Sony’s New UHD TVs Will Run On Android TV

Sony’s New UHD TVs Will Run On Android TV

Rather than pack in ever more pixels or flex its screens, Sony is rolling out a number of technical and design tweaks aimed to make their benchmark-setting UHD televisions even better this year — and that includes a brand spankin’ new OS powered by Google.

In all, Sony has just announced that it will be releasing a number of new model series over the next year, including the top of the line X900C Series 4K Ultra HD TV (and its 75-inch version, the X910C). The X900C will be Sony’s thinnest offering to date when it is released later this spring; just 4.9mm at its thickest point — that’s on par with the LG OLED we reviewed late last year — and mounts flush to the wall. Plus, the X900C series will incorporate the company’s latest 4K processor, the X1, as well as the company’s TRILUMINOS display technology that reportedly offers more accurate colour reproduction, deeper black levels, and improved contrast over existing LED sets.

The 65-inch X930C and 75-inch X940C models, which are also dropping later this spring, offer similar specs, albeit in thicker cabinets. They too will offer TRILUMINOUS displays powered by the X1 chip. Plus the X940C will sport Sony’s X-tended Dynamic Range Pro feature to produce what the company claims is “our best contrast ever — capturing every shade of light.” The smaller X930C will use the slightly less potent X-tended Dynamic Range feature instead.

Sony is also debuting a couple of introductory-priced UHD series, the X850C (available in 55, 65 and 75-inch models) as well as the 43- and 49-inch X830C. These too offer TRILUMINOUS displays and the X1 chip but do lack many of the bells and whistles that the higher-priced models have.

One feature that almost all these televisions share is their Google Android TV capability. This allows users to stream content from Google Play directly through the television, instantly Cast screens — and games! — from their mobile devices, even use voice search commands on a mic’ed remote control.

And home theatre buffs are in for an extra special treat later this month when Sony’s new native 4K projector goes on sale. Your home theatre can’t get much closer to a real theatre than with the VPL-VW350ES. It does 4K natively — we’re talking real, honest-to-goodness 4K, 4,096 × 2,160 lines, none of that 3840 x 2160 UHD nonsense — offers up to 1500 lumens of brightness through its TRILUMINOUS optical engine to provide a heightened contrast ratio, wider colour gamut, and better overall colour reproduction. It relies on Sony’s Reality Creation upscaler for watching non-native 4K content and includes both HDMI 2 and HDCP 2.2 ports for watching content both from external devices and through streaming services. The whole shebang is expected to set consumers back less than $US10,000 (huzzah?) when the system goes on sale later this month.

We’ll have hands-on reports of these and all the other incredible 4K UHD televisions direct from the show floor so stay tuned for updates!


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