Hisense is making its first Amazon Fire TV screen — and it comes with several gamer-friendly features. Bearing more than a passing resemblance to the earlier Hisense U6H, and appropriately dubbed the Hisense U6HF, it combines a 4K HDR TV with Amazon’s smart TV platform in an affordable package.
At launch, the ULED TV will only be available in a single 50-inch screen size, but will offer some relatively premium specs including Dolby Vision HDR and HDMI 2.1 ports for just $529.
In addition to the Dolby format and HDMI ports, Hisense says the U6HF will also offer a ‘Game Mode Plus’ setting that “decreases input lag, increases response time and reduces frame-rate issues on next-generation game consoles”.
The bad news, however, is that the TV is limited to a native 60 Hz refresh rate and can only reach a peak brightness of around 600 nits — a significant deal less than other 4K HDR TVs that often reach or exceed the recommended 1,000 nits required for prime HDR playback.
While Hisense’s model will look to set itself apart from the competition with its appealing new game mode feature, it’s not the only manufacturer out there producing Amazon Fire TVs — Insignia and Toshiba (under the ownership of Hisense, ironically) also make them, as does Amazon itself with its Omni Series TV.
Whether gamers will adopt the new Amazon Fire TV model en masse remains questionable, as most would likely rather buy a native 120 Hz TV that supports 4K at 120 frames per second, but the lower sticker price certainly could appeal to Nintendo Switch gamers heading back to school in September.
As for the original Hisense U6H that made its debut earlier this year at CES, it appears that will continue to be available, with Google TV as its smart platform, at retailers like Best Buy — though, at the time this story was published it’s retailing at a more-expensive $699 for a 55-inch screen.
At a lower price with similar-if-not-identical specs, the Hisense U6HF looks like it could be a good alternative to what’s already on the market from Insignia, Toshiba and, er, Hisense, but we’ll have to put it through its paces ourselves before we can give it a final verdict and see whether it deserves a place in our list of the best TVs under $1,000.
