Introduction and features
“Don’t like the way your TV looks today? So get out your screwdriver and change it!” It’s not the TX-40DX600’s tagline but it may as well be as it’s the rather odd choice presented by this 40-inch LED-backlit LCD TV from Panasonic, which boasts one of the oddest desktop stands we’ve yet seen.
Although it screws onto the bottom of the TV just like any other desktop stand would, once detached, you can turn it through 180 degrees, changing from an orientation with two small aluminium legs poking outwards and away from the TV screen to a second configuration sees those legs curving inwards.
The final look is quite different depending on which option you go for, though happily either choice lends the 40DX600 a cute floating look. However, those legs are a little shiny, plasticky and lightweight, and they definitely look better than they feel.
There’s much more to this 40-incher than that “tailored design,” though. Chief among the 40DX600’s attractions to some will be is completely flat design.
Thought the curved TV was a fashionable, desirable design icon? Think again – it’s dead already, at least according to Panasonic. Ditto 3D, which has also been abandoned on the 40DX600.
But a good bezel never goes out of style.
The screen surround is reasonably slim, however, with a 5mm trim around the top and sides, and 18mm at the bottom, which tapers back.
A follow-up to last year’s excellent 40CX680B, the 40DX600 is Panasonic’s best value 4K TV. Four pegs down from Panasonic’s flagship DX900 range –five, if you count its OLED – the DX600 series claims a 4K Edge LED-backlit panel with adaptive backlight dimming, 800Hz scanning and Quad Core PRO processor for super-quick smart TV navigation.
It also has both a Firefox OS and a Freeview Play catch-up TV app, as do all Panasonic TVs for 2016, which lend it a smart, usable interface to watch Netflix or Amazon Prime Instant Video.
Firefox is on fire
Panasonic is the only TV manufacturer to use Mozilla’s Firefox OS. And an OS it certainly is; to call it simply a smart TV interface ignores the fact that it represents a fully joined-up user interface where apps, inputs, external devices and catch-up TV are integrated as one … however, we do have one small complaint: Panasonic insists on calling its user interface My Home Screen 2.0, a throwback to a now discarded OS from a couple of years ago.
Firefox is a really easy user interface to understand and to use. The design is pure minimalism – three colourful, circular icons for live TV, apps and devices are presented against a photographic background that also includes a search option, and the current time.
It’s all simple, clean and vividly colourful, and looks like a phone interface, which sadly the Firefox OS will no longer become. Firefox OS on smart TVs is all about customisation, with constant opportunities to ‘pin’ anything to that main home screen.
That could be the Netflix app, a USB input that you use a lot, or a favourite TV channel. Hold down the remote’s home key for a few seconds and you find an intriguing Info Page, though it contains little save for some notifications panels, weather information and some of the random web video previews. However, you can also access a list of TV channels from its built-in digital tuner here, which supplies you access to a colourful list of Freeview HD channels.
Panasonic is promising a big update to Firefox OS later in 2016. This so-called Firefox 2.0 is set to include a way of sending content from a phone to a Panasonic TV, though only if that phone is using the Firefox browser.
What’s more interesting about Firefox 2.0 is that it will deliver a way to play various apps on the TV solely through the TV’s web browser without you having to search for, download or install specific apps to the 40DX600. But it looks likely to consist of some kind of Mozilla-curated content from around the web, including video, games, news and weather, so don’t get too excited.
Apps are the MVP
Another great characteristic of the current Firefox OS is its plethora of smart TV apps. And while you’ll find the streaming video staples here, there is one absolute standout: Freeview Play.
A hub for the catch-up TV apps of UK broadcasters, the Freeview Play app contains simple icons for the BBC iPlayer, ITV, Channel 4 and Five, with additional links to the BBC’s News and Sport apps. There’s only one thing to do; ‘pin’ Freeview Play to the Home page, which means going back to the Apps page where it’s hosted, and pressing the option key on the remote.
On that Apps page are 18 apps pre-installed, including Amazon and Netflix (both 4K HDR-ready thanks to HEVC decoding), YouTube (complete with VP9 decoding for 4K streaming), AccuWeather, Wuaki.tv, Chilli Cinema, and everything within Freeview Play. There are also a couple of TV utilities, including a Firefox browser (naturally), a calendar, a link to the Apps market for more downloads, and a shortcut to any TV programmes recorded from the digital TV tuner to an attached, formatted HDD.
The ins and outs
The 40DX600 is very well connected. On a side-panel (to the TV’s left-hand side as you look at it) are a couple of USB slots, an HDMI input, a headphones jack and a Common Interface slot.
Nearby, though rear-facing, are analogue inputs for component video (which were supposed to have disappeared from TVs by now) and two left/right phonos.
Underneath, and down-facing, are a couple of HDCP 2.2-ready HDMI inputs, an optical digital audio output, a RF in for tuning Freeview HD channels, and a wired LAN slot (though the 40DX600 also includes WiFi).
Also available
The TX-40DX600 (£599) is part of Panasonic’s DX600 Series, which is actually rock-bottom of its five-way 4K TV line-up.
It’s also sold as the 49-inch 49DX600 (£799) and the 55-inch 55DX600 (£999), which makes the 40DX600 alarmingly smaller than its 4K stablemates. However, both of those larger versions have IPS panels, which tend to lack contrast, so perhaps the VA panel-endowed 40DX600 does have an advantage despite its size.
Go up a peg to the DX650 Series and you get 10,000 Hz scanning and a new design, and a step further to the DX700 and Panasonic TX-DX750 Series for HDR. However, there’s a long drop to the next DS500 Series, which lacks even 4K resolution.
Picture quality and sound
One of the biggest downsides of the 40DX600 is that it doesn’t do HDR. Considering that HDR is supposed to be the next revolution in TV watching, that’s a shame. But don’t kid yourself – this is an assured 4K TV ready easily capable of demonstrating just how impressive the new resolution can be. (And, if you can’t fathom shelling out for a non-HDR 4K TV, take a look at the one-step-higher 40DX700.)
That said, being saddled with boring old standard dynamic range is not the quite prison sentence you might have imagined.
A blast of football in 4K reveals not only a great amount of detail, but more than enough brightness and motion clarity to carry it off. When the camera swings into the penalty area quickly there is a touch of motion judder, but it’s so slight; there’s a fluidity to 4K here I hadn’t expected.
It’s crucial, too because motion blur – still common on LCD panels of this price – can make 4K resolution utterly pointless for video. Kudos to the 40DX600’s nifty frame interpolation and backlight scanning for that, though there’s something about the 40DX600’s small size that is troubling: Is 4K really that impactful on a 40-inch TV?
I would argue that it is with the very best, brightest content. That means sport. For example, some 4K football reveals clearly defined players even from distant camera shots, and the kind of clarity in faces in the crowd that make you feel much closer to the action, and that 4K sport is a real event. That feeling is almost entirely missing during some 4K action from Elysium, which looked almost indistinguishable from Full HD on the 40DX600.
Still on 4K sport, the 40DX600 impresses further with colour clarity and brightness. OK, so there’s not the blinding brightness of HDR and the exceptionally vivid colours it brings, but the average TV watcher who’s never even seen HDR in action yet (and – whisper it – may not even like it) will be thoroughly impressed by the 40DX600’s subtle colour definition.
There’s little in the way of light spill from the edge LED backlight, but it must be said that the 40DX600’s viewing angle is not great; watch from the wings and the colours do pale significantly. That also applies to black levels, but here again the 40DX600 punches above its weight when viewed head-on.
Full HD material retains all of these plus-points, though do be wary of watching standard-def channels from the built-in HD tuner. They do look pretty blocky, though just about clean enough to watch.
The 40DX600’s Firefox OS extends to how external devices are handled, with circular icons taking you to videos stored on a USB stick – and I got plenty of playback skills from the 40DX600.
For the first time ever, I managed to get a 4K TV to playback 4K-rendered files in MKV, MP4 and TS formats. The 40DX600 also supported a plethora of files encoded in MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and H.264, including AVC HD, MPEG, MP4, AVI, WMV and even WMV HD.
Sound off
The 40DX600 isn’t blessed with anything other than average audio. It’s almost always the way with flat TVs at this price-point, but it’s hard to get excited about the 40DX600’s three basic settings: standard, music, and ambience. All three are much alike, featuring plenty of clarity, but little low frequency.
However, if you’re watching a movie I suggest you engage the virtual surround mode and push the bass up a tad. It’s not the surround sound it claims to be, but it does give a fuller, more balanced end product, albeit with slightly harsh treble highs.
Incidentally, from a USB stick or a networked PC or Mac, the 40DX600 played MP3, M4A and WMA music files as well as lossless files including FLAC and WAV formats.
Verdict
It’s really hard to argue against the 40DX600 in terms of value. Some might bleat that including 4K resolution at such a small screen is pushing it, but the good news is that those extra pixels don’t negatively affect the image quality on lower quality sources.
The choice of desktop stand array might attract some, though any feeling of premium quality won’t last for long – the 40DX600’s build is fairly lightweight and lacks the solidity of TVs further up the food chain.
However, if you want small-screen 4K for as little spend as possible, this 40DX600 is the sweet-spot.
We liked
By supporting 4K from YouTube, Amazon and Netflix – as well as every downloaded 4K file we could find – the 40DX600 shows itself as truly 4K in every sense. Better still, images are clean and retain detail.
Key here is the 40DX600’s excellent motion resolution, which keeps 4K looking sharp – though its small size means that bright and colourful footage – such as sport – is much more impressive in 4K than movies are. Black levels are convincing, and somewhat surprising is the 40DX600’s lack of light spillage in the corners. There’s clearly a very capable VA panel inside.
However, it’s the spotless and speedy Firefox OS that takes most of the credit for making the 40DX600 a fine living room TV that’s fit for the 4K future.
We disliked
Aside from the lack of wow factor from 4K movies – something we can blame on the 40DX600’s small size (50-inch is where 4K really starts to impress) – this 40-incher has few cons. Perhaps the main drawback is the tight viewing angle, which means colours and contrast draining if you watch from anywhere away from head-on.
Some may also mourn the lack of 3D, which had become a standard-issue feature, but now appears to have been completely cut. For those with even a couple of favourite 3D Blu-ray discs, it makes buying a new TV a slightly more painful process than it could be.
Final verdict
If you want 4K at the cheapest possible price, the 40DX600 is Panasonic’s sweet-spot, but its talents stretch further than simple pixels. Excelling with bright 4K footage and all kinds of Full HD, this 40-incher nevertheless fails to make 4K movies truly pop.
There’s a slight issue with viewing angles, but otherwise the 40DX600 handles all sources with consistent clarity, with plenty of colour and motion sequences that are smooth enough, though images never reach benchmark quality.
However, this TV’s likability is largely down to the presence of the immaculate Firefox OS and a great choice of apps. It may stand firmly in the mid-range of Panasonic’s latest crop of 4K LED TVs, but the 40-inch 40DX600’s app-packed Firefox and its clean and colourful images make this a great value contender.
Source: techradar.com