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Television IT Technology

TVs Are Still Too Complicated, and It's Not Your Fault (theverge.com) 234

In his latest column for The Verge, renowned journalist Walt Mossberg argues that TVs -- their UI, execution, underlying technologies, and remote -- are still too complicated. In the latest weekly, he has shared the experience of buying a new TV, setting it up, and the first few days of getting through it. The modern set, Smart TV for most, comes with a plethora of proprietary and standard features. But only a handful of people actually know what these features are -- and how they differ in the models offered by the same company. Mossberg says folks at Best Buy were of little use when explaining these features, but did a good job making false claims such as "you have to buy a sound bar because the TV doesn't have good speakers" even when that wasn't necessarily the case. Now Mossberg, having pioneered tech journalism as it is known today, knows a thing or two about TVs, but for a general consumer, it is an unnecessary thing that could spoil the experience, and make a bigger dent in their TV budget than it should have. But buying the TV wasn't the worst part. Following are excerpts from his column: But learning to use the TV is a whole other story. The Bean Bird (assistive cartoon feature) setup process was pretty straightforward, but it gets you going just enough to start watching something. Tweaking all of the TV's many features, including common ones like picture tones and uncommon ones like zooming in on a part of the picture or using a built-in web browser, takes hours. You must wade through menus containing scores of choices. And some controversial features common to modern TVs are buried deep in these menus. For instance, while I like motion smoothing others strongly dislike it -- it's sometimes known as the "soap opera effect." If you don't like it, the LG's interface doesn't make it at all easy to understand what's happening to your picture or what setting to adjust to turn it off. It's not even called motion smoothing in the menus -- LG calls it "TruMotion." The user interface is also somewhat confusing. There are at least three ways, for instance, to change inputs and at least two to bring up quick settings. The menu for launching apps like Netflix, inputs, and more appears to have a million icons in it and marches for what seems like miles across the bottom of the screen. So you have to edit it, which takes a bunch of time.Mossberg also found issues with the way the remote was designed to execute. "For instance, it's supposed to become a "universal" remote, controlling all your connected set-top boxes, but I can only get it to control some, but not all, of the basic features of my cable box, a TiVo Bolt. And its voice search is pathetic -- far worse than the one on the latest Apple TV."
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TVs Are Still Too Complicated, and It's Not Your Fault

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  • by gurps_npc ( 621217 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @01:53PM (#52637879) Homepage

    Of course, I wasn't stupid enough to spend 10,000 of my own money to give other people the right to spy on me.

  • No TV (Score:5, Interesting)

    by NotInHere ( 3654617 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @01:54PM (#52637893)

    I want no TV, I want a monitor. Simple as that. Then I buy a set top box or whatever to connect it to satellite or internet streaming or whatever I use for watching. I dont want a smart TV that sends all I watch and do to the internet. No thanks.

    • Every TV is a monitor. You don't need to use the built in apps or the built-in tuner; a lot of people don't.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Ah, not so fast! I have an LG Smart TV from about 5 years ago. You cannot switch inputs on the god damn thing without using a built in app. Switching inputs goes like this:
        1) pick up the remote (only used for switching inputs) and press the quick apps button
        2) Wait 10 seconds while it loads
        3) point at (it works like a mouse) the "input" app and click
        4) Wait while it looks up inputs like DLNA, etc. Watch HDMI 1 and HDMI 2 get pushed off of the screen when it finds our computers.
        5) Switch to screen 2, cl
        • Re:No TV (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Saithe ( 982049 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @03:30PM (#52638807)
          Use it as a monitor hooked up to a badass receiver for your sound-system. One input used, rest are on the receiver end.
        • My 2014 Sony Bravia does the same thing. That's really is the one of the only issues I have with the set. Luckily, most of my devices are HDMI-CEC compliant, so they'll turn the TV on and swap inputs even before the smart functions have booted up.
        • by yzf750 ( 178710 )

          3) point at (it works like a mouse) the "input" app and click

          Use the other remote that came with the TV, not the mouse remote. I have 10 LG TV's from that era at work, they all came with a standard remote with number buttons, vol + -, channel + -, input, etc and the stupid mouse remote that we never use.

      • by NotAPK ( 4529127 )

        Er, no.

        When using HDMI the new 4K TVs limit what sources they will accept or the sources limit what displays they will output to.

        The current HDMI specification with HDCP is a complete joke, and I've wound up attempting and failing to help fiends, family, and neighbors connect their laptops to their new TVs via HDMI.

        Each time I tell them to take the TV back and choose another. Of course they don't...

      • Re:No TV (Score:4, Insightful)

        by haijak ( 573586 ) * on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @04:26PM (#52639359) Homepage
        Nope. Even ignoring all the "Smart TV" features. No TVs these days are "monitors". Monitors, weather you're talking about screens or speakers, are built with the expressed purpose of accurately rendering the signal you feed into them. TVs these days do all sorts of video processing to make the picture look "good" not "accurate". They intentionally increase (distort) the contrast and color saturation. They apply additional sharpening, predictive motion smoothing, and who knows what else. You have to dig into the settings and try to find and disable all those setting to get an accurate picture that looks like it was intended to. Computer monitors don't do any of that. They have a few settings to adjust contrast, brightness, and color; but those are only there to fine tune for better accuracy. I want my TV to be a monitor, not a video filter processor.
      • You don't need to use the built in apps or the built-in tuner; a lot of people don't.

        Unfortunately, giving them access to anything resembling an Internet connection means the apps can still do whatever they like, and we are rapidly reaching a point where that Internet connection might be provided wirelessly without the knowledge or consent of the owner. Unless you plan on building a Faraday cage around your home or moving to the middle of nowhere, any "smart" devices you have are going to be a threat to your privacy and security soon, whether you like it or not.

        The sooner we have regulation

        • and we are rapidly reaching a point where that Internet connection might be provided wirelessly without the knowledge or consent of the owner.
          Uhhh....so don't give the TV your wifi password? Are TV apps really "dangerous"??? Your post is predicated on nonsense that even a small child could see through.

          • Your post is predicated on nonsense that even a small child could see through.

            No, you just apparently aren't familiar with trends in the industry. There are already plenty of devices that make their own arrangements for remote communications.

            Do you give the SatNav in your car a WiFi password? Of course not, if it's one of the models with real time traffic updates, then the vendor normally has a deal with one of your mobile/radio networks to push those updates out. Various accident/breakdown functions built into modern cars also come with their own plan for literally phoning home.

            Here

          • Also, in response to this:

            Are TV apps really "dangerous"???

            That depends. A lot of TVs and other "smart" devices sit in your main living areas. Many have sensors like cameras and microphones attached. Many are connection to household networks and to the Internet. Few of those network/Internet connections have any sort of isolation or firewall to limit access to only relevant systems.

            Personally, I find it creepy that people across the Internet could be watching and listening in as a family do or discuss whatever they do or discuss in the "pr

    • Re:No TV (Score:5, Informative)

      by lgw ( 121541 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @02:10PM (#52638063) Journal

      I want no TV, I want a monitor. Simple as that.

      Even as a monitor, my TV was unwatchable until I found that damn "motion smoothing" setting and killed it. It also took a while to change it from "show room display settings" to something more reasonable for my living room. As a geek, I was able to get it all sorted, but it was pretty poor usability the whole way.

      I dont want a smart TV that sends all I watch and do to the internet.

      Heh, even if you're watching a torrent or something, if your smart TV has a network connection it's phoning home with what you're watching (or hashes of screenshots thereof). Sadly, no one is selling high-end panels without all the "smart"-ness unless you want to pay 2-3x for industrial stuff.

    • +1. Just buy a monitor and plug a cheap PC into it. Use a web browser to pull up content.
      • by PPH ( 736903 )

        A Raspberry Pi [lifehacker.com] will do nicely.

        • Re:No TV (Score:4, Informative)

          by supremebob ( 574732 ) <`moc.seiticoeg' `ta' `yknujemeht'> on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @03:33PM (#52638839) Journal

          Everyone I know who's tried this says that the Raspberry Pi's (at least the older model 1 and 2 devices) choke when you try to play 1080p video on them. That was the same experience that I got as well.

          • The newer ones are quite a bit faster. But still, a better solution for almost the same amount of money is to get one of the boards that is designed to serve as a media center controller.

          • by jedidiah ( 1196 )

            The old PIs play video fine, it's the UI that's sluggish. Special purpose silicon handles video playback. It's everything else that that has to depend a system that's underpowered for general purpose use.

          • by NotAPK ( 4529127 )

            I can tell you that my RPi v1 will play most 1080p content "perfectly" but with some caveats.

            1. I purchased the hardware decoder keys ($2 or something).

            2. Newer H265 content will not play smoothly at all, even at lower resolutions.

            I've never tried higher resolution than 1080p, since that works fine and the TV is only roughly 720p (one of those "HD Ready" abominations) anyway.

            PS: Am running OpenElec, streaming media over a home made Ethernet-WiFi-WiFi-Ethernet bridge to a local media server. No special hardw

    • Personally I wouldn't mind that either, but then I would also want at least 5 HDMI ports, which almost n TV seems to come with. Think about it. DVD/BluRay player, Game Console, Cable Box/PVR, Roku, and 1 free cable to plug in an ad hoc device like a laptop and we are already at 5 devices. We should probably have 7-10 HDMI ports just to ensure we never have to move the plugs around. My current TV only came with 3 HDMI ports and they are being occupied with game console, Cable PVR, and DVD player. Good th

      • I use my stereo receiver to switch inputs to the TV so there is only one HDMI cable running into the back of the TV. Of course that doesn't really solve your problem either since even receivers now are going "Smart" like I somehow need to duplicate the functions of the Smart TV and the computer hooked up to my home theater...

  • by Anonymous Coward

    what i wouldnt give for a quality car stereo that just had a volume knob & a usb port & didnt try to razzle-dazzle me like some kind of hopped up slot machine.

    • by PPH ( 736903 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @02:27PM (#52638201)

      Full sized touchscreen displays are the thing these days. Too bad they didn't think to include a 'power-off' screen saver that looks like a hole in the dashboard with a couple of hanging cables so car thieves would think your stereo was already stolen.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • What I wouldn't give to actually have additional capability from my ridiculous touch screen infotainment stereo than what I'd get from a simple unit with buttons... My Ford Touch offers no real features over the non-premium small screen with buttons option other than being able to customize the background. Oh except the button version can store 10 radio presets per FM station vs the 6 that the computer system with a huge fucking touchscreen can handle.

    • by imidan ( 559239 )
      Also: microwave ovens. You know how, when you go to someone else's house, their microwave is utterly incomprehensible? Every single microwave oven ever made requires a different esoteric incantation to do the simplest goddamn thing. I had one, many years ago, that just had two knobs. One was a cook time knob, and the other might have been power level. I can understand the desire for some slightly more complex controls than those, but that was by far the simplest microwave oven I've ever seen. Rarely d
  • There is no need for push button remotes any more. LCD screen remote should be the standard. It's a 1970s technology that has barely evolved with other changes in consumer entertainment.
    • by chris234 ( 59958 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @02:06PM (#52638017)

      A problem I've heard from people about touchscreen remotes (and did experience with my old Pronto remote) is the lack of tactile feedback. You don't know what you're hitting without looking down at the remote as you can't do it by feel.

    • There's apps that let your phone do this, and you can buy LCD remotes. 95% of people don't bother, because remotes are easier to hold, easier to use, and have tactile feedback.

    • Why? What's wrong with buttons? I literally do not understand this comment. Does a piece of technology just become outdated because it's old? SCREW THE WHEEL GUYS AND FIRE IS JUST SOOOOO LAME MAN!
      • by tatman ( 1076111 )

        I was trying to convey that LCD screens allow a much richer UI over fixed buttons. Push button remotes are limited by the number of buttons on the remote. I find it very frustrating to navigate a menu by pressing combinations of pressing menu and exit. And then remembering what the combination is when I switch to another TV.

        LCD screen is effectively a GUI. So there are opportunities to make the remote far more functional, even colorful or animated. For example, LCD screen could show very different

        • by JohnFen ( 1641097 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @04:07PM (#52639165)

          I was trying to convey that LCD screens allow a much richer UI over fixed buttons.

          Yes, but for the use case of a TV remote, the most important thing is to be able to use it without looking at it.

        • by NotAPK ( 4529127 )

          The remote should be very simple with nice easy push buttons.

          On/Off
          Channel Up/Down
          Volume Up/Down

          Menu/Back/Exit
          Arrow Keys to navigate pretty and efficient on-screen display
          Yes/No buttons for the menu options

          That would be it as a bare minimum. If you want to go all out and add a keypad for digit inputs then I'll allow it, but the usefulness of this is waning, especially as cable TV with gobs of channels is becomming less useful.

          What I would consider in addition to the list above would be 4 or 5 shortcut butto

          • by NotAPK ( 4529127 )

            Sorry, of course a mute button, and maybe a smattering of one or two other things I've forgotten about.

            Something I'd like to see (and never have) is a "picture mute" button. It's basically an advertisement mute button. The sound goes off/down to a pre-set level, and the screen goes monochrome and darkens. The bullshit from the ads doesn't disturb you, allowing the audience to chat among themselves, yet someone can look and see if the show has resumed. I know the time-shift features make this less attractive

    • by sjames ( 1099 )

      Sure there is. Durability.

  • Thanks Sony (Score:5, Funny)

    by pushing-robot ( 1037830 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @01:57PM (#52637925)

    http://www.theonion.com/video/... [theonion.com]

    (nsfw/language)

  • To bad cable card failed and tru2way hit the same fate. RVU seems cool but it has some of the same faults as tru2way.

    A new FCC mandated gateway system with no forced UI's no per device fees no forced DRV fees is needed to help make people to be able to use one UI / one remote to view TV.

  • Too many producers of consumer electronics completely ignore the software side of things. From bad UI design to security, in their rush to market they skimp on the things that make that sort of thing worthwhile.

    • Not just the television device manufacturers.

      Streaming app creators are much worse.

      It is rare to find a well designed streaming app. Hulu is terrible and has gotten more terrible now that they took away the queue (wtf is with that?!) but it is far from the worst app out there.

      I recently looked at the SeeSo app on my Roku... holy crap... that is a poster child of doing it wrong.

      So yeah, the user experience is only as good as the weakest app, imo.

  • I know more then a few unfortunate souls with their TV's in the Retina Burning, Vomit Inducing DEMO mode
  • by darkain ( 749283 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @02:32PM (#52638239) Homepage

    Reading all the comments here on this story, and honestly only one thing comes to mind... (yes, an obligatory XKCD comic) https://xkcd.com/927/ [xkcd.com]

  • Give me great shows and programming, I'll figure out how to deal with the TV set (basically like every other gadget I will use only 10% of its features). Current TV is a 10 year old SD set (but it's a flat screen), I haven't seen a need to get a huge whiz bang 80inch set.
  • by XSportSeeker ( 4641865 ) on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @02:35PM (#52638261)

    Smart TVs are riddled with underpowered hardware, security issues, outdated or plain abandoned apps, empty stores, and they are condemned to get completely abandoned after a while, unless you replace your TV sets as much as your smartphone or something, which doesn't seem to be something most consumers will do.

    My Samsung TV came with smart tv functions (I didn't want it, but the price was right for the set), after initially testing the Samsung Hub or whatever they called it, I packed the smart tv remote and other crap that came with it (a bluetooth accessory, 3d glasses, and all that crap) away, and never looked back at them. And afaik, after a couple of years it's basically unusable - outdated, slow as molasses, and now a security issue.

    The horrible mess that has been created by a bunch of TV manufaturers wanting to push proprietary shit on consumers has got to stop, that is if TV manufacturers still wants to offer usable smart tv solutions for consumers.

    I dunno why Google stopped Android TV development, but that's the way to go. In fact, just throwing regular Android there would be a huge improvement over the shitshow that smart tvs currently are. I mean, nothing like Chromecast and other streaming pendrive/small tabletop devices selling like water to show how ineffective the smart tv strategy was.

    Even if smart tvs worked well, were secure, and had good features overall, it's just a failed strategy. You really don't want to combine a product that is supposed to last 10 years or so, with something that will get outdated in less than a year.

  • Some of the comments in this story give me the impression half of slashdot members have no fucking clue how networks operate.
  • by Quirkz ( 1206400 ) <rossNO@SPAMquirkz.com> on Wednesday August 03, 2016 @02:44PM (#52638361) Homepage

    I bought a new TV last Christmas, and my recent experience tends to agree. It wasn't even a smart TV, just a standard one. I still had a whole bunch of problems.

    * Terrible interface for trying to figure out how to adjust color/brightness
    * Terrible interface for trying to scan for over the air channels. Ran through this probably 5 times to get it right.
    * Discovered a firmware bug which would turn the TV on once every 24 hours. This could not be disabled. Spent two weeks trying to upload patched firmware, which included a web site that said the model number was wrong even when it wasn't (no ability to browse, you've just got to know and type it from the box), multiple calls to the main vendor and then sub-vendors, finally getting the firmware patch with no instructions, calling back to find out totally unintuitive process for uploading the firmware, part of which includes "wait for 5-20 minutes while it takes care of itself in the background, and if you interrupt this invisible process you may brick your TV".
    * Found that patched firmware didn't actually fix the bug, but that it at least allowed for a sub-feature that, if there's no signal to the TV, it will turn back off 15 minutes later.
    * TV had terrible sound. Tried multiple versions of traditional (audio jack) and USB speakers, none of which worked for inexplicable reasons. Eventually took a big risk spending $80 on a soundbar that would handle digital audio, hoping it would work, and got lucky. (Sub-issue: soundbar goes to sleep if the TV is paused for a while, and when you wake it back up, the TV doesn't recognize it. You've got to turn the TV on/off to get sound working again. Sub-sub issue: sometimes Netflix loses track of sound, even when the TV had located it; same fix.)
    * I've got 3 remotes: TV, streaming device, and sound bar. The wife and kids get it, but none of our visitors or relatives can figure anything out. I'm *this* close to printing a laminated cheat sheet of instructions, which they probably won't use because it's too complicated.
    * Relatives tend to leave the TV either tuned to an over the air signal or a powered-on streaming device, so that when the firmware bug kicks in, then the TV stays on until someone realizes it was accidental and turns it off hours later.

    • I think I bought the same thing. It's soooooooooooo tempting to just pull out a gun and shoot the fucker full of holes.

    • by crtreece ( 59298 )
      You took all that time to create a detailed, well formatted post, but didn't name and shame the manufacturer and model? Please let tell us how to avoid the pain you've gone through.
      • You took all that time to create a detailed, well formatted post, but didn't name and shame the manufacturer and model? Please let tell us how to avoid the pain you've gone through.

        Agreed. This is the sort of detail that you won't often find on a regular online review. I'd love to have this info, if anything to at least add to a list of manufacturers to avoid for a while, even if the model goes away.

      • by Quirkz ( 1206400 )

        Sorry. RCA 48" LED HDTV. Couldn't remember the details offhand, had to look it up.

        It was a Wal-Mart Black Friday and/or Cyber Monday special, so it may not be coincidence this is a particularly inferior model, but that doesn't excuse all the problems I've had with RCA-specific aspects.

  • And it is not your fault either... err well maybe it is.

  • Let me see if I understand?

    Buying a complex piece of electronics is a complex process.

    Getting it set up to perform basic functions is pretty simple.
    Getting to perform more complicated functions turns out to be more complicated?
    More options means more complicated.

    Is that about it? When has that ever NOT been true?

    How stupid-proof does the world have to be?

    Further, "...folks at Best Buy were of little use when explaining these features, but did a good job making false claims such as "you have to buy a sound

  • It is our fault because we (the TV purchasing public) continue to buy. If we refused to purchase things that were overly complicated, manufacturers would create simpler products.

    As a side note, I don't personally think TVs are too complicated. That being said, without regard to if they are or are not overly complicated, the quality and complexity of products in the marketplace is ultimately the consumers fault.
  • Mossberg is correct on this. I've had to explain a complicated remote (for a non-smart TV) to one of my parents, who has hearing problems.

    .
    The only functionality on the remote he really needs is power on/off (turning both set-top box and TV on and off), volume, mute, numeric keypad. closed captions on/off. That's pretty much it.

    Yet I get phone calls asking why the closed captions switched over to a different language, or what happened to the closed captions, etc., etc., etc., etc.

    I asked the cable c

  • 1. TVs are too complicated; nobody needs a goddamned 'smart TV' to start with, it's stupid.
    2. People are getting dumber and lazier so it's no surprise they can't figure out how to run their TV.
  • I recommend sanyo tvs for anyone with basic tv needs it has this nice reset button on the remote just press it twice and it resets all settings back to default and rescans the channels.
    Saves lots of time when dealing with people over the phone.

  • Why would I want a tuner in my TV? It's just about guaranteed to be garbage, I can't upgrade or alter it without replacing the rest of the TV... and frankly, it's of no use to me where I live now, and to me it's just a very annoying input which I can't disable (unless someone out there knows something about SHARP TV special menu hacking that I don't... still, it's not a GUI option) and to which I sometimes switch accidentally when my multifunction remote is in the wrong mode.

    Get that stupid tuner out of my

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