Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I knew I wanted either the 65" XBR65X900A or the XBR65X850A. I spent a lot of research on the AVSForums and at my local Sony store where I got to play with them side by side. With the fact that you get the Sony 4k player free with the 900, which you can sell for $500, the cost of the 2 is essentially the same. I eventually bought the 850, and here is why and my review: Comparison 900 to 850: I think the 850 looks much better. The ears (speakers) on the 900 just look dumb to me, and most early high end buyers either have a good sound bar or have a home theatre system (which I do). So I knew I would never use the speakers. Yes the 900 has a wow factor because it looks different with that slab of Gorilla glass, while the 850 looks more traditional, but the 850 still looks very professional and high end. But mostly the 900 is just WAY to reflective. In the store, with the lights behind, the 900 was almost unwatchable. The 850 is not a matte screen, it is still somewhat reflective, but it is nothing like the 900. Basically with them side by side I could see the same reflections in both, but with the 900 the reflections were sharp and clear, but with the 850 they were muted. So when watching TV I could not help but noticing the reflections in the 900, while the 850 were muted enough so I did not notice them unless I consciously looked for them. Now my home, even during the day with lights on, is not as bright as the store, but with the 850 here I am very glad I got it and not the 900. The 850 is still more reflective then my old Sony 60" SXRD, but I do not notice them. I think the 850 is the perfect balance, as the more reflective the deeper the colors. So unless you only plan to only watch movies in a dedicated dark room I could not imagine the 900 working out. Other than that they both looked the same to me. If anything I like the 850's overall picture a little better to me, even though technically the 900 is supposed to be the `better' TV. So when Amazon offered their $400 is Amazon credit for the 850, I bought it. (The saleslady at the Sony store even admitted that the employees all like the 850 better than the 900) 850 review: I have the following inputs driving my 850. FiOS cable (1080i), PS3, PS4, Xbox One (all 1080p) and my PC which can do native 4096x2160p (24 Hz) and 3840x2160p (30 Hz). Note that the 4k Sony's (850 and 900) will be upgraded to full 60 Hz for the 3840 (and 48 Hz for 4096) by the end of this year, meeting HDMI 2.0 specs. (edit: this has already taken place) I did some basic calibrations with my old Avia DVD. The Sony is not set up as bad stock as some TV's, but still needed some tuning. TV looks great. HD content (which is either 720p or 1080i, depending on the station) looks very sharp up converted to 4k. I was worried because the better your picture the worse bad content looks, but even the SD content looks better than my old TV. Now I don't think SD content is going to look any better than a high end 1080p TV, but it is good. DVD's look fine, and Blu-Ray's look AMAZING. I think the up conversion to 4k with the Blu-Ray's does make a small difference. Or maybe it's just all the other high end quality parts of this TV, but movie night just bumped up a notch in quality from my old TV. The biggest difference to me though is the PC/Game quality. For the PC, this is an amazing monitor, either in 2k or 4k. My 1080p games (either the PC or the various game machines) look amazing and I notice no blurring or lag issues (Forza 5 looks fantastic). 4k: So what about 4k? My only 4k content are demos played through VLC on the PC. Yes, they do look amazing when you are up close (3 feet away). The funny thing is 1080p material looks just as good. So I did some screenshots and you could barely tell the difference. I think the 4k up scaling of 1080 material is just so good that you can barely tell the difference. So I did some screen captures of the same 1080p material on my computer monitor (1920x1080) and indeed I could tell a difference. So while the native 4k material is thin now, the up scaling of 1080 material does help a little. Nothing huge mind you, but it is something and gives reason for getting this TV even if you have no 4k material now. Streaming and Apps: This TV streams almost everything from my PC (including MKV files). The audio is passed through to my receiver perfectly with the ARC passthru in 5.1. Oddly it does not stream the 4k mp4 files... It also does not stream flac audio files, which all my music is in, but I have given up on that even though flac is by far the best, and lossless, audio codec there is and is used all over the place. There are also a TON of apps. Most are useless, but the big ones like NetFlix and Amazon work fine. 3D: I didn't get to compare the 900's 3D, but the active sync 3D of the 850 is amazing. Now I really don't care much about 3D and will only watch it occasionally, but it does look amazing. Both interlaced 3D Blu-Ray's and side-by-side downloads streamed through the PC. I see no flickering and the 3D effect is really good. Even the 2D->3D looks quite good on some things. It does give me a little headache after a while, but 3D is a very individual thing. This being my first LED TV I was worried about motion, and this is "only" 120Hz. I have watched football, movies etc, played games, and there is nothing to worry about. Yes, if you get the exact right shot, like a slow pan across an indoor studio, you can notice some jitter (with the MotionFlow off) or a smooth pan with hiccups (with the MotionFlow on), but in reality you never notice it. This is an issue with ANY LCD/LED TV, and the Sony is fine. (Most recommend either turning off MotionFlow or setting to Cinema mode, anything else looks too fake) Now this TV is not perfect. The circular stand really looks nice, but sticks out in front of the TV a bit (no issue if you mount it obviously). My biggest complaint however is the manual. Not only do you not get it (it's available online only), but even though it's 250 pages it goes into no detail. For instance, on the Motionflow there are something like 7 different setting, but nowhere does the manual tell you exactly what those settings mean, and what they do different from each other! There are a lot of high end picture settings you can change on this TV, but nothing in the manual on specifics of what they do. Come on Sony! The speakers are better than a cheap TV and can be used in a pinch, but no one spending $4K on a TV will be using these speakers. So you will need a decent sound bar and subwoofer at the minimum. (where as with the 900 the speakers are probably just good enough to stand on their own with a good subwoofer) Overall I am thrilled with the TV. Is the 4k worth the extra over Sony's high end 1080p TV? Probably not right now, but then again is a 60k car really worth it over a 30k car? I'm happy. With the HDMI 2.0 firmware upgradeable this TV will be future proof for a very long time. And in 2 years 4k media players will be available for $200 with hundreds of movies (as opposed to $700 with a dozen movies now) For me, my old TV was shot and I wasn't going to get a 1080p only to have to get a 4k one in 3 years. This TV should last for 10 years, and if it does that it will be well worth the money. Update: I purchased Assassins Creed IV for the PC. WOW, do you notice the difference running it at 3840x2160 vs 1920x1080. I mean my friends can even tell from sitting on the couch when I switch back and forth how much sharper the 4k is. Unfortunately for me my somewhat new PC is not powerful enough to really handle 4k, to actually play the game at 30fps I have to lower so many settings... But in 2 years or so (I am not about to spend another $1500 to get the top of the line PC parts now) when I have a new processor and video card PC games should be amazing! Update #2: TV is still doing fine in April now. One thing is I do occasionally notice a little motion jitter when watching cable TV. Like when I watch a football game it will be all smooth, then just occasionally it will jitter for a split second, not enough to bother me but you do notice. I never had that with my old SXRD TV, and I know all LCD/LED TV's have this issue. As I have no other big TV to compare to (my little 20" in the kitchen doesn't do this, but it's only 20") I don't know if this TV is any better or worse then others. Oddly I never have this happen with games... Also, the other 4k thing is how much better my PC looks on it in full 4k. Especially high resolution photos, there is a huge difference when you have a photo from a 15-20 megapixel camera and you display it in 1080 vs 4k. Night vs day!