Vizio M-Series (2017) review – CNET

The question a TV like the Vizio M-Series poses is simple: Do you want to pay hundreds more for a slightly better picture, sleeker style or different brand name? If the answer is no, this is the TV for you.

Just like 2016’s model, the M-Series is the cheapest TV I’ve tested that earned an 8 out of 10 in Performance. You won’t mistake it for an OLED TV at more than twice the price, but its picture is great for an LCD. It sits in the sweet spot between budget 4K TVs like the Vizio E-Series or TCL S405, and upper-midrange models like the Sony X900E, Samsung MU9000 and Vizio’s own P-Series. Its picture can easily compete against those more expensive LCD TVs, and in some ways it’s better, so if raw picture-for-the-dollar is what you want, the M should be first on your list.

Vizio improved HDR image quality from last year and maintained a great picture with Dolby Vision sources, and the M-Series handles regular high-def sources well too. The key to everything is local dimming, a technology that really boosts LCD image quality, especially in demanding home theater lighting situations where it matters most.

So why wouldn’t you want an M-Series? The biggest reason is probably brand reputation — some people would rather pay extra for a Sony or Samsung TV of similar image quality, or get one of those brands”http://www.cnet.com/”good-enough” TVs at the M-Series’ price. Another is styling: Let’s face it, the M-Series isn’t going to win any beauty contests, and if you spent a fortune on interior decor you might want a set that looks the part.

Those two knocks also apply to CNET’s second highest-rated non-OLED TV of 2017, the TCL P series Roku TV. If you want a 55-inch model and value Roku’s superior Smart TV experience, you should get it instead of the Vizio. But it only comes in that one size.

For everyone else, consider an M. It remains my go-to recommendation for savvy buyers who want excellent picture quality for an affordable price, and for the second year in a row, earns CNET’s Editors’ Choice award.

Goodbye, free tablet; hello, weak menus

Last year Vizio (and others) made a big deal about including a tablet remote with the M and P series and ditching built-in menus. This year there’s no included tablet — just a regular generic-looking clicker — and onscreen Smart TV menus are back. They’re weaksauce, but that’s hardly a deal breaker given excellent alternatives like the Roku Streaming Stick Plus or, if you want Dolby Vision, an Apple TV 4K.

Vizio’s Smart TV takes too long to load after you press the “V” button on the remote and once it does arrive, there’s no much there. Just 10 apps appear along the bottom, and while four are heavy hitters (Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and Vudu) the rest are minor, and it doesn’t have plenty of other big apps like YouTube, HBO and Watch ESPN. You can’t remove or reorder apps, or in any way customize the Discover section, which occupies most of the screen with movies and shows you probably don’t care about.

Netflix and Vudu support both 4K and HDR (Dolby Vision in Vudu’s case), but I was miffed to discover that the Amazon app doesn’t support HDR. The only way to get YouTube is via your phone, and even then it’s in 4K, not HDR.

By “via your phone” I mean the “Chromecast built-in” function. Going into any supported app on your phone and hitting the Cast button reveals the Vizio TV as an option; select it and video from the app will play back on the TV. There are thousands of supported apps, and the system works very well in general, but I still prefer a real onscreen menu system — just not Vizio’s. But if you’re a phone-centric kinda person, you can always use Vizio’s SmartCast app to control the TV.

One cool trick you can do with a Chromecast TV, however, is control it with a Google Home speaker. It worked very well in my tests on the M, although unlike Alexa commands of Sony TVs, for example, power on/off isn’t supported.

Right now Netflix, YouTube, YouTube TV, HBO Now and the CBS All Access and CW apps are supported by voice on Home. As a YouTube TV user, I appreciated being able to say, “OK, Google, play NBC” or, “OK, Google, play the Knicks” and have the Vizio play the live channel or my recording of last night’s basketball game on ESPN, for example. “OK, Google, play ‘Game of Thrones”http://www.cnet.com/” and, “OK, Google, play ‘Star Trek: Discovery”http://www.cnet.com/” worked as well. Subsequent commands, like, “Skip forward 30 minutes” and, “Next episode,” worked in some apps but not in others. YouTube also worked as promised.

Heavy on features, not style

Vizio isn’t investing heavily in its external design department. The M looks just like last year’s M: slate-gray frame from the front, silver edges and thickish profile from the side. The stand legs consist of chrome rods bent into rounded supports, and while distinctive, they risk looking a tad cheap to my eye.

The focus is on picture-enhancing features, starting with full-array local dimming (FALD), which Vizio is branding “XLED Plus” this year. It improves the all-important contrast and black levels, and has better uniformity than edge-lit dimming. The number of dimmable zones (32) is actually half that of last year’s M and one-quarter that of the P-Series, and in general, more zones equal better picture quality. With the exception of the TCL 55P607, most other TVs at this price lack dimming entirely, use the edge-lit variety as seen on models like Samsung MU9000 or cost a lot more, like the Sony X900E.

The M-Series has a 60Hz refresh rate panel — Vizio’s claim of “120Hz effective” is basically bunk. It lacks a setting to engage MEMC (motion estimation, motion compensation), aka the Soap Opera Effect, as found on the more expensive Vizio P-Series. For 2017 all of the sizes in the M-Series use higher-performance VA panels, not the IPS panel found on the 55-inch version of the 2017 P-Series and the 60-inch version of the 2016 M-Series.

One other difference on paper between the M-Series and P-Series is the P’s somewhat wider color gamut. In our tests comparing the two, however, the M actually showed a wider gamut. Like LG, TCL and (soon) Sony, Vizio supports both major types of HDR, HDR10 and Dolby Vision, in the M-Series.

The M-Series lacks a built-in TV tuner, so it can’t receive local TV stations available via antenna/over-the-air broadcasts.

Connectivity caveats and complexities

• 4 HDMI inputs (1x version 2.0, 3x version 1.4, all with HDCP 2.2)
• 1 component video input
• 1 USB port
• Ethernet port
• Optical digital audio output
• Stereo analog audio output

Here’s another difference between the M-Series and P-Series. Of the M-Series’ four HDMI ports only one, Input 1, supports HDMI 2.0a. The other three, inputs 2 through 4, support HDMI 1.4.

In practice, however, you can still connect many of today’s highest-quality sources to any of the Vizio’s HDMI inputs. The “1.4-only” inputs will work with 4K Blu-ray players from Samsung and Oppo and, according to Vizio, as long as you send standard 4K/24 signals, but not with the Xbox One S (you’ll need to connect that to HDMI 1, and engage the “Full UHD color” feature in the VIZIO menu).

I tested the Amazon Fire TV and it worked fine on Input 4, but the Roku Streaming Stick Plus needed to be connected to HDMI 1 (with a port saver for the tight quarters back there) to pass 4K and HDR. I also tested the Sony UBP-X800 and it worked fine on Input 4 with standard 4K/24fps movies like “Wonder Woman,” but not “Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk,” the only disc I know of that sends a 4K/60fps signal. “Billy” via the Sony didn’t deliver HDR on Input 4, but did work properly on Input 1.