Samsung Q8F vs TCL P7L / P79L

In terms of brightness, the Samsung Q8F performs surprisingly well for a television without local dimming. It measures up to 500 nits, which practically means that most movie and series scenes look pleasant, and it definitely cannot be accused of lacking the "HDR effect." In films like Life of Pi or The Meg, the screen was able to glow and deliver light effects at a satisfying level. It struggles more during challenging moments—with dark frames containing single bright points. The global dimming used causes the television to darken the image to maintain deep blacks, but at the cost of detail brightness. This is clearly visible in the scene from Sicario 2, where the helicopter lights dropped to around 200 nits. This is a conscious design decision that gives the impression of deeper blacks but somewhat takes away from the brilliance of individual elements, and this should simply be kept in mind. When it comes to color reproduction, the Q8F utilizes quantum dot technology, which broadens the color range. A DCI-P3 coverage of 91% can be considered a decent result, although it is not a record-breaking achievement compared to other QLEDs.

The biggest limitation of the TCL P7L in HDR is simply brightness. The TV doesn't have a large luminance headroom, so strong highlights, sunlight, or small light sources can't clearly "pop" out of the image. As a result, even well-produced HDR material looks fairly restrained and in terms of dynamic range is closer to good SDR than to what brighter models show. That doesn't mean the P7L can't handle HDR at all — the issue is mainly a lack of sufficient backlight power.

Looking at color, the situation is a bit better. The TV covers about 91% of the DCI-P3 gamut and about 68% of the wider BT.2020 color space, so for its price class the color range is quite decent. TCL markets this model as QLED, though the nature of the solution used is closer to a PFS phosphor-based backlight than a classic quantum-dot layer. What matters most to viewers, however, is the result: more saturated colors are available.

We decided to check the Filmmaker mode because it provided us with the best picture right out of the box. However, this does not mean it was perfect. The white balance had too much blue and red tint, causing the white to take on a slight purple-pink hue. Such an imbalance affected the visibility of practically all colors, as can be seen in the comparison photo below. The brightness characteristic in SDR content was quite well adjusted, although in HDR materials, we noticed that the television did not always manage its global dimming—at times, the screen was too dim, while at other times it suddenly brightened. Fortunately, issues related to colors can be effectively corrected with calibration tools, so we decided to get to work.

In Film mode the TCL P7L performs fairly well without major adjustments, especially with typical SDR material. The white balance is relatively even, although as brightness increases there is a slight rise in red and blue and a bit of a shortage of green. This does not produce a strongly noticeable tint and most colors remain close to their reference points. The ColorChecker confirms this, with a large portion of errors falling below a level that would notably bother viewers during normal watching. We have more concerns about the gamma response. In the darkest parts of the image the TV runs it noticeably above the reference, so some shadow detail can be a little too dimmed. The curve then settles and for much of the range it is close to the intended target. As a result SDR generally looks natural, but in dark scenes the P7L can lose some subtlety. In HDR the factory setting is less precise. As brightness increases an excess of blue becomes more pronounced, making the image look cooler than it should. The number of larger color deviations also grows, particularly in brighter hues. The EOTF curve itself is handled fairly conservatively, with the TV showing the image darker than the reference over a large portion of the range. For a budget model, however, the factory Film mode settings are not bad.

After calibration, we managed to correct the white balance almost to perfection. Older SDR content looks stunning — most errors are within a threshold of 2, which is definitely below the human eye's perception limit. In HDR, we also brought the white balance to the correct level, but a different problem arises here. So why are there still relatively large errors in color reproduction? This is mainly due to the limited color palette and the way the television manages brightness. The applied global dimming technique does not give the user control in the settings, so when analyzing the EOTF curve in HDR films, it is clear that the Q8F can independently modify luminance. This can be considered a certain limitation, but despite this, the image after calibration is still much more enjoyable than in the factory version.

After calibration, the TCL P7L can deliver a really pleasant picture, especially with classic SDR material. We managed to very effectively even out the white balance, and the gamma curve now tracks close to the target value of 2.4. You can also see this in the color measurements, as most errors dropped noticeably, and in everyday viewing it's hard to find any strongly visible inaccuracies. Movies, series, YouTube, or regular TV therefore look more natural, without unnecessary warming or a cool cast. For a model in this price range, the result in SDR is really very good.

With HDR the situation gets more complicated. Calibration helped improve the white balance and tidy up some deviations, but here the panel's limitations become increasingly apparent. The P7L has relatively low brightness and can't maintain appropriate luminance for more saturated colors, so some errors remain even after careful tuning. In other words, settings can improve how the TV interprets the signal, but they can't overcome its physical capabilities. That's why calibration makes the most sense for this model primarily with SDR.

Let's see how the Q8F handles older content, which often has poor quality. Let's start with the positives: the upscaling, which means raising the image to a higher resolution, works really well. The TV handles both classic television and materials from YouTube without giving the impression that we are dealing with something completely unattractive. Materials in very low resolutions, such as 576p, perform worse — the image can be cropped, and unfortunately, the overscan phenomenon cannot be turned off. However, the digital processing itself looks worse too. The noise reduction function, instead of removing unwanted interference, smooths out almost everything: film grain (which is desirable for many viewers) disappears along with the texture of the image, and the faces of the actors begin to resemble characters from cheap Turkish soap operas. It is therefore hard to consider this option useful — it's best to leave it completely turned off. Perhaps Samsung will refine the operation of this feature in updates, but for now, it’s difficult to regard it as anything other than an unnecessary addition.

In this regard the TCL P7L performs surprisingly well, especially for such an inexpensive TV. The tonal transition smoothing feature, which in many budget models does little or almost nothing, actually manages to improve the picture here. It doesn't remove all banding completely, but it can noticeably reduce posterization and make trickier gradients look more natural. At this price point that's a genuinely pleasant surprise.

Upscaling itself also performs well. Lower-resolution material is scaled correctly, without excessive sharpening or adding artificial outlines around objects. Of course the P7L won't turn a very poor source into 4K-quality footage, but for regular TV the result is simply solid. For a model in this class there is little to criticize.

Due to the 60 Hz panel, it's hard to call the Q8F a television made for gaming or watching sports. The panel isn't particularly fast, making motion blur clearly visible. If you were counting on spectacular, almost "stadium-like" experiences during broadcasts, you might feel a slight disappointment. Fortunately, in the case of movies and series, Samsung has not abandoned motion smoothing features. This is nothing other than a motion smoother that allows improving the fluidity of productions recorded at 24 or 30 frames per second. Thanks to this, one can decide whether they prefer a smoother, "television" image or to maintain a cinematic quality. It all depends on the viewer's preferences, and the ability to adjust this parameter is undoubtedly a plus.

The TCL P7L uses a panel with a native 60 Hz refresh rate at 4K resolution, and that's how it should be treated in everyday use. For movies the TV mainly offers frame interpolation, so it can smooth motion and reduce the typical judder, but it does not deliver the smoothness of true 120 Hz panels.

[UPDATE] We have updated our 2025 Samsung TV reviews following the release of firmware version 1131, which officially restores the essential HGiG (HDR Gaming Interest Group) support.

It is not entirely clear what Samsung has mixed up this year with its televisions, but the Q8F is not free from all the confusion with updates and shortcomings. While its older cousin, the Q67D, could still be recommended to casual gamers with a clear conscience, it's hard to find a reason to do so here. Aside from the automatic game mode and the attractively designed Game Bar, we practically get nothing that could attract gamers. The lack of proper HGiG implementation is a big problem, especially since function simply disappeared after the 1126 update. The issue with VRR is even worse. Although it is featured in the manufacturer's brochures and appears in the Game Bar, we couldn't activate it. The Xbox Series X console did not allow it to be activated at all, and the option remained grayed out and inactive. It's hard to praise such a television even to casual gamers, which is a shame because Samsung has had a strong bargaining chip in the gaming segment for years.

For such an inexpensive TV, the P7L has quite a lot to offer gamers. It has ALLM, VRR, Dolby Vision for gaming, and TCL adds its Game Bar, which lets you quickly view key information or change some settings without leaving the game. Not everything is perfect, though, because HGiG doesn't work here as it should, but at this price point it's hard to complain much about the feature set. The most interesting thing starts when you give up on 4K. At that resolution the TV runs at a maximum of 60 Hz, but at 1440p and 1080p it can already display at 120 Hz. And that's not just a spec-sheet curiosity. In fast-paced games that support that frame rate you can really notice the difference in smoothness, so if you care more about smoother motion than maximum image sharpness, that mode can make a lot of sense. Of course that doesn't make the P7L a true 120 Hz TV. Even so, it's precisely those extra modes that make the P7L perform really well for gaming.