Christmas is still five months away, but that's not stopping LG Electronics Canada Inc. from showing what it has in store for the holiday season. LG hosted its annual Holidays in July product preview today at Airship 37, a funky event space in the Distillery District near Toronto's eastern waterfront.
For videophiles, the highlight had to be three new OLED TVs. The price for this technology is becoming much less prohibitive. LG launched a curved 55" OLED HDTV in Canada last October for $11,000. It is now rolling out a second-generation 55-incher for $5,000. The panels are the same, but the new model has down-firing speakers instead of front-firing film speakers.
The price drop is the result of improving yields on OLED displays, said Kevin Andrews, Senior Brand Marketing Manager for LG Canada's Home Entertainment Division (shown in picture at top of story, along with Brand Marketing Manager Greg Belina). "So far, we've been able to meet demand," Andrews added. "We've had no supply constraints."
Coming in about six weeks is a wall-mountable 55" OLED television, for $8,000. The supplied hanging mount has two magnetic clasps that let the display swing out from the wall for making connections. As the photo at right shows, the OLED TV is literally pencil-thin (it's actually thicker than Belina's pen!)
Both 55-inchers are HD displays, with 1,920x1,080-pixel resolution. Coming late in the year (in time for the holiday season, Andrews says) is the curved 77" OLED 4K TV that LG first showed at CES back in January. It will carry a $27,000 price tag, and will sport LG's new webOS-based smart-TV platform. As expected, all three OLED displays had gorgeous pictures, with anthracite-deep blacks and brilliant colours.
Also on display at Airship 37 were 79" and 84" LED ultra-high-definition TVs ($9,000 and $1,3,000 respectively). Both feature webOS-based smart TV. Like all of LG's premium televisions for 2014, the big UHD sets use IPS (in-plane switching) panels, a feature the company is emphasizing this year.
At the holiday event, LG was displaying its 65" IPS 4K TV, alongside an 8550-series 65" UHD TV from Samsung and X900 65" UHD from Sony. All were displaying a series of static images. Head-on, they all looked superb; but the IPS panel's superior off-axis colour was apparent when you moved to the side. A demonstrator gave each TV a little poke; the IPS picture did not deform at the site of the jab; the others did temporarily.
LG Canada has been taking its IPS Challenge show on the road, usually with just Samsung and LG TVs in tow. The next stop is Collingwood, ON for this weekend's Elvis Festival. So far, about 12,000 consumers have participated in the challenge, Andrews said, and about 80% prefer the LG set.
Earlier this year, LG Canada engaged Toronto-based Charlton Research Inc. to conduct a controlled study. There were about 125 participants, who had printouts showing what the static images on the TVs should look like. They were also asked to compare durability (the "poke" test) and the TVs' smart applications (the LG set had its webOS platform). According to Andrews, 80% of participants preferred LG.
LG Canada's mobile division was showing off several nifty products, Arriving on August 1, the new G3 smartphone features a gorgeous 5.5" Quad HD (2,560x1,440 pixels) screen, 13MP camera with laser autofocus, front camera with gesture control for snapping selfies, and lovely metallic finish. (Carolina Pini, Senior Brand Marketing Manager of LG Canada's Mobile Division is holding the G3 and new G Watch in this photo.)
But most of the attention was focused on the G Watch. Priced at $250, it's already available on Google Play, and will be offered in Canada by Videotron and Telus. It's always on, so you just have to look at it to see the time (a useful feature for a watch!). Texts and notifications can be pushed to the watch for easy viewing.
And you can use voice ("OK Google") to activate applications on the paired phone. If you ask for directions to a destination, the watch will provide turn-by-turn prompts, and give an ETA based on current traffic. LG Canada Marketing Manager Torsten Spahr showed how a user could send a QR of a boarding pass to the watch, then just flash it at the gate.
The G Watch is dustproof and waterproof to 1m, so it's safe to use at the beach or in the shower, Spahr noted. And it uses standard 22mm watchbands, so it's easy to change the look. According to Spahr, about 600 micro apps suitable for the G Watch's 1.65" screen are available from Google.
LG Canada's appliance division also had some innovative products on display, including a dual-oven range with fast-heating infrared grill (making it easy to sear meat); an over-the-range microwave with easy-clean enamel and powerful extending vent fan, a huge fridge with LG's door-in-door feature for quick energy-saving access to beverages and other popular items; a capacious dishwasher with third tray up top for utensils; ductless air conditioner/heat pump with a secondary venting unit that doubles as a picture frame; and top-load washer with water atomizer for more effective rinsing. Also on display was a radically downsized laundry pair that lets dealers demonstrate key features.