Samsung TU8000 (UN50TU8000, UN50TU8000, UN55TU8000, UN65TU8000, UN75TU8000)

The Samsung TU8000 is an entry level model of Samsung’s 4K LED television for those on a budget. The TU8000 is the successor to last year’s RU8000.

The way that Samsung saved costs on the TU8000 was by leaving off some of the advanced features found on higher-end models like Quantum Dot Panel and Gaming Features. 

For the price — you get a great television picture at a very good price. 

If you need an owner’s manual for the Samsung TU8000, click here. 

The TU8000 features a good native contrast ratio making it great in a dark room. Additionally, there’s good motion handling and excellent input lag, making it perfect for playing games and watching sports. For an entry level television, the TU8000  performs well for most applications.

Just like many entry level televisions, the Samsung TU8000 comes in many screen sizes. The TU8000 comes in 6 screen size variations including 43 inch (UN43TU8000FXZA), 50 Inch (UN50TU8000FXZA), 55 inch (UN55TU8000FXZA), 65 inch (UN65TU8000FXZA), 75 inch (UN75TU8000FXZA), and 85 inch (UN85TU8000FXZA). 

Samsung TU8000 Specifications

Samsung TU7000 and TU8000 Technologies and Features

Panel Technology

Just like most models in Samsung’s television lineup, the Samsung TU8000 uses a VA — Vertical Alignment — panel technology. One of the advantages of this technology is that it has an excellent native contrast ratio to deliver a deep black. However, a TV with VA panel technology usually has a poor side viewing angle given the alignment of the panel

The TU8000 uses a backlight technology, which is an edge-lit led backlight technology. But Samsung did not include any local dimming feature to improve performance in a dark room.

Image Processor

The Samsung TU8000 is powered by the image processor called “Crystal Processor 4K”.  This processor is not as powerful as the Quantum Processor 4K found on the more expensive QLED TV Lineup — but it’s able to process HDR images well. Additionally the image processor is able to do a good job of up-scaling lower resolution content to the native resolution.

Motion Technology

The TU8000 only has a native 60 Hz Refresh rate panel and can only support content with a frame rate up to 60 Hz. So you don’t get native 120 fps content.  

To improve their performance in handling motion, it’s powered by “Motion Rate 120 Hz”. Unlike higher level televisions that support VRR technology to enhance the game experience, the TU8000 does not support any VRR technology.

To dim the backlight, there’s a PWM (Pulse Width Nodulation) dimming system. But even with this technology, the highest possible dimming frequency is 600 Hz for the TU8000. Since it is a high dimming frequency, this makes the TU8000 almost flicker-free. When it’s set to “Game” mode with “Auto Motion Plus” enabled, its dimming frequency changes to 120 Hz.

To help make motion appearance smoother, particularly when playing 60 fps content, there is an optional BFI (Black Frame Insertion) Mode. Enabling this mode will make the dimming frequency change down to 60 Hz. To enable BFI mode, you turn on the “LED Clear Motion” setting. 

One thing about enabling BFI mode is that it may help keep motion smoother, but this may cause a backlight flicker strobe effect that could bother people sensitive to that.

Connectivity

For the major connectivity points, the Samsung TU8000 is equipped with 3 HDMI ports Each HDMI port supports HDMI 2.0 Full bandwidth, CEC, and HDCP 2.2. Additionally one of the HDMI ports (HDMI 2) will support ARC (Audi Return Channel). Although none of the HDMI ports supports HDMI 2.1 or eARC (Enhanced Audio Return Channel). 

In addition to HDMI ports, the TU8000 has 2 USB ports although it’s not USB 3.0. In addition to HDMI and USB ports, there’s 1 Tuner In (RF In), 1 Digital Audio Out (optical) and 1 Ethernet IN, and 1 Composite IN.

Smart TV Platform

As part of the Samsung smart TV platform, the TU8000 includes the latest version of Tizen OS 2020. Even with this advanced operating system, the platform lacks some features found on higher end models, like those seen in their QLED TV lineup. 

The TU8000 also includes nice apps such as Bixby, Amazon Alexa, Google Home and others. 

When testing it, the Tizen OS runs smoothly. The interface is intuitive and quick to learn. It comes with a substantial selection of preinstalled apps. Just about all streaming services are provided, like YouTube, Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc. You’ll also have a Web Browser, Games, Live TV, and other apps that you can download from the Samsung Apps store.

With Bixby, Amazon Alexa, or Google Home — you can use the voice command to direct your television.

For the controller, the the TU8000 is equipped with both basic remote and smart remote.

>> Please click here to see today’s price for the Samsung TU8000 <<

Samsung’s TU8000 Performance

Black Level and Contrast

The Samsung TU8000 native contrast ratio is around 6000:1 — which means it is excellent. This makes it  deep enough to make black look really black in a dark room. 

Unfortunately, there’s no local dimming feature which might improve performance in a dark room. The TU8000 produces a deep dark when showing a small highlight in a dark room, but you may see blooming around a small bright object.

SDR Peak Brightness

With real scenes, the TU8000 can hit around 275 nits. The peak brightness is fairly consistent across different content, being around 300 nits.

But on a 2% window (where 2% of screen is white while the rest is black), the peak brightness is lowered by the frame dimming system to around 175 nits to minimize blooming. This works well in a moderately lit room — while in a very bright room, the peak brightness is just not bright enough. 

The HDR peak brightness of the Samsung TU8000 is relatively same to its SDR peak brightness. This means that regardless of whether its an SDR or HDR image, its peak brightness is relatively the same. With HDR peak brightness at less than 300 nits, this peak brightness is not bright enough to show HDR images as bright they should really be. The TU8000 is able to bring out small highlights in HDR which is nice.

Color Performance

The TU8000 doesn’t support a wide color gamut. The color gamut is only wide enough for SDR content that is mastered in Rec.709 while for HDR content, it can be quite disappointing. In DCI P3 xy color space, the color gamut coverage of the TU8000 is only around 76%.

Meanwhile, in DCI P3 uv color space, the color gamut coverage of the TU8000 is around 82%. To show HDR images mastered in DCI P3 like HDR10 or HDR10+ fully like the content creator intended, an HDR TV must be able to cover at least 90% of DCI P3 color space. And the color gamut if the TU8000 certainly is not wide enough to do that.  

The TU8000 has mediocre color volume. Even though it can produce deep dark shade colors reasonably well, the limited color gamut keeps it from producing a wide range of shades and colors. 

Discussing about color gradient, on the screen of the TU8000, banding is visible in almost all colors.  You can turn on the “Smooth Gradation” setting which is used to remove banding — but that can only help so much.  

Side Viewing Angle

Just like most other TVs with a VA panel, the Samsung TU8000 has a poor side viewing angle. At around 15 degrees off center and front, the blacks of images displayed on screen look faded. Color of images will also lose accuracy starting at around 25 degrees. On top of that, starting at around 30 degrees, the brightness level will also be decreased. 

This means that when viewed from the side, the picture displayed on the screen will not look as good as when viewed from the center and front. If you often watch TV with a family group who sit together in wide seating, then this Samsung may not be a good choice for you.

Motion Handling

The pixel response time is very good.  With around an 18 ms pixel response time, it’s low enough to make fast-paced content appear clear on screen. There may be a faint trail following a fast moving object and it can be longer than most TVs, but this shouldn’t be noticeable in normal content. 

When playing 24p movies, the performance of the Samsung TU8000 is poor. It’s not able to remove the judder from any source, even when the source is native 24p movies like Blu-Ray or DVD movies.

Input Lag

In PC and Game mode, the Samsung TU8000 has a nice low input lag. With 60 fps content, regardless of the resolution, whether 1080p, 1440p, 4K, 4K with HDR, 4K @ 4:4:4 chrome,  the input lag is around 10 ms. This is low enough to make it very responsive when used to play any game, even for fast paced games that require quick reflexes. And as mentioned above, the TU800 only has a 60 HX refresh rate panel, and doesn’t support 120 fps games. 

The HDMI port supports ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode) and can change automatically to Game mode when you play a game with a compatible console. Unlike the QLED TV lineup, the TU8000 does not support VRR technology.

>> Please click here to see today’s price for the Samsung TU8000 <<

Conclusion

For Watching Movies

The Samsung TU8000 is an average television for watching movies in a dark room. It does  have an excellent contrast ratio to produce a deep dark along with excellent black uniformity. The combination of deep dark and excellent black uniformity actually makes dark scenes look great onscreen, even when viewed in a dark room.  

However there’s no local dimming feature to further improve performance in a dark room, particularly to minimize the blooming effect. 

And the performance in handling 24p judder is also very disappointing — even when the source is native 24p movies. 

For Watching Sports

When used for watching sports, the performance is acceptable. There’s good pixel response time and the 60 Hz BFI mode makes fast motion images look clear and smooth, good enough for watching fast sports like Formula One. 

But the SDR peak brightness is not very bright and reflection handling is only decent. This makes the TU8000 only suitable for use in a dim to moderately lit room.  

Overall the performance when used for watching sports is mediocre, but considering the price range, it’s still a good value. 

Video Games

The TU8000 is a good television for playing video games. You get good motion handling and a 60 HZ BFI mode that can help make fast games look smooth and clear. 

There is outstanding input lag in Game Mode, allowing you to play games responsively without lag, even fast paced games. 

The support of ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode) also means you don’t need to manually change to game mode since it can automatically change to game mode once the signal from a game console is detected. 

HDR Performance

If you get a Samsung TU8000 for an HDR Experience, you’ll probably be disappointed. There is good native contrast ratio and excellent black uniformity, making shadow details of images shown fairly well on their screen. But there’s no local dimming to further improve dark scene appearance. 

The TU8000 does not support wide color gamut, so some colors of an HDR image may not be shown accurately. 

Additionally, the HDR peak brightness is not bright enough to bring out highlights in HDR. As the result, HDR images displayed on the screen don’t look much different compared to SDR content.  

Summary

The major advantage of the Samsung TU8000 compared to the similar TU7000 is precisely due to the smart features. They both run the same smart TV platform, but the smart TV of the TU7000 doesn’t support voice navigation while the TU8000 supports voice navigation. In addition to its own platform “Samsung Bixby”, it also works with Amazon Alexa and Google Home. 

You can see our full head to head comparison of the TU8000 and the TU7000 here

So is the TU8000 a good choice for you? Of course the decision comes back to your own preference. Keep in mind that with the same size screen, the Samsung TU7000 is usually sold for a lower price than the TU8000 while picture quality is similar.

>> Please click here to see today’s price for the Samsung TU8000 <<

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