China's OnePlus is Going To Start Making TVs (theverge.com) 48
Chinese electronics company OnePlus, known for making inexpensive but high-end smartphones, is entering a new line of business: making TVs. From a report: Best known for its phones, China's OnePlus also has a small catalog of really good accessories like wireless earphones and surprisingly awesome backpacks, though nothing as complex or expensive as a television set. In announcing the news on the OnePlus online forums, company chief Pete Lau describes it as "the first step in building a connected human experience." [...] OnePlus has decided to make its entry point into this market the TV itself, which has always been at the center of home entertainment, though often with the help of other connected devices. Reading Lau's teaser announcement, the OnePlus TV -- which so far only has a project name, no timeline or specs have been revealed -- will serve as the connectivity hub for OnePlus' future vision of the smart home.
Re:Hell no! (Score:4, Funny)
The TV will report what you watch,how often you watch, and probably has a camera in it with facial recognition and records who is watching, and reports it all back to the government.
Re: (Score:2)
has a camera in it with facial recognition
Necessitating a notch
If it's anything like the phones... (Score:2)
HDMI (Score:3)
How’s that again? (Score:5, Insightful)
”Best known for its phones, China's OnePlus also has a small catalog of really good accessories like wireless earphones and surprisingly awesome backpacks, though nothing as complex or expensive as a television set.”
A smartphone is arguably far more complex than a television set.
Re:How’s that again? (Score:4, Insightful)
Social Score Included? (Score:2)
Will buying this improve your social score in China?
Suicide (Score:2)
Given OnePlus' positioning, this isn't a smart move. They can't possibly compete on cost, and other companies are much better at differentiating their offerings.
Re: (Score:2)
On the other hand, if you (a) your competition is financially weakened and (b) you think you can produce the product for a little less than they can, it's an opportunity to deal some competitors a death blow.
That could be valuable because with the build quality of modern TVs they have to be replaced every couple of years. That means that while there isn't growth in the number of TVs installed, there is potential for sales growth if there are fewer players.
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I'm not sure that's true. If you look at a vendor's 4K TVs, for example, you'll find a range of models. (I've been thinking about buying one, so I've been looking.) The cheapest may be sold barely above cost, but the price difference for improved features clearly indicates a healthy profit margin, and I think they do a pretty good job of upselling the value of the better models.
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I don't know what they're going to do, but suppose they came out with an offering very similar to TCL, but allowed users to decide whether they wanted a FireTV, Roku, or non-smart interface? Wouldn't that be cool? I doubt that's where they're going. I would guess that TCL is the model they're going to try to emulate. TCL has Roku, so they'll go with something else.
I wish them luck, as I want to see more competition in the TV market. I hope they find some combination of features that are missing right n
Like TCL (Score:3)
TCL has made big waves in the US TV market in recent years, so it's not surprising that another company would see an opportunity to move into the market as well. This has been made possible in large part by Amazon, as an electronics company doesn't have to deal with hundreds of electronics chains or dozens of distributors to get their product out. Now they just have to deal with one company.
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Indeed. Up till recently this year, I'd always bought Samsung TVs. But this time I was looking for something I could plug into headphones or an external speaker and Samsung no longer offers that. I picked up a TCL with Roku built-in for a good price and I couldn't be happier. I was one of those "I like my dumb tv thank you very much" people before, but this software interface just works and does it well.
Re: (Score:2)
Yup. I haven't bought one yet, but I like what I've seen how it selects different inputs. I just wish it had more connections, as if I have to use a receiver to do the switching, I lose the nice single interface for everything.
Colour me surprised (Score:2)
One Plus, owned by Oppo (which makes smartphones), owned by BBK Electronics (which makes TV sets), can easily enter this new market?
Do you say that BBK wants to enter the Western TV market using a well-known brand? Incredible for sure
If OnePlus reads this (Score:2, Interesting)
Some features that would cost little to nothing to add, but would get some people to actively seek them out:
* Explicit, native support for BOTH 1080p50 and 1080p59.94 (AFAIK, *all* 60fps is REALLY 59.94fps for the sake of backwards-compatibility with NTSC). Seriously, it's 2018. Why the FUCK do we still have TVs sold in America that reject 720p50 and 1080p50 over HDMI, EVEN THOUGH the EXACT SAME GODDAMN HARDWARE (with slightly-tweaked firmware) can do both framerates on TVs sold elsewhere?
* By extension, ex
Re: (Score:2)
In addition to your list :
- No cam
- No microphone
- No network connection at all (I'll stream my stuff myself)
- A shit load of HDMI connectors
Re: (Score:2)
Or at least, if they HAVE to put "smart" functions into the TV for the sake of marketing another feature, at LEAST have the decency to do it in a way that doesn't get in the way of using it as a raw computer monitor with a half-dozen HDMI inputs.
Also... don't do stupid things like put a 3840x2160 LCD behind a slightly-oversized bezel so the outer 50 pixels are hidden. On my hierarchy of "shitty, stupid things TV manufacturers do", this goes near the top of the list. It makes life absolute HELL for anyone tr
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Also... don't do stupid things like put a 3840x2160 LCD behind a slightly-oversized bezel so the outer 50 pixels are hidden.
I don't think any manufacturers do this (or at least I've never seen or heard of one). What most TVs do have is an overscan setting (sometimes on by default, sometimes off by default, and sometimes on with no option to disable***) which discards the outermost pixels of the image and stretches the remainder of the pixels across the screen. The reason (or at least one reason) for this was that analog TV signals had data (like closed captions) encoded in the vertical refresh between frames. That data should ha
Re: (Score:2)
It might be a first-world problem, but it's a BULLSHIT problem that doesn't HAVE to exist, and one example of a way we've literally gone backwards in TV design over the past 50 years.
1960s: TV had sound within a few seconds, stable picture within 20-30 seconds, correct picture within 50-60 seconds.
1970s: TV had sound instantly, stable picture within a few seconds.
1980s: hit the power button, TV has picture and sound before you have time to lift your finger from the button.
1990s: same, but if you REALLY obje
Re: (Score:2)
"cost little to nothing to add"
Existing electronics that provide least common denominator features are produced in incredible volume thus they are amazingly cheap and take zero effort to integrate. Any added features cause a literally infinite percentage increase in effort.
More spying (Score:2)
DO NOT WANT!