I tried Alexa+ and was very pleased with how it worked, allowing me to adjust the volume and search for dark psychological thrillers from the ’90s. You can enable Alexa voice prompt and bypass the microphone button on the remote, but that didn’t work as reliably as I would have liked. Sometimes saying “Alexa” didn’t wake up the TV.

Based on benchmarks

Benchmarks don’t lie, or at least that’s the theory. We all see colors differently and respond to contrast and brightness based on our own visual perception. While the R95H met all the specifications of the BT.2020 color gamut, Spears & Munsil’s benchmark results made it clear that the R95H’s performance is not as outstanding as its competitor LG Micro RGB Evo. I noticed that the skin tone variation on the Samsung wasn’t as obvious: two people who don’t look all that similar, complexion-wise, looked more or less the same on the screen.

The image quality settings didn’t help much. Dynamic mode (which other TV makers call Vivid) caused some colors to bloom and bleed, and Filmmaker mode made the skin tone scene too dark. The AI ​​picture settings worked best, especially for football, but most adjustments related to contrast and brightness didn’t help as much as on the LG.

Likewise, the demo tests were not as impressive as I would have expected for the new display technology. The green grass behind a wooden fence wasn’t as bright as I would have liked for a premium TV. The white fog over a snowy mountain was clearly visible, but a little faded. Picture modes and adjustments to white balance, brightness and color temperature didn’t help much either.

The true LCD screen and anti-glare technology that Samsung uses in the R95H made this TV less susceptible to changes in picture quality than the LG or Hisense RGB models I tested. On the LG Micro RGB Evo specifically, simple adjustments to color temperature and white balance had a more noticeable impact on picture quality, as did most picture modes. For example, using the Vivid picture mode improved benchmark tests, while Dynamic mode on the R95H didn’t move the needle. Buffalo wandering around a field looked a little flat due to the anti-glare technology. Dark trees in a mountain scene were not sufficiently distinguishable from the dark background. A yellow flower looked oversaturated in Dynamic mode, but too flat and boring in Filmmaker mode.

Trying the not so bright colors

Photography: John Brandon

When testing the R95H, I learned that color processing is very important on micro RGB TVs as opposed to OLED TVs, because colors must be reproduced constantly.