My father needs help choosing a new TV

TheCaptainsLog

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Hi All

This is my first post and follows a lot of reading about the best TV’s to buy, including Dodgexander’s excellent posts.

My father, who’s in his 70’s, has an 8 year old LG 32” TV at the moment. He watches in a quite bright room during the day but usually with minimal lighting in the evening. He sits directly in front of the TV and about 8 – 10 feet away. I think other seats in the room (which are rarely used) are at about 30 to 45 degree off straight-on viewing. Daylight comes into the room to the right of his TV but the TV is angled away from the window and he could close the blinds if it's an issue.

He watches some streaming channels – NOW, Prime, BT Sport (mostly rugby, cricket and baseball), all via a BT 4K box – and Freeview (mostly SD). I think it’s unlikely he’ll upgrade to a BT box that will handle HDR unless BT release the new STB to everyone FOC (v. unlikely)

The problem he has with his TV now is that, due to deteriorating eyesight (although this has improved after a couple of cataract ops), he finds some content difficult to see, primarily because it’s too small – so, he’s looking for a bigger TV. I measured the space available and he’s got room for up to 50”.

From reading the various posts on here, I don’t think OLED is suitable for him and top-tier would probably be wasted if he’s not using HDR. I suppose then my questions are:
  • If he can’t access HDR, are lower cost or smaller TV’s going to look odd? By that I mean, does a lack of HDR capability affect the image of ordinary content?
  • What would be a good TV at that size for him on the basis of his use described above?
I like the look of the XH9505, which is in his budget (up to, say, £1000), but I don't really think he'll see the benefit unless BT offer the new HDR-capable box to all users in the near future.

Thanks in advance
 
The Sony looks decent, good brightness/intensity (with a touch of bleed into the black borders which the fussy might find distracting).

Sound will almost definitely be an improvement over the 8 year old LG, I had a 720p one and the audio was dire.

Samsung offer better upscaling.
 
If you go for the XH9505 it's £850 here


RicherSounds and JL will pricematch if you contact them and prefer those retailers. I think based on your dads needs you could go for something cheaper though, although perhaps not as he likes sports. Wait for the experts to come along, mainly just wanted to make sure you didn't overpay for the 9505 as it's on offer.
 
If he can’t access HDR, are lower cost or smaller TV’s going to look odd? By that I mean, does a lack of HDR capability affect the image of ordinary content?
Because of the way HDR works if it comes bundled with the video signal there's no easy way to disable it, therefore for future proofing it makes sense to get a TV like the Sony XH9505. If you have a TV without decent HDR capability, it will still accept the signal, but display it with problems.

On the other hand, its probably going to be a long time before we see HDR on broadcasts, that is unless he accesses the trials the BBC have on the iPlayer (need fiber internet too for this) or also uses streaming services like Netflix.

In your position I'd probably treat the purchase as SDR only and save money, put that money toward a capable HDR TV in the future if he does find himself watching some HDR content. A mid or low tier TV in my best buy guide would be fine. The mid tier options having better motion, but in all honesty probalbly even a low tier model will be fine.
 
Thanks for all your responses - particularly Dodgexander for the explanation about HDR which, I admit, is a total mystery to me. I don't think he's likely to go down the fibre route so, on that score, HDR probably won't affect him.

One further question on HDR though; you say 'unless he uses streaming services like Netflix' - he uses Prime and NOW quite a lot and I see in the 'tech press' that both either have or will soon have HDR and that it will be a mix of Dolby Vision and HDR10+. I'm sure I can find (even if I can't understand) details of the differences but if the Sony has Dolby Vision, how would that affect viewing HDR10+?
 
Prime video uses HDR10+ on most of its recent shows. There are also one or two shows in Dolby Vision HDR.

If a TV doesn't support either HDR10+ or Dolby Vision it will fall back to use HDR in HDR10 mode as HDR10 is always included with both HDR10+ and Dolby Vision HDR video.

Now TV probably won't ever have HDR, I expect that is something Sky will keep for their subscribers...in fact, even Sky don't use HDR yet.
 
in fact, even Sky don't use HDR yet.
Just for info, Sky introduced HDR content earlier this year - there is now a reasonable selection of movies and sky 'exclusives' that uses the HLG format (although no live sport yet). Need to have the Sky Q UHD package.
 
Just for info, Sky introduced HDR content earlier this year - there is now a reasonable selection of movies and sky 'exclusives' that uses the HLG format (although no live sport yet). Need to have the Sky Q UHD package.
You're right, I had forgotten they have a catalogue of on demand HDR content.

What I meant I guess is, they don't have any live HDR content as yet on their TV broadcast channels.
 

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