Sorry - what size TV? (And recommendations!)

[iphonedyou]

Per the title, I should start with an apology. I appreciate this has been asked before, but times do change and the array of TVs out there is truly dizzying. Would anybody be kind enough to please assist with a few queries? I'd appreciate the experience as for a number of reasons we can't actually see the room the TV will be going in so it's difficult to judge.

1) Size!

The living room is 15'10 by 10'7 and broadly as rectangular as it sounds. This includes two bay windows however, one on the longer edge and one on the shorter, and for the time being I don't think we'll put the TV in a bay. It'll likely be in a corner, and not, sadly, wall mounted. Some TV size calculators suggest 55" but this sounds huge to me. It's not the biggest room, so I thought perhaps 48"? I don't really want it to be a huge focal point of the room to the stage where it looks silly or overpowering.

2) Quality!

I gather there's no benefit to 4k at that size and given likely viewing distances? If so HD is fine but I do value general sharpness, colours, depth of blacks et al. I suppose half decent sound would be a nice bonus.

3) Where!

I hear Richer Sounds is one of the best places, seems well recommended in this sub-forum? I'm looking to buy two TVs, for the lounge as detailed above, and for the kitchen. Would be same brand and model but smaller for the kitchen I think (though it's a bigger room, mind.) There's also a John Lewis near us. If there are recommended TVs anywhere that's doing a Black Friday sale we'd purchase then, also - potentially unseen if anybody is particularly effusive with praise for a given model.

4) Budget and other information

Assuming 4k isn't a requirement I'd like to get both for no more than £1,000. Primary use is TV and PS4. Thinness of TV not a huge issue as it's not being wall mounted but a thin bezel is essential as it's not a big room, every little helps, and it looks better. Whether HD or 4K I wouldn't like a curved TV.

Many thanks for any assistance rendered, and I hope I've been clear in my post.

[iphonedyou]

Nobody?

I've flipped on the curved aspect and am looking at:

Samsung UE48J6300 (living)
Samsung UE40J6300 (kitchen) + low profile wall mount

Both 1080P as 4k largely pointless on a 48in with 9ft viewing distance. £963 for both including wall mount.

[nickfrog]

I use this for reference http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.html It's usually spot on - I totally see your point about overpowering but :

- it depends how much of the detail you want to see at 9ft and how much you appreciate an immersive cinema experience
- we are still somewhat influenced by traditional sizes which were dictated by CRT so a big telly looks big because of resistance to change
- TVs have much thinner bezels now, measured in mm rather than cm (I don't mean thickness, I mean frame around the screen) so they have actually shrunk like for like over the past 5 years.
- A big TV will look weird the first week ; and then it won't : they all shrink 20%

I have a 65 at 12ft and it's near perfect size wise. I wouldn't go under 55 if were you and would actually try and squeeze a 58/60'.

[alock]

Probably a bit late for the original poster, but there is a good reason to go for 4k on any size TV. It is an exact multiple of both 720 and 1080 resolutions.

This means 720p content will look better than it does on a 1080 panel where pixels are distorted. On a 4k panel, each pixel in a 1080p signal becomes 4 pixels (2x2) and each pixel in a 720p signal becomes 9 pixels (3x3).

There is still a lot of 720p content for multiple sources.

[h0b0]

Here is my lounge, labeled family room.



I have a 58" 1080p Panasonic plasma on the outside wall. I have removed the half wall between family room and kitchen so my sofa is around 15ft away from TV. 58" is a good size for the space. It never feels too large. Amusingly, due to scale of the room people guess it's a 42".

I wouldn't bother with 4k because I only watch 1080i and 1080p on this TV