The Short Form

$6,999 / MITSUBISHI-TV.COM / 800-332-2119

Snapshot

Its cabinet depth and its price tag might be hefty, but Mitsubishi’s breakthrough laser-driven TV can deliver a spectacular visual punch

Plus

• Dazzling color capability • Very bright picture without detail loss • Low power consumption

Minus

• Deep cabinet compared to flat-panel TVs • No RGB computer input • Pricey

Key Features

• 1080p resolution • 120-Hz display • Deep color/xvYCC display options • 3-D IR emitter • Netcommand (CEC)-capable HDMI inputs • Inputs: 4 HDMI, 3 component- and composite-video, S-video; 2 RF antenna/cable; RS-232 control • 54 1⁄4 x 39 3⁄4 x 10 1⁄2 in, 136 1⁄2 lbs

Just a couple of years ago, rear-projection TVs were the only game in town if you wanted a really big screen without breaking the bank. But flat-panel sets have since taken over, leaving Mitsubishi and Samsung as the sole guardians of the RPTV flame. RPTVs get a bum rap due to their relative girth as compared to LCD and plasma models. But those extra-bulky cabinets of the past have been slimmed down, with the latest sets measuring only about 2 to 3 times the depth of a similar-size flat-panel. They’ve even come up with a solution for bulb-replacement hassles: Mitsubishi’s Laser TV instead uses a LaserVue light engine, a laser-driven solution designed to last for the life of the TV.

Bulb-replacement issues aside, a key consideration with the LaserVue light engine is its video performance. LaserVue delivers a highly focused beam of pure light, with colors that encompass an exceptionally broad spectrum. That sounds good in theory, but you should bear in mind that HDTV pictures are meant to be viewed using a standard set of color points (known as Rec. 709). Exceeding those points is a bit like turning up the bass and treble on your music system: It might sound more impressive at first, but you’re clearly altering the original program. Mitsubishi is well aware of this issue, and the L65-A90 lets you choose between the expanded color points and a more standard setting.

Instead of loading the L65-A90 with all kinds of bells and whistles, Mitsubishi concentrated on features aimed at enhancing the TV’s performance. So while you do get a 120-Hz mode to reduce frame judder, along with a host of other picture controls, you won’t find picture-in-picture, network connectivity, an RGB computer input, or many other things you might see on other companies’ flagship TVs. One small bell (or whistle) is the set’s ability to handle 3-D video sources, including a jack for driving a controller for 3-D glasses.

At around 10 inches, this is about the slimmest RPTV I’ve ever seen; Mitsubishi even offers a wall-mounting bracket for the set. The frame around the screen is as narrow as a finger, so even with its extra-big 65-inch diagonal picture, the front face of the L65-A90 looks no larger than most 58-inch plasma models.

Basic connectivity is fine, with four HDMI and three component-video inputs, plus an RS-232 port for interfacing with third-party control systems like Crestron. There’s also a USB input for a flash drive for displaying photos. The remote is essentially the same one Mitsubishi supplies with most of its TVs. Its layout is logical, with the most-used controls falling where you’d expect them, while the buttons are illuminated with a soft blue glow.

In a world that’s increasingly concerned about power consumption, Mitsubishi points out that no other big-screen TV is as green as the LaserVue. Typical power use runs around 100 watts, or about a quarter to a third of what a typical flat-panel this big would require.

SETUP

We normally test TVs in our own facility, but the only opportunity we had to test the L65-A90 was at Mitsubishi’s corporate offices. A hard reset ensured that the test sample was returned to its out-of-box factory settings, and I was left undisturbed to run any type of tests I wanted.

The set’s Natural picture mode, combined with its Low color-temperature setting, provided quite accurate color. As I mentioned earlier, Mitsubishi has leveraged the laser’s ability to deliver colors well beyond the standard limits, although this can be controlled by choosing between the Standard, Bright, and Brilliant color modes. Standard is the closest to, well, the Rec. 709 standard, while Bright and Brilliant extend the color range by increasing amounts. I did most of my assessment with color set to Standard, although I did take time to experiment with the extended modes to evaluate their effect.

Other key adjustments include the Deep Field Imager, which was useful for enhancing shadow detail in dark pictures, and SharpEdge, which I ultimately left off. As with other Mitsubishi TVs I’ve tested, the PerfectColor adjustments made it simple to correct for any color-decoding errors.

PERFORMANCE

The pre-title action sequence from the second James Bond film, From Russia With Love, has a Bond stand-in trying to evade an assassin from SPECTRE in a dark garden at night, which is a tough test for black-level and shadow-detail capability. The LaserVue TV was able to show exceptionally fine shadow gradations in both the garden hedges and Bond’s suit, although the deepest black the set delivered was really more of a very dark gray. At the other end of the spectrum, the bright sunshine when Klebb (Lotte Lenya) goes to see Grant (Robert Shaw) for the first time demonstrated the set’s ability to deliver punchy highlights free of any “blooming.” Colors with the Standard setting selected looked natural — something that could readily be seen in the green grass of the training center, and in Klebb’s skin tones.

Few movies have ever used as wild a range of colors as Speed Racer, a live-action feature that the Wachowski brothers worked to make look as much like a cartoon as possible. The Brilliant setting’s wide color palette made watching this Blu-ray Disc a real demonstration of what the LaserVue TV could deliver. From the intensely saturated yellow of Young Speed’s jacket and the lipstick red seats in Rex’s car to the deep azure of the sky, most of us have never seen colors like these on a TV. And while the ultra-vivid version was fun for a while, I found the slightly tamer-looking Bright setting easier to take.

Standard-def programs on cable didn’t fare too well on the L65-A90, with both CNN and the Disney Channel looking particularly soft. To be fair, SD-format TV rarely stands up well to close scrutiny on such a large screen.

BOTTOM LINE

Mitsubishi’s LaserVue technology gives the L65-A90 capabilities that have never been seen before in a TV. The tricky part is going to be finding a way to use those capabilities without significantly altering the original color balance of movies and other programs viewed on the set. But Mitsubishi has obviously considered this potential issue, since it also lets you select more standard settings for the TV. Even without its expanded color range, the L65-A90 remains an impressive TV, if a rather expensive one.

TEST BENCH

Color Point Accuracy vs. SMPTE HD Standard

Color	Target X	Measured X	Target Y	Measured Y
Red	0.64	0.67	0.33	0.32
Green	0.30	0.20	0.60	0.76
Blue	0.15	0.16	0.06	0.06
Cyan	0.225	0.18	0.329	0.30
Magenta	0.321	0.38	0.154	0.18
Yellow	0.419	0.51	0.505	0.48

The combination of the Mitsubishi L65-A90’s Natural picture mode and Warm color-temperature preset delivered the most accurate color. Grayscale tracking was somewhat bluer than standard, ranging from 300 to 900 K above the 6, 500-K target between 30 and 100 IRE. This result is better than most TVs, although any further tweaking would require a professional calibration, as there are no fine grayscale adjustments in the user menu. (Mitsubishi requested that I not enter the TV’s service menu to make adjustments during my evaluation.) While the Brilliant and Bright picture modes use deliberately expanded color points, Mitsubishi says the Standard mode uses the HDTV standard Rec. 709 points. When measured, however, the TV’s green point was significantly oversaturated, and its color decoder showed a strong green pull — presumably to compensate. But color decoding can be corrected using the PerfectColor adjustments. With these set correctly, there was no discernible green cast with regular programming.

A wide range of aspect ratio modes is available for both SD and HD signals, but there’s no zero overscan option. (Overscan for most of the Mitsubishi’s display modes measured 2.5 %.) Geometry was excellent. For a projection TV with such a shallow cabinet, I was surprised to see no bowing of horizontal or vertical lines on crosshatch test patterns. Convergence was also flawless, with no color fringing. However, the color “rainbows” that can sometimes be seen on sequential color displays as you move your eyes rapidly to one side were quite evident.

Full-field gray test patterns showed a noticeably brighter area near the bottom center of the screen. Other than this, the set displayed excellent uniformity, with horizontal off-axis viewing showing almost no dip in contrast until I was more than 100º off from the screen’s center. The TV delivers an intensely bright picture, with both dark and well-lighted images showing lots of detail and no picture information crushed at either end of the grayscale. True black was not present, however: a black full-field showed pattern looked just dark gray, as opposed to black.

The TV’s video processor did a good job handling the SD and HD test signals from the Silicon Optix HQV test discs, passing most of the video- and film-mode tests. However, a 2:3 pulldown test showed that the TV’s Film mode was very sluggish to lock up; it would even slip out of Film mode from time to time. Since there is no forced Film-mode setting to avoid this, I’d recommend pairing the Mitsubishi with a disc player that has a 24p direct-output mode.