Would the world’s slimmest TV please stand up?

January 5, 1:00 PMGadgets ExaminerDan Appleman

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Is this the world's thinnest TV? Should you care?

This year’s CES is the venue for the “who has the thinnest TV” contest. And the contenders are…

LG’s LH95 comes in at 24.8mm (0.976 inches) with a 2,000,000 dynamic contrast ratio and 240Hz refresh rate.

Samsung’s new Luxia series is 6.5mm (0.26 inches) thick and also boasts a 240Hz refresh rate.

At first glance, you might think that the Samsung set is the sure winner, but that isn’t necessarily the case. The question is: where are you measuring the thickness?

Both the LG and Samsung set reduce the thickness of the panel itself by eliminating the traditional flourescent backlight, replacing it with an array of bright LEDs.

The panel width is not the whole story though. The electronics, speakers, and the bezel and frame that hold everything together have to be taken into account. Is Samsung’s set truly 6.5mm thick over the whole TV? Or is it just the panel? Which set is really thinnest? We don’t know – yet.

Nor, do we really care.

The truth is, set thickness should be one of your least important concerns in choosing a TV. The real advantage of using LED backlighting instead of flourescent backlighting is not the set thickness, but the potential for increasing image contrast. An LCD works by having each LCD pixel act as a light switch – allowing light from the backlight to show through or not depending on the image. The contrast depends on the ability of the LCD pixel to switch the light (how much of the light it can block). With an LED backlight it is also possible to literally turn off the backlight behind black pixels. The result is a level of black that is not possible with a flourescent backlight.

So it really doesn’t matter whether LG or Samsung has the thinnest set. What matters is the use of LED backlighting - a feature currently reserved for higher end sets, that is likely to become more and more common in the future.