, Contrast, Color, Tint and Sharpness are all located here. Scroll down and you'll also have access to the Advanced Picture Settings that deliver access to Color Temperature controls (with RGB gain/cut), Noise Reduction, and the processing modes like Dynamic Contrast, DynaLight,  Resolution+, and gamma control. We found that Sharpness continues to do its best when set at its default of 0 for best result. Any other setting either artificially blurs the image or generates halo artifacts.

Sound

The Sound menu is minimal, but allows you to adjust the Balance as well as the amount of reduction the Dolby Volume system will be allowed to affect (you can also turn it off). You can also configure the Dolby Digital Dynamic range settings (for reducing the overall loudness experienced in rooms that aren't as well-equipped to handle dynamic sound). The Advanced Sound Settings grant access to control Bass & Treble controls as well as the virtual Surround fields, Voice Enhancement and Dynamic Bass Boost. From a pure enjoyment, and not accuracy, perspective, Toshiba has made it so that the Voice Enhancement and Dynamic Bass Boost actually result in more pleasing sound when using the TVs on-board speakers.

Applications

A bit of an oddball, this menu actually grants access to the Widgets, YouTube, VUDU and media player applications included with this television. Widgets and VUDU are brought up through the use of the Widgets button on the remote, but this menu provides the best way to access YouTube and the integrated Media Player (for playing back files on USB or SD card). There is also an integrated media browser with DLNA compliance, so you will be able to stream media from your PC (but not from a Mac). Other features in this section include a Favorites (channels) Browser, Timer settings and the Channel Browser.

Preferences

Parental controls are located here, as are the REGZA-LINK setup, Network Setup (for configuring your wired or wireless network), VUDU deactivation and setups for Photo Frame and Channel Browser. There is also a Media Renderer Setup. What we learned from this, is that Toshiba (and others) have a lot to learn from the likes of Apple, VUDU, Netflix and Google about media streaming and interfaces. The complexity of the system, its setup, and especially the convoluted descriptions and components involved in the user manual make this something we doubt many users will take advantage of.

Setup

The setup menu is a sort of catch-all place for configuration options like Menu Language, Antenna/Cable preferences and other tweaks. It also manages the Software Upgrade control and Quick Setup functions. It's also here where you can do Manual or Auto Tuning of the incoming antenna or cableTV channels. For the most part, this section will be handy in the beginning of your configuration and not be touched once the set is configured and ready for use.

Remote Control

Toshiba has redesigned its remote to take advantage of up to four devices, and fairly well. It can now control, in addition to the 46UX600U television, a Cable/Satellite box, DVD or Blu-ray player and an auxiliary device. We found the buttons to be well laid out, though there is no backlighting. There are three primary sections with the standard red, green, yellow and blue buttons at the bottom just above a selector (source control) switch. The top section is for power and numeric entry. The center controls menu, volume and channel functions, while the bottom is your navigation controls for disc players. It fits well in the hand, and our biggest hang up was the complete lack of discrete input buttons. To change inputs there is only a single Input button on the remote, through we suspect that Toshiba has individual codes available for those using a Harmony, Pronto or Universal Remote Control (or similar) remote.

VUDU Apps, Widgets & YouTube

Toshiba is very selective in what network applications are available on their TVs. This appears to be largely the result of working closely with VUDU. While applications like Pandora, FaceBook and Flickr are available, YouTube is relegated to a separately access application and Netflix is nowhere to be found (seemingly because it is a competitor to VUDU). What this means is that while the system for Network applications is dubbed "Widgets" the visuals suggest that they are, in fact, "VUDU Apps". Either way there is a lot of content to be enjoyed, just realize that you are essentially getting a managed VUDU+ experience with this Toshiba rather than a truly open system that can handle all manner of third party applications. Given the availability to bring in Netflix and other apps via Blu-ray players and other set-top devices like a gaming console or Roku device, that's not exactly a whole lot to complain about.

Pandora VUDU app

The VUDU apps can be brought up by pressing the 'Widgets' button on the remote control or by accessing them from the Applications menu. As we mentioned, there is a lot to choose from. Aside from select apps like VUDU, Pandora, FaceBook, Twitter, Flickr, Weather and Picasa, the system is largely filled with select video podcasts. While there is a nice selection of podcasts, you cannot add your own favorites and the system isn't customizable with the exception of adding favorites from the existing titles. When going into one of the video podcasts, it was unfortunate to see that the titles and show notes didn't scroll, so on many of them it was hard to see what, specifically, we were browsing beyond the first few words of the description.

We also ran into the situation where the video podcasts would buffer while the audio continued to play. We agreed with this prioritization, however it was nearly endless once it began and the buffer ran in the middle of the screen, with the frozen video behind it and the continuing audio running. This happened quite a bit and wasn't relegated to a particular show or time of day. We aren't sure why the buffering system isn't configurable to prevent this or why Toshiba didn't specify a larger buffer in order to avoid this common occurrence. Given that we can stream HDX movies in full 1080p from VUDU, we're perplexed at why the system has issues with what is essentially highly-compressed standard definition web-video.

Yikes! Stop buffering already!

The YouTube app is only accessible from the Applications menu, another odd decision, but one that appears to be tied to the fact that YouTube isn't considered a "VUDU app". To engage in any Facebook or Twitter action, you must first log in, which is a pain as you can guess with a television remote. The good news is that the system can store both your login and password information.

Much harder than texting, but you only have to do it once...

For the non-streaming apps, like the Associated Press, we found the information to be well-presented and easy to read, even from 12 feet away. You could even, on that app, change the content to be white on black instead of the default black text on white.

46UX600U Calibration and Benchmark Testing

For measuring and calibration, we utilized SpectraCal's CalMan software (v3.7) and an X-Rite Chroma 5 meter. This is a great combination for reviewing LCD flat panel TVs and the newest Chroma 5 now handles LED backlit televisions. The Toshiba 46UX600U offers tons of controls, from RGB Gain & Offset controls, to Base Color Control which allows you to adjust Hue Saturation and Brightness for each color. To begin, we set the white and black levels, using several key test patterns that allow us to dial in the settings exactly how we like them (in particular we pull out either the Spears & Munsil Calibration BD or AVIA's Pro Calibration DVD). Once we dialed in the Brightness (which we happened to set to '1') and Contrast (which could go all the way up to 100 without overdriving the display) we took a measurement. Our contrast ratio came in at 2698:1 - and this was without any of the software Dynamic modes engaged! Considering the average movie theater might net you a contrast ratio of 300:1 or so, this is a very dynamic picture that holds up well to bright ambient light as well as light-controlled or darkened rooms

It was nice to see the measurements back up my initial observation that this was a very dynamic set. We got several measurements depending upon where we set the backlight, however they didn't differ much (nor should they). For night time viewing, and our evaluation, we set the backlight at '15'. This seemed to deliver a good mix of vibrant whites and deep blacks. In a completely darkened room this was the perfect setting, though some may prefer a slightly brighter display overall.

We started in Movie Mode, that being the obvious choice for best color and performance. The display is initially set to Color Temp 2, which we found to be much higher than our desired target of 6500K. Once we dropped it to '1' we measured an average of 6700K from our two test points (30 and 80 IRE) even before calibrating the television.

After we dialed in the RGB grayscale, we were able to make some pretty impressive improvements. Here is where we started and how far we were able to bring the television into compliance (all calibration started with Movie mode, though we switched the Color Temperature to '1' before calibrating):

The above results were based off using the Movie Mode with a Color Temperature 2 setting.

Our final results were much closer to what we wanted to see.

Initial color temperature, defaulted at '2' tended towards Blue, with the color coming in at over 10,000K - way too high for our tastes. After switching to '1' it was at a fine place to start calibrating - and we noted that even those who can't calibrate their TVs will enjoy a more accurate picture once you are in that mode.

Color accuracy as represented by the CIE chart snapshot was quite a bit off on the secondary colors when we began (leaning dramatically towards Blue), and we'd attribute this to the shift produced by the Color Temperature control. After calibration the color gamut actually looked pretty good, with only a slight narrowing of the color dynamics existing between green and red. This was not something that we could notice apart from measurements, however. We also found that the entire system could technically be made to bring green and yellow into better alignment by adjusting the global Hue control - this simply didn't seem necessary, however, and we were pleased enough with the other colors to not want to compensate in this manner. Incidentally, the Base Color Controls, which are designed to allow you to adjust Hue, Saturation and Brightness for each of the six primary and secondary colors, seemed unpredictable. We couldn't use them, for example, to truly dial in the Red, Yellow and Green colors to bring them closer to Rec. 701 (the high definition ATSC color standard).

CIE chart before calibration (left) and after (right)

HQV HD Perfect Score is 100
Toshiba 46UX600U HD Benchmark Score: 100

HD Tests (Samsung BD-C6500/1080i)	Max Points	Score	Pass/Fail
HD Noise	25	25	Pass
Video Resolution Loss	20	20	Pass
Video Reconstruction	20	20	Pass
Film Resolution Loss	25	25	Pass
Film Resolution Loss Stadium	10	10	Pass
Total Points	100	100

Comments on Testing

We found the Toshiba to be a relatively good performer. It passed all of the tests with flying colors, unless we had the menu system up, which seemed to throw the Film resolution results askew (which we felt was insignificant.) It's getting such that every set we test these days does very well at rendering standard definition material as well as high definition. Color and contrast seem to be the main differentiators as well as how well they do frame interpolation and whether they have the features to make them stand out in terms of practical, observable dynamic range.

46UX600U Viewing Evaluation and Conclusion

Black levels were very good on this set, as was the overall brightness uniformity, though not as good as a non edge-lit LED backlit display. What that means is that the television has the ability for the display to provide a more or less even and consistent amount of light to all areas of the screen. While not perfect, we've seen competing edge-lit displays that have dramatic swings in the corners and sides as opposed to the central area of the screen. Toshiba's focus on quality over developing razor-thin displays seems to have paid off here.

For most of our tests we alternated between HD Netflix titles and Blu-ray Disc movies. Everything looked really great and we were impressed by the depth of color as well as the general ability of the display to handle both brilliant whites and deep blacks within a single frame. While not supporting local dimming, the Toshiba does a fantastic job of creating a very rich, almost three-dimensional picture. We also liked the quality of the picture that this TV produced overall. It seemed that whether or not the 120Hz mode was engaged or Film Stabilization turned on, the picture simply looked amazing - even with standard definition DVD content. Toshiba is simply great at producing a good picture and it's something everyone should take note of when they preview this set. There won't be much commentary here as the images speak for themselves - at least to the limits of our ability to convey them via photographs:

VUDU HDX: Alice in Wonderland
Vibrant color meets detail and deep, rich blacks.

All the detail of this brush and the texture of the wall came though, and the colors of the reconstitution scene were absolutely stunning post-calibration.

THAT is a big (but colorful) head.

I loved the detail in this photo

Netflix HD: Appleseed
This show is dark, both figuratively and in the way the material is presented on the screen. While not showing a lot of color, we actually stumbled across it and found it to reveal something about this television that we hadn't expected. Appleseed uncovered just how well the Toshiba's latest LED backlit television could handle streaming content and reproduce fast moving content. But what was really interesting was how the TV handled some of the embedded artifacts of this piece. This movie actually looked better on the Toshiba than on my reference Epson 9500UB Projector, largely because of the 46UX600U's ability to handle a mismatched deinterlacing error that had been made during mastering. It still wasn't perfect during pans, but the effect was rendered more tolerable by the Toshiba's video processing.

Conclusion

This TV does really well, and for $1700 it represents a competitive answer to those looking for a value solution in the 46-50" display category. While not supporting local dimming, the Toshiba 46UX600U still provides an exceptional picture with a dynamic contrast ratio, excellent network features and vibrant color. It has features that matter and the picture is one of the sharpest we've ever seen. This is a television that is easy to calibrate and even easier to setup out of the box and utilize. We think Toshiba is onto something and won't sit back idly and allow other manufacturers to gather up market share. They appear to be targeting the market with a quality-centered solution and one that we think should impress more than a few retailers, dealers and consumers alike.

Toshiba 46UX600U LED LCD Television
Street Price: $1699
http://www.tacp.toshiba.com/
800-631-3811

About Toshiba Digital Electronics
Toshiba America Consumer Products, L.L.C. is owned by Toshiba America, Inc., a subsidiary of Toshiba Corporation, a world leader in high technology products with subsidiaries worldwide. Toshiba is a pioneer in HD DVD, DVD and DVD Recorder technology and a leading manufacturer of a full line of home entertainment products, including flat panel TV, rear projection and direct view televisions, combination products and portable devices. Toshiba America Consumer Products, L.L.C. is headquartered in Wayne, New Jersey. For additional information please visit www.tacp.toshiba.com.

The Score Card

The scoring below is based on each piece of equipment doing the duty it is designed for. The numbers are weighed heavily with respect to the individual cost of each unit, thus giving a rating roughly equal to:

Performance × Price Factor/Value = Rating

Audioholics.com note: The ratings indicated below are based on subjective listening and objective testing of the product in question. The rating scale is based on performance/value ratio. If you notice better performing products in future reviews that have lower numbers in certain areas, be aware that the value factor is most likely the culprit. Other Audioholics reviewers may rate products solely based on performance, and each reviewer has his/her own system for ratings.

Audioholics Rating Scale

• — Excellent
• — Very Good
• — Good
• — Fair
• — Poor

Metric	Rating
Detail and Resolution
Deinterlacing & Scaling
Contrast and Black Levels
Color Reproduction
Noise Reduction
Calibration Options
Build Quality
Ergonomics & Usability
Ease of Setup
Features
Remote Control
Fit and Finish
Performance
Value