Smart TVs still suck

I really wish LG had better support channels....

[lovemadeinjapan]

I was in a museum recently and was dazzled by the astonishing picture quality of TV's there. I asked the model and they said they were donated by fans. Looked them up, and that opened a bin of what I call "the golden age" of TV's now, and it is basically 2009-2011. At that time VA panels were perfected and able to give 1:4000-1:7000 static contrast. That is a really good contrast, indistinguishable from OLED contrast if you have a few dim ambient lights in your TV room, only in pitch-black rooms you see the OLED contrast is better. Another thing they excel at is backlight gamut and uniformity, thanks to 10cm thick panels and CCFL tube backlights. No clouding, no direct led local dimming ageing problems, no bleed, just even blacks. They have no smart software, no network connection (a few might have the first built-in Youtube, but that's all Ethernet offers in 2010), 3-4 HDMI, SCART, component, VGA, basically any connection you need. And the price is roughly 1€ per inch today second hand!

[catsupchutney]

Like you I resisted a smart TV for over a decade. I bought a Vizio and I only use it with a local Plex server. It's okay. I wish I could hack into it and install BSD or Linux.

[leadbetter]

I have a 43" LG 4k monitor which has 4 HDMI, 1 DP, and 1 USB-C inputs and the built-in speakers are actually decent. Hook it up to a raspberry pi with kodi or any of the streaming boxes with android tv and you're set. And it was only 500 euro a year ago. Recommended.

[iangbarton]

We have two LG TV's. I don't use the smart functions, although YouTube, Netflix and Amazon Prime seem to work OK when I tried them. I use a FireTV 4k stick which is now connected via ethernet since Google messed up the last update to Google WiFi. The only time I need to cast to the screen is when I use a cycling app with the turbo trainer. Using a very old Chromecast stick casting from my Android phone works.

[cdnpunk]

Software does suck. Does yours ever not turn on unless you physically unplug it and plug it back in?

[mrmysteryguest]

Your network may need to have UPnP & mDNS active, I had to set up these per client in my pfsense install (using an firewall rule alias) for both casting to my Roku and for my Kids Nintendo Switch to work correctly

[simonwhelan]

It might be worth looking at substituting a "smart tv" with a monitor connected to a system that you control.

[NFVblog]

Smart TVs are still quite young as systems, so sometimes there are problems that make it uncomfortable to use, but they also have many advantages, because they do not require advanced configurations to access streaming services and for an average user it is just fine., the problem arises when you want to use advanced connectivity features and this really annoys you. then it depends from brand to brand

[thingyee]

My LG casting YouTube works but pretty much every other cast device I used sucks. You gotta drop £1k on LG for that however. I was going to blog post about casting issues on different devices

[videocommenter]

The LG TV Plus app only works on iPads without issues, great if you need to type.

Edit: not a good TV remote replacement but that’s the only way you can use the app

[MasterTSayge]

TRUST ME!! It's not worth it!
I bought a TCL and it broke within 18 months, I had the warranty too and the warranty doesn't cover Anything. I went to the geek squad and they told me my ballast in the screen was busted and they don't cover that only because it doesn't count as a software issue.
The newer TVs made in 2014 and the present are garbage.
Meanwhile, my 2009 Polaroid TV STILL WORKS!!
Don't spend no more than $200 on any TVs.

[KingZero]

yeah man... get a chromecast is you want to cast and an apple tv if you want to airplay.... the stuff built into those tvs never work... but the standalone devices are pretty good if you don't mind the price...

[elclippo]

"Smart" - or just buggy and vulnerable...

[RealYethal]

Disable IGMP proxying in your router and see if that helps, when services that rely on autodiscovery fail in smart devices it's usually igmp on the router being misconfigured

[haraz]

my smarttv from 2015 still lives and as well a the 2016 tv which is mine noew

[shamasis.bhattacharya]

I hear you. The first smart thing I did with my first smart TV is to turn off the smart features. The dumb thing is that turning off smart features is also broken! It still doesn’t turn off the annoying things I want to turn off.

I have a Samsung model from 2016.

I plan to upgrade next year to LG OLED ... CX model. But I’m going to stick with Apple TV and nVidia Shield.

[FinaISpartan]

Yeah, only get a tv for the panel. If you ever want any smart features, better to hook up an SBC or an Nvidia Shield tbh.

[MrEpicVid]

You should’ve bought a TV from a local brand, Prism+

[mikeglenn]

I am sorry that you lose your money on that thing. That is why is better to just buy a pc monitor it is relatively cheap and far more reliable. If you want a TV just hook it up on any setup-box or a mini PC over HDMI.

[mrusli]

Buy A Rasberry Pi or Intel Nuc hook up to a tv. Because Smart tv is very limited.