Philips 47PFL9703 (47-inch LCD)

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By Philip Wong, CNET Asia
Jun 02, 2008

Philips' flagship 9703-series looks and feels just like any other of its 2008 panels. But there's more than meets the eye beneath its refreshingly new skin. Jam-packed with the company's latest technological bells and whistles, the supercharged 47FPL9703 is as good as it gets against the latest in the market. For appetizers, it has a blazing-fast LCD response time, brilliant trillion color display and a high-powered speaker system. Now let's check out the main course.

Upside: If you prefer your movies and dramas served in stunningly vibrant hues and smooth color gradation, the 47PFL9703's 2,250 trillion color reproduction will hardly disappoint. This rides on top of its In-Plane Switching LCD panels, popular for their superb viewing angle. They've low color shift property, too, where tonality and saturation are affected when the screen is viewed off-center. Philips also has the sonics covered through 30W worth of reserved audio power. That's roughly 50 percent more than the average, paired with rear invisible speakers enhanced by sound diffusers.

To tackle the LCD's fundamental motion deficiency, Philips has gone back to the drawing board and refined its original Digital Natural Motion engine. The Perfect Natural Motion (NM) packs eight times more processing power than the former, and twice the equivalent of the lower-end Hi-Def NM. The number-crunching ability allows multi-directional motion detection and compensation to create unique intermittent picture frames for suppressing judder. This complements the 100Hz Clear LCD frame rate-doubling technology which helps deliver a class-leading 2ms response time.

Connectivity-wise, it's right up there with a tantalizing selection of four HDMI inputs. Quantity aside, they sport new EasyLink compatibility for cross-device one-remote operation and 1080p24 support for unadulterated player-to-TV video relay. For audio fanatics, you can also route sound digitally to your home theater system through a digital coaxial output to feast your ears. Rounding up the selection on the multimedia front is a side USB port. You could use it to display your JPEGs onto the big screen or pipe MP3s for background music via thumbdrives, etc.

Downside: Interestingly, its Ambilight ambient lighting system has taken a backseat this year and is featured only in two lesser models. While we aren't completely sold by the concept, this has nevertheless been prominently offered in its premium models, so it comes as a surprise to find one without. The stepped-down 30,000:1 dynamic contrast is another mild disappointment, considering its 52-inch counterpart's souped-up 55,000:1 rating. Same goes for the slightly lower 176-degree viewing angle, easily overshadowed by just about every 5000 and 7000-series in its flat-panel TV stable.

Outlook: The Philips 47PFL9703 should be available as early as July in Singapore. Judging from the brief demo during its launch, the Dutch company may have itself a winner under its belt. Though it may not stack up well against the Samsung Series 6/7 or LG Scarlet in terms of aesthetics, this Philips is nonetheless neck-to-neck in terms of features and, to a certain extent, key hard specs. If Philips prices this panel right, this will be a serious contender and alternative to the usual Japanese and Korean panels.