Hisense U7K Review | The Best TV for Most People

Folks I think I found it I think  I found the sweet spot in TV for 2023 Welcome back everyone I'm Caleb Denison and  this is my review of the Hisense U7K 4K HDR mini   LED TV I've had my eyes on this TV for a while I  have to admit I had some pretty high hopes going   into this review for this television not lofty  expectations just high hopes And I'm pleased to   report my hopes have not been dashed I'm going to  tell you just about everything you really need to   know about this TV and spoiler alert there's a  very good chance this TV could be exactly what   you should buy I'll run through what this TV does  well what it doesn't do well but more importantly   we'll talk about whether or not the Hisense  U7K is going to be the TV that I recommend to   the most folks who come asking for TV buying  advice before we dig in I need to ask you for   a favor will you please do me a solid and help me  make this video wildly successful we have to play   YouTube's algorithm game just like other creators  and for this specific video I need it to reach   as many folks as possible so if you would kindly  consider giving it a like and leaving a comment as   usual you guys are always awesome about that but  also share it to someone you know who is looking   to buy a new TV and could use a little nudge  in the right direction if you can share it not   only will you help your friends and family out but  you'll help me out a ton of all the TV videos you   should share I really think this is the one it's  the best jumping off point for folks just starting   to research TVs whether the Hisense U7K ends up  being the right TV for them or not so thank you   so much in advance I try not to ask for such  specific favors often so I hope you don't mind   I'm doing so today okay I am super excited to tell  you about this TV so let's get to it let's start   with a quick refresher on where the Hisense U7K  stands in Highsense's TV lineup and the TV Market   in general in Highsense's lineup there's the ux  which is their limited edition cost no object TV   kind of a specialty the real flagship of high  senses TV lineup this year is the u8k and this   U7K just sits right below that you might compare  the U7K to TCL's Q7 for example it's kind of an   upper midlevel TV or you could say it's a lower  level top tier TV you know how there's a pretty   fine line between a medium rare and medium stake  this TV kind of treads a similar fine line now for   a quick price comparison understanding that these  prices were correct at the time I made this video   but will likely vary a bit over time here's a  breakdown graphic of the Hisense U7K prices at   various sizes next to the step up Highsense U8K  prices at various sizes and what you'll see here   is that generally speaking you can choose to get  a larger U7K for the same price as the step down   size of the u8k so the 65 in U7K costs about the  same as the 55 in U8K and so on and so forth or   you could just look at it from the perspective  that the U7K is just a more affordable TV than   the U8K mentioned this because we'll talk a  little bit about whether given your budget you   might be better off getting a larger screen U7K  or a smaller higher performance U 8K now for the   basics of the TV and I'm not going to dwell on  this forever but it's a pretty attractive design   with surprisingly solid build quality you don't  see that often at this price we've got a stamped   metal back solid feet that you can position wide  as we have them here or more narrow if you have a   smaller stand it comes with a backlit remote and  it's got a fairly robust speaker system built in   with a subwoofer on the back to add some base to  the rather small down-firing speakers built into   the bottom of the TV for the price I think you get  a pretty attractive TV let's now dive into this   TV's picture performance you know what time it is  welcome to a review segment I like to call numbers   for Nit-Nerds just got a little costume change  here hold on all right now we're going to dive   into some technical details on this TV and if that  doesn't sound like something you're interested in   feel free to skip this section using the time  codes in the description because once I'm done   rattling off some of this measurement data I'm  definitely going to wrap it all up in observations   that everyone can understand okay now about those  measurements as you've come to expect I took most   of my measurements from the TV's filmmaker mode  preset in both SDR and HDR now this time I used   the default color temperature setting of warm 1  and worked from there because that's how the TV is   set up out of the box some of these measurements  are a bit different if you select warm 2 but as   I'll soon discuss things looked pretty solid  before I did any tweaking at all the white   balance and SDR filmmaker mode was damn good for  a TV at this price erors were mostly in the bright   white areas with the white trending a little too  cool or blue it was an easy fix by knocking the   blue gain down in the two-point white balance  resulting in really solid white balance it was   the same for the HDR white balance which by the  way must be adjusted separately color accuracy out   of the box was very good for SDR and outstanding  for HDR the only rogue colors are green and cyan   and really not not all that out of whack by the  Numbers the brighter those colors got the more   they strayed from accuracy but the errors are low  enough that most folks will rarely if ever pick up   on them that is outstanding performance for a TV  of this price now for everybody's favorite part   peak brightness interestingly in SDR filmmaker  mode the peak brightness out of the box was at   about 530 nits and that's at about 80% on the  brightness setting that is way too bright for   the accuracy police but for most folks that kind  of SDR brightness is going to be exactly what they   want so while it doesn't seem to fit the intention  of filmmaker mode it's a smart move for making   customers happy now you can pull the brightness  down for SDR if you watch in a dark room or you   can use the embedded light sensor to automatically  make those adjustments based on how bright or dark   your room is but and I need to make a big deal  out of this if you want the best brightness this   TV can provide you really need to turn that light  sensor off here's us doing exactly that I found   that while it does a decent job of adjusting the  brightness depending on your room it messes around   with the white balance in a way that I don't  care for so I turned it off and left it that   way the story around Peak brightness in HDR is  kind of interesting so in case you're new to my   TV reviews historically Highsense TVs outperform  their claimed Peak brightness that was true of the   use U7G and U8G two years ago it was true last  year with the u7h and u8h and it was even true   of the U8K that we reviewed earlier this year for  instance high sense would print 1,000 nits Peak   brightness on the box and the TV would handily  outperform that by punching up to say 1300 nits   at least that's been my experience that has not  been the case for me with this specific U7K TV   sample but I think I might have an outlier here  my readings for peak brightness in HDR with a 10%   white window came in at about 750 nits and when I  moved the test pattern to a 25% window it bumped   up to 850 nits and that's the highest I saw it  get first of all it's odd that a 25% window would   read higher than a 10% window normally it's the  other way around second of all that's well short   of Highsense's claim for 1,000 nits like I said I  expected this TV to outperform Highsense's claims   anyway ditching the white window for the Spears  and mons so Peak HDR highlight pattern I saw   real highlights at about 600 nits now I normally  don't do this but I checked a few other reviews   from reviewers that I respect and they got right  at about that 1,000 nit peak on their test bench   I've rooted around in all the settings and made  sure no Eco or power saving settings were on local   dimming is set to high as it should be and I even  toggled dynamic tone mapping on and off just to   see what happened this s simple is just not as  bright as those I'm seeing reviewed elsewhere   I don't think that there's anything wrong with  this TV I just think that's how this sample is   behaving honestly I'm not too worried about it  though because perceptually there's not a ton   of difference between 850 and 1,000 nits and  the average Picture level of this TV tracks   exactly as expected with about 550 nits full  field brightness okay moving on as I mentioned   earlier color performance came in great for SDR  and even better for HDR are I saw 97% of P3 color   gamut and 76% for bt2020 and the only notable  color errors were at the brightest end of the   spectrum this TV flawlessly performs 3-2 pull down  for jutter free 24 frame per second movie and TV   playback though there is a predictable stutter  in the bright areas on slow panning shots due   to the TV's excellent pixel response time the U7K  does have a black frame insertion feature and it   is as expected very flickery and I can't stand it  but that's true for almost every TV that I review   but if you want BFI it is available upscaling is  very respectable on this TV in general and great   for the price of the TV Great who am I Tony the  Tiger anyway it handily outperforms the TCL Q7   in terms of sharpness when upscaling 720p content  though there's less of a difference from 1080p up   to 4K in fact image processing overall is pretty  stellar on the U7 okay you will see some color   banding on low bit depth sources like YouTube or  sling TV and unfortunately the smooth gradation   feature doesn't seem to have much of an effect  at all I feel like it's here in the menu but it   almost seems like it's been disconnected inside  I see no improvement with this on low medium or   high so I just left it off blooming control is  very good I'd say the TCL Q7 is just slightly   better in this one area but you'd never know it  without putting the side by side black levels are   generally excellent and contrast is outstanding  for a TV at this price okay now that we've got the   technical details covered let's just speak more  broadly about this TV's performance honestly I've   lost count of how many hours I've spent watching  this TV just normal everyday content from YouTube   to TV shows to life Sports to streaming movies  and 4K Blu-rays and well here's the takeaway   this is what most of you need to know I think the  Hisense U7K is the smart smartest TV buy for the   most amount of people I have already recommended  it to several friends and a couple of extended   family members and every person who has bought it  went out of their way to email or text me to tell   me how thrilled they are with their new U7K TV  the U7 case performance is good enough to satisfy   a video Enthusiast on a tighter budget and far  better than most folks will be expecting when   they take it home it offers awesome color accuracy  out of the box so long as you use filmmaker mode   or theater day or theater night it retains HDR  highlights well this TV rolls off gently it does   not I repeat it does not hard clip it's brilliant  and vibrant for all kinds of content it upscales   your cable satellite or DVD collection well the  user interface is solid and reliable at least   for now motion resolution is quite good on this  TV I watched a lot of fast-moving Sports and I   was never disappointed with Quick camera moves up  and down the basketball court or football field   movies looked great TV shows were practically  flawless game mode is excellent on this TV game   mode picture performance is really not all that  far off from the more accurate picture modes plus   it offers a fun gaming dashboard and supports  freesync vrr and refresh rates up to 144 HZ if   you've got a PC that can support that and it even  sounds pretty decent considering most TV speakers   just sound downright awful this TV just takes all  the right boxes it is in my opinion the best value   in TV it hits that sweet spot of performance  and price you can pay more but you won't get   a lot more whereas you could pay less but you  will get a lot less than this tv offers I mean   I think that's why I'm going to make this a  go-to recommendation for anyone who is not   a knit nerd the TV is not perfect though while  it has outstanding anti-reflection on it which   minimizes glare and is a good TV for daytime  viewing where you can have some sun coming into   the home or maybe you just have all the lights on  the off angle viewing is not good now to be fair   most TVs at this level and even Above This level  don't have good off- angle performance the second   you step off from dead center in front of this TV  the contrast and the color starts washing out but   again that is par for the course now they could  improve the off angle by using an IPS panel but   the black levels blooming and halo issues would  take a small hit speaking of which I believe the   75in version of this TV does use an IPS panel so  it'll have better off angle viewing uh but with   more dimming zones I'm hoping its black levels and  blooming control should still be pretty good even   with that IPS panel perhaps not as excellent  as we see on the 55 in and 65- in models but   hopefully still solid also in the not great column  uh this TV and I'm hoping this is just a bug I'm   checking with high sense but for whatever reason  this TV in HDR via HDMI sources it keeps reducing   the peak brightness to 78 I can't figure out why  so I don't love that oh and don't worry I always   tested HDR Peak brightness at 100 I was absolutely  sure of it so don't worry I didn't drop the ball   there so for the vast majority of you out there  watching if you've been wondering if maybe the   Hisense U7K might be the right TV for you you want  really good picture quality but you don't want to   spend insane amounts of money to get it I 100%  throw my full weight behind this TV it has been   great to live with this TV for a couple of weeks  and I think most of you are going to absolutely   love it now for those of you who consider yourself  a more casual knit nerd like you enjoy the company   but you're not a card carrying member you might  be wondering if you're better off getting the   U7K or the U8K and to anyone who is having a tough  time deciding between the two here's what you need   to know the U8K is a brighter TV it has brighter  average Picture level and its HDR highlights are   also so brighter it's got a bit more punch to  it and when there's more ambient light it can   maintain the perception of contrast and color  vibrancy just a bit better than the U7K can if   you watch during the day a lot and you want the  best possible experience when watching during   the day then I think the u8k is probably worth the  upgrade for most folks including WB TV enthusiasts   who do most of their watching in a dim to dark  room or can at least make it dim or dark when   they want the U7K is really all you need just it's  a delightfully surprisingly great TV it's better   than the TCL Q7 and while not quite as great as  the TCL QM8 it gets Mighty close for a lot less   money final message to you is buy with confidence  the Hisense U7K gets two very enthusiastic thumbs   up for me and I'm looking forward to recommending  it to most folks who call for TV buying advice   thanks as always for watching everyone what do  you think of the U7K think this might be your   new TV still tempted by the U8K or maybe the  TCL QM8 tell us all about your experience in   the comments so others can learn from you don't  forget to like And subscribe while you're down   there I'll see you on the next one and until  then here's two other videos I think you might like if I get interrupted by  a helicopter one more time

Channel: Digital Trends

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Id: 0PvuwLda_ac

Length: 16min 21sec (981 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 19 2023