The Ultimate in Local Dimming

Dolby Vision. That's Dolby's name for their local dimming technology, or HDR (High Dynamic Range), and SIM2's new Solar Series is the first TV available with it.

Using a whopping 2,206 individually addressable LEDs, this 47-inch has the potential to be the best looking LCD ever.

More info after the jump.

The key to making local dimming look its best is to have as many "zones" as possible. Each zone dims or brightens depending on what is on screen. Due to limitations in cost and complexity, current local dimming models have far fewer zones than they do LEDs.

So the fact that SIM2's Solar Series (the first TV with Dolby Vision) is able to dim each LED is cause for note. Instead of 16 or even a few dozen zones across the back of the TV that can dim compared to what is on screen, the Solar Series has 2,206 "zones," as in each LED. Potentially the contrast ratio is significantly higher than any other local dimming LCD, and potentially better than even the best plasmas.

While I haven't seen the completed Solar Series, I have seen Dolby Vision several times at several different trade shows. It was Dolby Vision that got me excited about local dimming technology. While the current generation local dimming sets like the Sony XBR8 and Samsung 950 look great, the Dolby Vision proto looked much better.

Being able to dim areas of the screen at a much finer resolution allows for the on screen contrast ratio to be much higher than any current local dimming model. Will it measure that much better? Probably not (check out my XBR8 review for why). Will it look better? Most likely.

The 1080p TV is 16-bit. This is presumably 8-bits for the panel and 8-bits for the backlight. This allows 65,536 different shades per color. For comparison, many high-end LCDs are 10-bit panels, which are capable of 1024 shades per color.

They're claiming a brightness of greater than 4,000 cd/m2. This is equal to about 1168 foot-Lamberts, which is about 1118 more than you'll ever need. Also enough to need a welders mask and sunblock. But I'm sure you can turn it down.

If you want to see what a local dimming backlight looks like when it's working, in this case, the afore mentioned XBR8, check out the Sony post at the bottom of our CEATEC coverage.

No pricing was announced, but don't expect it to be cheap. They say they'll be shipping in Q2 of this year. (edit: Q2 for the pro version, the consumer version will be announced at CEDIA, with availability sometime after.)

We'll review one as soon as we can.

PRICE: TBD
CONTACT: SIM2.com, dolby.com