TVs Is it worth buying a 4k 65" TV for my new house?

I'm just in the process of moving into a new home, with a fairly large living area. I'm looking to buy a 65" TV for the room, but am struggling to decide whether or not it is worth going 4k over 1080p. I'm aware that there is very little content available at this stage that is rendered in 4k. However, if I'm going to be spending this amount of money, it seems hard to justify investing in 1080p, which could soon become an out of date technology.

Advice from people who know more than me about this would be most welcome.

Thanks

 

65" 4K TV's are about £3000 to £10,000 iirc so I would instantly say hell no since they are going to come down in price, quite dramatically later this year and next year.

Look at 4K monitors, they are now around £500 compared to 3 months ago where they were nearly £3K.

 

Yeah, but that's comparing two different panel technologies, so doesn't really mean anything. Obviously the TN panels are much cheaper. It's the IPS panels that carry the premium price.

Samsung's top 1080p 65" TV is only marginally cheaper than their 4k 65" offering.

 

Personally I would wait for the prices to come down. And for an OLED / Plasma replacement to be released as I'm not a fan of LCD. Also I think it would be a bit premature seeing as most content isn't 1080p yet! However it's your money so do what you want.

If you're buying a 65 inch tv regardless, and the price difference isn't too much go for a 4k tv. I believe Samsung 4K tv's can have their parts upgraded for when the specifications are changed (HDMI etc).

 

No way, 4k won't be mainstream for years. Sky don't even broadcast in 1080p, let alone 4K. As far as I can tell, the only tangible content is Netflix, and to stream 4K on that you are going to need a ridiculously fast net connection.

Definitely not worth the extra cost IMHO. Putting my money where my mouth is, my housemate and I just bought a 60" Samsung LED 1080p panel for £1k.

 

The first thing to think about is viewing distance.

Viewing distance <8ft: Maybe. Once this years range is available from all of the manufacturers, there's going to be some gems and last year's 4k tax has been reduced massively.

Viewing distance >13 ft: No, unless there's another compelling reason for a particular 4k set other than the res, or to just get a warm fuzzy feeling that you havea 4k TV.

Viewing distance 8-13ft: Tough call.

With a 9-10ft viewig distance in a dedicated room, I've opted for a 65" 1080p with a view to adding a 4k PJ (and motorised screen to drop in front of the TV) once they no longer require a 5 figure investment. But then I bought a TV last year, and 65" 4k last year was a shedload more than 1080p (and none of them were HDMI2.0) - to the extent that buying 1080p at the time and replacing it with a 4k set of the same cost in 2-3 years would still be way less than a 65" 4k at the time.

And bear in mind that 1080p will by no means be "out of date" any time soon - technology will move on, but the human eye's ability to resolve detail will not.

 

I would say yes

65" is massive. My Aunty has a 50" 1080p screen and you can see the pixels even at a 'normal' viewing distance.

Look at it this way - you'll be able to play 1080p content quite happily and you'll be all set when 4K does pic up.

On the other hand, don't expect to do any 4K gaming unless you're willing to shell out for some pretty serious hardware.

 

The viewing distance is in the 10ft range. I'm conscious of the fact that I have very good eyesight and have been known in the past to see pixels where some other people don't.

It's a tricky one, because I know that content support for 4k is hardly on the horizon, but at the same time I almost feel like I would be cheating myself to buy 1080p at this stage in the game. While I think it may be sometime before sky start broadcasting in 4k, I'm not sure the same can be said for buying movies. IIRC there are already blu-ray discs available that are rendered in 4k.

You mean like the hardware in my sig?

 

No. If anything, buy a nice HD projector for that money. 4K is way too expensive right now for what you get out of it, and we're also entering in to the future of OLED displays. There's also no support right now, outside of a handful of videos online and Sony's box that seems to actually just be a fancy upscaler.

The "mastered in 4K" BluRay releases are also silly. They're in 4K at the studio, but downscaled back to 1080p to fit on the BD disc. They then get upscaled by the player. It's a stupid stop-gap method that is a waste of time and money. Go native or go home.

For 4K content to take off, we need another new format (or multiple layer BD discs, with players that support it), or a wholesale push to hard drive based content that takes ages to download.


I'm holding off replacing my 1080p 40"er until we've got OLED 4K for circa £1k.

 

You might be comparing the top end 1080p to the low end 4k.

For now, I'd stick with a decent 1080p (Don't buy the cheapest or most expensive model) and in a few years if your satisfied with the amount of 4k content you can always upgrade.

That being said, see if you can get yourself a short 4k test clip, reencode it to 1080p and 720p and run the 3 resolutions on a mix of TV's (4k, 1080p) down at the big box store showroom. Only way to know for sure is to test it out with your own eyes.

 

I was totally there with you, the fact that when I was in the market just 8 months ago, the fact that a 4k 65" was preposterous money helped my decision to no end. Now it would be nowhere near as clear cut.

What's your typical longevity with tech related purchases? If this is something you're planning to keep in service for 7 years, and you're not going to get upset about it when it's been superseded 6 times over, then I'd say definitely go for 4k now.

If you're going to get TV envy in 12 months time when it's bettered, and then in another 12 months when it's bettered yet again, and so on, then go 1080p.

There's always something better coming - 4k is it now, but what happens in 2 years time when 4k OLEDs are priced in a more compelling manner. If you fit in to the former category then your attempts to "future proof"will have been in vain, as we still won't be flooded with 4K content by that point and you'll already be behind the curve.

 

Lack of content would stop me paying for a 4k tv set at the minute, Streaming of 4k in the uk at least will need a high end connection. Id be waiting 2 years and buying a set then.

 

If I was thinking of buying a reasonably high end large screen TV now I would probably have to go for 4k.
The advantages are just so tangible. 1080p is going to look old fast at that sort of screen size.

However, I'd also probably hold fire for 12-18 months.

Branded 4k TVs are already dropping below £1000 (albeit around 40"). I have a feeling there will be big price drops in the next 12-18 months as push for mainstream acceptance kicks into gear.

If I needed a TV now I'd be tempted to buy something reasonably priced, 1080p and maybe even a little small with a view to upgrading to a big and beautiful 4k set once prices drop a bit.

 

Go for it then!

 

I'm tending to agree with the idea of getting a 1080p set, the 4k would have been nice to plug my pc into though and playing the odd game.

I'll have to mull it over some more, but I guess it does seem to make more sense to go 1080p now and then upgrade two or three years down the line once there is more content and it is a mature technology.

Just so long as I can't see those pixels....

 

Honestly I'd get a 1080p projector and screen then get a 4k later in the year

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I don't really fancy a projector setup. There are too many drawbacks. Mainly the requirement for low ambient light.

 

It depends on the projector and the lumens it produces along with the quality of the bulb, I don't really have an issue watching my projector setup 24/7 with normal daytime light.

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Whilst I can't be 100% sure, I'm fairly certain you aren't seeing actual pixels from those distances. What you might be seeing is macro-blocking or other compression artifacts. Consider that while Netflix may claim to stream 4K content (so does YouTube), it's the same thing the video industry has been doing for years. If you're used to looking for it, then you'll probably still see the same ting with 4K.

Other than that, Mister_Tad's advice is pretty much spot on.

 

early adopters are what pay for the development of new standards, I say buy now if you can afford it, you could always hook your gaming pc up to it to show off its capabilities.

if people don't buy into something it gets lost, look at 3d there is a single 3d channel on sky, if more people bought into it, i'm sure there would be more.