I’ve had my 65″ Sharp for 9 years now (blogged about here). I finally have an upgrade. I got an 85″ Samsung LCD/LED, at a big Black Friday week discount from Amazon.
Like most modern TVs, it is a 4K TV (or UHD – Ultra High Definition – twice the linear resolution of HDTV). There’s not a lot of content in 4K yet, but more all the time. Netflix has several series that are streamed in 4K (House of Cards, Jessica Jones…) and Amazon and YouTube are adding content all the time too. Dish has announced a 4K upgrade that I will look into, but they already over-compress a lot of HD content and I will have to read some reviews before I pay any more.
The big “gimmick” right now is curved TVs. Personally I don’t like the curve, and so this is a flat TV. Partly I think they make them curved just because they can, and it looks kind of neat. But I think they are worse for off-angle viewing, and catch more reflections.
I am mostly very happy. It’s a good upgrade to my old TV. Nature shows in 4K are especially amazing to watch, but even HD content gets upscaled and looks very good.
My biggest complaint is that the screen is glossy and reflects any light behind me. My old Sharp had a matte finish, but that’s not really an option for a 4K TV, as the matte tends to blur the fine details that 4K reveals. I will have to figure something out, either a curtain behind the sofa or opaque shades on the kitchen lights.