The Grundig Fine Arts GBH 9040 is a Full HD 40-inch LCD TV. It’s been available in Europe since autumn 2009 for a list price of 1,699 euros (1,550 GBP), but sells online for about 1,300 euros (1,200 GBP). UK pricing and availability were unavailable at the time of writing.

Reviewed by Florian Friedrich on March 26, 2010

High contrast ratio.
High motion sharpness.
Low power consumption.
Excellent picture from RGB signals.
USB recording capabilities.

Poor presets for home cinema.
24p video shows 3:2-pulldown judder.
Errors in video processing for YCbCr signals.

Grundig has once again found the right path with its TVs: The GBH 9040 offers a number of great functions, relatively high contrast, and an excellent picture from RGB signals. Weaknesses in the operating software disappoint, but Grundig has already announced an update to remedy these.

Most Important Connections:

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Multimedia

With its €1,700 list price, the Grundig is one of the pricier 40-inch models on the market. So why’s it so expensive? This is partly to do with the unusual features (recording via USB), the four-centimetre-deep casing, and the highly effective LED backlighting.

In terms of multimedia, Grundig’s USB 2.0 interface is a real highlight: It can play back multimedia files, such as DivX videos, as well as USB recordings from suitable set-top boxes. When receiving a digital signal, the TV can also record programs to USB storage devices itself. Programming the recording function is easy via the Electronic Program Guide (EPG), and we think the whole thing makes for an excellent, innovative feature.

On the down side, you can only simultaneously record and play for short periods of time, meaning time-shift TV will only record for a maximum of 10 minutes. Manual recording only allows you to watch the live picture; that is, you can neither pause nor rewind the stream.

Other Features and Operation

Complete package: The Grundig’s connections cover all the bases. Still, only providing one Scart socket seems a bit miserly.

The built-in tuner can receive both analogue and digital cable, including HDTV, and digital terrestrial TV. The problem for digital-cable users, however, is the lack of a CI+ slot. In terms of operation, too, we have a few complaints: Channel changing, for example, takes a bit too long, and there’s no back button. The menu looks very modern, but isn’t particularly intuitive to operate.

Less than ideal: The remote control’s mini joystick demands a lot of dexterity.

Picture Quality of Standard-Definition Signals

The movie preset offers the best basis for deriving a natural TV picture; any adjustments are stored automatically in the “User” preset. We had to change a few things to get an attractive analogue TV picture, and the changes also brought excellent fine-detail differentiation to digital TV.

If you input a Scart-RGB signal, the Grundig delivers a picture of above-average quality. Stupidly, however, there’s no film mode, meaning there’s loads of flicker on fine structures in DVDs such as our chosen test film, “Six Days Seven Nights”. Fast-moving pictures display with almost no blur — as long as you reduce the backlighting. If you find judder or double edges on fast objects irritating, we recommend activating the 100-hertz motion-enhancement technology.

Unfortunately, the HDMI input’s video processing isn’t exactly the cream of the crop: If you input a signal in the YCbCr colour space, dark areas of the picture look muddy, giving a dull overall effect. You’re on the safe side if you’ve got a player or set-top box that allows you to change the colour space, since using the RGB colour space results in an accurate picture with full differentiation and natural colours. But there’s sadly nothing you can do about the non-uniform greyscale reproduction: Dark greys show a pronounced blue tint, and slight colouration appears in black-and-white films.

Picture Quality of High-Definition Signals

The Grundig’s colours deviate from the standard values.

The levels problem described above also appears in YCbCr signals from Blu-ray players, causing errors in the picture. In general, too, Blu-ray films look excessively soft. Test patterns quickly show the cause of this: The Grundig cannot achieve 1:1 pixel mapping, so fine details are lost. We also see weaknesses in the 24p reproduction, which fails to replicate authentic cinema-style video: Irregular 3:2-pulldown judder appears in the intro sequence of “Casino Royale”.

But Grundig has already announced a firmware update to resolve these criticisms. We’re keen to see how this turns out, as it could turn the Grundig Fine Arts GBH 9040 into a first-class TV. After all, the Grundig already meets one essential criterion for attractive movie pictures: a deep black. The in-picture contrast ratio, at over 3,300:1, almost meets the level of plasma displays.

Sound Quality

The built-in speakers perform well: The sound is neutral and clear in both music and speech.

Picture Mode: Custom

Brightness: 51

Contrast: 76

Sharpness: 13

Colour: 51

Noise Reduction: Off

Colour Temp.: Warm

Vibrant Colour: Low

Perfect Clear: Off

Dynamic Contrast: Off

Dynamic Backlight: Off

MPEG Artefact Reduction: Off

These settings apply to realistic playback of HDTV/Blu-ray material through the HDMI interface in a darkened environment. Manufacturing and HDMI playback device deviations might necessitate slight adjustment.