Philips will no doubt have crafted itself a place in the design hall of fame, if there's one. And one reason for the honor would be a clever technology called Ambilight. It’s old now, so I’ll go easy on the oohs and aahs. In fact I restrained myself when it was new too, as I was skeptical then. Of course over the years, newer models have been released, and definitely impressed us all.
In comparison to the Korean and Japanese giants, Philips might be a little low-key in price and volume, but not in market presence: last Diwali, its PFL7422 won hearts due to its insanely cheap price, never mind the noisy picture. We received a new PFL9532 47-incher for review, also known as Cineos. Then crept in evil plans of pitting it against the previous, lightless one, to see which one is brighter (absolutely no pun intended).
Ambilight
Round one: Design and features
The referee is 'this writer', as news journalists are wont to annotate. Though this writer ain’t writing now, he's having a tough time trying to cope with the tension in the air, as these two 47-inchers face off aggressively.
First blow: the Ambilight looks a bit better, as it is fully in black and very sober. The stand for both is a block-like square, so there are no real curves anywhere in the design, bezel included. The non-Ambi has a silver frame, which comes second in my list after the black beauties. The Ambilight is obviously a bit heavier and broader, probably due to its extra feature.
Then come connections, the Ambilight has three HDMI inputs, while non-Ambi has only two. POW! A quick uppercut to the jaw and non-Ambi was down for the count.
Non-Ambi made a quick recovery but Ambi just turned on and glowed, expecting to blind everyone in the ring (though not quite; it isn’t that bright). A few clicks on the remote and the light was bright enough to wake someone up. That’s another uppercut, and non-Ambilight was on the floor bleeding. Luckily the bell rang: on to round two.
BTW, CINEOS for philips is actually a "category" if you will which depicts that the product is the BEST IN CLASS that philips makes.
