Samsung NU7100 TV Review

The design of the Samsung NU7100 is great. It incorporates design features found in higher-end models like the similar legs to the Q8FN (without the silver finish.) and the same back as the NU8000. 

The stand is modern and sturdy. It is wide enough to fit a soundbar in front.

Footprint of the 55" TV stand: 37.2" x 10.3"

The back of the TV has the same textured finish found in this year's NU8000. There are a few cable management tracks that span the entire width of the back of the TV. Also the TV comes with two clips that attach to the stand legs to also assist with cable management.

The borders of the Samsung UN55NU7100 are simple with a textured plastic finish and have average thickness.

The TV looks thin when viewed from the side and resembles the also new NU8000. It too lacks the OneConnect mini, saving you the trouble of where to place it when wall mounting the TV. At the same time, changing connections is not a as simple as with the OneConnect.

The NU7100 gets warm along the bottom edge of the panel where the LEDs are. This is common for many Samsung models and should not be a problem.

The build quality is ok. It feels solid even though it is almost entirely made from plastic.

The contrast on the TV is great, and in-line with other Samsung TVs like the NU7300. This is good for producing deep dark scenes.

Update 06/15/2018: We have reset the TV and retested the native contrast ratio, and it is a bit higher. It is likely that the calibration raised the black levels slightly, lowering the previously measured contrast ratio.

The Samsung NU7100 does not have a local dimming feature. The above video is provided for reference only.

Decent peak brightness, good enough for a dimly lit room but the Samsung 55NU7100 can't get bright enough to overcome glare. It isn't as bright as similar models from last year, like the MU6100 or MU6500

Disappointing HDR peak brightness. It is fairly consistent across all input windows. Small highlights in dark scenes are dimmed by the TV's algorithms, as shown by our 2% window test. Like with SDR, the HDR performance is worse than last year's Samsung lineup. Similar performance to the budget-level LG UK6300.

The TV has a good gray uniformity. In the 50% gray test picture you can notice it is a little darker on the sides and especially on the corners. This fades as we move towards the center of the screen where things are pretty even and thus, the minor dirty screen effect is hardly noticeable. This is very good for those who will use the TV mostly for sports viewing.
The 5% gray uniformity is very good with no noticeable brighter spots.

The Samsung NU7100 has a poor viewing angle, but it is better than last year's MU6300. The black levels shift dramatically when viewing even slightly off center.

The Samsung NU7100 has an excellent black uniformity, similar to the 2017 MU6300 and one of the best among LED TVs. The are no clouding issues and black looks very uniform. As a result, dark scenes in movies look great.

The TV has good reflection handling, but the semi-gloss finish can't overcome glare in a brightly-lit room. It has a similar finish to the MU6300 and MU6500.

Out of the box color accuracy is decent. The Movie picture mode provided the most accurate settings. White balance and color dE are a bit high but most people won't notice a huge difference. Gamma is high, and color temperature is a bit warm.

Update 04/12/2019: This TV was incorrectly measured with Brightness +2, instead of at 0. This only has a small impact on the results (slightly dimmer dark scenes below about 30 IRE) and so we don't plan to retest it.

After calibration with the Movie picture mode, the white balance is almost perfect and colors are much better. Gamma follows our target 2.2 almost perfectly, although the color temperature is a little off from our target of 6500K.

See our recommended settings here.

The Samsung NU7100 displays older 480p content well, without any issues or obvious artifacts.

720p input is displayed properly without any obvious scaling artifacts

1080p content, like from a non 4k Blu-ray or game console is displayed well and looks almost as good as native 4k content.

Native 4k content is displayed well on the TV.

The NU7100 supports a standard color gamut only and is best suited for SDR content. Like the 2017 MU6500, red and green fall quite short of their HDR targets.

The 'Movie' Picture mode is the most accurate, but it doesn't follow our PQ curve. The brightness rolls off gradually as the TV gets closer to its peak brightness. The PC and Game EOTFs are very similar to 'Movie', but also don't follow our target very closely.

Disappointing color volume, mainly due to the limited color gamut of the TV. It is unable to produce deep, dark colors, and it is limited in its ability to produce bright saturated colors like those in a sunset or bright outdoor scene.

The TV displays our test pattern well but in real-world tests, there are small points of banding in large areas of similar color.

There is no temporary image retention on the NU7100.

We don't expect the TV to experience burn-in, as the VA panel in our long-term test appears immune.

Decent response time. In dark scenes like our 20% test slide the 100% transition is very slow and there is some motion trail.

It is slightly worse than last year's MU6300, and similar to the MU7000. While it isn't bad, competing TVs from other brands like the LG UK6300 offer better motion performance.

Most of the blur in the above photo is due to duplications caused by the backlight flicker.

Similar to the Q8FN, the flicker varies depending on settings.

The Samsung NU7100 uses PWM to dim the backlight except when at 100%. It flickers at a high frequency (240Hz), but due to pwm at lower brightness levels, the flicker becomes more noticeable. This year's model is an improvement over the MU6300 with its 120Hz flicker, but it is still not as good as the Sony X850F

When Auto Motion Plus is enabled with the slider set to 0, the backlight flickers at 120Hz, as seen here. This creates a duplicated motion trail similar to when motion interpolation is enabled.

Similar to the Q8FN, the flicker varies depending on settings. There is almost no flicker in 'Movie' mode with the backlight at 100% and 'Auto Motion Plus' set to Custom.

The TV has an optional black frame insertion feature to help motion appear smoother. When enabled, this feature reduces the flicker frequency to 60Hz. As on all Samsung TVs, this is enabled by setting 'Auto Motion Plus' to Custom, and enabling 'LED Clear Motion'.

New to this year's NU7100 is the ability to keep the 120Hz flicker when in game mode. This can help motion in games appear smoother if you don't mind the visible flicker. This is automatically activated when you are in Game Mode, as there is no other option to enable flicker.

Similar to the Q8FN, the flicker varies depending on settings.

The TV is able to interpolate 30 fps content up to 60 fps, the native refresh rate of the panel. This can help motion appear more fluid, but some people don't like the Soap Opera Effect this causes. To enable it, set 'Auto Motion Plus' to Custom, and adjust the 'Judder Reduction' slider to your preference.

In motion scenes there are visible artifacts, when the motion gets too intense the TV stops interpolating.

Similar to the Q8FN, the flicker varies depending on settings.

The Samsung UN55NU7100 is great at displaying content without stutter, even for low frame rate movies. The higher response time helps the transition between frames appear smoother.

The TV cannot remove judder from 24 fps content played through a 60p/i cable box, or from native 24 fps content played from a Blu-ray. Most people aren't very sensitive to judder and won't see it.

The Samsung NU7100 does not support any of the variable refresh rate technologies like AMD's Freesync. This was tested with an Xbox One S and with a Radeon RX 580.