Sometimes the best surprise is no surprises at all
Welcome back everyone I'm Caleb Denison and today we're going to review the TCL 5 series Roku TV
that would be the s555 possibly one of the easier TV model numbers to remember honestly now this is
a TV I've been looking forward to checking out because as you may recall I reviewed the 2021 5
series Roku TV that was the s535 it was a solid TV but then the 5 series Google TV came out that
was the s546 at the beginning of this year and it boasted some improvements over the Roku TV we had
reviewed earlier which was a bit of a departure for TCL normally I'd have expected it would be
essentially the same TV just under a different Smart TV platform well the s546 which you can
still buy by the way was better and although it was a bit buggy at the time those bugs have now
been largely worked out still I've been eager to check out the s55 here because it is meant
to have all the picture quality improvements of the Google TV version but built on Roku
that being the case I I feel like I knew exactly what to expect from this TV but because I hadn't
yet gotten a chance to evaluate it for myself I wasn't comfortable including it in some of my
best TVs list for 2022. different sizes of the s55 here could make the best under 500 list and the
best under one thousand dollar list but because I hadn't tested it myself I just wasn't ready to go
there well if you ask me it ain't too late this TV is still going to be relevant for many months
to come and at the time I'm recording this video the holiday shopping season is still very much
underway so let's see how this TV does what you can expect from it whether you might want to buy
this TV or say a competing model like the Hisense u7h before we jump in two quick reminders one is
that we've got a big giveaway announcement coming up soon we're celebrating that million subscriber
Milestone so keep an eye open for that video and the best way to do that is to subscribe and
ring that Bell also because it is scam season and because we are running a giveaway soon a reminder
that we will never ask you to get a hold of us via telegram or any other social media
platform those are all scams we'll be running our giveaway through our secure page on our secure
website digitaltrends.com and we'll be linking to it from the description of our announcement
video which thankfully is one place scammers can't get to all right let's talk about this TV
so at the top of this video I said no surprises what does that mean well starting with getting
the TV out of the box it means the s55 looks and operates a lot like I thought it would this TV is
relatively inexpensive but it isn't the cheapest you can buy and that pretty much describes the
TV's looks and build quality it's not flashy but it ain't trashy either the only thing that struck
me as odd as I assembled this TV was that the screws didn't want to seat in their holes as I
screwed them in I mean all too well that ends well the feet are now secure in the TV but it
was an interesting touch Point still far from a surprise now the feet only go in one spot on this
TV unlike some models where you can position them inward so you can set it on a smaller media stand
or shelf you'll need some width to accommodate this TV in the case of this 65-inch model that we
have here about 50.25 inches now there's no real Cable Management so I would suggest getting some
velcro ties to keep the cable mess to a minimum I also also find those velcro ties clutch for
when you're wall mounting too way better than zip ties for multiple reasons if you do wall mount I
think you'll like the way this TV looks like most decent TVs these days it's got minimal bezels on
the top and sides and a matte black strip along the Bottom now that light under the TCL logo in
the center can be turned off in the menu if you want by the way you know it's funny that same
light on a TV I have at home drives me nuts and I know I can turn it off for some reason I just
don't don't be like me just turn it off in the Roku menu if you want now for connectivity this
tv offers four HDMI inputs and none of them offer full HDMI 2.1 bandwidth but that does
not mean this is a poor TV for gaming it's pretty solid for gaming actually so you know what let's
just talk about gaming right now it's got a 60 hertz native panel so it will max out at 4K 60
hertz but it does offer variable refresh rate or vrr including basic freesync now how you useful
that will be to you I'm not sure it basically goes down to 48 Hertz and up to 60 hertz which isn't a
huge range but that seems to mitigate a little bit of screen tearing in games that aren't locked at
a low refresh rate I think what really makes this a decent gaming TV for me though is the very low
input lag about 11 seconds in game mode at most resolutions which is awesome that right there is
going to make gameplay feel great and then the HDR performance in game mode as I'll discuss shortly
is also quite nice now before I get into some picture quality measurement data I do want to
talk about one slight annoyance that remains from prior 5 series models that I've tested and that's
a little bit of lag in the interface operation from time to time clicking around at a fast pace
will get you hung up it unfreezes eventually but I'm easily annoyed by that also if you have the
TV connected to a sound bar powered speakers or an AV receiver via Arc or e-arc yes it does support
e-arc then you'll notice changing the volume is a really slow Affair again an annoyance that I
expected as I experienced this on other TCL Roku TVs now as promised it's time for my favorite
segment numbers for Knit nerds now if you care not for the Nitty Gritty sorry look you don't have to
stick around for nerd time theater you can skip ahead to the picture quality takeaway using the
time code link down in the description but for my knit nerds out there here's the basics this
TV for me punched up to about 550 nits in SDR and just shy of 800 nits in HDR when calibrated to d65
White point now the SDR brightness I got is a tad lower than what some other folks have gotten while
the HDR Peak brightness is a bit higher than what some other reviewers got and that's in the dark
HDR setting by the way with warm color temperature and local dimming feature maxed out now my take on
this TV includes that 800 result because I factory reset this TV and checked many many times over and
it came in that way every single time so I'd like to think it is representative of what's
on the market but it did come straight from TCL so keep that in mind at any rate the out of box white
point and color errors on this TV in the movie mode for SDR and dark HDR mode for hdr10 were
not bad just shy of four on the white balance and about the same for color so technically visible
but not by much and it didn't take a lot for me to correct the bright white balance for some reason
my adjustments to the Roku app were ineffective at 10 20 and 30 luminance for white I'm not sure
why I'm reaching out to TCL about that but hey I really don't see anyone getting this TV calibrated
so what's important to me is that it looks great out of the box and in those picture modes it does
in standard it is unsurprisingly way too blue and of course Vivid looks like hot garbage or I guess
it would be cold garbage right but that's true on just about any TV anyway here's my take on the
picture quality it is Rock Solid for the price for anyone who remembers how impressed reviewers were
with the tcl6 series from like three or four years ago it's like that today's TCL 5 series looks like
yesterday's tcl6 series but at a lower price and I mean who can complain about that the SDR
brightness and HDR brightness are solid for the price though not the best out there I'll get to
that in a minute the contrast is excellent for the price thanks to solid backlight control even if it
doesn't have a ton of local dimming zones the color is brilliant and well saturated on angle
at least and motion is perfectly acceptable though you won't get as smooth a picture from this TV as
one that does up to 120 hertz you do however get a bit less stunner since the reaction time isn't
as quick which I think some people will actually prefer my only real complaints about this TV one
is that the off angle viewing is not great if you're sitting dead on Center you're getting a
really really nice picture if you sit off to the side you really aren't thanks to the VA panel we
get those deep blacks in great contrast but also thanks to the pretty basic VA panel we
also get disappointing off-angle viewing it is what it is so I didn't exactly win the panel
Lottery on this TV with regard to dirty screen effect it isn't terrible but I see it now if you
don't really see dirty screen effect Now isn't the time to remove the veil from your eyes not
if you're considering this TV or another at its price point it's kind of just part of the deal
also no surprise the TV sound quality is not great and by that I mean I would personally
not be able to go without at least a basic sound bar I almost hate bringing it up because it's so
common at this price point but then there's the Hisense u7h which sounds better than it
should and well that's as good a segue as any to what I think is an inevitable comparison [Music]
so who should buy this TV and who should buy the Hisense u7h well first I know there are some out
there who may not feel that's a fair comparison and that's because as I'm making this video the
Hisense u7h costs a bit more than the TCL s55 actually the s55 here sits between High sensors
u6h and u7h in terms of price which makes doing a direct comparison kind of difficult but since the
picture quality is so similar between the two I'm going to go ahead and make the comparison anyway
because I think a lot of Shoppers are going to do the same so first off if you prefer the Roku
OS built into the TV well then the s55 is the choice but if we take the smart TV platform out
of consideration you do get better specs from the u7h it's a brighter TV in both SDR and HDR and it
has a 120 hertz panel with HDMI 2.1 bandwidth support from two of its HDMI inputs although
it does seem to struggle with proper 4K 100 120 hertz gaming a bit also the Hisense u7h manages
to offer jutter-free 24fps movie content when you get it from a 60 hertz Source like a cable
box whereas the TCL s55 seems to struggle with that a little bit not a lot just a bit on the
other hand the tcls55 has lower input lag across its supported resolutions and to me is a less
flickery TV and I'm not sure the brightness differences between the two are going to be
super meaningful for most viewers so I guess I'd say if you're a knit nerd and you want the
most brightness for your money and you want 120 hertz panel and HDMI 2.1 bandwidth well
the u7h is probably a better choice at least on paper but if you want to save a little money the
TCL s55 strikes a great balance between cost and performance the kind of performance that's
impressive enough to deliver some wow to your eyes without punching much of a hole in your
wallet I've enjoyed watching it very much now personally speaking if the cost increase wasn't
a concern I'd say step up to the tcl6 series if you can the return on investment is well worth
it if you're a video Enthusiast but if you're just looking for a solid TV that is loaded with value
the TCL s55 is an excellent choice no surprise there thanks as always for watching everyone
did you pick up a tcls55 and if so what do you think about it let us know about it down in the
comments don't forget to like And subscribe and here's two other videos I think you might like