TCL P7K: what it ships with and what can come off

See what comes off this model →

Before the software part, one fact worth clearing up first, because it is the one that causes most disappointment with this model: the P7K panel is 60 Hz.

TCL advertises a «120 Hz game accelerator», and it does exist, but it works at 1080p, not at 4K. If you have plugged in a console expecting 4K at 120 frames per second, this is not that television. For films and series it makes no difference —cinema runs at 24 and broadcast at 50— but for gaming it is the difference between what you thought you were buying and what you bought.

In practice that means a PS5 or an Xbox will let you pick 1080p at 120 Hz and the set will take it, at the cost of resolution; at 4K you are back to 60. The three HDMI 2.1 ports do not change that: a port carries what the panel can show, and no more.

And one more warning, in case you go looking for information online: the 85-inch P7K sold in Australia is 144 Hz native and carries Onkyo sound. The European set of the same name states 60 Hz. Do not extrapolate spec sheets between markets with this brand.

What it is, in two lines#

A 2025 4K set with an HVA-type QLED panel and Direct LED backlight, with no declared local dimming. Measured brightness comes in around 315 nits in independent testing, while the spec sheets claim between 350 and 450 depending on the size and the market: the measured figure is the one to use when you decide where to put it.

Direct LED with no local dimming means the backlight sits behind the panel but is not divided into zones that can be dimmed on their own: blacks in a dark room stay grey, and there is no blooming around bright objects either, because there is nothing there to bloom.

In exchange it brings the four HDR formats that matter —Dolby Vision, HDR10+, HDR10 and HLG—, three HDMI 2.1 ports with eARC and Google TV. For the price, that is quite a lot.

On memory, TCL publishes no figures in its European sheets. The official Australian sheet for the same series mentions 16 GB of storage; there is no confirmation for Europe, and saying so is better than filling the gap.

How to tell whether this page is about your set#

The commercial name identifies nothing: TCL sells the same panel under different references depending on the country and the shop, and within the same range the P7K lives alongside the P6K, which is not the same television.

Under Settings → System → About you will find the model, the Android version and the available storage. With ADB connected, getprop ro.product.model and df -h /data give you the model and the free space without wandering through menus. TCL sets with Google TV usually report themselves under the BeyondTV platform, a name that covers several sizes and several shop references at once.

What ships on it#

Google's. The launcher (com.google.android.tvlauncher), the recommendation engine (com.google.android.tvrecommendations), voice search (com.google.android.katniss) and the services (com.google.android.gms). That is the layer deciding what you see when you switch on.

TCL's. Apps carrying the com.tcl. prefix: the in-house channel, the setup assistant, the content hub. The exact names change from one firmware version to another, so do not trust a list copied off the internet: list your own and decide about what you actually have.

Everybody else's. Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+ and the rest ship installed by commercial agreement, not because the television needs them.

What comes off without much thought#

The streaming apps you do not use. They take up space, they update themselves, they turn up in the recommendation row and they talk to their servers. If you subscribe to one tomorrow, it reinstalls from the store in two minutes.

The manufacturer's free content channels are the second clear case: they are there to fill the home screen, and taking them off leaves it emptier, which is exactly what you came for.

What to look at first#

The recommendation engine is the one most people want gone and the one that calls for most care. Turning it off leaves the home screen clean, but it also empties the "continue watching" row, which in a house with several people is missed.

And the manufacturer's telemetry is cut back a fair way from the privacy settings themselves, before touching a single package and with no risk at all. That route first.

What not to touch#

Google Play services. They are the foundation of the store, of accounts and of a good share of the apps. Without them the television boots and little else.

The launcher, as long as you have no other one installed and working. A television with no launcher switches on to a black screen, and fixing that with only the remote in your hand is far harder than having thought about it beforehand.

Anything starting with com.android. that you cannot identify: com.android.systemui is the system interface and com.android.settings is the settings app itself.

And on this model, with particular care, anything to do with HDMI and with the control of external devices: eARC and game mode run through there, and those are exactly the two things most used on a television in this bracket.

What you actually notice#

The home screen stops proposing series from services you do not have. Content notifications disappear. And the television answers the remote a little sooner in the first seconds after switching on, because fewer things are asking to update at once.

What does not change: the 315 nits, the 60 Hz of the panel, the HDR or the sound. None of that depends on the apps installed, and no clear-out is going to turn the panel into a 120 Hz one.

Where it sits in the range#

Below it is the P6K, which is not QLED and drops to around 270 nits. Above it are the C6K and the C7K, which are already Mini LED with zone dimming and genuine 144 Hz panels. All of them share the same Google TV, so what this page says holds for the whole range with very few changes: what separates one from another is the panel, not the software.

If the price step up to a C6K is within reach and gaming matters to you, that is where the real difference lies. If what you want is to watch films in an ordinary room, the P7K does the job and this page serves you as it stands.

All of this comes undone#

Nothing explained here is permanent. Packages disabled over ADB come back with one command, and a factory reset returns the television to exactly the state it left the box in.

Nothing here touches the system: you are only telling the set not to load something that was already installed.

If you own one#

The app list from your own P7K, exactly as the set reports it, together with the free space you have left, is the one thing missing to close its entry in the directory. And if you also tell us which size you have, you help document a range in which, as you have seen, not every size is the same television.