Philips The One 58PUS8545 TV Review – A bit of everything!
If looking up for a versatile and convenient TV, it's worth a shot!

Philips The One 58PUS8545. This is not any type of a TV, but THE CHOSEN one. I find it exciting to give such a prominent name not to a flagship, not an OLED 8K, but to a middle-ranged one. And this shows something: that Philips stresses what’s low-price!
A bit of history
So, what’s in a name? Philips is a company set up in 1891 in Eindhoven in the Netherlands, and it started by making… bulbs. Almost 100 years later, in 1972, Philips produced and sold the first video-recorder in the world and this is one of the numerous achievements in their rich track record. In 2011, the TV Philips division was sold to TVP Technology, a firm based in Hong Kong, while TP Vision, the entity now dealing with the production of Philips TVs, is still based in Amsterdam. At present, Philips TV sets are owned and designed by TP Vision; they have no connection whatsoever with what’s left from the Philips brand and are made in China. Of course, this doesn’t mean that they aren’t very good ones, but don’t think that you have got that type of Philips familiar in your childhood, which was a European brand. But the name Philips is there, and it’s not just written down, TP Vision took care to keep the brand quality up.
Philips The One 58PUS8545: size and design
Let’s now move on to another key “aspect”: the looks. It is good looking and impressive. Philips The One comes up in several size options, from 108 to about 176 cm. Which means 43, 50, 58, 65, and 70 inches, and 58PUS8545 is right in the middle. So, I’d say that a 58-inches one or 146 cm fits in, neither too large, nor too small. I’ve placed it behind my own 55-inches one for a few days in a 5m x 5m sized room and it fits well the decor.
As to the design, Philips The One 58PUS8545 is plain and minimalist. A silver metallic case, simple, maybe a bit too thick for some people’s taste and a metallic top stand, quite large and solid, yet sufficiently discreet. Metallic as well, but shiny compared to the matte case, the stand turning the screen left-right. The set is quite robust and well-built.
58PUS8545 is rather thick, no extra-flat back to stick it to the wall, has VESA and bumps not allowing a full alignment with the wall. Connectors divided in two slots, HDMI, USB, ethernet, digital audio, everything a TV needs in 2020.
Ambilight
And this series, Philips the One has something, something many of you will truly enjoy: Ambilight. This TV has RGB LEDs all around its back except the bottom, LEDs to be synchronized with the image on the display, in order to project a glow suitable to the screen content. You can set those LEDs to get a certain pattern, a specific background, or you can, as said, to synchronize with the content. This back glow is absolutely spectacular, and once you play it’s simply awesome. In addition, Philips The One 58PUS8545 comes with integrated Philips Hue, I’ve got this, and it can be easily synchronized with the HUE bridge. As long as the TV and the bridge are on the same network, this happens simply and naturally.
Android TV operating system, games and apps
Yes, we do have Android TV. Unlike LG or Samsung which use proprietary operating systems, namely Web OS, respectively Tizen, Philips, just like Sony, uses Android TV. It is a better opened system, and the more it will be adopted by several brands and models, the more popular it could become. I have installed a Google Play Store and downloaded Real Racing 3. The pleasant surprise was that I could connect on Blutooth 4.2, the TV supports this one, a G613 gaming keyboard from Logitech, a ROG Gladius 2 mouse and a Dual Shock PS4. I have downloaded the game right on the TV, the scaling is ok, but the processor doesn’t work too well, and I’d say the details aren’t great either. But the controller went really, really fine and I could finish a Real Racing 3 race on the TV with the controller. And this seems to me really exciting.
Philips The One 58PUS8545 has 16 GB internal memory and a bonus: you can add an external USB memory. So, get it, it’s there, and you’ve got the console as well. This would then be the benefit of its operating system: you have the whole range of apps from the Android ecosystem, and that in principle over time you can use any game or app from this store. I installed a GeForce Now on the TV, relieving the stress on the internal processor, and played Death Sranding directly on the TV using only a controller. It’s not the same image and speed as on a tough phone, you still need some resources to keep the app and stream up even if it’s processed somewhere in cloud, but it can be played.
Both in the case of games directly taken from the Android, and for those streamed from Cloud, the experience is not the most fluid in the world, but they work for now, on an affordable TV with Android TV, and this means to steal a glance at what could be great and convenient in a few years from now on. These would be some of the benefits to use Android TV. And, of course, especially when about games, Ambilight!
Philips The One 58PUS8545: screen and image
Can one see well? How well? We looked at it closely. The screen is 4K and can support Dolby Vision, the HDR most popular standard on Netflix. Full HD in 2020 is not worth since 4K are quite affordable now. And as we started looking into this, we hit a limit: although there is a brightness cursor, it does not change the intensity. Lighting seems fixed on this TV, you have two modes, night and day, and a few more settings such as vivid, standard, games or film. You could however change brightness from Backlight Contrast, but this is something else and it would have changed other values. But the screen itself is really good.
This TV has an excellent blackness level, of only 0,09 to maximum brightness and a contrast of over 3000 to 1. The color uniformity is also very good, with a maximum Delta E deviation of 4.1 in the top right upper section, the rest being of 2 or under 2, which is again surprisingly good. The light uniformity is also excellent, maximum 10% deviation. The brightness does not “shine”, between 200 and 300 nits average in SDR, which I’d say doesn’t burn the retina (I couldn’t measure the HDR, but most likely the peak brightness in this standard goes somewhere in between 400 and 500 nits) but except this the screen is more than decent, at least for the color uniformity and accuracy.
Image and audio processing
The image processor of Philips The One 58PUS8545 is P5 Perfect Picture in its latest cutting-edge option, the most powerful and finest one. The processor actions upon several image parameters to best optimize it. On the other hand, I have personally never enjoyed excessive processing, which renders that feeling of theatre props, soap-opera kind of, and fortunately this is not the case here. It’s craftly and decently done.
The films on Netflix in Movie Mode look well, no loud colors and excessive processing and I wondered if this kind of film mode on this TV could be similar to the Filmmaker’s Mode, to least alter the features of the film and keep it as close as possible to the vision of its maker.
For supported standards, it knows HDR+ or Dolby Vision. This does not mean it can handle them given the capabilities of the screen. I’d say Dolby Vision implies a higher brightness level than what the current screen can give.
The same goes for the audio. The two 10W speakers work well, clearly and loud enough, but I’d say they’re not good enough for Dolby Atmos. Surely, a home cinema system connected to this TV would probably sort out this inconvenience.
Philips The One 58PUS8545 Connectivity
As I said earlier, I could easily connect… anything. Mouse, keyboard, controller and this because this TV has a Bluetooth 4.2 and it works fine. The remote control is simple and intuitive and it does have an access button directly to the most popular streaming service, Netflix. You can use classic ports too, 4xHDMI, and each of them supports the connection of a soundbar (ARC), 2XUSB, audio digital, ethernet if you wish to connect the TV via the cable to the internet and certainly the classical antenna.
Conclusion
Any objections before ending this about la Philips The One 58PUS8545? Although it presents clear benefits in terms of versatility, the Android TV, or its operating system, doesn’t convince me yet. It doesn’t have the fluency of the proprietary ones, and I think that the brightness could be better. And now, before I tell you the price, let’s recap now that we’ve got all data: large size, 58-inches of 4K resolution, clean and solid design plus this Ambilight gimmick with RGB back lighting, and a surprisingly good screen, with black, contrast and uniformity excellent ranges.
All this for about $800 at a discount. It has a few drawbacks but it excels in some features: large size, good screen and an even better price. It has Ambilight, it has the opening provided by Android TV despite few glitches, nice design and it’s well-done!