Tag Archives: H9G

"The image quality of the H9G Quantum can compete with televisions that cost twice as much."

• Incredibly bright

• Very good black levels

• Surprisingly good HDR image

• Easy to use

• Responsive Android TV OS

• Color is a little off

• Movement jerks sometimes

Hisense is on a tear.

After several years of chasing the same brand awareness enjoyed by competing manufacturers like LG, Samsung and Sony, Hisense sales have soared. And if its H9G Quantum TV is any indication, the company could be in a dominant position.

The H9G Quantum is the first time I can remember a television that's so heavily under-promised and handed down. It's not perfect, but it's going to be one of the best TV options for the vast majority of people this year.

Out of the box

Although I recently reviewed the Hisense H8G, I was pleasantly surprised at how elegant the H9G looked after setting it up. I have to say I was initially surprised by the TV's feet – they look like giant bottle openers when not attached to the TV – but once they were installed they started to grow on me.

When those huge feet are in place, they don't look so clumsy and big anymore. Half of them are not visible and the other half seem to make the TV look nice. Not that the H9G needs a lot of disguise. It has almost no existing bezels on the top and sides, which are slightly recessed behind the glass panel of the TV, which makes for a very modern and minimalist look. The brushed metal trim at the bottom seems out of place in comparison, but luckily it doesn't attract too much attention.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Inside the box with the TV was the aforementioned feet, four screws, a power cord, remote control, batteries, and a jumble of paper product literature.

As for the remote control, it's pretty simple, but it has a couple of keyboard shortcuts for popular streaming services and a button to bring up voice control, which the Google Assistant supports.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

properties

Connectivity is all the rage these days, and this is where the H9G quantum falls a little short. While competing TV manufacturers are promoting various game-friendly features such as automatic low latency mode (automatic game mode), variable refresh rate (VRR), 4K image performance of 120 Hz, and eARC, none of the H9G's four HDMI ports support any of the following these functions.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

For gamers, there is little input delay and HDR image quality, and those who connect soundbars will need to use standard ARC as Dolby Atmos passthrough is not supported.

These shortcomings can be easy to miss if you have no plans to play with your TV and just want a great picture. The H9G offers a local dimming LED backlight system with 132 zones in the 55-inch ($ 700) model and 180 zones in the 65-inch ($ 950) model.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Hisense also claims that a peak brightness of 1000 nits is not only bright enough to convince HDR images, but should also be enough to make the black levels look nice and dark when controlled over so many dimming zones.

I'll be referring to this TV as the H9G Quantum long enough to mention that the quantum in the name means quantum dots in the TV itself and that this should allow not only a very large color gamut, but also a higher color volume with more degrees of intensity for those colors.

All of this to say, if you are looking for image quality at a great price, then be sure to read on.

User experience

Before I get into image quality, I want to talk about what it's like to use the H9G. On the whole, it's a pleasant experience, but I've encountered a few quirks that could bother those looking to tweak their picture settings for the best possible performance.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

The Hisense H9G runs on the Android TV platform and does this adequately – the experience is fast enough, with some lag in clicking through apps, and apps themselves load pretty quickly. Chromecast is built right in, so you can find your favorite videos, photos or music on your phone and watch them on your TV using a mobile device or computer.

When it comes to image settings, there is some very good news and some a little confusing. The good news is that when you select a picture mode for SDR (standard dynamic range – like cable / satellite TV, DVDs, most games), the system will automatically select the picture mode that makes the most sense for HDR.

Sit, click, watch and know you're getting the best image performance.

For example, if I selected Theater Day mode for the standard display, the TV would automatically switch to HDR Bright or Dolby Vision Bright when I watched HDR content on Netflix or Amazon. When I chose Theater Night, the TV would automatically go to HDR Dark or Dolby Vision Dark mode.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

I've never seen this type of automation and is extremely helpful for the average user who isn't interested in manual adjustments. Sit, click, watch and know you're getting the best image performance.

Hisense has also built in some automatic picture and sound adjustment functions with A.I.support that try to optimize the TV's picture and sound based on environmental factors. I didn't find them particularly useful, however. In general, I prefer to be in control.

And it's the control freak in me who got confused as to why I couldn't have independent white balance settings for SDR and HDR. I admit that this is an issue that most users don't. If you are amazed by what I am talking about, you know that this problem does not affect you. But for those who choose to have their TVs professionally tuned, it has been known that the H9G was unable to make white balance corrections (an adjustment that helps adjust color) for SDR and HDR independently. Ultimately, I went back to the factory setting for this setting.

Image performance

I already hinted at this, but now I want to be very clear: the Hisense H9G offers excellent image quality for the price. In fact, I suspect this might be the right TV choice for a very wide audience.

Hisense claims that this TV can achieve 1,000 nits of brightness right on the box. That seems like an odd thing as the vast majority of the people who would see this TV in its box while shopping are likely not that keen on what a sucker is, let alone how many of them your TV is supposed to produce. But I suppose it's a large number and people might assume it's good.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

That's a pretty good number. I think you need at least 750 nits of peak brightness for HDR images to look good. When the television delivers perfect black levels, like the Sony A8H OLED or the LG CX OLED. For a TV with LED backlighting like the H9G, 1,000 nits provide impressive contrast in my opinion. What I found exciting was that the H9G I received was able to achieve much higher brightness. My sample averaged 1,300 nits and peaked at 1,400 in some scenarios, which is better than advertised. When does this ever happen?

However, all of that brightness doesn't mean much if the TV can't effectively display even dark blacks. To my amazement, the H9G offers some of the most impressive black levels I've ever seen on an LED TV, let alone one that costs under $ 1,000.

The result of the impressive brightness and deep black levels of the H9G leads to a really exciting contrast. You don't have to be a TV aficionado to appreciate it – the H9G just dazzles.

Since I approach every TV with the same level of accuracy, I tested the H9G's color accuracy. It wasn't poor, but not as good as I'd hoped it would be. To make matters worse, I found it difficult to adjust due to a color matching issue mentioned above.

When using the Calman software together with a SpectraCal C6 colorimeter, I found that the white measurement contained far too much blue. Whenever one color is out of balance in white, all other colors are removed. This manifested itself in a magenta hue to white and cream colors, and I felt that shades of red were also significantly affected.

But I'm a TV nerd and I do this every day. I don't think most people will have an issue with the H9G's color accuracy.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

However, I think some people might have a problem handling the H9G. When I test a TV, I turn off the motion smoothing functions because I don't care about the soap opera effect they cause and I have to level the playing field for all of the TVs I have tested.

With motion smoothing turned off, I saw a lot of stuttered movements, and not just in fast-paced sports. Even faces on the screen seem to blink when they move slightly. The problem was more obvious in some scenes than others, but when I saw it I couldn't see it anymore, which I found a little frustrating.

With smooth movement, there was some stuttering to be seen. Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Other users have reported similar issues to me while others still stated that they did not experience the problem. This is likely because some people are simply more sensitive to small anomalies than others.

Overall, however, the H9G is a satisfactory TV, and I think most people will absolutely love it. Both SDR and HDR content appear vibrant and rich, and in some cases seem to disappear from the screen. This is top-notch picture quality that I expect from televisions that cost almost twice as much. The image of the H9G compares well with the Samsung Q80T for $ 1700 and the Sony X950H for $ 1700.

Our opinion

The Hisense H9G Quantum is one of the best values ​​on TV that we'll see in 2020 and well into 2021. Its picture quality will amaze most viewers, while its ease of use makes it a pleasure to experience every time you turn it on.

Is there a better alternative?

Possibly. The TCL R635 looks very promising, as does the Vizio P-series Quantum. At $ 900, the TCL R635 is a slightly better alternative in some ways and costs less. I'm also confident that Vizio's $ 1,000 P-Series Quantum will be very competitive in the brightness department for those who may need an even brighter TV, although that's hard to imagine after looking at the H9G. I will update this section as soon as these televisions have been thoroughly evaluated.

How long it will take?

The Hisense H9G is not well suited to taking advantage of the advanced gaming features offered with next generation gaming consoles. For television, however, it would be many more years.

warranty

Hisense warrants 1 year parts and labor.

You should buy it

Yes. If you don't need advanced gaming features but want a very bright TV with impressive black levels and overall great picture quality without breaking the bank, the Hisense H9G Quantum is an excellent choice.

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