u/Tight_Inflation3153

Hello,

I really, really want to share this. I stumbled upon this Citadel Katana at a random auction in a small city here in France, amidst stuff like plates, furnitures and other random stuff. It's used but in an exceptional state and was clearly well taken care of. I got it for $800, a bargain for what this is. If I stumbled on it on the second hand market for $2500 I would have still bought it in a heartbeat.

Through digging into Citadel wayback machine links I managed to find its spec sheet :

>This sword is UNIQUE.
Beautiful shinto style slightly arched throat blade. Yamato construction.
Hand forged XC75 steel. Selective tempering with clay giving as usual a real and beautiful HamonNagasa: 30.32″
Kassane: 0.22″
Moto Haba: 1.25″
Hamon: Gunome
Mune with soft slopes
Sori: 0.73″
Point: Chu Kissaki, Yamato shape swollen into a viper head
Nakago: limé en Takano Ha
Habaki: double, hugging the throat. One in hardened copper and adjusted on the blade, the other in brass engraved with a shower of stars. Seppas: guilloche brass
Tsuba: beautiful reproduction by hand carving and engraving of an old tsuba. Bronze with salts.
Saya: matt black lacquered jackfruit wood and ostrich paw leather insert. Kurigata in water buffalo horn. Shito Dome in guilloche brass.
Tsuka: braid of black silk on white coarse-grained same. Katatemaki. Kashira in quilted iron kabutokane as well as fuchi. Length 11.02″, width 1.38″
Balance point forward of Tsuba: 5.83″
Weight 34.57 Oz
Length total: 43.31″
Entirely handmade by CITADEL
Blade carries lifetime guarantee subjected to normal use

It's the perfect length for my height and arm length, but still very lightweight.

Citadel fittings are handcarved and not cast. That handashi style kabuto kashira is a great touch, the same is clearly of great quality, the tsukamaki is rock solid. The menukis are beautiful and comfortable.

That tsuba is a work of art, it's a reproduction of an existing Japanese tsuba and it shows it looks authentic. the rim is polished to a mirror finish, really stands out.

Then that habaki. What can I even say. I'm oddly sensitive about habaki work, because to me it's a great indicator of the overall quality of a katana. Even the most simple brass habaki if properly shaped to the blade it's hugging can look very beautiful, and the opposite is true. But here I get both a very complex construction AND an incredible look. Genuinely might be my favourite part of the entire katana if not for...

....The blade is just a dream. This is a 77cm long nagasa. It has no right being this nimble while still having authority in the cut like it does. The polish is amazing, it shows pretty much 4 shades: the hamon, the rest of the ji, the shinogi-ji and the bohi. All catch light in a different way.

The saya is also of exquisite quality. I didn't think I'd like the ostrich leather (the red looked very bright in the auction photos) but in person it's way less loud, and it gives a lot of personality to an already very special katana. It obviously has horn parts everywhere, and even the shitodome are clearly handmade.

You probably can tell, but I'm amazed but what I found, and for this cheap? I feel truly blessed.

Hello,

So I've been using a LG C1 for a couple years, and burn in finally caught up to me. The entire center of the screen was affected, with clear UI spots from gaming. That C1 came after a B9 which also got burned in in a similar timeframe.

I work from home on my computer, and outside of the gym most of my hobbies are in front of the screen. That means my usage is extremely heavy. As such, I thought that getting yet another OLED was just a recipe for more disappointment down the line.

Being European and wanting only 32"+ MiniLED displays, my options were extremely limited. I settled on a TV instead, the 43QN90F. Here's my review after a first full day of use, might update it down the line if there are new findings.

**The good :**

- It's BRIGHT. Really makes content pop it's a pleasure to watch pretty much anything, even regular youtube videos. Definitely an upgrade from my C1.

- Blacks are 90% of what I had on OLED. There's some blooming in extreme cases, but that's the only time where I notice this is not an OLED.

- The matte display is not an issue. That was something I really wasn't looking forward too, being a big glossy display enjoyer. But I think that once a display is bright and contrasty enough, matte coating doesn't make things noticeably worse unless you have the exact same display but glossy to directly compare side by side.

- Lots of interesting settings. It's really possible to tune the image a lot, so whether you're a "true to life" or "fuck it we ball I want colors to be burned in my retina" guy you can get your fix

- Text clarity. Finally text looks right. After years on these LG OLEDs I kinda forgot that's not how text is supposed to look like.

- No. Need. To. Baby. It. That cannot be overstated. Having an OLED means changing your entire desktop setup to minimize risk of burnin, all for it to still inevitably happen down the line if you're a heavy user like me. Here, just not having to do ANY of that is sooo refreshing. No more hiding icons and taskbar, no more black wallpaper, no more "wait I've been on this for like 5 hours I should probably turn off the display so it can do a pixel cleaning cycle". No more fearing the next time I see a fullscreen solid color, where I know I'll notice new burned in spots.

**The mid :**

- Viewing angles are less than ideal. But to be fair, that was also the case on my C1, to a lesser extent. It's just the price to pay when using these large displays as monitors where you sit a fair bit closer than the intended use case. In my case, I have a deep desk and it's at the very limit of it to maximize distance, but that's not enough.

**The ugly :**

- Motion. There is no two ways about it this is a slow panel. it's the one thing I really don't like here coming from the response times of OLED, scrolling is distractingly bad. Mind you, actual motion in game/videos is fine (not perfect especially with black smearing but really not a big deal at all I'll get used to it), it's scrolling in Dark mode that really looks bad to me. So much ghosting. I'm considering becoming a light mode Andy, it's to that extent. The 120hz of the C1 looks clearer than the 165hz of this QN90F.

If motion was better, I would never ever ever look back I think.

So, will I keep it? I'll use it for a week to fully get used to this new image I'm getting, but I think I will yes. OLED is just not compatible with my use case. If only motion was better it wouldn't even be a question really.

So yeah, MiniLED is a great tech. This whole motion issue is annoying, and if I could find a display that doesn't have it I would probably swap. But I just don't think that exists in Europe atm, at least not for larger sizes. If I missed a display that checks all boxes, or if there are "hidden" settings to improve my experience you're more than welcome to share !

My best find ever: Citadel Unique Katana. An absolute dream.