When comparing Sony X900E 49" (XBR49X900E) vs VIZIO P-Series 55" (P55-E1), the Slant community recommends Sony X900E 49" (XBR49X900E) for most people. In the question“What are the best TVs?” Sony X900E 49" (XBR49X900E) is ranked 6th while VIZIO P-Series 55" (P55-E1) is ranked 8th. The most important reason people chose Sony X900E 49" (XBR49X900E) is:
The X900E looks true-to-life with really deep blacks, clear details, and captivating colors. Pictures look realistic with lots of details. There’s great depth to them and you’ll be able to see everything in the picture stand out. Dark scenes are excellent with nice shadow details that are not overly dark to the point where some details get drowned out. This is thanks to really deep black levels, enabled by the panel’s contrast ratio of about 5500:1 which means it can produce blacks that are 5500 times darker than the brightest white. This can be pushed even further to over 6500 with local dimming. The colors are lifelike and accurate even without any calibration by the user. They will look really vibrant even in bright scenes because of the panel’s high peak brightness levels of ~500 nits for SDR & ~550 nits for HDR. Even in a decently lit environment, the X900E’s picture quality can still hold up as the panel is great at handling reflections and it can get bright enough to fight off glare.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Excellent picture quality
The X900E looks true-to-life with really deep blacks, clear details, and captivating colors.
Pictures look realistic with lots of details. There’s great depth to them and you’ll be able to see everything in the picture stand out.
Dark scenes are excellent with nice shadow details that are not overly dark to the point where some details get drowned out. This is thanks to really deep black levels, enabled by the panel’s contrast ratio of about 5500:1 which means it can produce blacks that are 5500 times darker than the brightest white. This can be pushed even further to over 6500 with local dimming.
The colors are lifelike and accurate even without any calibration by the user. They will look really vibrant even in bright scenes because of the panel’s high peak brightness levels of ~500 nits for SDR & ~550 nits for HDR.
Even in a decently lit environment, the X900E’s picture quality can still hold up as the panel is great at handling reflections and it can get bright enough to fight off glare.
Pro Google Assistant is available
The X900E runs on Android TV that has Google Assistant. It has voice commands that are pretty useful as you can open apps with it, ask for the weather, and even turn the TV off.
Pro Excellent at upscaling low-res content
The X900E can upscale 480p, 720p, 1080p content to 4K with no issues. All the details are preserved and most won't notice any imperfections.
Pro Virtually no reflections
The X900E's panel has a semi-gloss finish that significantly reduces the intensity of glare.
Pro Great ecosystem of third-party apps
The X900E runs on Android TV that has access to the Google Play Store. The Play Store has a nice selection of apps, but normal Android apps won't work unless they support Android TV.
Pro Interface is ads-free
There are no ads on the X900E's interface.
Pro Excellent at handling highly dynamic content
The X900E can display fast-paced or rapidly-moving objects very well without any trails behind it. The panel only requires ~11ms to fully change the pixels color, which eliminates virtually all motion blur. It also has a native refresh rate of 120Hz that makes images look smoother.
Pro Great versatility
Apart from being an excellent TV for movies, the X900E is a decent choice for gaming and sports thanks to its decent input lag, low motion blur, great screen uniformity, and a 120 Hz native refresh rate that makes images look smoother.
The input lag of ~35ms is sufficient for most gamers, apart from competitive ones, to stay in sync with what's on the screen. The low motion blur of ~11ms and a refresh rate of 120 Hz ensures that everything will look smooth - fast-moving objects won't leave any trails on the screen.
It’s also viable for watching sports because the panel also has no issues with displaying large, same-color objects on screen, like football fields.
Pro Great at handling glare
Even in a decently lit room, the X900E's picture quality will remain more or less the same as in a dark room.
The colors will still look vibrant because the panel is bright enough to fight off glare. It has peak brightness levels of ~500 nits for SDR & ~550 nits for HDR, and reflections are also significantly reduced by the panel's semi-gloss finish.
Pro Excellent for HDR content
On top of the excellent picture quality, the X900E has everything essential to an immersive HDR experience: decent local dimming, great coverage of HDR colors, and high HDR peak brightness level.
Its excellent black levels are further improved with local dimming, which can make parts of the screen darker when the image calls for it. This results in an increase in overall picture quality with black levels becoming much deeper, so highlights will stand out further.
The panel can reproduce the wide range of colors required for true HDR playback because of its wide color gamut, which covers ~65% of the standard colors required for HDR according to the Rec. 2020 color space. This is considered great for reproducing HDR details, and it can display these colors accurately at different brightness levels.
Along with the the high peak brightness level of ~550 nits, HDR scenes will look stunning and you'll be able to see HDR details really pop.
Pro Highly versatile
Suitable for gaming, movies, and sports, the VIZIO P-series is one of the most versatile TVs in its price range. While the combination of low input lag and fast response time makes the TV suitable for gaming;, the VIZIO P-series also does a great job of processing highly dynamic content, such as sports. Furthermore, the TV’s uniform blacks, excellent local dimming, and reasonably high peak brightness makes it an attractive option for home theater.
Pro Good for gaming
It has great motion blur handling abilities and a dedicated gaming HDMI port with a reduced input lag of 15.9 ms makes the VIZIO P-series quite suitable for gaming.
The TV’s excellent motion blur handling is directly related to its ability to change the color of each pixel 80% of the way in just 3.9 ms so you won't notice any trails on rapidly moving objects. The VIZIO P-series by far outperforms all the competitors on the market when it comes to this.
Pro Picture looks good from an angle
The 55-inch model of the VIZIO P-series has excellent viewing angles because of its IPS panel which preserves correct colors and shades no matter the angle between the viewer and the panel. This property makes the TV ideal for watching with a group.
Pro Can increase media's frame rate
This TV is an excellent choice for those who like to ‘speed up’ the regular 30FPS media, sourced from cable/satellite boxes or old DVDs as it can boost up low frame rate content up to a whopping 120 frames per second rate. Some people call it a ‘soap opera effect’, but technically the process is called interpolation. Additionally, it’s worth mentioning that this TV’s biggest competitor: the TCL P607 cannot interpolate motion.
Pro Compatible with HDR media
The VIZIO P-series is suitable for HDR-enhanced content because of its full HDR10 and Dolby Vision support. The HDR10 and Dolby Vision are currently the two flagship HDR formats used in the multimedia industry, which means that all the new HDR movies and shows are compliant with either one of those formats.
It’s also worth noting that in the HDR field, the VIZIO P-series outperforms its competitors, including the Samsung MU8000 which lacks Dolby Vision support.
Pro Good build quality
The VIZIO P-series feels solid and rugged because its frame and stand are built from high-quality metal. In comparison, the most significant competitors of the VIZIO P-series: Samsung MU8000 and TCL P607 have their frames and stands built from plastic.
Pro Has an excellent remote app
This TV comes with a brilliant, well-integrated phone and tablet application which can transform your smart gadget into a fully-functional remote. The application is particularly handy when you need to input some text, for example, while searching content on YouTube or Netflix.
Pro Compatible with current-gen consoles
This TV works fine with all the current generation consoles, including the Xbox One X, PS4 Pro, and Wii U, because of its 4K 60 Hz support.
Cons
Con Bad sound quality
The sound quality of X900E's built-in speakers is bad. It can't produce much bass and sounds rather flat. There is also noticeable distortion at high volumes.
Con Lacks support for Dolby Vision
The X900E currently only supports the HDR10 format for HDR content.
Con Not suitable for group watching
The X900E has a narrow viewing angle that makes it unsuitable for group watching.
Its picture quality gets worse when viewed from off-center angles. At ≥20° away from the center, the blacks start degrading into greys and colors will start looking dull. Brightness levels start decreasing at ≥50° away from the center.
Con Bad for HDR gaming
This TV is not a good choice for HDR gaming because its dedicated gaming HDMI port does not have enough bandwidth to support the HDR-enchanted input. This means that you will have to use a regular HDMI input port to feed the TV with the HDR content. The problem here is that the regular HDMI input has 43.5 ms input lag which is too high for fast-paced, competitive gaming.
Con The 55-inch model has low contrast
The 55-inch VIZIO P-series TV has significantly lower picture quality than the 65-inch and 75-inch models. The 65-inch and 75-inch models use a VA panel while the 55-inch model has an IPS panel. The main difference between those is that the VA panel has, on average, four times higher contrast ratio than the IPS panel; Thus, the VA panel can reproduce more vibrant and more in-depth scenes.