The Philips PUS9435 series has great aesthetics. The decoration is made in silver-black color. Philips PUS9235 models have a white bezel. The design decision was taken over from last year’s OLED934 series . At the front are Bowers & Wilkins speakers, which is expected from Philips this year.
The PUS9435 series uses an LED panel with Direct LED backlighting. Visually, this is a minimalistic and beautiful device. Speaker housing color is black and white. It’s worth emphasizing here that this is not a soundbar. The speaker, or rather the speaker box, is attached to the TV using a T-shaped stand, which gives the impression of a “hanging” screen.
The central stand of the stand is reinforced with a small metal plate to strengthen the support, but there is no swivel function – you cannot rotate the screen relative to the stand. The speaker cabinet is draped with Kvadrat fabric, which attracts attention.
The remote control is slightly angular, made in a plastic case. There is nothing new in the design of the console. Most Philips TVs are equipped with these standard input devices. The body is black, the buttons are backlit, there are separate Netflix and Rakuten keys (depending on the region). The rear of the console has a finish similar to Scottish Muirhead leather.
The PUS9435 series TVs have a VESA mount, while the 43PUS9235 does not come with this option. Let’s add that the 9235 series has only one 43-inch diagonal, and it makes no sense to hang such a TV on the wall.
Opportunities
The 9435 series is equipped with 3-sided Ambilight, which can be operated in several modes. The specs include the P5 graphics engine, but without the AI processing that typically accompanies 2020 OLED models. PUS9435 models have universal support for HDR standards: HDR10, HDR10 + and Dolby Vision.
Such an abundance of standards is Philips’ trademark, which users like. In HDR modes, the maximum peak brightness is about 500 nits. The 55PUS9435 TV interface is based on Android 9 Pie. The Google Assistant service is built into the 9435 and 9235 series models. There is support for Alexa. Alexa voice control requires an additional speaker.
Sound
Speakers Philips 55PUS9435 are made in the style of B&W, which we met in last year’s series. In the back there are phase inverters. Adjacent to the two tweeters are four midrange drivers and two Atmos speakers at the top of the soundbar.
They are located closer to the edges of the case. The bass drivers support ABRs (Assisted Bass Radiators), thereby achieving low noise levels. Since the 55PUS9435 in question is a demo model, the focus was on sound, not image quality.
Therefore, it is difficult to make final conclusions about the visual characteristics of the PUS9435. But what was shown on the screen was enough to evaluate Philips visual effects. The image looks great with rich and vibrant colors.
When assessing the sound quality, there was a comparison between the PUS9435 and last year’s OLED934. All tracks used as reference on the two models performed well. In terms of music, the PUS9435 boasted typical B&W reproduction with an excellent “musical sound”.
The vocals of each contender for comparison were strong and clear. The performance of each track is warm. The bass was good too. In general, the sound system pleased me and you may not have to purchase a separate soundbar.
The off-screen voices are clearly audible, spreading just above the TV screen, which adds a “sound from above” feeling. This is not to say that this effect is the most exciting, as it is difficult to achieve without the help of the rear channels. However, it was an impressive show in front of a TV screen that shouldn’t cost as much as the OLED 934.
In fact, the difference in sound reproduction between OLED 934 and PUS9435 is not as great as expected. To be honest, the OLED934 wins, but the soundscape between the two was similar. And this means that the PUS9435 gets a solid top five in terms of sound.
Connections
Philips has confirmed support for Disney + since March 2020. But this service will be available for now only for the European market. According to some reports, eARC support is not provided, although some sources indicate HDMI 2.1 interface with ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode). Speaking of interfaces, only two of the four HDMIs can support HDR content from an external source.
Conclusion
Apparently, when we looked at the PUS9435 series, we all expected “good sound” ratings in the non-premium segment. And Philips did it.
The Philips PUS9435 series boasts sound, as TVs with this 2.1.2 sound configuration are rare on the market today. However, image performance has not been tested.
