Televisions

The UE55F8000 hits the ground running with its design, which combines an on-trend slender bezel with a dark, glassy finish and built-in camera. However, other designs in this roundup are spectacular too, so the UE55F8000’s styling alone won’t be enough to carry Samsung’s set to victory.

Samsung’s UE46F8000 is a frighteningly hard act to follow. Recalling that set’s combination of an astonishingly sophisticated Smart TV engine and ground-breaking LED picture quality still puts a big stupid geeky grin on our faces.

The Panasonic TX-P60ZT65 casts a longer shadow than its slender frame might suggest. It is, says it creators, the final word in plasma panel development. The most advanced PDP design to roll off Panasonic’s production line, albeit in limited quantities, the brand says it simply can’t take the technology further in any way than makes economic sense. So what we have here is the culmination of years of development, with a lineage that can be traced back through both Panasonic and Pioneer. The result is, quite simply, the best Full HD image you can buy today. 

When the light falls just right, Sony’s W9 LED TV glints emerald, like something precious – which, indeed, it is. This 40in thinscreen follows hot on the heels of one of last year’s finest LCD displays, the HW8, and seeks to maintains Sony’s forward momentum with a modicum of extra functionality and a splash more AV refinement.

Of Samsung’s forty new screens unleashed so far for 2013, the UE46F8000 is the flagship 46in model. Bestowed with a raft of new measures designed to deliver the best TV pictures the company has ever mustered from an edge-lit LED screen, it also ups the ante in terms of Smart TV and multimedia interaction.

There’s something imperious about the Panasonic DT65. Perhaps it’s the super-thin bezel and jet-black screen, or the aloof high-necked pedestal. Or maybe it just knows it’s smarter than everybody else? Whatever the reason, this is certainly not an austerity flatscreen TV. With an armoury of advanced tech, including voice control and customisable interface, it’s one of the most ambitious models yet seen from the brand. 

According to the current AV buzz, plasma TV technology is on its death bed. Having spent a week with Samsung’s sensational new PS64F8500 plasma TV, though, I can’t help but think that plasma has never felt more alive.