Integrating TV and Web: Samsung Smart TV is Promising, Needs Work
By emeadows
August 30, 2012
August 30, 2012
- In increasing numbers, consumers are using their large flat-panel TVs to watch online video, play music, view photos, access social media and more.
- “The trouble is, this is primarily being done via plugged-in PCs, or add-on boxes like Apple TV, Microsoft’s Xbox, and Roku players,” the Wall Street Journal notes. “They use separate remotes and are accessed via separate inputs on the TV.”
- In response, TV manufacturers are offering smart TVs. “Their pitch is that you can switch between, or even combine on one screen, regular TV and Internet content, without adding extra devices and remotes, or switching inputs,” explains the article.
- Walt Mossberg decided to “check in on the state of the smart TV.” He did so by using the latest Samsung unit because of its popularity and touch-based remote, along with its Smart Interaction concept, “which uses a camera and microphones built into the TV to support voice control, gesture control and facial recognition,” he writes.
- While Mossberg found that the 46-inch ES8000 worked well for watching cable, conducting Skype conversations, streaming TV and movies through Netflix and other services, he also found the Smart interaction to be “unreliable and awkward.”
- “I focused my testing on the Smart Interaction, the new remote and the latest version of the Smart Hub, Samsung’s built-in interface for apps and Web content,” he notes. “The TV easily hooked up to my cable box and allows you to control many functions, like turning the TV on or off or launching apps, by saying ‘Hi, TV’ then speaking a command,” with built-in mics on the TV or remote.
- But in many cases, Mossberg’s commands were ignored or interpreted incorrectly. “Gestures were similarly frustrating,” he writes. Same goes for face recognition, which rarely, if ever, worked.
- “There are flashes of a great future merging regular TV and the Web on the Samsung Smart TV,” he concludes. “But it needs work.”
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