Hisense H50N6800
FOR Crisp picture; smart design; natural colour palette AGAINST Contrast not subtle; trouble with dark scenes
“Dress for the job you want, not the one you have”. Unless you're thinking of turning up at your accountancy firm in a Batman costume, it’s generally good advice.
Hisense’s latest 50in N6800 television is certainly dressed for the part. Also available in 55in and 60in versions, it offers a middlemarket alternative to the television offerings from the big four of LG, Sony, Panasonic and Samsung.
On paper, the N6800 appears to tick all the right boxes: it has a 4K screen and smart functionality, as well as ULED and HDR Plus technology – which sound similar enough to OLED and HDR to impress prospective buyers in the showroom. However, in practice, the Hisense doesn’t quite reach the expected heights.
Range of technologies
ULED stands for Ultra LED, an umbrella term for a number of technologies that improve the picture quality of ‘normal’ LCD sets. This includes Wide Colour Gamut, High Dynamic Contrast, and 240-zone local dimming which makes dark colours deeper while light ones go brighter.
HDR Plus, meanwhile, is a form of High Dynamic Range for televisions with a brightness of at least 400 nits (the N6800 reaches 450 nits). However, it’s notably different from HDR Premium or the 1000 nits necessary to be considered as a UHD LCD Premium set.
Remote sounds
On the software side, the way that the Hisense handles streaming services is enjoyably simple with a proprietary operating system called ‘VIDAA U’. Pressing the Home button on the remote overlays a row of apps in the middle of the screen, while keeping whatever you’re watching playing in the background. It’s customisable too; if you’re an Amazon Prime subscriber but don’t have Netflix, you can set it up so one appears before the other.
BBC iplayer, Youtube, and Wuaki.tv also come pre-installed, with the last two having dedicated buttons on the remote (as does Netflix). Catch-up services from ITV, Channel 4, and Demand 5 are absent, but Hisense says that a future update will add them, along with Freeview Play functionality, to the platform.
The remote itself is nice to hold and the channel buttons have a good texture, but the plastic, clicking sound they make means it’s a little less appealing to use. Thankfully, the Hisense also supports Anyview Cast, so if you have an Android phone you can stream content to the TV.
Despite the competitive price tag, the N6800 is pretty stylish. It has a nice border of metal between the screen and the frame, and while the back is plastic, it’s solid and substantial. Off the top of our heads, it’s difficult to recall a modestly priced television that looks better than this.
There are four HDMI inputs, two of which are HDMI 2.0, two HDMI 1.4. For anyone watching movies, this won’t make much difference, but hardcore gamers will want to make sure their 60fps games are going through the HDMI 2.0 input for maximum performance. There is also an ethernet port, an optical output, RCA plugs and three USB inputs.
Making the grade
Having set up the TV for our testing room, turned Dynamic Contrast to Low and toggled the Local Dimming mode, we find that the N8600 puts out a decently crisp picture when a scene is lit well.
Watching Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp on Netflix, there’s a
“The N6800 appears to ticks all the right boxes: a 4K screen, smart functionality, HDR Plus. But the Hisense can’t reach the expected heights”
decent amount of detail to the water in the lake and the bright red wood on the side of each cabin. When the camera moves closer, there’s enough insight to show the strands of hair on Coop’s ill-fitting wig which only serve to emphasise the ridiculous nature of the show.
Skin tones are natural, provided you leave this TV’S colour temperature on Standard; changing to either Warm or Cool puts the palette on the wrong side of convincing. It’s pretty colourful, contrasting greens and blues clearly, but there is room for improvement. We’d like a little more subtlety, as it isn’t a particularly nuanced colour range, and bright lights cast on character’s faces don’t have enough gradation to look realistic.
Stepping down from 4K content to Blu-ray and standard definition broadcasts,