TV Set up Guide: 14 tips for getting the best

picture quality out of your TV

In depth Don't stick with your TV's default settings!
Page 1 of 4Introduction: connections, sources and overscanning

For some reason many TV brands are rubbish at setting up their own TVs to deliver great
pictures.
In the vast majority of cases when you get a new TV out of its box, the default picture position is
to deliver pictures that are ridiculously overblown, with cartoonish colours, excessive brightness,
messy backlighting, and sharpness levels set so high that all you see is noise, not detail.
There was a time when we could at least comprehend this, on the grounds that TVs want to look
bold and colourful on bright shop floors.
But these days most TVs ship with separate Shop and Home factory preset modes. The
manufacturers's wide-ranging lack of comprehension of how to produce great pictures from their
own panels is frankly bewildering.

Thankfully you don't need to be a THX-trained calibration professional to make a vast positive
impact on your TV's performance. All that's required is a willingness to brave your TV's
onscreen menus, and a few minutes - yes, just minutes to implement the set-up tips described
below.
So what are you waiting for? Pick up that remote, and prepare to unlock your TV's true potential.
We've used a Panasonic TV to illustrate these steps but you'll find most TVs have very similar
menu systems for changing settings.

Make sure you check that the TV you want has the connections you need

1. Make sure you're using the right connections

It's amazing how many people still don't realise that different connections deliver radically
different picture quality. So here's a list of connection options organised from best quality to
worst:

Component video
RGB Scart
4-pin S-Video
Non-RGB Scart

Composite video input

The most important thing to realise here, of course, is that HD pictures can only be delivered by
HDMI and component video.
And since the component is an analogue delivery system, HDMI should be your default these
days. Even if you're using a non-HD source, such as a DVD player, you should try and use an
HDMI if you can, as its digital delivery system invariably delivers the cleanest, crispest images.
At the time of writing 4K is starting to become a big deal. So if you're interested in that, you will
not only be looking to use HDMI ports but the very latest v2.0 HDMI ports, which support the
greater data bandwidths required by Ultra HD sources. If you want a 4k TV check that its ports
are HDMI 2.0.
Panasonic is also putting DisplayPort sockets on its 4K TVs, as these usually computer-based
digital ports are also rather handy at dealing with 4K. However, we don't really expect these to
enter common usage.

2. Make sure your sources are set up right

Another external issue that can affect your TV's performance is the settings you're using for
external sources like Sky receivers and Blu-ray players. So let's look at a couple of the most
important points to keep an eye on.
With Sky/Freeview/Freesat HD receivers, we'd recommend that you set the HD Resolution to
Automatic rather than the usual 1080i HD default position. This means the box will output HD in
HD and standard def in standard def, leaving the upscaling of the latter format to your TV.
This is a good idea because in almost all cases TVs do a better upscaling job than your TV
receiver box can.
With Blu-ray and DVD players, we'd usually suggest that you make sure you've got the frame
rate output set to 24p for the purest results. The only time you might want to try adjusting this
output to 50 or 60Hz is if your TV's motion handling is unusually poor/prone to judder.

Turn off overscanning to make sure you get the full picture

3. Turn off overscanning

Moving to your TV now, one of the first things you should do to optimise picture quality is
check that your TV is reproducing HD sources pixel for pixel, rather than 'zooming' them up so
that the edges of the image are pushed off the edge of the screen.
This 'overscanning' process was originally introduced because broadcasters sometimes put image
'junk' at the extremities of the frame. But this rarely happens in the HD age, with real picture
information instead filling every pixel of the 1920x1080 HD frame.
So if you leave overscanning on, not only are you losing a little real picture information but
you're losing some of the sharpness that only comes with direct pixel for pixel mapping.

Get contrast settings right and the rest will follow

4. Put contrast first

As far as many TV experts are concerned, contrast especially a TV's ability to produce
believable blacks is key to overall picture quality.
It provides the foundation for everything else to grow from. Yet it's also the area where many
brands come the biggest cropper with picture presets especially with LCD screens, which
struggle with contrast versus plasma and OLED technology.
Many TV makers ship their products with their contrast levels set to maximum. But while this
might help a TV's picture look eye-catching on a shop shelf, such high contrast levels generally
wreak havoc on a domestic viewing experience.
First, they make colours look unnaturally vibrant. Second, they make peak whites appear stressed
and over-dominant. Third, they exaggerate any noise inherent to the TV technology or source
image. And finally they make black levels look forced and hollow.

People with plasma TVs should also note that over-contrasted pictures can cause problems with
screenburn, where channel logos and other static image elements can eventually leave a
permanent shadow burned into your screen.
As a general rule we'd suggest reducing contrast settings to no higher than 70-80 per cent of their
maximum for LCD TVs, and potentially even lower for a good plasma set.
Another related point concerns the dedicated contrast or black level boosting/stretching options
some TVs have. If you find one of these on your TV, we'd recommend you at least experiment
with turning it off. Why? Because many of them simply go too far, becoming so obsessed with
making dark parts of the picture look blacker that they 'crush out' much of the subtle shadow
detailing that makes dark areas believable and layered.
If dark parts of the picture look like empty 'black holes' with your contrast booster in action,
you're probably better off without it.
Dynamic contrast
The majority of LCD TVs further try to boost their contrast performances by using so-called
dynamic contrast options that continually adjust the amount of light emitted in response to
changes in the image content.
Again, though, we'd suggest treating such features with suspicion, as in many cases dynamic
contrast systems can cause frequent brightness 'jumps' with their continual light adjustments.
If you find yourself distracted by this, try turning the dynamic contrast system off. This will
reduce contrast, but in many cases (though perhaps not with LG LCD TVs, which have tended
recently to struggle to deliver good black levels without dynamic contrast engaged) you may
well find the increased stability worth the contrast sacrifice.
Local dimming
One more issue to discuss in this section is local dimming. It's common now for both edge LED
TVs and direct LED TVs (which put their lights directly behind the screen rather than around its
edge) to adjust the brightness of different parts of the screen independently to suit the demands
of the image.

Generally we'd suggest that you leave these features on, though only at their low settings.
Selecting a higher setting can often result in the appearance of distracting side effects, such as
hollow-looking dark areas and ugly 'blocks' of light around any bright objects that appear against
dark backgrounds.
What you're ultimately looking for when trying to get to your TV's optimum contrast setting is
the deepest black colour you can get without causing the image to look unstable, uneven, or so
dark that all shadow detailing has been crushed out of the picture.

5. Watch your backlight and brightness

The single most heinous picture preset 'crime' we see is backlight settings put way too high.
While this can make the picture look instantly punchy in a bright shop, excessively high
brightness is usually wholly inappropriate for a domestic situation.
At least if you're actually in any way interested in watching pictures that look detailed, contrastrich and naturally coloured.
We've found that the best picture quality with most LCD TVs results from reducing the backlight
and brightness settings to between 40 and 50% of their maximum value. This is especially true if
you're watching a film in a relatively darkened room.

You can get away with nudging the backlight up a bit above half way if you're watching in a
bright environment, but go much higher than that and both colour accuracy and contrast response
start to diminish.
Keeping the backlight and brightness levels as low as we've suggested almost always gives you
deeper, richer, more natural-looking black colours. It counters LCD's natural tendency to look
rather grey when showing dark scenes.
Plasma exceptions
We should note here that we've been talking about LCD technology. With plasma screens you
can arguably use slightly higher brightness settings. Plasma produces its illumination on a pixelby-pixel basis, enabling you to push the image brighter without dark sections losing their
integrity.
However, excessive brightness can still damage colour subtlety with plasma, and can also lead to
some excessive dotting noise. This is because higher brightness settings can make it harder for
individual plasma cells to control their charge levels.
Backlight clouding
With LCD screens there's one more very compelling reason for reining in their brightness and
especially backlight settings: backlight clouding.
With edge-lit LCD TVs in particular too much backlight can lead to areas (especially the
corners) of dark pictures looking overly bright, making it look like there are vague clouds
hanging over parts of the image.
This is one of LCD's most distracting problems, so it's great that you can usually reduce its
impact simply by reducing the backlight intensity.

Backlight clouding
With LCD screens there's one more very compelling reason for reining in their brightness and
especially backlight settings: backlight clouding.
With edge-lit LCD TVs in particular too much backlight can lead to areas (especially the
corners) of dark pictures looking overly bright, making it look like there are vague clouds
hanging over parts of the image.
This is one of LCD's most distracting problems, so it's great that you can usually reduce its
impact simply by reducing the backlight intensity.

page 2

There are many colour settings you can play with on modern TVs

6. Handle colour with care

With colour, you're looking for a balance of settings where colours look vibrant and dynamic but
aren't flared at the edges.
You don't want the picture to look garish or so over-saturated that you can no longer see subtle
colour blend differences.
Also important is that a TV delivers colours with a 'temperature' closer to the 6500 Kelvin level
generally best suited to video playback versus the higher temperatures preferred for PC monitors.
We mentioned 'balance of settings' very deliberately, as our experience is that a TV's colour
adjustment alone only gets you so far. Adjusting the backlight and especially contrast settings
tends to be more important to getting credible colours than the main colour setting, which usually
defaults to a pretty sensible 45-55% level.
If you're really serious about video quality, though, you might want to explore any deeper colour
management facilities your TV might carry.
These usually take the form of adjustments to the main RGB colour elements. Some TVs also
support adjustment of the secondary cyan, magenta and yellow colour components.
These tools can be useful in correcting biases a TV may have towards a single colour. Where
they really come into their own, though, is with some sort of test signals (more on these later).
Colour metering technology is designed to help you know when colours are getting as close as
possible to those defined by the Rec709 TV standard.

While the Rec709 standard may suit some tastes and can help a TV produce colour subtleties not
expressed using more strident settings, it doesn't necessarily always produce the most pleasing
picture quality for every LCD and plasma panel.
Many mainstream viewers feel that accurately calibrated pictures look a bit muted and flat and
it's not our job to tell people who feel this way that they're wrong!
If you want your pictures to look punchy, go for it. But don't get so greedy for dynamism that
you reach a point where certain tones become over-dominant or you can no longer make out
subtle tonal shifts.

7. Don't fall into the sharpness trap

With HD sets it's tempting to imagine that you're going to get the best results if you set the TV's
sharpness level really high. In truth, though, pushing sharpness can lead to some significant
problems.
The most obvious one is that too much sharpness can cause pictures even good quality HD
sources - to look really noisy and gritty.
The edges of objects in the image can also start to look forced and 'glowy'. The picture can start
to look so forensic in its detailing that you feel aware of the pixel structure of the panel rather
than just getting immersed in the overall pictures.
Many brands especially Samsung tend to push sharpness too hard using their out of the box
presets. We strongly recommend that you feed your TV a Blu-ray and carefully adjust the
sharpness until you get to the tipping point where sharpness starts to tip over into noise.

Ambient light sensors are unnecessary in most situations

8. Deactivate ambient light sensors (usually!)

Almost all TVs these days carry sensors able to detect the ambient light in your viewing room, so
that the TV can automatically adjust facets of the picture to compensate.
However, this automated approach can lead to problems, especially given the usual tendency for
sensor-equipped TVs to ramp the contrast up too far if high ambient light levels are detected.
Also, it's a simple fact that no automated process can replace what your own eyes and tastes are
telling you. Generally speaking our advice is that you turn eco settings off and calibrate pictures
manually.
To be fair, some manufacturers are delivering better results with these auto-adjustments than
they used to. For instance, the Eco mode on the Philips L8008was actually clever enough for us
to recommend that you use it.
Bang & Olufsen is doing some interesting things around the light sensor with its newly launched
Avant TV too especially the way they take your room's colour tone into account. But for the
most part TVs fare better with their sensors off especially when watching films.

page 3

Don't overdo the picture processing settings

9. Don't always believe the picture processing hype

Nearly every TV these days boasts a proprietary picture processing engine supposedly giving
you all manner of video improvements.
But some of these engines are not nearly as clever as they think they are, and can at times
actually make pictures worse.
So you should treat all aspects of any TV's processing with suspicion. So much so that we'd
recommend that you toggle each of your TV's picture processing elements on and off in turn
while watching a tough scene (probably a dark Blu-ray scene with lots of action) to see which
settings you like and which ones you don't.

Noise reduction
Noise reduction systems are particularly unhelpful with HD sources, causing softness or image
lag. In almost all cases we turn NR modes off when watching Blu-rays or HD broadcasts.
We tend not to like NR with DVDs either, though it can occasionally help suppress source noise
in heavily compressed standard definition digital broadcasts. Though even here we'd suggest you
only use the lowest power setting for the NR systems.

Motion compensation
Another processing area to be especially careful with is motion compensation. All but the most
basic LCD and plasma TVs feature some sort of processing system designed to tackle flat TVs'
innate problems with judder and motion blur.
But while these sound great in principle, the amount of processing power and cleverness required
to address judder and blur in real time is so high that it catches many brands out. Common ugly
side effects of motion processing systems include softness, smeared halos around fast-moving
objects, and flickering over really fast motion.
If you find yourself troubled by any of these issues, turn the power of the motion processing
elements down (most manufacturers provide multiple settings). Or just turn it off entirely.
Some people also dislike the smoothing effect of motion processing systems when watching
films, feeling that it makes them look like TV dramas rather than movies.
Motion processing can sometimes be useful with 3D footage, we've found, as this is more prone
to judder than 2D on some displays.
Motion processing is also generally more effective with broadcasts. These start out with a higher
frame rate than the 24fps we'd recommend you watch from DVD and Blu-ray and don't pose
such a challenge to motion processing systems.
So it will probably prove the case that if you want to consistently get the best from your TV,
you'll have to revisit the motion processing options quite regularly to suit different sources.

10. Game advice

If you're a gamer you need to do more than just mistrust image processing; you need to hunt it
down and kill it wherever it may be found.
This is because any type of video processing runs the risk of causing a delay in the time it takes
for a screen to produce its pictures. Such delays are clearly bad news for anyone playing
reaction-based games like Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Forza.
Many TVs helpfully provide a dedicated game preset (sometimes it's tucked away in strange
submenus, such as the System/General menu on Samsung TVs, or the Options/Scenes submenu
on Sony TVs).
This should turn off most processing for you. But if your set doesn't have a Game preset, you'll
have to manually deactivate as much processing as you can for your gaming input.
It's worth adding, too, that sometimes game presets still leave some processing features on, so
don't assume that just activating a Game mode will give you the fastest response time. Double
check that there isn't any remaining processing that can be turned off to give you that extra few
milliseconds of competitive advantage.

11. Try to avoid screen reflections

Position your TV so it's as little affected as possible by direct reflections of either sunlight or the
lights around your room. This can profoundly improve your viewing experience. The picture
becomes more vivid without you having to crank the contrast up, and your connection with what
you're watching becomes more direct.
If you're in the market for a new TV, also bear in mind that some use screens that are much
better at filtering out ambient reflections than others.
Managing room reflections is especially important if you're thinking of buying a curved TV, as
curved screens tend to exaggerate the scale of any reflections that hit them.

page 4

12. Remember that viewing angles can be critical

Although this isn't a major issue with plasma TVs, the picture quality with many LCD TVs is
critically dependent on how much of an angle you're viewing them from.
Even if you watch some LCD TVs from as little as 30 degrees off axis you can suffer quite
serious drops in contrast and colour. So try to ensure your seating positions are as straight on to
the TV as possible.
Curved TVs initially appear to complicate this situation a bit, but we've found that their
curvature prevents the usual reduction in colour and contrast with off-axis viewing. However,
curved screens create other viewing angle-limiting issues essentially uncomfortable image
geometry.
Overall curved TVs still leave you with a viewing angle limitation of 35-40 degrees off axis.

13. Feel free to use calibration discs

We're increasingly suspicious that some aspects of 'accurate' TV calibration are based on
principles that are starting to sell today's TV technologies short. But there's no doubt that using
special test signals can be helpful in getting your TV set up to its best advantage.
Unfortunately, though, unless you know your way around the internet there are precious few
sources of such test signals that normal consumers can use. The most affordable solution is the
Digital Video Essentials Blu-ray, a disc containing a (small) selection of test signals and an
insanely long explanation of what you can use each test signal for.

Calibration discs are rare but can be extremely useful

However, at the time of writing this disc has been showing as 'currently unavailable' on Amazon
for some time. Which leaves you with pretty much just one other option: the Spears & Munsil
HD Benchmark and Calibration Disc.
In truth this is superior to the DVE offering in its scope and flexibility, though it's also a little
more complicated, and costs the best part of 30.

14. Consider a professional calibration

If you're a stickler for picture accuracy then you could consider having your TV professionally
calibrated. If you want to be sure this is done correctly, you should try and track down a qualified

Imaging Science Foundation (ISF) specialist from the list of dealers found at
www.imagingscience.com.
A professional installation will cost anywhere between 200 and 400 depending on the
complexity of the job, and also depends on your TV having enough picture calibration tools to
make an ISF calibration possible.
Some TVs (including many LG and Panasonic models) are actually approved by the ISF as
having all the setup systems it needs to optimise pictures, though a TV doesn't have to be ISFapproved to support a calibration. For instance, Samsung doesn't seek ISF certification, yet its
mid-range to high-end TVs have more than enough setup options to support an accurate
calibration.
Not everyone will like the way ISF-calibrated pictures look especially if they're already
accustomed to the very vibrant, dynamic images their TV likes to push in its out of the box state.
But the ISF images will certainly be accurate to what the people who created a Blu-ray or
broadcaster intended.

TVs with a THX certification will have picture presets that have been approved by THX

One great thing about sets with ISF endorsement is that they provide dedicated ISF presets, so
you could simply switch to those when watching something 'serious' like a film in a dark room.
Then you can switch back to a punchier preset for other types of viewing.
One final point here concerns THX. If a TV earns THX certification it means it has passed
THX's stringent and independent test procedures where picture quality is concerned. THX TVs
also carry picture presets that THX identifies as delivering the most accurate picture quality.
However, while THX modes on plasma TVs tend to be OK, we often find them to be pretty
uninspiring on LCD TVs.
This is chiefly because part of the THX ethos is that their presets won't use any of the features a
TV may carry to help improve its contrast performance. Which means that THX modes are
sometimes accompanied on LCD TVs by poor black levels and, worse, very obvious backlight
clouding problems.