TCL? Telephone Communication Limited?

Hardware and technical stuff
1

You may have noticed that pretty much out of nowhere this apparently unknown to American consumers television company has begun selling pretty well received televisions with 4K and HDR at what amounts to cut-rate prices. But i guess as of today they’re the third largest seller of TVs worldwide?

This TV, for example, is a 55" 4K TV with Dolby Vision HDR for $400. $400 for a 55" 4K HDR TV! Those were a minimum of around $1,500 or so last year.

Who are TCL? Well, obviously, they’re Chinese. But more hilariously, they’re named for TDK cassettes. That name’s a blast from the past. Apparently they used to make knock-off cassettes under the brand name TTK but were sued for copyright violation in 1985 (according to Wiki) and changed their name to TCL. What a path to today.

Anyway, their TVs are surprisingly highly recommended for their price. They’re apparently the budget TV to beat if you’re looking to upgrade to 4K and HDR now.

2

Reported! Err, wait, @Enidigm… Is that really you, or a cheap knock-off?

3

I have a 32 inch TCL roku TV in the bedroom and it is great. 160 bucks, built in Roku.

4

What? I’m at least 85% a real person for 1/2 the price!

5

TCL have been sold over here in Oz for quite a few years though, but no idea of their heritage! Thanks for that!

Edit - Er, I guess making (successful) knock-off brands are heritage?

Edit 2 - I also note that some of these Chinese brands are often leading for gaming performance - input lag, motion blur, etc.

6

I’m tempted to buy a TCL while waiting for the price of OLED to drop down to reasonable levels.

I just wish they made a 65".

7

65 and 75 inch 4ks should be coming later this year, for Xmas

8

I have noticed a lot of the Roku TVs are made by TCL. Never heard of them before that.

9

I’d love to buy a 70 inch, but they cancelled the large ones earlier this year, stating that they’d prefer to focus on one 55 inch model instead.

I hope they reverse that for next year.

10

The Wirecutter recommends the TCL over the Vizio P series, which is why the TCL caught my interest. The fact that it supports both HDR10 and DV ticked off a couple more boxes for me.

Oh reeeeallly? That’s good to know. I wonder what the pricing will be like on the 65".

11

I recently got the TCL 55P607 which is what you really want, not the S405 in the OP. The P607 (or P605 from Best Buy) has full array local dimming with like 40 zones. The S405 and the C807 are both edge lit so the HDR isn’t as good. The P607 is still a steal at $600. You basically have to spend twice that to get a better LCD TV, and at that point you should just stretch all the way to OLED.

12

Grains of salt and all that but it’s being advertised

13

That model appears to lack the local dimming that sets the P607 apart.

14

Good catch. I’m definitely only interested in the “P” series and there’s no 65" (yet).