I have been using the Panasonic 49” JX900 for a few weeks now, with multiple sources and digital content to get it through different use cases.
The Panasonic 49” JX900 is a premium 4K LED TV with a rich feature list. Its HDR Cinema Display Pro screen is impressive and shows high contrast and smooth performance, with consistent brightness all over the screen.
Its new HCX Pro AI Processor continuously works to figure out the content you are watching, making sure colour and contrast are appropriate for the content you are watching. With multi HDR support, including HDR10+ and Dolby Vision IQ, it gives you a perfect picture automatically.
You can also set the TV to use any of multiple preset modes which include a filmmaker mode that makes the picture appear as intended by the creator, even under different light conditions.
In case you have a controlled environment and know what to do you can easily set your own picture mode and adjust it to achieve the results you want.
My use involved a good mix of sources, including Freeview DVB-T, Amazon Fire TV, Vodafone TV and an Xbox Series X. It also involved having different light sources including natural sunlight through windows or artificial LED downlights. In every way, the Panasonic 49” JX900 performed admirably.
In terms of sound, it includes support for Dolby Atmos and multiple sound modes that you can tweak at will. The sound comes from two 10w speakers and it’s probably good enough for a small room – you will get a much better result if you pair it with a soundbar.
Talking about a soundbar it’s interesting to note when you assemble the TV you have the option of positioning the stand in the middle or at each end of the TV. This means you can easily push a soundbar closer to it thanks to the space between the two feet.
Initial Freeview setup was painless and took only a couple of minutes. The on-screen guide is easy to use but I couldn’t get the rewind option for live TV to work – even if you plug some external storage. Attaching external storage (in my case a 750 GB SSD) allows you to record both individual episodes or entire series. The control to record and playback are easy to use.
The smart TV functionality is pretty good. Apps include Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, TVNZ on Demand, Freeview on Demand, YouTube, Disney+, Spark Sport, Sky Sport and Neon – even Plex. The remote control has dedicated Netflix, YouTube and Prime Video buttons. You can connect the TV to the Internet via ethernet or via WiFi - including 5 GHz support. You can also manually change network settings.
If this is not enough, there’s a good mix of inputs – four HDMI in total with support for HDMI 2.1. Different inputs have different capabilities so make sure you select the correct input for each device you to connect. All inputs support ALL (Auto Low Latency Mode), eARC (Enhanced Audio Return Channel) is only supported on HDMI 2, VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) and 4K HFR (High Frame Rate) are supported on HDMI 1 and 2. In addition to these you also have three USB ports and Bluetooth wireless connectivity.
The Panasonic 49” JX900 has built-in Alexa. I just added it to my account and use the dedicated voice button on the remote to get Alexa's attention. It works just like other Alexa devices, giving voice responses and showing more information on the big screen.
For high spec gaming, you will want to use either HDMI 1 or HDMI 2. The Xbox Series X uses all these features, giving you glorious 4K 120 Hz gaming with a very smooth performance.
The Panasonic 49” JX900 is available through retail now.
