Samsung UN46ES6500 46-Inch 1080p 120Hz 3D Slim LED HDTV

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2791 in Home Theater
• Size: 46-Inch
• Color: Black
• Brand: Samsung
• Model: UN46ES6500
• Released on: 2012-02-20
• Dimensions: 28.40" h x 42.00" w x 10.90" l, 33.00 pounds
• Display size: 46

Features

• 46-inch backlit display full HD 2D or 3D
• Smart Hub
• Built-in WiFi
• Web Browser
• 1-Year Parts and 1-Year Labor Warranty

From the Manufacturer

[Samsung LED Comparison Chart]

Experience vivid, life-like detail and clarity in both 2D and 3D. View larger

Most helpful customer reviews

104 of 106 people found the following review helpful.
Struggle, Pain, and Joy
By Some Dude
This review is for the 60" model.

First Impressions
-----------------
The box is *huge*. The TV is *thin*. Not even an inch at the edge, and maybe just over in the center. The menus are pretty straightforward. (I don't care too much about the 3D or Smart features of this TV at the moment, and don't have much frame of reference for how to judge modern 3D, so I can't really review these aspects.) The screen doesn't seem too glossy, but it apparently works very well as a mirror because I can see a negative image of my kitchen when it's off.

Struggle
--------
One extremely annoying "feature" of these TVs that I've found out after purchase is the "CE Dimming" feature. This is not the "ECO Dimming" or anything you can control; It's hard-coded into the certain picture modes (Standard and Native, at least). This feature is something that will reduce the backlighting when there is mostly black on the screen. (For example, if there is 100% brightness white text on a pure black screen, it would actually display at a fraction of that intensity due to the backlight dimming). I've read that this is to reduce the appearance of light bleeding in from the edges, since it's edge-lit. This "feature" annoys me significantly, particularly because I am not allowed to control it. After searching around I found out this is called "CE Dimming" and you can hack it by going into the service menu (you can find the instructions online yourself), however messing with it apparently voids the warranty. The only picture mode I found that doesn't use this is "Movie" mode. But, movie mode looks terrible with its default settings.

After 3 days of struggle, experimentation, and research, I've found settings that actually give me a picture I can call "good" or better. I'm not an expert, but I'm technical and pretty picky. So, because I have found no calibration settings for this series of TVs yet, I'm going to provide the ones I am using, if only to prevent any of you from having to obsess over this for hours and hours. I'll offer a little bit of explanation as to why I'm setting it the way I am. I got some guidance and expertise from a known site, but as of right now they do not have professionally calibrated settings. What I did is by eye only.

Settings
--------

Picture Mode: Movie
Backlight: 15
Contrast: 100
Brightness: 46
Sharpness: 10
Color: 50
Tint: 50/50

Dynamic Contrast: Off
Black Tone: Off
Flesh Tone: 0
RGB Off: Auto
Color Space: Auto
White Balance: 25 for all
10p White Balance (R, G, B): ON
- Interval 1: -8, -7, -7
- Interval 2: -10, -3, 2
- Interval 3: -9, -2, 6
- Interval 4: -9, -1, 8
- Interval 5: -10, 1, 10
- Interval 6: -6, 3, 10
- Interval 7: -9, 5, 10
- Interval 8: -1, 5, 8
- Interval 9: -5, 1, 6
- Interval 10: 0, 2, 0
Gamma: 0

Color Tone: Warm2
Digital Noise Filter: Off
MPEG Noise Filter: Off
HDMI Black Level: LOW
Film Mode: Auto2
Auto Motion Plus: Clear
LED Motion Plus: On

Comments on the Settings
------------------------
Movie mode is the only mode I found that doesn't use "CE Dimming", which is a huge annoyance to me. (I'd rather see edge-lighting, easily. Not sure why I can't control that, Samsung.) Backlight, brightness, and color are kind of like salt and pepper: Use to personal taste in your environment.

A note about almost all the other settings: I like an eye-popping, colorful picture as much as the next guy, but I don't like it at the expense of information loss. From my own experimentation (in Standard and Native modes), all the Dynamic Contrast and Black Tone settings did was flatten out the low end of the blacks. Dark scenes look like "paint by number" with all kinds of banding and digital multiplication/division. Lame, worthless settings if that is the effect, and a problem in general with "digital" stuff.

Standard white balance isn't fine-grained enough to make the adjustments to any of the picture modes that are necessary, in my opinion. I messed with it for a long time, so I know. :) The only way to get actual, fine-grained color control is to use the 10p White Balance settings. Now, I only know this from messing around with it, but what this does is allow you to control the individual colors R, G, and B as 10 different intensities, from black to white. So, Interval 1 is the darkest reds, greens, and blues (close to black), and Interval 10 is the brightest R, G, and B, close to white. If you use "Expert Pattern 1" you can see how this works. Short summary?: Red is WAY over-represented and blue is WAY under-represented when everything is set at 0. Everything looked neon until I calibrated this, particularly the reds, and greens to some extent. (Maybe they can create a "1980's" picture mode!)

The noise filters aren't needed when you have everything calibrated correctly. They are kind of an excuse for having the eye-popping over-saturated settings that Standard and Dynamic mode come with. I'm not too sure on the Film Mode and LED Motion Plus. They didn't give me any noticible changes. The Auto Motion plus is nice, but I found that it starts getting choppy when you have other effects going on, including a lowered sharpness (I imagine it must be doing some extra calculations for that.) So, I only set it to Clear because it doesn't seem to get choppy with that set, but still provides some stability and smoothness in fast scenes.

Overall
-------
I give the picture (once it is set correctly) a 5/5. The fact that I can't adjust certain "features", combined with the level of screwing around it requires to make the picture look good makes me lower that. Seriously Samsung... why can't there be a default mode in here that has professionally calibrated settings? You must know that the reds are way too saturated, right? You can still set it to "Standard Mode" by default to create eye-popping pictures that make people buy the TV. But with all your expertise, why not just have a mode that has all this stuff pre-calibrated and save us the time?

EDIT (2012-05-28): After further tinkering, I think I have refined settings to make the picture pop a little more without ruining the picture. Use above settings, but adjust to these:
Dynamic Contrast: LOW
Black Tone: Darker
HDMI Black Level: LOW
Color Space: Native

38 of 38 people found the following review helpful.
Second Samsung TV
By PeteReviews
After purchasing a Samsung UN55D7000 about 6 months ago (2011 model) which I was very happy with, I needed a new TV for my bedroom and this model was the perfect size and it had many of the same features.

This TV is the 2012 model and is still fairly new, they are still working out the bugs with the smartTV side for the 2012 models at Samsung. I noticed that this TV does not have the HBO2GO app yet and I read how it is because it is a 2012 and the app has to be changed.

Also the Browser is not working, this could be an issue with just my tv but I tested it and it would not connect.

I compared this TV next to the D7000 and it was exactly the same but it did not have the "spotlighting" that occurs on the 2011 models. The blacks seem much blacker also.

I have not tested the 3D part, one good this is that this model comes with 2 pairs of glasses, they are the ones with batteries you have to replace and they do not recharge but I did not buy it for the 3d part.

I tested the Pandora app and it worked the same as other my other TV. The entire Samsung model line up seems to be ahead of the curve and quality seems to be great. The tv is very thin and crystal clear. The built in speakers sound good.

Pros
- Clear Picture and good colors
- Samsung smartTV - huge fan of how it works and the ease of use

Cons

- Browser is not working and some apps are not ready for the 2012 line up (yet, no worries they will get them working)

46 of 52 people found the following review helpful.
Ultimate Configuration, Awesome 3D with Too many Software Issues
By Phanindra
Let me start with PROS
Ultimate configuration with awesome 3D experience, super clarity and sound quality. Would buy it again when below issues are resolved.

CONS:

Hell lot of software Issues:

1) All of a sudden Netflix froze and it doesn't respond to any remote control button. I have to power it off and when I power it on with wifi and/or wired connection I see multiple issues as below
2) After the above step if i power on my TV it starts with a Green horizontal line on the top edge of the TV
3) When ever this happens it loses all my Network settings and it doesn't connect the Smart HUB (Netflix/YouTube). It doesn't even detect my WIFI or a wired LAN connection.
4) Whenever YouTube gets stuck/freezes TV doesn't respond to remote control and on restarting the TV wired or wifi connection gets disconnected and doesn't detect wifi or wired LAN connection.
5) At times when I watch YouTube TV restarts all of a sudden.
6) When ever I restart YouTube if I forward the earlier video I was watching the amount of forwarding/image doesn't match with the time it is buffered for. Ex: Fast forwarding the video for 30 mins approximately shows 1 hour 30 mins on the seek bar of YouTube.
7) Netflix doesn't connect thru wifi initially so I have to connect through LAN cable
8) 3d doesn't work with Netflix

TV Model No: UN46ES6500FXZA
Version No: TS01
Serial No: Z4XXXXXXXXX179M

Below are the Transaction numbers for the calls made to Samsung support to resolve. But nothing helps.

1) Samsung Transaction No: 2xxxxxxx40 -- Was to reset to factory settings only to see the issues again.
2) Samsung Transaction No: 2xxxxxxx60
3) Samsung Remote Diagnosis Chat Session ID: LTK56xxxxxxxx4X
4) Samsung Transaction No: 2xxxxxxx07- Level-1/Tier-1 couldn't help this time. They escalated to Level-2/Tier2 Support & i was put on brief hold every time and I was finally heard from Samsung that the crash & restart are firmware issues are being fixed in an firmware update across E models which is being fixed. Do you want to wait for a fix and live with the issues till you get a firmware update? I wouldn't do that when I am spending so much on a TV.