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Tafadzwa Muronzwa
Now with kids back at school for the longest time you get to have the TV to yourself and you might be thinking of upgrading your TV screen but then you are not sure which one to get.

Maybe this will help.

High Definition (HD) simply put means the black is blacker and the white is whiter. A quick example of this is watching a projector outside during day time, it gives a very faint picture and clarity is reduced because the black is not black and the white is as snow.

Most people would want to change their TVs from the standard TV to a higher resolution TV, with the 4K resolution TV being the favourite choice of many. 4K resolution refers to horizontal resolutions of around 4 000 pixels. The “K” stands for “kilo” (thousand). The majority of 4K displays come with 3840 x 2160-pixel (4K UHDTV) resolution, which is exactly four times the pixel count of full HD displays (1920 x 1080 pixels). Most people have TVs with 1080 pixels.

If we are to compare the 4K resolution and the one with 1 080 pixels, most people will go for the 4K. But here is a kicker — you don’t need such a TV monitor. You have no business wasting money on it. Why, you may ask. Because only a few streaming sites are compatible with 4K displays like Netflix and Amazon. There is still more content that needs to be converted or to be produced in 4K resolution for you to upgrade your TV.

Of late 4K models are starting to become more affordable because of new technology coming out, it’s not in the most affordable pricing yet but you can buy from low-quality brands, but they wouldn’t be as good as the big brand names Samsung and LG. Other than that, 1 080p is still a good choice because of the wide range of content availability.

They say growth is a force of nature, you can’t go against but the TV industry is quickly out growing the content creators. Dstv still has a few of its channels in Full HD, they are yet to make all channels in FHD and at this pace I don’t see 4K channels near the horizons. Personally, I think buying a 4K TV is like ordering a Bugatti Veyron on a 1,5 Litre Honda Fit engine. Yes, it’s going to be nice to look at, your friends will marvel at it, but come 8pm news time we both see the same quality of 720p standard TV even when you have a Full HD TV. The same applies to movies on soft copies, 98 percent are in 1 080p that’s both the old and latest movies.

If your budget doesn’t allow you to buy a smart TV, don’t worry just get an Android TV Box, this is a media device preloaded with streaming sites you can basically do anything online and costs north of USD$35 locally.

TV SECURITY

The destructive looting in South Africa revealed something of interest I never knew existed called TV Block. It’s a security measure that completely stops all functions of the smart TV once it is connected to the internet. This happens in the event the TV is stolen from the manufacturer “only”!

This left me thinking of my cousin who had a break in and his Samsung HD Smart Tv was stolen among other goods. Up to now there is no trace of the TV. Samsung has been” hiding” this security feature from the public, shame on them . . . I’ll leave this here for now.

For those starting a family, a plasma TV is ideal since it has a hard glass surface that doesn’t break easily when your lovely child throws the Dstv remote at their favourite Peppa Pig cartoon on the screen. These tend to use more power and generate more heat than other TVs. Another mistake that most parents make is placing a television set on a TV stand which the young one can easily push and the Tv easily falls over.

The best option is to mount the TV on the wall and some TV brackets actually come with a padlock which makes it very hard to steal. These padlocks cost about US$25 for original TV brands.

Another way of making sure you get back your TV screen when its stolen, is installing a GPRS tracker inside your TV and it works even when the TV is switched off without a power source, this is a sure way of catching the goons in their stash house. This can be done locally for USD$100.

The day you sign into Netflix, make sure you disable the password, so that when thieves try to connect to the internet and watch Netflix content using your account they can be nabbed. This will be automatically picked by the app and will show recent dates, times, locations and the IP address which you can take to the police, then go to internet service providers who can close down on the goons watching Netflix on your TV.

Last, but not least you can consult an insurance company and hear what they will say about covering your beloved household TV.

At the end of the day, what you do with your money is entirely up to you, but I will stick to 1 080p Full HD for now.

Happy watching Family!