Toshiba 58L9300U Review (58L9300)

58 inch Cloud TV 4K LED UHD TV

by , Senior Editor

The 58L9300U is the smallest entry in Toshiba's 4K UHD TV lineup. 58 inches is an interesting size that give Toshiba a slight leg up against Sony's 55 inch 4K TV for those who don't want a massive TV. Toshiba loaded it with bells and whistles like 3D playback, smart TV options in the form of their Advanced Cloud TV, and a slew of picture quality features every picture quality junkie will love. From what we've seen the detail is impressive but the weaknesses of LCD/LED TVs are still present.

Toshiba 58L9300U 4K UHD TV
This shot from the L9300 really shows off the amount of detail it can display. Depth is also another strong suit with the foreground, focused areas, and background are all clearly separated

Picture Quality Features

The 4K UHD resolution is the most notable aspect of picture quality on the 58L9300U. Toshiba has also loaded it with a ton of features to really ramp up the picture quality. The reason for all these extras is due to the lack of 4K content currently available. These features make a big difference in converting 1080p content past its native resolution. The Clear Scan 240Hz refresh rate processing is a feature worth mentioning. This feature is used to further reduce motion blur. The result is smooth fast action playback with greater clarity. Some other additions are the Color Gamut Enhancer and the Surface Brilliance Enhancement. These settings bump up color intensity and brightness for a more lifelike image.

3D Performance

The 58L9300's 3D playback is strong on the 4K resolution screen. 2D to 3D conversion is included as well. That feature has been improving over the years and it's nice to see Toshiba including it as well. By all means, 2D content does not have the same results as original 3D content, but this is a great way to refresh movies and shows you are familiar with.

Toshiba 58L9300U 4K UHD TV
Here we still see a great sense of depth in the L9300 series. Notice the brightness issues in both the bright and dark areas of the screen.

CQ Engine

Toshiba's CQ Engine on the L9300 is comprised of a long list of menu features that allow viewers to obtain the best possible picture quality for any viewing situation and content. This will be a heavily used feature for picture tweakers out there. Options include: Edge Enhancer, Dynamic Gamma, Color Master and Expert Mode Calibration Capability, and a new UltraClear Dynamic Noise Reduction feature. The inclusion lets us know that Toshiba wants viewers to play with their picture settings since we all have personal preferences on what looks best.

Color and Depth Adaptive Resolution+

The Color and Depth Adaptive Resolution+ feature is one that really caught our attention. Color and depth are two big factors that go into our picture quality rating, so we were interested to see how it effected the picture. It really comes into play when upconverting content to play on the big 4K screen. When enabled color saturation level appear very lifelike, which is one of the highest goals our calibration settings. Picture depth also benefits slightly from this feature too. A TV that displays good depth makes all the difference in good picture versus a bad picture.

Toshiba 58L9300U 4K UHD TV
The L9300 displays bright colors that come off a bit over saturated. This picture highlights the screen uniformity issues seen in some LCD/LED TVs.

Cloud TV

Toshiba is aiming to address the slowness of smart TV platforms by moving theirs to the cloud. The Cloud TV functionality on the 58L9300 makes it easier to achieve a more personalized experience. It also includes server based upgradability so Toshiba can maintain the service remotely. Since it has been dubbed 'Cloud TV' there must be a way to access it from anywhere right? Right you are. Toshiba plans to release mobile companion apps for all the major smartphone and tablet operating systems. That is iOS, Android, and Windows 8. The move is a step in the right direction for Smart TV integration and interaction. Here is a short list of all the features available:

  • Family Calendar is a simple feature that lets family members schedule events in a centralized location.
  • Personal Messaging is kind of like e-mail for the TV
  • Photo Album allows photo storing and sharing.
  • Streaming News lets you customize where your live news is coming from
  • MediaGuide is a TV programming guide with advanced search capabilities and program recommendations
  • Miracast and WiDi  makes it possible to share screens from smarthphones, tablets, and laptops. With both router and peer-to-peer wireless capabilities

Built-in Wifi and Dual Core Processor

The 58L9300 has built-in wifi so you can connect to your home network with ease. This immediately grants you access to the Cloud TV features and the included web browser. All of this is powered by Toshiba's CEVO 4K Quad+Dual Core Processor. It's a mouthful, but it gets the job done. Smart TVs, especially 4K TVs, need a lot of power under the hood to run applications and process images with lots of detail and information. Everything works very well in this realm.

Appearance

Toshiba 58L9300U 4K UHD TV Appearance and Design

The L9300 series features a gun metal trim with a stand to match. The thin black bezels are less than an inch but much wider than most of the ultra thin bezels found on other top tier models. The display is supported by two pillars coming up from each side of the hollowed out square stand. It ends up being very pleasing to the eye. Other top tier LCD/LED models from Samsung, Panasonic, and LG really have the upper hand when it comes to design though. Toshiba's design is a good one, but modest.



Robert Wiley Having reviewed and written about Television Technology for over 10 years, Wiley never tires of researching the newest qualitative trends related to the technology. Most people do not get excited about possibilities behind the latest video engine...Wiley does. Read more about Robert

 



Bookmark and Share


(As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.)
Recommended TVs By Size
[an error occurred while processing this directive]