Critique my TV choice

[Seti]

Ok, the first thing I need to point out that I'm a complete luddite when it comes to all things electrical so if you reply please do so in simple terms.....diagrams and finger puppets to explain things would be ideal!

I need a new TV and visited the Samsung shop and liked the look of the UE 55 HU7500 which was priced at £2,299.

Appreciate that Ultra high definition is not available at the moment but I guess rather than spend c.£1000 on a non HD tv now and then another c.£2000 in a year it makes sense to buy one now?

Assuming that's not a bad idea, is this a good TV to buy?

Thanks

[Matt..]

Surely it's better to wait for 4k to be more widespread, better quality, and cheaper? It seems far too early to bother with it right now when there's virtually no content to make any use of it.

[ASK1974]

Seti said:

Assuming that's not a bad idea, is this a good TV to buy?

Your assumption is unfortunately flawed, whilst the TV has HDMI2 and is 4k there are potential changes coming that could render the screen incompatible with some 4k content. HDCP2.2 (due this autumn) will not be backwards compatible with any older version and the movie studios have mad it clear that this is a prerequisite for studio released 4k content - big problem right there. Now there may be work arounds but we're telling all our clients that we simply can't garentee anything so I'll say the say to you. You're firmly in early adopter territory and there isn't even any content yet available so it's a bit of a gamble.

However, is this a good TV to buy? Absolutely. It's pretty much as 4k ready as you can get, very smart and with HD content is one of the best screens on the market. Only OLED betters it now plasma has gone and if you want a great telly it's a great choice. Just bare in mind it might not be completely 4k compliment. 4k content is still away away so...

[Seti]

Thanks for the replies....certainly given me something to think about.

[OldSkoolRS]

Also bear in mind that with a 4K TV you need to sit much closer than you might imagine to benefit from the extra resolution. While there is talk of extra bit depth on 4K which would reduce colour banding, this could be easily wasted due to low bit rates from broadcasters: Just because something is broadcast in HD doesn't mean it's necessarily much better than SD due to overly compressed video.

I'm as much of a fan of new AV gear as the next man, but I really do feel that (for TVs at least, since projectors are more my field of interest) that 4K is purely a badge rather than any great advantage for the average viewer. In fact I'd go further and suggest that many owners would be better off buying a decent 1080p TV and paying to have it properly calibrated instead if they really care about having good picture quality.