It is hard to imagine that there could be many more improvements to the market for televisions today, but it seems like manufacturers are always working towards putting out something new to entice the masses with better picture quality and sound to make things even crisper and clearer than ever before. You may thought things could not change that much from the HD televisions that have only been on the market for a couple of years, but along have come the Ultra HD televisions that many people now refer to as 4K televisions. Before you go ahead and make an investment in the product, you may want to know whether there is a big enough difference for you to spend the money on a 4K TV just yet.
What is a 4K Television?
The ultra-High Definition (HD) televisions promise to deliver four times the number of pixels to your picture than that of the typical 1080p HD set that many people already have in their homes. While you may not have broken the bank on the HD television that you have in your living room, bedroom or family room (the prices have dropped quite a bit in recent years for these sets as they get bigger), the ultra HD sets can set you back a pretty penny. Most of these sets are priced anywhere from $1,500 to upwards of $10,000 or more, depending on the manufacturer and the size of the set itself. Many of these sets are between 50 inches and 85 inches, making them really designed for large rooms that can handle them well.
Is a 4K Television Really Better?
The problem that many people are having is that there it can be hard to notice any real difference in quality between the Ultra HD television and your standard high definition television. Unlike when HD came along to blow standard definition televisions out of the water and out of the marketplace, the difference between Ultra HD and a 1080p set can be hard to see. Ultra HD does not employ any type of revolutionary quality to it; it is just an improvement in definition over the current sets available. There are some users that report noticing a difference in sharpness and contrast of color while others cannot really see any difference at all in the sets.
You also have to remember that as of right now there is limited content available that can actually be seen in 4K so that the majority of your content is only going to be displayed in typical HD fashion, which does not really give you much of an edge over what you already have. There are plans from several satellite providers and streaming companies to start to offer programs in 4K, but it is not really there yet and there are few offerings in Blu-ray and the like that you can even get your hands on yet.
This all brings back the question is 4K really worth the investment at this time? There are still some tweaks that may need to be made, but consumers do report that some movies and shows do look better on an Ultra HD set than they do on a 1080p set. While these sets are still new and not radically different from what is out there already, if you are the kind of person that has to have the latest out there and have the money to spend, you may want to take a look at 4K televisions.