Kitz Forum
Chat => Tech Chat => Topic started by: Black Sheep on February 15, 2017, 08:02:09 PM
-
Have any Kitizens recently upgraded their TV set ???
Although our current Panasonic Viera still appears to be ok after quite a few years, compared to others I see during my day-to-day workings, it is nowhere near as sharp, crisp or bright.
So I've decided the time has come to update, but my god ..... technology has moved on in leaps since I last spent time comparing LED v Plasma, before opting for the Viera !! ??? ???
4K v HDR, or a set equipped for both modes, or maybe Dolby ?? Flat or curved ?? I have to admit to losing patience slightly trying to absorb all the info.
So, with that in mind ........... do any of you guys have any recommendations regarding a set that is tech future-proofed for a reasonable amount of time to come, that is also reasonably priced ?? By that, I mean I don't want to be spending £2k on a set just for the name, where a lesser known make has the same spec.
I know it's a long-shot but if tha' dunt ask, tha' dunt get. :)
-
We replaced our 2008 Sony with a new Panasonic just over a year ago, have been very pleased. Ours is basic 4k led backlit, nothing special. The one technology that inspires me is OLED, but it was just too expensive then, maybe still is. And I've yet to see a reasonable demo of OLED, showing typical program material, rather than stuff contrived to look good.
There are lots of 4k demos on youtube and it does look amazing. But apart from demos it is a bit pointless as there is hardly anything available to watch, unless you resort to Netflix home-brewed material, which has never inspired me. I'd make sure you have 4k as most sets do, but don't raise your hopes of getting much use from it.
A big consideration was the OS, as I found Sony were now in bed with Google, shipping Android as the underlying OS. I am deeply mistrustful of Google, so that that made Sonys a no-no for me, but to each his own. Panasonic run Firefox OS which scares me a little less but even so, you have to go hunting around the setup menus to disable the option that allows Panasonic to collect and sell your viewing habits, even on normal terrestrial channels BBC/ITV etc. :(
Panasonic have obviously struck a deal with Netflix, as they have stuck a dedicated Netflix button on the remote. If you don't like Netflix that may annoy you and even if you do it may still annoy you as it is located in a position that is all to easy to hit by accident. Then again, if Netflix pay Panasonic for the button, it means Panasonic can sell me the TV for less money. :)
-
OLED is certainly the technology to watch, but only LG and Sony are really investing into it. Samsung are going with QLED, which is basically just a slightly upgraded LED TV, as opposed to OLED which is a completely different underlying technology.
In terms of OS, I prefer TVs that use Android TV due to the fact that it is more likely to get updated for longer, as it tends to be that with most of the work being done by Google, the TV manufacturers are willing to release updates for longer. Samsung are quite poor for updating their TVs in the long term.
4K is certainly a technology to invest in, with HDR being a nice addition but not a necessity. 4K content is definitely going to become more ubiquitous over the next year, with Sky being one of the first to release mainstream TV with 4K soon, which means the others won't be far behind.
In terms of the built in Netflix button, I think they have struck that deal with several manufacturers, as a Sony television my grandparents own also has a dedicated button.
At the moment my recommendation would be an LED 4K TV from Sony, LG, or Panasonic. Samsung TVs are good, but as I say, their smart features tend to get left to die, meaning it is more likely they would be vulnerable to security flaws. Sony tend to be the sharpest, while LG tend to be the brightest and most colour accurate.
-
Sony, Samsung, LG or Panasonic. My preference would be 1 of the 1st 3, less so Panasonic. 4k with HDR, if you're actually going to pay to watch 4k. I wouldn't bother with 4k without HDR.
Sony's now run on Android, with YouView tv guide and interface, brilliant for On-Demand.
LG have their webOS for the interface which is also excellent
I have a Samsung smart tv from just before they switched to Tizen as the tv's OS and haven't really used it.
Many sets now come with Freeview Play, which is a good alternative to YouView if you actually watch tv through your aerial. Like YouView you can watch On-Demand content straight from the tv guide just by scrolling back through time.
If you want to spend big bucks, go OLED. It's still very expensive though, but if you're willing to pay the picture quality beats anything else out there.
-
Concerning flat or curved, I understand that the curved screens have a very limited angle of view. So unless you'll be watching the TV on your own, get a flat one.
-
One further comment... our own purchase followed a long period of negotiation over screen size. I wanted bigger, she was less convinced, I kind of won as we got a 55" screen. Wall mounted, just above eye level when seated and for watching movies, viewed at our sofa distance about 12-15ft, it is pretty good.
But for 'background' viewing, say, when we're watching the news while chatting amd eating dinner off our laps, it's a bit dominating. I'm seriously considering getting a little, say 12", tv to put in the corner of the room as well as the big screen on the wall. ::)
-
My personal approach to this is to buy a good quality screen and forget about the "Smart" features, tuners or using the built speakers. Over the TV's life I just use it as a monitor and connect different boxes to it to provide whatever features I want as the built in ones tend to go out of date very fast and tend to be badly supported.
I upgrade my TV about every 6-10 years. From what I have read currently 4K is pointless until there is decent amount of content AND unless you get a huge TV (55" plus) you can't really see the difference from normal viewing distances. The technology that apparently DOES make a difference is good HDR.
You can't beat a good HTPC for covering all the bases for smart features imho. If you have a good quality screen and a decent HTPC theres not much you can't do (with the possible exception of Sky TV)
So if your current screen is good quality HD, works OK and unless you want HDR maybe you should buy the new features you want through a box of some kind and save yourself some money?
Personally I have a MediaPortal TV server all my telly is over the network to everything : phones, tablets, HTPC's etc. Its cool and is a really fun geeky project
Chunks
-
Wow !!! Thank you so much for the replies, there is definitely some great food-for-thought in all those comments. I'll sit back for a couple more days and see if anything else is added, before I use this info and trudge down to my local TV shop.
*Apparently they will match the low prices you seem to get when ordering on-line (Amazon etc).
-
Just last month I upgraded to an LG OLED UHD HDR tv. It’s the “Picture on Glass” model so is only a few millimetres thin and looks great even when switched off. Picture wise it is stunning, great dynamic contrast range, excellent colour rendition and good sound thanks to the built-in sound bar. Upscaled broadcast HD or 1080p Blu-Ray is exceptional, but give it a UHD HDR source and the image on the screen is fantastic and being an OLED tv there is no issue with viewing angle. I’ve partnered it with a Panasonic UHD Blu-Ray player, there are quite a few releases on UHD disc so hopefully plenty of future viewing material. Highly recommended.
-
This one (http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/lg-oled77g6v-smart-3d-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-77-oled-tv-10153761-pdt.html) looks good, and there's a whole £1000 reduction on the price. A real bargain. ::)
-
This one (http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/lg-oled77g6v-smart-3d-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-77-oled-tv-10153761-pdt.html) looks good, and there's a whole £1000 reduction on the price. A real bargain. ::)
How much! :o
I've never spent anything like that on a car let alone a TV!
-
Don't think we have ever spent more than £500 on a TV. Over 20 grand for a TV. That's just stupid money. :no:
-
I never had a mortgage as high as that amount :o :o
Stuart
-
A good source of reviews for TVs is AV Forums
https://www.avforums.com/homecinema/TV.3
PS. These might be better value. ........ :-\
http://www.mostluxuriouslist.com/most-expensive-televisions-in-the-world/
-
Re these prices, so far as I recall, a basic colour TV retailed about £250 to £500 in the early 1970s. By today's values that would be about £3500 to £7000, converted for inflation since 1970. :o
I seem to remember a big breakthrough in mid 70s, the first colour set under £200, reckoned to be affordable at last (was it an early Sony trinitron, iirc, probably about 14" screen? ) But again, converted for inflation since 1975, that's still over £1500 today.
My parent's bought their first TV 1957. Cost them just over £50 then, or over £1000 after converting. It was about the size of a modern dishwasher with, iirc, a 12" b&w (obviously) screen.
-
My 19" Bush TV I have not long bought for £65 are good value. ;D fits nicely on my desk.
-
This one (http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/lg-oled77g6v-smart-3d-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-77-oled-tv-10153761-pdt.html) looks good, and there's a whole £1000 reduction on the price. A real bargain. ::)
But the £45 installation is a rip off! :D Not that BS would need it.
I have read criticisms of Smart TVs; the limitations of the s/ware and how it quickly becomes victim of obsolescence. Being obliged by location to use satellite, I'm happy with my dumb TV and PVR. Even were Freeview a viable option, I think I'd be the same, as replacing PVR is cheaper.
-
This one (http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/lg-oled77g6v-smart-3d-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-77-oled-tv-10153761-pdt.html) looks good, and there's a whole £1000 reduction on the price. A real bargain. ::)
That's the one! ;D No, only joking, mine is 22 inches smaller. ::)
-
The biggest elephant in the TV room is Viewing angle, having gone from a 37" Panasonic Plasma that I bought in 2008 to now LG OLED 55e6, no LED screen can match the 'sit anywhere in the room' without some compromise.
The B6 version is the same but no sound bar, and much cheaper.
And your right Severnlayer, misses went very quiet :o ,now it's in the room she's got used to it. It may be 4K but it doe's a grand job on low res tv channels.
My £50 Sony bluray player is stunning when watching the Martian and Blade Runner. Anyone watch channel 998 on Freesat? that's in 4K.
Phillips have now joined the OLED camp.
-
This one (http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/lg-oled77g6v-smart-3d-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-77-oled-tv-10153761-pdt.html) looks good, and there's a whole £1000 reduction on the price. A real bargain. ::)
It always makes me wary when I see price cuts and start to wonder why and how can they afford these type of cuts/discounts but in this instance it's fairly plain to see because at £23,999.00 what MUG is going to be paying that sort of price.
Then we have the situation of if they can afford to reduce prices then:
a) are they still making a profit and
b) it must have been overpriced to start with.
-
I agree with those last points, but that's how lots of companies run their businesses, giving people the illusion of big discounts. The big furniture companies have been doing it for years.
-
Aren't there supposed to be some rules to prevent that; something like on sale at **** store for ** days at the higher price?
-
The rules are very lax. I think I'm right in saying that a chain can meet the 'Sale' condition by offering the product in question at the higher price in one of their stores only, for a period of six weeks.
-
Fwiw, my own hope for OLED would be improved control of black levels and detail in dark areas, which has always been a huge weakness of LCD tvs, including those that call themselves LED. Better viewing angles would be nice, but black levels are the feature I'd be paying pay for, were I to shell out on OLED.
There's been fudges in recent years to address LCD(/LED) black levels, like 'local dimming', but I personally have never been impressed. In fact I have local dimming disabled on my current Panasonic as the local dimming artefacts annoy me even more than the problem (milky blacks) they it is trying to fix.
-
Apols for consecutive posts, but it just occurred to me that OLED might suffer from burn-in, meaning I'd have to avoid pillar-boxed or letter-boxed programmes. It kind of makes sense, because all LEDs lose intensity over time. Trouble is, I want to see things in the aspect ratio the maker intended, 4:3 pillar boxed for old Dad's Army episodes, and extreme wideangle letter boxed for newer movies.
A quick google suggests burn-in may indeed be a problem. Any further thoughts on OLED burn-in, anybody?
-
I haven't noticed any such effects on my set so far, but I tend not to watch content with persistent static images. Apparently LG OLED sets have systems to mitigate any nasties as detailed here http://www.lg.com/us/experience-tvs/oled-tv/reliability (http://www.lg.com/us/experience-tvs/oled-tv/reliability) (scroll down a little).
-
I bought a "smart" Sony Bravia a few years ago. It still works well as a TV, but the "smart" facilities were pretty dumb at the outset.
My advice:
Buy the best TV you can afford, with as many HDMI inputs that you can get. Ignore any "smart" facilities.
Use external "set top" boxes to supply the smarts.
Expect a cabling explosion. Almost everything will want internet and power connections.
Do not make the mistake I recently made and assume that a 4K monitor can act as a 4K TV. Mine does not support HDCP 2.2.
-
Well ............ after much research (enough to cabbage ones brain), and various recommendations from both review sites and real-life people who breathe air ::) ....... we have decided to run with the Sony Bravia KD43XD8077 43 inch Android 4K HDR Ultra HD Smart TV .
It ticks all the boxes for us personally, and is reasonably priced.
It will be with us on Sunday, so I'd like everyone to be logged onto kitz for when I need assistance switching it on !! :-\ :) :)
-
Will be interesting to have your report how beneficial 4K is @43"! Some say 43" is too small.
Anyhow, enjoy! :)
-
Like I said, Ren ............. I've done my research and for my small lounge, 43" is actually 3" more than the recommended viewing screen.
Believe me, 49" would look slightly ridiculous, I've even gone to the trouble of cutting a template out of cardboard to see what it would look like. :no:
You may have gleaned from my posts on this forum, I'm far from anal about these things. If the picture is better than our current one (which it is, hands down), then I (or should I say, we), are more than happy with it. I'll probably only use 25-50% of it's 'Smart' capability as well ......
Different strokes for different folks, I think the saying goes, my friend ?? ;) :) :)
-
Enjoy your new toy, BS.
I'm looking forwards to hearing real life pros and cons of your chosen TV. Envious already though, I'm sure you'll like it. :)
-
I wasn't criticising your choice of size, just saying that 4K gives little, if any, viewing benefit over Full HD! As before: Enjoy!
-
Thanks lads.
-
im the odd one out then with my basic 1080p 32 inch samsung va tv :)
oled indeed is very good quality just be aware tho it decays faster then lcd tech
-
While 43" might not be large enough to get the full benefit from a 4k resolution, I'm sure the screen will be offering plenty from the improvements in colour & contrast that come alongside the resolution in UHD.
A cardboard cutout? That's going beyond the call of duty :-[
-
Ha ha ................. both myself and my wife struggled to visualise the size of the item, just using a tape-measure.
As I mentioned, the room is not very large and where the TV is positioned it has to be just right or to say it would look ridiculous is an under-statement !! ;D ;D
So, the only way to get a true representation was to fashion a cardboard screen ...... I didn't bother with the stand though ;) ;D.
All-in-all, the 43" size is absolutely perfect for us ..... along with what the set has to offer, after taking into consideration a million reviews, suggestions and 'must-have's'.
Of course, the bottom-line is always money ..... and it really does seem to be value for the money we have paid. Believe me, you can go daft with this TV malarkey .... I know, as I was slowly getting sucked into the proper high-end stuff. Had to give my head a wobble. :-X
-
I've recently discovered another advantage of 4k, it is great for still photos.
I recently got a decent new camera with a 20 megapixel sensor, not long back from a short holiday where I got to play with it a lot. After a bit of editing the holiday snaps go onto a media server that allows them to be viewed in 4k on the TV, and inflicted on visiting family.
The interesting thing is, when looking at a printed photo with lots of detail, like an interesting landscape, and something catches the eye, people tend to hold it closer. On a TV I've noticed the equivalent - people will get up from a chair and move closer to the screen to make out the detail, at which point the extra pixels make all the difference. :)
-
im the odd one out then with my basic 1080p 32 inch samsung va tv :)
oled indeed is very good quality just be aware tho it decays faster then lcd tech
Mine is an 8 y.o. 32" Panny HDReady model. I keep hinting to wife that a new 40" 1080p would only be minimally larger, and better. She won't bite! is less likely too now, as dish needs re-siting and replacing because of trees.
-
I started by buying a 49" Philips Android smart TV with Ambilight - would have been a great TV but I heavily use streaming under Android and about two or three times a day Android would crash and a reboot was necessary, a real shame Philips didn't iron out all the bugs. So I sold that and bought a Hisense 65" 4K which had a fantastic review on Avforums (https://www.avforums.com/review/hisense-H65m5500-M5500-uhd-4k-hdr-tv-review.12991). Got it from a price match John Lewis did, 5 year guarantee as well.
I love the TV, 4K was made for large screens, and no crashes - Android moved to a 4K Android TV MiBox(rock solid reliability compared to Philips). I'd also definitely say that 65" is really not that big - bigger than a typical TV but, believe it or not, it doesn't dominate the room, not much different to a 49" really. :)
-
Waiting with interest for Black Sheep's review of and/or experiences with the Sony Bravia KD43XD8077 43 inch Android 4K HDR Ultra HD Smart TV (as the KD55XE9005 is under consideration here!)
-
Only installed it on Sunday, but I can absolutely confirm we love it !!! Bear in mind we have upgraded from a 7yr old (or thereabouts) Panasonic Viera, so anything would have shown a noticeable difference. ;)
Due to personal circs at the minute (elderly care), I haven't had time to 'bugger about' with it ..... but I have found it very easy to get to grips with. As with all things new, it's the navigation of the device that is time-consuming, but after a couple of days the basics are soon picked up.
I have viewed a couple of freebie 4K/UHD vids and when this tech really takes off with the masses, it is easy to see why it would. It's like 'you're there' it's that clear/sharp.
Regarding size (oo-er). We have chosen the best set based upon what all the research suggests and it is absolutely fine. Any bigger and we would be having to look 'around' the screen, eyes dotting about all over, to see what was going on. With the sizing guide you see the whole screen in one go, if that makes sense ?? Bigger does not mean better in such circumstances.
My only regret is not buying a sound-bar at the same time. Whilst visiting my Mum she showed me the difference in sound with the bar off, and then on ..... again, it is very noticeable therefor a 'must have' in my eyes. Don't get me wrong, the in-built sound from the TV itself is adequate enough, just working on a cost-effective basis I think circa £150 for a sound-bar will benefit us. :)
-
Don't get me wrong, the in-built sound from the TV itself is adequate enough, just working on a cost-effective basis I think circa £150 for a sound-bar will benefit us. :)
We have a three year old Sony Bravia and the sound out of the box was pretty poor. The stand on ours is so low profile you can't put a sound bar in front of it, so we've now gone for a sound base option on the shelf below, which at least allows us to stack our Freeview recorder on top of it.
The sound is orders of magnitude better than the TV's. Worth considering as an alternative to sound bars in my view.