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First Click: Buying 4K, not the 4K hype

October 16th, 2015

4K is the newest marketing buzzword for consumer electronics. Like 3D before it, manufacturers are using its allure to entice us into upgrading our TV, monitor, All-in-One desktop, smartphone, home theater projector, camera, laptop, and tablet.

It’s almost impossible to find a 1080p TV above 30 inches in most retailer shops these days. They’ve all been replaced with big 4K televisions with big price tags; some with HDR, some without. We’re also seeing set-top streaming devices like the Roku 4, Nvidia Shield, and new Amazon Fire TV make the move to 4K. Smartphones like the iPhone 6S now shoot 4K video and the Sony Xperia Z5 even sports a 4K display. Over the last month we’ve seen the launch of the Toshiba Radius 12 with 4K display, the Dell XPS 12 which can be transformed into a 4K tablet, a new iMac with 4K display, and Sony 4K home theater projectors with HDR support.

Often the push for 4K is just a marketing gimmick, but it can be a useful feature under some circumstances on some products. Here’s a chart that can help cut through the hype:

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