New 50 inch TV advice

almillar

You're going to have to tinker with the settings on any TV, once anyway. You don't mention how you were watching the football, I'll assume in HD, on a broadcast channel? If it's SD, or a dodgy internet stream, quality expectations will go out the window, regardless of TV.

As suggested above, the TV may be oversharpening things, or it may be trying to help with motion blur. Ironically the very settings they add to 'get rid of/improve' things, can often make things worse. Don't just go spending money, any TV is going to take some setting up. Once you get it how you like it, it's saved.

[Deleted User]

almillar said: Once you get it how you like it, it's saved.

I'm not sure a 50" TV at a £300 price point can be "saved". It's also very likely to fail altogether in a relatively short time...

mobileron

so why will Richersounds/John Lewis offer long warranty on something thats likely to fail.
Im old enough to remember when samsung came to the market,was working for a major Japanese brand we laughed at them, the Japenese brand is no longer around.

[Deleted User]

mobileron said:

so why will Richersounds/John Lewis offer long warranty on something thats likely to fail.

Are those retailers actually  selling large screens at that price point, though?  

Regardless, if they are cheap to produce and sell they are also cheaper to replace, so there is no reason not to still offer the warranty..

almillar

What if OP just needs to tweak a few settings, and then will be happy with their TV? What if it does last?!

[Deleted User]

almillar said:

What if OP just needs to tweak a few settings, and then will be happy with their TV? What if it does last?!

Regardless of potential longevity, it is (and will remain) a low budget TV which no amount of "tweaks" can or will improve to the extent he appears to desire. Motion blur on Live soccer will remain whatever he does...

This is a money-saving site, but in this case  I fear a bit too much money is being "saved".

almillar

Moneyineptitude said:

, it is (and will remain) a low budget TV which no amount of "tweaks" can or will improve to the extent he appears to desire. Motion blur on Live soccer will remain whatever he does...

On the information available in the thread, he hasn't attempted to tweak it at all. And in my experience, there could be some gimmicky feature switched on that is ruining the picture. And we also don't know the source, which could be the problem. I don't know the last time you looked at cheap TVs, but I imagine they're a lot better than you remember.

The TV is bought. You wouldn't have advised it, I may not have either, but I think we should try to optimise it, before spending more money. What if OP is happy with it?!

[Deleted User]

almillar said:

The TV is bought. 

On another thread it's revealed that the OP has  already  exchanged for another budget TV. 

Since the OP seems to think he can only improve  picture quality by signing up to 4K broadcasts from BT and Sky, your settings suggestion is falling on deaf ears I'm afraid..

Mr_Benn

Your all right.  Buying a low cost TV gets you the lower quality picture.  Im not going into the details, but I didnt buy the original one, and it had to be exchanged at Argos.  Personally i wouldve bought a 43 inch, and possibly another Sony as my 32 inch was great. It was akward spending a lot more on the exchanged TV than i wouldve liked to  The problem also is until you start spending over £6-700  its not obvious which tv is really better without actually seeing a non 4k picture on it.  All the shops just stream the same 1 minute 4k content so they look brilliant. And of courdse OLED look great.   So we now have a Samsung ue50ru7100kxxu.  The football picture is better,  the HD channels about the same.  I have tried tweaking some settings, but accept that the picture is good, and it may be the only way of getting some of the channels sharper is to pay for 4k. Its annoying that you cant get BT Sport 4k via Sky, as that wouldve been a good test.  Playing 4k content on youtube looks very good, so it would seem its more about the channel quality than the tv , obviously channels like Gold are old footage so wont be sharp.  Im going to have a look if any other setting can help first anyway before thinking about Sky Q (changing upscaling seems to be one suggestion ) .  Am I happy with the whole situation, not really, but on the much happier side at least my house isnt flooded like many in my County  (Worcs ) .   Appreciate all the positive answers, and the not so helpful ones         

[Deleted User]

Mr_Benn said: I have tried tweaking some settings, but accept that the picture is good, and it may be the only way of getting some of the channels sharper is to pay for 4k. 

You need to realise that Sky 4K content is not available via any traditional "channels" at the moment.

 "Upgrading" to Sky Q will not somehow make your (still) budget TV any better at "sharpening" the channels you mention.

 Certainly, many live soccer games are available in 4K but the Sky Sports channel itself is not 4K. 

4K Movies are available "On Demand", but again, there are no 4K Movie channels.

There are also no 4K BBC, ITV, CH4 or CH5 channels..

So basically, unless you can afford to invest significantly more money, you'll have to be content with the channels you watch at their current quality. You should certainly experiment with the picture settings, but please don't expect miracles especially when watching channels which still only broadcast in standard definition.