Arguably the biggest stir at the CES 2024 last January was caused by LG’s remarkable prototype see-through OLED TV. Now, almost exactly one year later, LG is actually ready to take the Signature OLED T beyond prototype stage and make it available for consumers to buy.
LG’s remarkable transparent Signature OLED T TV (which can be made opaque at the touch of a button … [+]
While it’s great to see LG push such an “out there” product through to consumer sale stage, though, as with the brand’s other most radical OLED designs in recent years, such as its “rollable” R series, the world’s first consumer transparent OLED TV is not exactly a mainstream proposition.
In announcing the availability to order of the 77-inch Signature OLED T TV, LG revealed that the price of its unique lifestyle TV proposition is a cool $59,999. Naturally I’ve already ordered one for each of my yachts.
If you missed all the coverage of the Signature OLED T from CES 2024, where it ultimately picked up a five CES 2024 Innovation Awards, you can find my own first impressions of LG’s stunning OLED innovation in this article.
To sum it up again here, though, the Signature OLED T is an OLED screen that can become transparent while still showing pictures, but which can also, at the touch of a button, become a regular opaque OLED TV, complete with full black backing, so that you can enjoy films on it in the same way you would if you’d bought a regular OLED TV.
LG’s Signature OLED TV is arguably the ultimate lifestyle TV design.
The result is arguably the ultimate lifestyle TV; a massive screen that can literally become invisible when you’re not watching it, but which can also deliver an uncompromising home theatre picture performance when you fancy a proper movie night. And actually, that’s just the start of its designer charms.
LG had already put a lot of effort into coming up with imaginative ways of taking advantage of the Signature OLED T’s unique see-through technology at the 2024 CES, so it’s not surprising to find LG promising plenty of cutting edge fun with the finished consumer version. LG highlights in its launch information, for instance, an Always-On-Display mode called T-Objet that turns the OLED T screen into a “transparent digital canvas” you can use for showcasing artwork, photos or videos that still contain gorgeous colour and clarity despite the screen’s see through status.
There’s also a so-called T-Bar mode, where a ticker strip appears on the bottom of the screen providing information such as sports results, weather forecasts, the titles of songs you’re playing, or even updates on the status of other IoT devices on your home network while the rest of the screen remains transparent, completely removing the gaping black hole in your room normally left behind by a 77-inch TV in standby mode. Even the OLED T’s “T-Home” set up and app menus have been optimised for the transparent display.
Who wouldn’t want to watch whales swimming across the top of the mountains they can see through … [+]
Being able to make the OLED T transparent also raises new possibilities for where you put it. For instance, you could potentially put it in the middle of your room without it dividing the space up when set to its transparent mode. Or you could put it in front of a window without it blocking out the light or the view.
A transparent screen would look a bit strange if it had loads of distinctly non-transparent cables hanging out of it, of course. So to complete the OLED T’s “now you see it, now you don’t” magic trick, LG has equipped it with wireless video and audio transmission technology, where an external Zero Connect Box takes in all your sources and beams their picture and sound losslessly to the OLED T screen. This wireless transmission system can cope with 4K images at up to 120Hz frame rates, as well as supporting variable refresh rate gaming — including in the NVidia G-Sync and AMD FreeSync Premium formats.
Serious AV fans concerned, finally, that the Signature OLED T’s design will affect the traditional picture quality of LG’s OLED TVs need not worry. Once switched to its opaque mode, the black backing sheet that rolls up behind the previously transparent screen is completely solid, allowing no light through, so that it essentially becomes one of LG’s regular premium OLED TVs. Complete with LG’s latest powerful Alpha 11 AI picture (and sound) processor.
While LG has only confirmed US pricing for the Signature OLED T so far, it does promise that the screen will also be rolled out to additional markets over time.
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