TCL offers a number of picture modes along with the default Standard and more accurate Movie options, including Smart HDR, Sport, Game, and PC. When it receives a Dolby Vision signal the TV defaults to the IQ option, which adjusts the tone mapping based on the measurements from a light meter. The screen isn’t nearly as thin as that of Samsung’s recently tested QE55Q60B rival, but it’s slender enough, at least over roughly half of its rear area, to be considered elegant.

The 55C735K’s HDR tone mapping is good enough, too, to deliver reasonable amounts of subtle shading in the brightest HDR picture areas, avoiding the excessive bleaching out of these HDR picture areas that can sometimes afflict such affordable TVs.

Even the 55C735K’s smart engine is a pleasant surprise, built as it is around the latest Google TV system rather than its clunkier, less friendly Android TV predecessor. This site uses cookies to analyse site traffic, improve your experience and personalize ads or other contents. There’s also a faintly blue tone to dark scenes that you can’t eradicate without upsetting other aspects of the colour balance.

Just as importantly, though, TCL’s processing is refined enough to deliver tones across such a broad palette with impressive subtlety.The P735K is also available in the UK, but despite sporting such a similar model number it doesn't support Quantum Dot colours or the latest high-end gaming features. Build quality, though, is fairly basic, with the screen’s light weight making it clear that the chassis is a largely plastic affair. This seems like a pretty sound move for a brand unlikely to have as many relationships – at least in Europe – with all the key content providers as Google/Android does.

My preferred solution was to choose the Low Power mode, turn dynamic contrast off, set Micro Dimming to Low, and then tinker with the colour saturation, brightness and contrast settings to achieve a decent balance between colour punch and naturalism. In terms of competition, the most obvious is the 55in Hisense E7K, which offers an LCD panel combined with a direct LED backlight and quantum dot colours. There are also various useful features available, including the ability to take screenshots, adjust the shadow levels, and activate an aiming aid. Besides a stunning display and vibrant colors, you get to enjoy superb 4K visuals which elevate your viewing experience to a whole new level.

While not quite as exceptional as its pictures, the C845K’s sound is still much better than we would expect with such an affordable TV. The TCL 673K Series is an excellent choice for anyone looking for a high-quality viewing experience. The 55-inch 55C735K, though, finally fixes this frustration, at least for the UK and Europe, combining an unprecedented feature count for its money with picture quality that shames some TVs costing twice as much. Although it supports HDR10, HLG, HDR10+ and Dolby Vision, with 4K HDR content (Movie preset) it isn’t bright enough for full-screen HDR content; but it is more potent with smaller details and highlights as they frequently have more pop.

One of these settings is Dynamic Tone Mapping, and while there’s a choice of options, the default balance setting appears to deliver the best overall performance. The C845K delivers outstanding sharpness and clarity with native 4K sources, and while its motion handling with 24p sources isn’t quite as refined and natural with or without processing active as the best rivals, it is fairly free from unwanted side effects and still looks natural enough to leave you immersed in what you are watching. Across the range, the C93K, C83K and the 55- and 65-inch versions of the C73K offer 144Hz along with a wider array of gamer-friendly features.

I reckon it’s better to toggle on Game mode through the System settings banner than through the picture presets.