LG has a bit of a penchant for eye-catching TV features compared to recent releases from CES — remember the foldable TV? Well, in this demo, it gets several times better with a transparent 4K OLED TV.
How it works? You're about to find out – at CES 2024, I got up close and personal with the 77-inch LG Signature OLED T (as it will be known when it launches). And yes, it will actually launch this year – although of course we have no idea how high the price will undoubtedly be.
The Transparent TV is also wireless for 4K pictures and audio between the display and the Zero Connect Box, which is where all your cables connect. There are no unsightly cables with the unit at all. As you can see, it's like a piece of furniture – shelves – so the technology that powers the screen is in the shelf part.
What I wasn't expecting from this TV are the two modes – Transparent mode enables you to see an image with a transparent background. This effect is very clever and can always be turned on to display photos or artwork.
But obviously you don't want to watch everyday TV in transparent mode. Instead, LG has solved this problem with what it calls “Screen Contrast” – where you can lift this issue with the touch of a button. This acts as a backsplash for the display so you can get the full benefit of the OLED TV's picture.
The photo is particularly impressive. Obviously I took a fairly cursory look at the TV, but it seemed to have the usual LG OLED picture excellence. LG is using the new Alpha 11 AI image processor for this TV, which it says provides a 70 percent improvement in graphics performance and a 30 percent faster processing speed compared to its predecessor.
There's also a feature that LG calls the T-Bar, which is basically a bar that runs across the bottom of the screen for various updates including weather and news.
The future of television?
Since you don't need to place the Signature OLED T next to other equipment, you can place it in the middle of the room or even next to a window. LG suggests that it can be used as a space divider. Of course, although the image can reach the TV wirelessly, you'll need to plug it into a power outlet as you'd expect.
The idea, of course, is that you no longer need to have a big black rectangle dominating your living space, in order to integrate the screen into your room. Many TV manufacturers have now experimented with modes that turn the TV into a work of art or a more aesthetic item when you're not watching TV, but this is different; A real attempt to make the screen blend in with your wall. It certainly seems like a more efficient solution than retracting the screen, as with the older foldable TV.
It's a really interesting vision of where we could take TVs in the future, integrating them into our homes in ways we can't appreciate today.
