TCL is best known for their high-quality televisions. This year at CES, they have new releases for home theaters as well as new headphones for consumers at all levels. So whether you need to upgrade your home experience or just rock out better on your daily commute, TCL has a product for you!
Let’s start with their new area, headphones. It’s unclear if the copyright offices made them pay per letter or they could only buy so many vowels, but the lines are SOCL, MTRO, ACTV, and ELIT. Coincidentally, those are also a terrible hand of letters to have in Scrabble. In any case, they break down as follows:
SOCL is the funky fashion brand, with a transparent body in different colors. They are in-ear buds and come in both wired and wireless flavors.
MTRO is what TCL calls “a fluid utilitarian design”, which I think is just a fancy way of saying these are headphones you wouldn’t be embarrassed to wear if you ran into your boss on the street. These are both wired and wireless, with over-ear and in-ear options.
ACTV are the sport headphones, and they are sweat proof and designed to stay in place during strenuous activity. They will also come in wired and wireless forms, though my advice is to avoid wires while working out, lest you find yourself on a bloopers reel on YouTube for gym fails.
ELIT is their highest-end model, with high-resolution sound and optional noise canceling.
The SOCL, MTRO, and ACTV will be shipping in February, while the ELIT will arrive this summer.
On the home theater side, TCL is continuing their partnership with Roku and releasing new smart TVs. They are releasing a 75″ TCL Roku 6-Series television for less than $1800, plus Roku OS 9 will be hitting all TCL Roku 5-Series and Roku 6-Series televisions.
In addition, look for the TCL Roku TV 8-Series televisions with mini-LED and Quantum Dot technology to improve colors, as well as 8K resolutions, voice-controlled AI, and microphones designed to hear consumers talking to the television even in noisy environments.
Finally, to make the viewing experience really pop, they have new soundbars for TVs 43″ and up and for 55″ and up. Alto 5 and Alto 7 will offer specialized sound modes and will be compatible with wireless subwoofers for the best possible experience. These will be available in Spring 2019.