This new Fire TV beats Amazon's in one big way

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Toshiba's new Fire TVs get local dimming, voice control

Toshiba M-Series Fire TV on the wall
(Image credit: Toshiba)

There's a new Fire TV for the holidays with the just-announced Toshiba M-Series, starting with the Toshiba M550KU LED 4K UHD Smart Fire TV. It represents a major first for Amazon's smart TVs, with 48 discrete dimming zones for enhanced HDR performance.

The new M-Series is Toshiba's follow up to the popular Toshiba C350 Fire TV, which is also our favorite Fire TV model of the best TVs, and features prominently on our list of the best TVs under $500. The new Toshiba M-Series TVs go on sale this month through Best Buy and Amazon.

In addition to getting an array of dimming zones — a feature sorely lacking in Fire TVs thus far — Toshiba's new M-Series set is also one of the first with hands-free voice interaction. That feature, previously offered only on the recent Amazon Omni Fire TV models, looks like it will be a key feature on all of the more premium Fire TV models going forward.

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Brian Westover
Brian Westover

Brian Westover is currently Lead Analyst, PCs and Hardware at PCMag. Until recently, however, he was Senior Editor at Tom's Guide, where he led the site's TV coverage for several years, reviewing scores of sets and writing about everything from 8K to HDR to HDMI 2.1. He also put his computing knowledge to good use by reviewing many PCs and Mac devices, and also led our router and home networking coverage. Prior to joining Tom's Guide, he wrote for TopTenReviews and PCMag.