Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 TV Review

The Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 is Vizio's second-highest model for 2019. It sits between the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019 and the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019 in their lineup. Vizio changed their lineup a bit this year, and this TV replaces the Vizio P Series 2018, not the namesake Vizio P Series Quantum 2018. The main competitors of this TV are the Samsung Q80R, Samsung Q70R, and the Hisense H9F.

The feet are almost identical to those found on the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019, but with a flat finish. They support the TV well but don't completely prevent the display from wobbling. Like other Vizio TVs, they are wide-set and require a large table if the display isn't VESA mounted.

Footprint of the 65" stand: 50.8" x 11.6".

The back of the TV is almost entirely made of plastic, and is very plain, with no cable management.

The borders are very thin and aren't distracting.

This TV is relatively thin and doesn't stand out much when wall-mounted.

The Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 has great build quality. It's sturdy and feels well-built, despite being made from cheaper materials than other high-end TVs.

The Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 has an excellent contrast ratio, but it's slightly worse than the other 2019 Vizio TVs we've tested, including the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019, which is unexpected. Local dimming is extremely effective at boosting the contrast ratio.

This TV has a great local dimming feature. It crushes blacks a bit more than the Vizio P Series 2018, but otherwise performs very similarly. With local dimming set to 'High', some scenes are a bit brighter, but others are dimmer and there is a bit more black crush. This setting might be a bit better for subtitled content, but otherwise, we recommend the 'Medium' setting for everyday use.

Like the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019 and the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019, the local dimming setting has an impact on peak brightness. Although we did most of our testing with it set to 'Medium', this setting might be too bright in some cases, in which case 'Low' is the better option.

Note that the 75" model has slightly more dimming zones, so local dimming performance might be slightly better.

The Vizio P659-G1 has great peak brightness but is significantly less bright than the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019. With most real content, it's only a bit brighter than the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019, but some scenes can get brighter. There is some variation in peak brightness with different content (ABL), but this shouldn't be an issue for most people.

We measured the peak brightness after calibration, with the 'Calibrated Dark' Picture Mode, and Local Dimming set to 'Medium'.

If you prefer a brighter image or a colder color temperature over an accurate one, with the 'Vivid' Picture Mode and the 'Cool' color temperature, with Gamma set to '1.8', and Local Dimming set to 'High' we measured a peak brightness of 984 cd/m² for a short period of time, as measured on the 10% test window.

Like the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019 and the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019, the local dimming setting has an impact on peak brightness. Although we did most of our testing with it set to 'Medium', this setting might be too bright in some cases, in which case 'Low' is the better option.

This TV has good peak brightness in HDR, much better than the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019, but not as good as the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019. Small highlights in some scenes are very bright but can fall short of the content creator's intent.

We tested the HDR peak brightness with no calibration settings, using the 'Calibrated Dark' Picture Mode, with the Backlight set to '50', and local dimming set to 'Medium'.

If accuracy isn't as important to you, or if you prefer a colder color temperature, the 'Vivid Picture Mode hit a peak brightness of 992 cd/m² for a short period of time, as measured with the 10% window, with the Color Temperature set to 'cool', Gamma set to '1.8', the backlight set to '100', and local dimming on 'High'.

Like the M Series Quantum 2019 and the P Series Quantum X 2019, the local dimming setting has an impact on peak brightness. Although we did most of our testing with it set to 'Medium', this setting might be too bright in some cases, in which case 'Low' is the better option.

Decent gray uniformity, but there is some noticeable dirty screen effect and some vertical lines that can be distracting in panning shots. There is also significant vignetting.

Like most VA TVs, the viewing angle on the Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 is poor. At wider angles the brightness decreases and black levels rise, causing the image to appear washed out, and colors shift and lose accuracy. For a better viewing angle, an IPS TV like the LG SM9000 or Sony X800G is a better choice.

The Vizio P659-G1 has good black uniformity. With local dimming disabled, there is some noticeable clouding throughout the image. With local dimming enabled, though, there is very little clouding, and almost no blooming around the bright test cross.

This TV has great reflection handling, almost identical to the M Series Quantum 2019.

With our pre-calibration settings, this TV has decent accuracy. Gamma is close to our target of 2.2, which is good, but more scenes are displayed slightly too dark. There are some noticeable color errors and some more significant errors in brighter shades of gray which might be noticeable.

After calibration, this TV has outstanding accuracy. Gamma follows the 2.2 target almost perfectly, and the color temperature is extremely close to the target of 6500K. Any remaining color and white balance errors are far too small to be noticeable.

You can see our recommended settings here.

Like all Vizio TVs, upscaled 480p content, like DVDs, doesn't look as good as most other brands. This doesn't bother everyone equally, but it might be an issue if you watch a lot of older content and are sensitive to upscaling artifacts.

720p content, like with 480p content, looks a bit worse than most other brands. It still looks decent, though, and should please most people.

1080p content like Blu-rays looks great, almost as good as native 4k content.

4k content is displayed perfectly, with no noticeable issues or artifacts.

The Vizio P659-G1 has an outstanding color gamut and has nearly perfect coverage of the DCI-P3 color space used by most 4k UHD Blu-rays. We did notice a difference in tone mapping between this TV and the other 2019 Vizio TVs we've tested. Although the 100% primaries are very saturated, the colors in between are skewed closer to the white point and are visibly less saturated than the Vizio M Series Quantum 2019 and the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019.

The EOTF follows the PQ curve very closely, resulting in an accurate HDR image up until the TV starts tone mapping. In 'Game' mode, the TV defaults to a backlight setting of '100', which results in an over-brightened image. Setting the backlight to '50' results in a more accurate EOTF, as (shown here). Whereas most TVs default to maximum brightness in HDR, Vizio TVs default to a setting of '50'. If you find HDR content too dark, simply increase this setting. If at a setting of '100' HDR is still too dark, also decreasing the gamma setting to '1.8' results in a noticeably brighter image, as shown here.

The Vizio P659-G1 has very good color volume. It can display deep, saturated colors well, but can't fill out its color gamut entirely, and like almost all current TVs, blues aren't as bright as other colors or pure white.

The Vizio P659-G1 has decent gradient handling. There is some banding noticeable in all colors, especially in shades of gray or green. Like the other 2019 Vizio TVs we've tested, there is no option that can smooth gradients.

There are no signs of temporary image retention on this TV, even immediately after displaying our high-contrast static test image for 10 minutes.

We don't expect VA panels to experience permanent image retention, as the VA panel in our long-term test appears immune.

This TV has an outstanding response time. There is some overshoot noticeable, especially in dark scenes, and there are noticeable duplications in motion, due to the 120Hz flicker of the backlight.

Like the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019, the backlight on the Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 uses PWM to dim, so there is flicker at every backlight level below 100. This 120Hz flicker causes duplications in moving objects, as seen in the response time photo.

The Vizio P659-G1 has an optional black frame insertion feature that can help improve the appearance of motion by reducing the backlight flicker frequency to 60Hz. To enable this feature, set Clear Action to 'On'.

This TV has a native 120Hz panel, and it can interpolate low frame rate content up to 120Hz.

Find out more about the Vizio P Series Quantum 2019's motion interpolation feature, and how to enable it, here.

Due to the fast response time, there is some noticeable stutter when watching 24p movies. This is especially noticeable in slow panning shots. If stutter bothers you, the motion interpolation and black frame insertion features can help reduce the amount of stutter.

Like the Vizio P Series Quantum X 2019, this TV can remove judder from true 24p sources, like a Blu-ray player, or from the native apps, automatically, with no additional settings. Unfortunately, it can only remove judder from 60p/i sources by setting the Reduce Judder slider to '1'. This might introduce some motion interpolation, although we didn't notice any artifacts.

The Vizio P659-G1 has a native 120Hz refresh rate, but it doesn't support any advanced variable refresh rate technologies, like FreeSync.

The Vizio P Series Quantum 2019 has outstanding low lag, which is great for a responsive gaming experience. Unlike most brands, this mode can be enabled from any picture mode, simply by enabling the Low Latency setting.

Like many high-end Vizio TVs, the lowest input lag is reserved for HDMI port 5. The other ports still have low input lag, but it's a bit higher than most TVs currently on the market. Unfortunately, the low latency port doesn't support some high-bandwidth formats, including 4k @ 60Hz with 4:4:4, and it doesn't support HDR.

This TV doesn't support game auto low latency mode (ALLM).

The Vizio P659-G1 supports most common input formats but doesn't support 1440p. It can also display chroma 4:4:4 properly in all supported modes, as long as the 'Computer' picture mode is used, which is great for use as a PC monitor. The Full UHD Color has to be enabled for most high bandwidth signals.

Like many other Vizio TVs, HDMI port 5 is a low-latency port, and it doesn't have the Full UHD Color setting, so some formats, including 4k @ 60Hz 4:4:4 aren't supported.

Update 12/09/2019: Vizio has added support for HDR10+ on most 2019 and 2018 models.

Like most other Vizio TVs, this TV supports HDR10 and Dolby Vision.