Our best picture... All TV reception, screen images, monitor pictures and print pictures are simulated. 2012 Sony Electronics Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. Sony, BRAVIA, X-Reality, Motionflow, OptiContrast, Intelligent Peak LED, Media Remote, Sony Tablet and the Sony make.believe logo are trademarks of Sony. PlayStation is a trademark of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. Blu-ray Disc is a trademark. Android is a trademark of Google Inc. iphone, ipod, and ipad are trademarks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. All other trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners. Features and specifications are subject to change without notice. 2012 Training Guide Televisions Sony Electronics Inc. 16530 Via Esprillo San Diego, CA 92127 1-800-222-7669 www.sony.com HD4163
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Here s why: 06 Why we made this guide 10 TV myths and facts 18 How to determine the best TV picture 26 Not all smart devices are created equal 30 How to demonstrate the best TV picture 42 You ll want to watch everything on it 44 Sony invented or exclusive technologies 46 Our product line up 5
You don t sell features. You sell entertainment. Another pocketful of features? Hardly. You don t sell features. You sell entertainment experiences magic! This guide shows you what s important to your customers in televisions, then helps you discover and present the Sony TV magic that meets those desires. At the end of the day, we re all consumers. And all consumers want to be happy with what they buy. We wrote this guide with that in mind. It s always about them. 01 Connectivity Picture Quality The three keys to making your customers happy: Always put the customer s desires before yours. Recommend products individually tailored to each customer, whether or not they re your personal favorites. Full HD 1080p 3D Look at the big picture. 02 Show them the magic. 03 The 2012 line of Sony BRAVIA televisions focus on three key benefits: picture quality, connectivity and Full HD 1080p 3D. Listen closely to what your customer tells you. Even if they re only buying a single product, think about how that product will mesh with what they already own, as well as how it will work with future upgrades. Something they ve never seen before. Something they can only get from you, or from the unique products you sell. 6 7
TV myths vs. facts. 1 Myth A handful of companies make all LCD panels, so no brand of TV is better than another. Fact A panel is a part, one of many in a TV. All manufacturers use parts from others. Just because you bought some of the same ingredients as a gourmet chef, doesn t mean the sauce will taste as good. It s what you do with the ingredients that differentiates you. The magic isn t in the LCD panel it s in the Sony exclusive technologies that make our panels perform like no other. Since most panels are made by the same manufacturers, a key component that makes one TV better than another is the processing engine that drives the panel. Only Sony has the acclaimed X-Reality and X-Reality PRO processing engines, and they re a big reason one of many why Sony TV picture quality is so good. Keep reading you ll see. 10 11
2 Myth If a TV picture looks better in the store, it ll look better at home. Fact Not true. Most TV brands are set up to stand out in a brightly-lit store. Everything s artificially enhanced to the max color saturation, color temperature, contrast, sharpness. An uninformed customer will think this standout picture is better. Wait till they get it home. TV showroom modes are designed to get attention from a distance. What stood out in the bright store is eye-piercing and inaccurate in the relaxed lighting at home. You don t want a returned TV because the customer is unhappy about the picture. Sony TVs are set up to look accurate and natural in both home lighting and store lighting. How? When you turn on a Sony TV for the first time, you ll have the opportunity to select between Retail Mode and Home Mode. In the store, you ll select Retail Mode, and Sony TVs will give you the most accurate picture possible in a bright store environment. At home, your customers will select Home mode. Then they ll get the same professional-quality picture as Sony s most demanding customers movie studios, TV studios, and Blu-ray mastering labs. 12 13
3 Myth All TVs with the same motion clarity number have the same picture quality. HX929 HX850 Fact Not even close. You may see two TVs sitting side-by-side, both claiming a motion-clarity number of 480. The TVs may even cost the same. But the technologies generating that number are totally different. HX750 EX640 Other manufacturers may take a 120Hz LCD panel and insert black frames by blinking off the panel s LED backlight to achieve the desired frame rate (480). It takes a lot of black frames to get a 120Hz panel to simulate the motion clarity of 480. While this technique can reduce judder, injecting that many black frames can also introduce the side effect of darkening the picture, and can actually introduce blur, which motion-smoothing was designed to cure! Sony s Motionflow XR 480 system begins with a high-speed 240Hz panel, not a 120Hz panel. So, getting to 480 requires fewer black frames, resulting in a brighter, clearer picture with less blurring. Using the 240Hz panel, Motionflow XR 480 combines Sony s exclusive X-Reality picture engine, image blur reduction, and backlight blinking to create a clear, detailed picture as objects move across the screen. The number 480 may be the same. But the motion clarity is not. 14 15
An outstanding picture quality an elegant design, and top-notch features make the Bravia XBR-55HX929 a tough HDTV to beat pcmag.com, Sony BRAVIA XBR-55HX929
How to determine the best TV picture. Motionflow Technology Make it move. With TVs, you ll see all kinds of motion-smoothing numbers 120, 240, 480, 960. Those numbers help indicate how the TV handles fast motion errors, but explaining motionsmoothing to a customer is much easier than that. Just show a moving picture, preferably one with a nice, sweeping camera pan across a big scene, such as a skyline or a landscape. What are you looking for in this scene? Taking motion clarity above and beyond for a more lifelike picture. Judder the slight shaking motion from converting film to video. The TV with the smoothest motion wins. Sony s Motionflow technology actually compensates for the motion blur caused by slow shutter speed in the camera that captured the action. We make the cameras and we know TV, so we can deliver superb motion technology. 18 19
Make it stop. Freezing a TV picture lets you take your time examining attributes such as color accuracy and dark-area detail. Example: a person wearing a black shirt or suit. Freeze the picture, then compare how TVs handle detail in the black garment (buttons, lapels, wrinkles, etc.) while still keeping a deep, accurate black. The goal: balance between detail and darkness. X-Reality PRO 02 01 01 dark area detail See the tiniest wisp of hair, the finest weave of cloth. 02 color accuracy View what the creators intended. Every shade and tint as real as life itself. Of course, you ll never see everything in a black garment. The director and cinematographer want to create a specific mood with some things revealed, others left in shadow. When show creators make that creative decision, they often make it while viewing a Sony display. To view what the creators intended, play it back the same way. Optimizes everything you watch with unprecedented detail and astonishing color. 20 21
Go to black & white. It s common for TV makers to tweak the color temperature toward blue to make the whites pop in a brightly-lit store but you can go too far with this technique. It s difficult to see this trick in a color picture. But if you turn the color setting all the way down, you should see a difference. You ll see less black and bright blue in Sony 2012 TVs, resulting in more accurate color, even in our Vivid Mode. See it in action. Switch a Sony TV to black and white to see what it should actually look like. Our professional experience in post-production and mastering is directly reflected in our Sony televisions. Once you see the difference, we believe you won t tolerate an artificially tweaked TV ever again even in color. 22 23
Not all smart devices are created equal. Sony smart TVs offer Wi-Fi connectivity for instant access to movies, TV shows, videos and songs. Your customers can tap into the latest apps for news, weather, games, Facebook, Twitter and more while watching TV. And because new apps are automatically delivered, customers will have the latest content. Remember, quality of apps trumps number of apps. Video Unlimited. What do you expect from a company famous for picture quality? A video streaming service that encodes great looking content. Sony exclusive Video Unlimited offers access to over 80,000 movies and television shows from all major studios. Your customers will get access to content sooner, often 28 days earlier than Netflix. Enjoy the shows you want without having to leave the house. Music Unlimited. Music Unlimited is the ultimate source for digital music, offering content from all major music studios. A single subscription delivers instant access to over 15 million songs plus a personal music library, ad free radio channels, and access across multiple devices including Sony TVs and Sony Blu-ray Disc players, Sony tablets, VAIO computers, PlayStation 3 systems and Android Smartphones. It s easy to customize a listening experience with the Music Unlimited My Channels feature. All your customer has to do is just enter the name of a favorite artist and a playlist will be instantly created featuring similar music. Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon and more. With no need for a PC, bring the best of the internet to the TV screen wirelessly or via Ethernet port. Access music from around the world with Pandora and Slacker Radio; stream the latest movies and TV series from Netflix and Hulu Plus or free from Crackle. With millions of possibilities, customers will get more digital entertainment choices all in one place to enjoy a world of online entertainment from the comfort of the couch or on the go. From the hottest movie release, healthy dinner recipes, golf tips, or Skype video calls with far away friends and family, Sony offers the kind of content that will make a difference in your customer s life. 26 27
The best-looking picture I ve seen from an LCD TV in a long time. soundandvisionmag.com, Sony BRAVIA XBR-55HX929
You ll want to watch everything on it. YouTube clips and cable TV look amazing. Blu-ray Disc movies, phenomenal. Even 3D comes alive with clear details as real as life itself. Completing the Picture: Bringing It All Home. When you watch a film in a movie theater, you re likely enjoying a Sony complete picture from camera to editing to surround sound to mastering. To complete the picture at home, create a Sony ecosystem for your customers. With each Sony component designed to perform seamlessly with the others, your customers will have a high performing, well-matched, easy to use system. The Sony TV is the center of the home entertainment universe. For each customer, wrap a custom experience around the Sony TV with the right choices from: Sony Blu-ray Disc for highdefinition and 3D content Sony Home Audio and Sony ES components for pro theater-like sound Sony Blu-ray Theater system for one-box theater content and sound Sony Soundbar system for theater sound add-on to TV Sony PlayStation 3 system for HD and 3D gaming and more Sony HomeShare components to send music around the home Sony Streaming Player to turn any TV into a Smart TV, or share content home-wide Sony HD camcorders and still cameras to share personal 2D and 3D content 42