# Football 53” HD screen downgraded to 4K 65”



## Blue Al (Sep 13, 2015)

Please help me ...

As I cannot walk into curry's to look for myself
Just purchased a cheap 65" screen now I have buyers remorse

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/8980768, good reviews on Argos, curry, Amazon etc all positive of screen/image quality.

Normally I'd be looking at LG or Samsung, if buying new.
my "old screen is a 53" hitachi, all good to date but watching so much football the wife said "treat yourself" (obviously she has a long term plan, that will work out far worse for me )

It appears to my eye that the new picture quality is worse using all available channels and "inputs" Is this just bad upscaling of content from my toshiba, or is this a common experience?

I'm looking at the various inputs from the Ariel, old sky Hd, old Apple TV (3rd gen) blue ray player and Now tv for sky football, and BT sport via the Apple TV 
I haven't felt to need to upgrade before as so much existing content is Sd or Hd and has been looking ok on my old screen.

Now A few channels are ok, nothing is mind blowing, but the bulk of the content is far worse, things like games of thrones just look muddy, even the text on the sky planner looks fuzzy.

Do I need to upgrade all the supporting elements, to get a better overall performance as non-4K content always look rubbish so I just have to suck it up.

Or did I buy cheap, so should I send back to Argos, and spend £6-750.00 instead

What I don't want to do is disappear down a rabbit whole of upgrades to all kit and subscriptions and also spending 900 quid or more on a better screen, when in 2 months time I would much rather go to the actual match or watch it in a pub.

No amount of money will buy atmosphere


----------



## The happy goat (Jun 26, 2019)

If your not happy I’d return it.


----------



## GeeWhizRS (Nov 1, 2019)

This is more likely your SD picture being asked to be shown on a too big screen. Standard definition resolution is 640 x 480 (see below). Whilst this may be reasonable on a smaller screen, when you increase the screen size all you are doing is stretching the image to fit and in doing so it looks blurry and less sharp. Although HD channels should look decent enough. 
Have you been through the settings? There are plenty of tv setup videos on youtube.
People often go for a big TV when they are sitting a fair way off the TV. If you are close to a large TV and playing an SD image through it it'll look garbage on any quality of 65" TV.


----------



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

My 2ps worth.

Short Version: You want a better TV than that Toshiba. Send it back.

My Reason is this:

I did an exhaustive amount of work looking for a new TV, so much so that I got fed up and ordered the exact TV you bought because I thought....eff it, can't be bothered, I'll buy a cheap one and suck it up and buy an expensive one later. How bad could it be.

I then researched that TV and other 'cheaper' TVs and they are not a true Toshiba, they are made under licence by a company called Vestel. They made/make Sharp, JVC etc too. 

Phillips outsourced their lower end TVs to them too, apparently they spent more money after their contract ended to try and regain their brand image and perform damage limitation because of how horrendous the TVs were, in quality and reliability and how totally abhorrent Vestels after care was.

Toshibas own TV website, has all porn links etc on it's forum. Everything is shoddy.

So I cancelled the order. I never received the TV and didn't want to.

I then bought a Sony XH90 with full array backlight dimming, HDMI 2.1 with 120hz etc and I am absolutely well and truly over the moon. 


For your needs, you want a TV that is really from a main brand, even an entry level model from LG or Samsung will be light years ahead of that Toshiba. For better natural colours, Sony is the go to.

The processor in a branded TV will be more capable for upscaling etc. Upscaling is a bit of an issue with all though, I will admit. Standard Definition stuff doesn't look great on my £1,300 TV, where as HD looks absolutely stunning.

Individual models will have their positives and negatives so ideally look at reviews from Youtubers and Rtings etc.


----------



## AnthonyUK (Jul 25, 2018)

Football and any fast moving sport really shows up any issues in a TV.
You really need the fastest, smoothest updating panel you can afford for sport.

£449 for a 65" TV is really at the budget level and I would expect to have to add a 1 in front of that price for an acceptable TV of that size.


----------



## Andy from Sandy (May 6, 2011)

My LG OLED 55" was £1400 a couple of years ago so as Anthony, I think you went a bit cheap.


----------



## Blue Al (Sep 13, 2015)

AnthonyUK said:


> Football and any fast moving sport really shows up any issues in a TV.
> You really need the fastest, smoothest updating panel you can afford for sport.
> 
> £449 for a 65" TV is really at the budget level and I would expect to have to add a 1 in front of that price for an acceptable TV of that size.


I know I was gobsmacked at all the good reviews 
Equally the wife "found it" and I didn't want to look a gift-horse in the mouth

I suppose I was expecting just a small drop in quality in exchange for an extra 12" from 53" HD and didn't account for the upscale to 4K issue/trade-off

Thing is I've been telling her-indoors this for years ...Bigger is not always better


----------



## packard (Jun 8, 2009)

GeeWhizRS said:


> This is more likely your SD picture being asked to be shown on a too big screen. Standard definition resolution is 640 x 480 (see below). Whilst this may be reasonable on a smaller screen, when you increase the screen size all you are doing is stretching the image to fit and in doing so it looks blurry and less sharp. Although HD channels should look decent enough.
> Have you been through the settings? There are plenty of tv setup videos on youtube.
> People often go for a big TV when they are sitting a fair way off the TV. If you are close to a large TV and playing an SD image through it it'll look garbage on any quality of 65" TV.


Spot on, will depend on what you watch and quality of those inputs. Sky will only put out 1080i on Sky HD


----------



## AnthonyUK (Jul 25, 2018)

Blue Al said:


> I know I was gobsmacked at all the good reviews
> Equally the wife "found it" and I didn't want to look a gift-horse in the mouth
> 
> I suppose I was expecting just a small drop in quality in exchange for an extra 12" from 53" HD and didn't account for the upscale to 4K issue/trade-off
> ...


Exactly 

The price difference in the higher priced sets is to a degree in better panels but the biggest difference is in the image processing side for upscaling. Very little of the content we watch is natively 4k. There is some content on iPlayer and Netflix and I bet it looks great on that TV. Personally I can't watch anything on SD except wheeler dealers :lol:
Even then on my Samsung I can switch from Freeview to Freesat for that HD channel.
Of the 4k material, unless you have a high end set with QLED or OLED then you may find it is unwatchable do to it being HDR. I had a 55" Samsung that was fine for normal TV but awful for HDR content on Netflix.
I changed to a QLED which are expensive but significantly better in every regard. There are also some excellent OLED that are coming down in price.

Have a look at the Hisense QLEDs on Argos for a decent budget TV - https://www.argos.co.uk/browse/tech...cessories/televisions/c:30106/brands:hisense/


----------



## Mcpx (Mar 15, 2016)

What are the built in apps like? Assuming they put out a 4K image, there is plenty of content on Netflix/Prime etc in 4K which should give you a better idea of how the screen actually is. SD is never going to look good on a big screen but hd should be ok, sounds to me either your picture settings are way off or your hdmi cables are not up to the job. 

Picture settings are easiest to fix and if it does get worse there should be a reset to factory default option. With hdmi cables you don’t need to buy the stupidly expensive ones that Curry’s insist on but there are specific standards for carrying specific levels of bandwidth. HDMI 1.4 cables can transmit 4K but you will get far better results with a modern cable of HDMI 2.0 or greater, so if your cables are more than a couple of years old then it is worth the upgrade. Quality 2 meter HDMI 2.0 cables can be had for a tenner on Amazon. 

Going from HD to 4K is a more subtle jump in quality than SD to HD was, with the right images it can be stunning but you won’t really notice much difference on the news or Eastenders.


----------



## GeeWhizRS (Nov 1, 2019)

The HDMI thing is a red herring. If you get a signal out it should give a signal into whatever display you are using; the early generation of HDMI cables will handle a 1080p signal from that Apple TV 3rd gen, but forget about that for a minute. Stick BBC1 HD on and if it looks garbage then either buy a new tv or mess with the settings to get it right. If BBC1 HD looks fine but SD channels look garbage, you are sitting too close or you bought a TV too big for SD.


----------



## AnthonyUK (Jul 25, 2018)

Have a look for some settings for your TV on an AV forum. Those guys know what they are doing and once set it might take a while getting used to the more natural settings but generally it involves turning off nearly all of the so called ‘picture enhancing’ features &#55357;&#56832;


----------



## Will_G (Jan 23, 2012)

If you can hook up your phone to your tv then you can download the free THX Tune up app which will run you through setting up your tv to suit your set up


----------



## Blue Al (Sep 13, 2015)

Just as an update I have a pair of generic Amazon hdmi leads on its way 
Netflix 4K content is awesome, but otherwise will try thx tune as well but I'm inclined to spend an extra 150quid to try this unit LG 65UN73006LA,

https://www.hughes.co.uk/product/tv-and-entertainment/televisions/all-televisions/lg/65un73006la

still budget driven for the size but 5 year warranty, will be good enough to the next technology arrives,


----------



## AnthonyUK (Jul 25, 2018)

If you could stretch to another £100 this Samsung is a very highly rated - UE65TU7100.


----------



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

Blue Al said:


> Just as an update I have a pair of generic Amazon hdmi leads on its way
> Netflix 4K content is awesome, but otherwise will try thx tune as well but I'm inclined to spend an extra 150quid to try this unit LG 65UN73006LA,
> 
> https://www.hughes.co.uk/product/tv-and-entertainment/televisions/all-televisions/lg/65un73006la
> ...


The HDMI leads won't make any difference to SD Content no matter how good they are.

Different HDMI leads only make a difference with their rated data transfer rate. So the latest HDMI 2.1 Cables have to be capable of 48GBS worth of bandwidth to pass full colour chroma with HDR at 120hz in 4K or 60HZ in 8K from all devices that support it.

I cancelled my order so I never did actually see the quality of picture from the Toshiba but I'm sure 4K looks fine but most of the content below needs a decent processor to upscale as has been said before.

Ref the LG you have listed. Do you have a total upper budget in mind as I wouldn't mind sitting looking through what's available. I enjoy it :lol:


----------



## Blue Al (Sep 13, 2015)

Starbuck88 said:


> The HDMI leads won't make any difference to SD Content no matter how good they are.
> 
> Different HDMI leads only make a difference with their rated data transfer rate. So the latest HDMI 2.1 Cables have to be capable of 48GBS worth of bandwidth to pass full colour chroma with HDR at 120hz in 4K or 60HZ in 8K from all devices that support it.
> 
> ...


The upper budget was £450.00 :lol:
Budget creep now 650.00


----------



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

Here's a few picks:

https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-an...ogle-assistant-amazon-alexa-10218753-pdt.html

https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-an...ogle-assistant-amazon-alexa-10205968-pdt.html

https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-an...mart-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-led-tv-10206285-pdt.html

I know these are a tiny bit above your budget but you're at that point now where you're starting to break into a different category of TV. The quality of them though 'should' be better than the Toshiba and if nothing else, will be much more reliable. The long term reliability on Vestel TVs is horrendous.


----------



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

any updates on this?


----------



## Blue Al (Sep 13, 2015)

Argos say tv works so they won’t take it back

So much for 30day exchange or distance selling...


On a different matter had awful service from Argos on a Apple Watch (crimbo gift from her indoors)
I will never use them again on point of principle (maybe a ironing board) their after sales, websites, live chat are all equally appalling


----------



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

Blue Al said:


> Argos say tv works so they won't take it back
> 
> So much for 30day exchange or distance selling...
> 
> ...


Can you get it to a store? Just say it keeps switching itself off randomly.


----------



## AnthonyUK (Jul 25, 2018)

Blue Al said:


> Argos say tv works so they won't take it back
> 
> So much for 30day exchange or distance selling...


Their policy states you can return it within 30 days if unused/unopened. 
Pretty easy to understand :lol:


----------



## Blue Al (Sep 13, 2015)

AnthonyUK said:


> Their policy states you can return it within 30 days if unused/unopened.
> Pretty easy to understand :lol:


How do you return a product as unsuitable if you don't try it 1st will remain one of life's mysteries to me....:tumbleweed:


----------



## Kerr (Mar 27, 2012)

AnthonyUK said:


> Their policy states you can return it within 30 days if unused/unopened.
> Pretty easy to understand :lol:


They don't seem to be bothered if it's used.

She bought a new iron from Argos. Opening it she thought it wasn't new. It even already had water in it ready to use. :lol:


----------

