Comment by csmuk
13 years ago
Actually perhaps the most annoying thing I can see is that after paying a fuck-load for the television, they dare to show me adverts on the guide!
LG is instantly on my shitlist for this and the channel and media data leaks.
Do you know what, this actually annoyed me about my Panasonic TV, it does exactly the same.
When I go into the "Internet" function, it shows me ads at the bottom. Why am I seeing these ads?
For example, in the UK we pay the TV license to BBC to NOT see ads. We are paying for a TV so why am I still seeing ads?
If I was renting a TV at a reduced cost or some type of freemium model then I would expect it, takes the biscuit a little I say.
Samsung smart TVs are the same. I'm normally happy to view adverts if I am benefiting from whatever they fund - TV advert breaks paying for the content that I'm watching, in-app ads because I got the app for free, etc. With the adverts on the Samsung SmartHub all I can see is the software that I have already paid for.
Of course, the demo mode doesn't have advertising, so there is no way to know about it beforehand.
Potentially relevant link: http://www.samsungadhub.com
I'd have taken it back.
My Bravia EX has no adverts but I don't entirely trust it.
i have an NX Bravia and in the Channel Guide there are ads.. what about yours?
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You can turn this off. There's a setting somewhere, I forget which
I'm looking at buying a new TV at the moment, and it's disturbingly difficult these days to find a regular TV that doesn't come with so-called smart features.
I don't want smart features in my TV. I want my TV to show pictures and maybe make sounds from a useful range of input connections, and nothing else.
I can add my own features by connecting different sources to the TV, and so can anyone else who ever bought a FreeView box or PVR or other similar device. And that way, we can also ignore those sources that don't serve our interests, and upgrade or replace the supplementary sources as things like catch-up and on-demand services evolve, without throwing out perfectly good TV hardware.
I get that the TV brands want to jump on the advertising bandwagon, but this is the UK, home of the (commercial-ad-free) BBC. The vendors aren't going to be popular if they try to ram this obvious backward step down our throats, and I suspect they may be surprised by how many of us will vote with our wallets to avoid it. We just need to make sure customers who aren't A/V fanatics or HN-reading geeks are educated about what is going on, so they can vote with their wallets too.
I don't buy TVs anymore. I just buy a monitor that takes HDMI input. After all, the output of the cable box is HDMI.
Unfortunately, there are still areas where a good TV will beat a computer-style monitor, such as availability in sizes above 30" or so, and coming with a remote that can at least select between input sources and control basics like power/volume/brightness. But I agree with you, a good and dumb screen is what I really want.
Same here.
My TV does not even play sound through its speakers anymore since I upgraded to a surround setup. It literally does just display whatever I feed it through its HDMI inputs.
I kinda like it that way. Should the TV break, I can get a new one and won't have to spend hours trying to set everything back up the way it was.