Compare: Samsung QLED Q70D / Q74D / Q77D vs TCL A400 PRO

Samsung Q70D performed in the test exactly as it should for its price range – very competently. The strongest aspects of the television are certainly its performance when using a console and colour reproduction after the calibration process. The former will undoubtedly catch the attention of gamers with a range of conveniences that Samsung Q70D can offer, and there are quite a few, including that which is almost exclusive to the manufacturer's units – the ability to smooth out gameplay while still maintaining reasonable input lag, allowing titles running at 30 fps to perform like those at native 60 frames per second. In the context of gaming, one cannot forget the well-implemented HGIG mode, which, when set correctly, is on par with games using Dolby Vision. We must also acknowledge the easy pairing of the television with the Canal+ decoder, which is not such an obvious advantage, but we know that many people experience issues with this. Staying on the topic of television, it must be noted that the Samsung Q70D offers very good brightness in SDR content for its price range, making daytime viewing more than comfortable. A downside for the tested television is the lack of Dolby Vision, which would have significantly enhanced performance at the maximum brightness of the Samsung Q70D. The device's construction flaws should not be overlooked, as they may (though not necessarily) lead to light bleed that can be noticed in dark situations during dimly lit scenes. What cannot be taken away from the Samsung Q70D is the fact that it features one of the better motion smoothers in its price bracket, which works excellently for sports events or fast-paced action scenes. The system responsible for the television's operation runs very smoothly, and the only thing we can criticise it for is the absence of the Tidal app. In summary, the Samsung Q70D represents a good continuation of the manufacturer's seventh series, which year after year is gaining – firstly, in quality, and secondly, in popularity.

TCL A400 Pro is one of the most interesting lifestyle TVs we've tested so far. And not because it turns the whole idea of the "TV as a picture" upside down. In that respect it does roughly what the competition does: it should look good, blend into the interior and not be just another black slab in the living room. Its real strength lies elsewhere: in picture quality. This is the first TV of this kind that actually gives us an image built on solid blacks and high contrast. Full Mini-LED backlighting combined with a VA panel means the A400 Pro can show a depth that has simply been missing from lifestyle TVs until now. Of course it's not Mini-LED that you'd put shoulder to shoulder with the best LCDs on the market, but in its "picture" category the A400 Pro does something really important: it proves that an art TV doesn't have to mean a big compromise in picture quality. Importantly, it doesn't stop at blacks and contrast. The A400 Pro has very good colours, supports Dolby Vision and runs on Google TV, so in everyday use it is simply a convenient, full-featured TV for films, series and streaming. On top of that there are very strong gaming capabilities, so it easily finds a place with a console or PC. And I think it's this versatility that's its biggest surprise. It looks like a lifestyle TV, but it doesn't force you to give up the functions you expect from a regular TV.

The biggest reservations, paradoxically, are not about the picture itself. Sure, the number of local dimming zones could be greater and the upscaling doesn't stand out from the usual. But given the character of this model, what bothers us more are decisions connected with the concept of a picture on the wall. The lack of a slim mount in the box is a strange move, because that is exactly the type of installation that should be standard here. In addition, the wood-effect bezels are permanently attached, so they don't offer the same freedom of personalisation as on other models of this type. And because the casing is thicker, the A400 Pro doesn't always deliver as flat and subtle an effect as you might expect from a TV in this category.

And that's the biggest paradox of the TCL A400 Pro. In terms of image it may be one of the strongest lifestyle TVs on the market, but at the same time it loses a little where such a product should charm the most. Still, the balance is very positive. If the design decisions mentioned earlier don't bother you, the A400 Pro makes a lot of sense. It's a TV for people who want something nicer than a classic television but don't want to pay for looks with a major compromise in picture quality. That's why the TCL A400 Pro is one of the most interesting models in its category.

Samsung Q70D and its related models, such as Q77D and Q74D, use a VA panel, which should inherently provide decent contrast. Typically, it is several times higher than that of IPS/ADS screens that do not come equipped with an advanced local dimming system. As you can see, contrast results are quite varied, which is caused by the unevenness of the panel. Therefore, we might sometimes get good contrast, and other times it can be significantly worsened, but generally, it remains fairly consistent, aside from light bleed. Let’s take a look at the film scenes we prepared from "Oblivion" and "Revenant." As we can see, in the first one, the lights are well separated, which is a positive phenomenon, as the visibility of details in bright areas in further tests should be equally good. What stands out the most here is the unusual oversharpening of the smoke visible under the light and the navy black in the background. In the frame from the second film, the first thing that stands out is the unevenness of the backlighting of our piece. This was significant and strongly affected the perceived image. Nonetheless, the details in the film were well visible.

Moving on to the image quality tests, it’s immediately clear that the biggest change compared with typical lifestyle TVs is what the TCL A400 Pro brings to blacks and contrast. This is all thanks to full-fledged Mini-LED backlighting placed directly behind the panel. That allows the TV to locally dim selected parts of the image and not be limited solely to the panel’s native contrast. In the 65-inch sample we tested, we counted 180 dimming zones. That’s not an impressive number compared with conventional Mini-LED TVs, where there can be many more zones, but for a lifestyle TV it’s already a very big step forward. Especially since competitors often either lack advanced local dimming or use much simpler edge-lit backlighting.

In practice this delivers very good results. In simpler scenes where bright elements are clearly separated from a dark background, the A400 Pro can effectively dim the black areas and show genuinely deep blacks. It’s one of those things that immediately sets it apart from many conventional "picture-first" TVs. Of course, that doesn’t mean TCL completely avoids the limitations of Mini-LED LCD technology. 180 zones is still relatively few, so in more complex scenes, for example with small bright elements on a dark background, a halo effect can appear. It also happens that blacks in those conditions take on a more navy-purple tint, because the TV cannot dim the background with the same precision as OLEDs. Despite these limitations, we think the A400 Pro brings a significant breath of fresh air to this category. For a lifestyle TV that’s primarily meant to look good on the wall, the black level and contrast are a very strong selling point.

NOTE. It’s worth noting that the number of local dimming zones depends on the screen diagonal. Larger variants should have more zones, but because the number of zones increases with panel size, we don’t expect major differences in black level and contrast between the Mini-LED versions. The exception is the 32- and 43-inch models, in which TCL did not apply local dimming. These are much simpler LCD designs, so our review does not directly apply to those diagonals, and the prices given in the review should be treated as indicative only.

Number of dimming zones in the TCL A400 Pro

Screen size	Backlight type	Number of local dimming zones
32"	PFS LED	None
43"	PFS LED	None
55"	QD Mini-LED	112 zones
65"	QD Mini-LED	180 zones
75"	QD Mini-LED	240 zones
85"	QD Mini-LED	264 zones
98"	QD Mini-LED	448 zones

The brightness that the Samsung Q70D can offer is at a rather average level, although it cannot be said that the HDR effect will not be noticeable. Any brightness above 400 nits allows for a clear distinction between SDR and HDR content. As was the case in the paragraph about contrast and black levels, we can also observe here that the first scene, featuring a bright sunny sky and a darker foreground, has the lowest luminance of those measured. The result, which can be considered very good for this price range and display class, is that one. In a scene where we see a large light source filling a significant portion of the frame, the brightness of the TV is at its highest, reaching nearly 500 nits. However, it is worth noting the rather low coverage of the wide DCI-P3 colour gamut, which sometimes results in noticeable shortcomings in the colour reproduction. Additionally, users can enjoy rich colours and high precision in rendering shades, making movie screenings a unique experience. It is also worth mentioning that the Q70D Samsung panel performs excellently in eliminating blur during dynamic action scenes, which enhances the viewing comfort of sports broadcasts or games.

The TCL A400 Pro is a moderately bright TV. Its peak brightness reaches around 600 nits. That level already allows for a real HDR effect and in many films it does deliver a noticeably more appealing picture than in SDR. However, it’s not a level that dazzles by brightness alone. The A400 Pro is not one of those TVs that bombard the viewer with a powerful flash in every dramatic scene. The biggest limitation is visible with small bright elements on a dark background. Because of fairly aggressive zone control, the TV can significantly reduce their brightness, in extreme cases down to around 100 nits. That means small lights, sparks, stars or single highlights can be much less visible than they should be. It should be added, though, that this isn’t done without reason. The A400 Pro does this to keep black levels as deep as possible and to limit the halo effect around bright objects. It’s a deliberate compromise: the TV more often opts for deeper blacks rather than maximising point highlights. On the one hand this is understandable, especially given a limited number of dimming zones, but on the other you should be aware that the HDR effect won’t always be as strong as the peak brightness alone might suggest.

On the plus side, the colours are a strength. The PFS LED filter used here, marketed by the manufacturer as QLED, delivers suitably saturated colours. Our measurements showed about 94% coverage of the DCI-P3 gamut and around 74% of BT.2020, which is a solid result for this class.

The best factory mode in Samsung Q70D is "Filmmaker," and it was this mode that we used during all our tests. Before the calibration process, it had several flaws that effectively hindered the presentation of the director's intentions. In both SDR and HDR material, the white balance was dominated by red and green colours. As a result, there was a characteristic yellow tint on the image, which caused whites to appear yellowed and skin tones to be noticeably too warm. The reduced gamma in standard colour palette materials caused a significant drop in contrast, which was already not the highest. This led to the highlighting of details in the blacks, but also to clipping in brighter scenes. In this case, the EOTF curve proved to be much better and only brightened those scenes with quite low luminance. This was clearly visible in the section where we measured the maximum brightness of the television in HDR materials. At that time, a shot from the film "Billy Lynn" appeared unnaturally bright and lacking depth.

As usual, we carried out colour measurements in the best‑tuned picture mode, Filmmaker Mode, the one intended to be closest to the creators’ intentions. The A400 Pro, of course, also offers other picture modes, but in practice they show much larger colour errors and interfere more with the image character. So we won’t cover them in detail in this part of the review. How does the factory colour reproduction fare? In short: really very well. In fact, looking at our measurements, it’s excellent. Both the white balance and the luminance response were set surprisingly precisely. The errors were so small that during the measurements we genuinely rubbed our eyes in surprise. Such good factory settings don’t happen often, even in televisions running Filmmaker Mode. All the more reason to praise TCL, because the A400 Pro straight out of the box can produce an image very close to how the source material should look. The results were so good you could easily think someone had already given this unit extra attention and tried to calibrate it. Our one bit of nitpicking comes down to a single issue. In SDR material the image was slightly brighter than the reference for a dark room, because the factory gamma was set closer to 2.3 than 2.4. It’s not a large error and most viewers probably won’t even notice it. We should note, however, that we are talking about our specific test unit. There can always be some variation in factory colour between individual units, production batches or screen sizes. We do not assume every A400 Pro will look identical straight out of the box.

Fortunately, Samsung provides a wide range of calibration tools in all its TVs, including 2- and 20-point grey scale adjustments and advanced CMS. As a result, we were able to significantly improve the quality of SDR and HDR content. The vast majority of errors have been corrected, and the image that the Samsung Q70D now delivers is definitely much closer to the reference. Higher deltaE errors in wide dynamic range content primarily result from the display's insufficient luminance.

Despite the outstanding factory tuning, we couldn't resist checking how the TCL A400 Pro would respond to professional calibration. With such a strong starting point, we were especially curious whether we could squeeze even more from this TV. And here we have to boast: we managed to bring our sample to absurdly low colour errors. Results below 1 are something you don't see every day, even on very good TVs. Such outcomes are more often associated with professional reference monitors than with a lifestyle TV for the living room. In terms of white balance and colour reproduction, the A400 Pro after calibration simply excelled. The only thing we can pick on after closer analysis concerns the brightness response. The TV can vary the luminance level depending on the content being displayed, and quite often the picture is a little darker than it should be according to the reference. This most likely stems from the way the Mini-LED backlight and the local dimming algorithms work in this model. That said, it doesn't ruin the overall impression, because in terms of colour precision the A400 Pro after calibration reached a level that was genuinely hard to expect.

Considering how important lighting is in films and series, the overlapping structures and fluidity of tonal transitions constitute an extremely significant element in assessing image quality. The colour grading on the tested television is at quite a decent level. It cannot be said that it is outstanding, but it is not bad either. We assess it as acceptable. Brighter scenes perform best here, demonstrating the least amount of choppiness. In scenes recorded in darker settings, slight shortcomings in grading can already be noticeable, although it is not an issue that would cause discomfort while watching. This may be disturbed by the leaking backlight, which is clearly visible in the last image.

The TCL A400 Pro handles tonal transitions very well. Tonal gradation in most content is smooth, and any imperfections only appear in extreme cases, mainly on subtle grey transitions. It's worth noting that the vast majority of TVs struggle with scenes like these. What's also very good news is the lack of gradation issues in Dolby Vision. The A400 Pro did not introduce extra banding or visible artefacts in that format, which lately you can't take for granted. That's another factor that positively affects the viewing of films and TV series in HDR.

The function responsible for improving gradation is named "Noise Reduction" in the menu. As we have confirmed, it is worth enabling as it has a beneficial impact on tonal transitions. More importantly, it does not negatively affect film grain or fine details, which sometimes the competition "offers" us.

The image scaling on Samsung Q70D should be rated as average. The manufacturer does not aim to artificially sharpen the image, but rather to keep it naturally softened.

Digital image processing is unfortunately one of the weaker points of the TCL A400 Pro. That does not mean the TV performs badly, but it’s hard to call it anything clearly above standard. The upscaling itself is acceptable: edges are fairly well smoothed, the picture does not look overly sharp or “pixelated”, and lower-quality material can be watched without major discomfort. At the same time the overall image has a slightly soft character and you don’t see the kind of precision that the best image processors in more expensive TVs can offer.

Handling of tonal transitions caused by heavy compression is much worse. TCL equipped the A400 Pro with a “Gradual Smoothing” feature that in theory should reduce visible colour banding and artefacts in lower-quality material. In practice, however, its effectiveness is very limited. It does not improve tonal transitions in any noticeable way, and at higher settings it can further smooth image detail, giving it an artificial, slightly blurred character. For that reason we think it’s best to leave this feature off. The A400 Pro copes decently with basic image scaling, but if you often watch heavily compressed material with visible posterisation, this model will not be one of the best choices.

Samsung Q70D is the first model in the manufacturer's portfolio with a 120Hz panel. As a result, its motion smoothing features are more advanced than those in lower-tier models. In the menu, we find three functions responsible for improving fluidity. They are "Blur Reduction," "Judder Reduction," and "Clear Motion (LED)." We'll discuss the third one later. The first function enhances sharpness in motion, while the second adjusts the level of smoothing. The smoothness enhancer in Samsung Q70D works satisfactorily, and each setting makes a noticeable difference. Therefore, those who dislike the characteristic stuttering of films or who passionately watch sports will be able to achieve their preferred level of smoothness. In the image, we present a setting with slight smoothing, without the soap opera effect.

The panel used in Samsung Q70D has a fairly good response time for this type of display. Of course, it won't deliver an image as sharp as a proverbial razor, but at this price point, it is a recommended choice for all kinds of sports.

The TCL A400 Pro is equipped with a 144 Hz panel, but in practice we're most interested in how it performs at 120 Hz. That's the refresh rate most consoles, as well as many sports broadcasts and high-motion sources, are limited to today. In that range the TV performs quite well. Motion clarity is really good, especially after properly configuring the motion smoothing. The 'Motion Clarity' function improves smoothness. Its settings include two sliders that let you tailor the motion smoothing to your preferences, separately for low-frame-rate and high-frame-rate content. This allows you to achieve either a more cinematic look or a noticeably smoother image. If you don't want to fiddle with manual configuration, you can use built-in presets such as Low, Medium, High, Cinema or Nature.

The tested television is equipped with four HDMI 2.1 ports. Interestingly, all of them have a bandwidth of 40 Gbps; however, during the testing process, we did not observe any negative effects associated with this situation. More importantly, Samsung Q70D supports all features stemming from the aforementioned standard. This news will surely delight all gamers, as it means that whether using a console or a PC, we can expect the highest possible comfort during gameplay. Given the standard absence of Dolby Vision HDR for this manufacturer, it is significant that the HGIG mode has been implemented correctly and there are no issues with setting up the calibration chessboard. We particularly note that Samsung is the only manufacturer to allow gaming with the smoothness enhancer switched on, without significant degradation. This means that titles running at 30 fps will be perceived like those with native 60 frames per second.

Samsung, as one of the first manufacturers, introduced the Game Bar to its televisions, which has since been consistently refined. It contains all the necessary information regarding gameplay parameters that we can change "on the fly".

In summary: Samsung Q70D will perform excellently both with consoles and with computers. All functions worked brilliantly, and there were no issues with them. The ability to enable the smoothness enhancer without significant increases in input lag is a true gamechanger.

In terms of gaming features the TCL A400 Pro performs brilliantly. The TV has practically everything you’d expect from a gaming TV today: support for 4K at high refresh rates, VRR, ALLM, correct implementation of HDR formats in games, including Dolby Vision, and HGiG. That means it works well with both next‑gen consoles and PCs. Another plus is the inclusion of a Game Bar, a dedicated panel with the most important settings for gamers. From it you can quickly check basic information about the signal, refresh rate or active features, and customise the appearance and behaviour of some settings to your preferences. It’s a solution that may not change picture quality by itself, but it greatly improves the convenience of using the TV while gaming. The only thing to criticise is the number of full HDMI 2.1 ports. The A400 Pro has only two such ports out of four, and one of them also serves as eARC. In practice this means that if you want to connect two next‑gen consoles and a soundbar you may run into some limitations. In that scenario you’ll need to either swap devices or use extra equipment, such as an AV receiver or a soundbar with HDMI inputs. Even so, it’s hard not to rate the A400 Pro very highly as a gaming TV. The gaming feature set here is genuinely powerful.

Results of latency on the Samsung Q70D are at a high level, regardless of the signal or resolution. All gamers will certainly appreciate the manufacturer's efforts, which allow a game running in 4K 120 Hz with HDR to have only 7 ms of latency, which is practically unnoticeable even in online gaming. It's worth adding that lag with the motion smoother turned on roughly doubles, which still means very comfortable gaming in this case.

Input lag on the TCL A400 Pro is very low. With a 120 Hz signal we measured about 11 ms, and about 15 ms at 60 Hz. These aren’t as low as the few milliseconds seen on some OLEDs, but in practice it doesn’t make much difference. The lag is small enough that controls remain quick, responsive and entirely comfortable both on a console and when connected to a computer.

After connecting the television to the computer and wishing to use it as a monitor, we can expect a low input lag of 13 ms, which is practically unnoticeable on the mouse-screen-eye line. Thanks to the correct implementation of chroma 4:4:4, the readability of fonts is at a high level, so you can confidently connect Samsung Q70D to your computer as a monitor and expect a comfortable experience with text.

The subpixel layout is BGR, which does not negatively affect the use of the television as a monitor. However, as operating systems are not adapted to this type of subpixel format, it may cause slightly less distinct contours. This is, however, something practically negligible, and only a handful of people may notice it.

TCL A400 Pro also performs quite well as a large PC monitor. Helping with that is, of course, the full suite of gaming features: VRR, FreeSync, G-Sync compatibility, a refresh rate of up to 144 Hz and very low input lag. If someone wants to connect a PC and play from the couch or at a desk, the TV is perfectly suited to that. Importantly, it also handles regular computer work well. At 120 Hz fonts are very clear, so browsing, working with documents or using the system doesn't strain the eyes. It looks a bit worse after switching to 144 Hz. Horizontal parts of letters become slightly darker. However, that's not something that seriously affects everyday use. Overall, text readability is very good.

Due to the VA panel, the performance of Samsung Q70D in terms of viewing angles is its Achilles' heel. Even a slight shift off-axis leads to a significant loss of contrast and a substantial degradation of colours.

Viewing angles are not the strongest suit of the TCL A400 Pro. This is mainly due to the use of a VA panel, which brings advantages like better contrast but naturally performs worse when viewed at an angle. Just move further off the screen's axis and you'll notice a drop in brightness and colour saturation. So it's not on the level we're used to from IPS/ADS panels, and even less so compared with OLED screens, which in this respect still remain out of reach for conventional LCDs. The A400 Pro is simply best viewed as straight on as possible. That's when its picture looks its best.

The satin finish of the panel in the Q70D allows for quite good performance in a well-lit room. It is worth noting that reflections do not spread beyond their source, and thus do not bleed onto the rest of the panel. We also commend the maximum brightness of the TV in SDR content, which is 450 nits, allowing for comfortable content consumption during the day.

TCL A400 Pro does quite well in a bright living room. The biggest help is the matte screen finish, which very effectively mutes reflections and means you don't have to battle every window or lamp reflecting off the panel during the day. Add a decent SDR brightness of around 600 nits, so in terms of daytime image visibility it's really good. You should remember, though, that the matte coating has its price. In a brightly lit room the picture can lose a bit of depth, and colours don't look as punchy as they do in the evening. Reflections are much less visible, but at the same time colour saturation clearly drops. It's still a good TV for a bright living room; it just performs best when viewing comfort is the priority rather than the most eye-catching picture.

The operation of Samsung Q70D is managed by the proprietary Tizen system. This is fairly well-known software, as the manufacturer has been developing it in their TVs for quite a long time. Its main advantage is smooth operation and a lack of significant stutters, which we can confirm through conducted tests. The biggest downside, however, is its closed nature. Although the app store is quite extensive, we are still dependent on the grace or displeasure of the manufacturer. Therefore, we will not be able to install missing items, even from a USB drive. A perfect example of this is this year's discontinuation of support for the Tidal app. On the other hand, a benefit, especially for Apple device users, is the implementation of AirPlay functionality, which allows for easy screen mirroring from a device to the TV. Fortunately, Samsung also provided the option to connect a keyboard and mouse for much quicker navigation through the TV menu. It’s worth mentioning that the manufacturer has thankfully included a remote that connects via Bluetooth this year, which often wasn't the case in the past. The Tizen system has one more advantage. It integrates very well with external devices, such as the NC+ decoder or soundbars. The connection process is very quick and does not require special skills.

In summary: The Tizen system is very efficiently functioning software, which is certainly a strong advantage of the TV. While more advanced users may complain about the lack of something like KODI, the rest will be satisfied.

Google TV

TCL A400 Pro runs on Google TV, so in terms of Smart TV we get a very solid package. All the most important apps are there: YouTube, Netflix, Disney+, Max, Prime Video, Apple TV and the rest of the services you’d expect today. It also includes Chromecast, voice search and Google Assistant. The system itself runs smoothly and is convenient, although, as with Google TV, the home screen can be heavily filled with recommendations and promoted content. Some will like that, others might find it a bit annoying. Functionally, however, it’s hard to seriously fault it.

Digital art gallery

The most interesting part starts with the digital gallery, because this is what is meant to set the A400 Pro apart from ordinary TVs. TCL provides access to over 80 artworks that can be displayed when the screen isn’t being used to watch movies or series. That way the TV doesn’t have to hang on the wall as a black slab but can actually look like a painting. An ambient light sensor, which adjusts the screen to the room’s conditions, helps with this. And here’s some good news compared with the older NXT Vision A300: the annoying brightness issue in art mode has been improved in the A400 Pro. Gallery settings are now separate from normal viewing, so you can set a lower brightness for artworks without disturbing the settings for films or TV. It may seem like a small detail, but in practice it’s very important, because it helps the screen look more like an artwork and less like a glowing TV. TCL also adds the option to create your own images using artificial intelligence. The maker talks about over 100,000 available pieces and variants, so there’s plenty to choose from. You can stick with the ready-made gallery or pick something more in line with your own taste and room decor.

Traditional features

The traditional TV features are much less exciting. The A400 Pro doesn’t stand out here. You get standard broadcast TV, a channel guide and basic options, but no major extras that would change the way you use conventional TV.

The built-in player Samsung Q70D is a significant advantage. It handled nearly all video and audio files prepared for the testing process exceptionally well. The only exceptions in this regard are of course the Dolby Vision format (which is not surprising) and less popular codecs. Additionally, it is worth noting the support for Polish characters and the ability to change font colours as a positive aspect. However, it struggles more with photo formats, as it only supports JPEG among the popular ones. There's definitely a lack of formats like PNG or Apple's HEIC here.

Playing files from USB is one of the strong points of the TCL A400 Pro. The built-in player performs very well and can easily be counted among the best. It handles popular video, audio and photo formats without any trouble, so in most cases you just need to plug in a USB stick or external drive and play the content. That's good news, because you don't have to install third-party players straight away. The A400 Pro natively supports a really wide range of files and in our testing it had no major problems playing them.

The built-in audio system Samsung Q70D, due to its slim design, is not among the most outstanding. Overall, it's fairly balanced, although we wouldn't recommend cranking up the volume to levels higher than 2/4 of the scale. However, if we have a home theatre system, there is a range of codecs available, and we can enjoy the presence of the most important ones, namely DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby Atmos.

Sound on the TCL A400 Pro is fairly average. The most important bit of good news is that the TV can play loudly. It easily reaches around 83 dB, so volume itself isn’t much of an issue. It’s also a plus that it supports formats such as Dolby Atmos and the increasingly rare DTS in TVs. But that’s about where the praise ends. The standard 2.0 speaker setup has its limits and it’s hard to squeeze much more out of it. What’s mainly lacking is bass and a sense of space. The sound is fine for regular TV or YouTube, but with films, series and especially music it quickly becomes too flat. For that reason we would definitely recommend buying at least a simple soundbar or a traditional home cinema system. Especially since the TV itself supports Dolby Atmos and DTS, it practically begs to be connected to external speakers that will actually use those capabilities.

Samsung QLED Q70D / Q74D / Q77D vs TCL A400 PRO

Advantages

Disadvantages

Our verdict

TV appearance

Where to buy

Contrast and black detail

Number of dimming zones in the TCL A400 Pro

HDR effect quality

Factory color reproduction

Color reproduction after calibration

Smoothness of tonal transitions

Image scaling and smoothness of tonal transitions

Blur and motion smoothness

Console compatibility and gaming features

Input lag

Compatibility with PC

Viewing angles

Daytime performance

Panel details

TV features

Classic features:

Smart features:

Sound connection options

Supported audio formats (external HDMI eARC audio):

Senior accessibility

Google TV

Digital art gallery

Traditional features

Apps

Playing files from USB

Sound

Sound Quality Test

Acoustic Measurements