Best Smart TV? (>40")

foxslink

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Mar 28, 2016
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Hi guys,
I'm looking for a Smart TV to watch movies and play console games. My budget is 370$ (equals 280.000 pesos). The TV prices have increased in my country because of this week’s cyber monday, and many models are not even available today.
The only brands I searched for are LG and Samsung. AFAIK there are 2 types of panels, IPS which has weaker contrast and VA which has better colors. Also LG TVs last longer and have better OS than Samsung.
So which TV should I go for?

Samsung
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/51339-samsung-un43nu7090 43” Panel Technology IPS
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/85572-samsung-un43tu7090gxzs 43” Panel Technology IPS
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/85571-samsung-un50tu7090gxzs 50” (>300k) Panel Technology VA

LG
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/64112-lg-43um7100psa 43” Panel Technology IPS (white pixel issue)
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/80497-lg-43un7300psc 43” Panel Technology IPS
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/82028-lg-49un7100psa 49” Panel Technology IPS
https://www.solotodo.cl/products/79296-lg-50un7300psc 50” (>300k) Panel Technology VA


I appreciate your help
 
The words "best" and "smart" probably should never go together with regards to TVs.

Which is to say the "smart" OS's, especially, Samsung (Tizen) and LG (WebOS), are pretty stinky ecosystems (deprecation, show porting/updating of apps, hard to work with, delays, etc...)

Have you explored https://www.rtings.com ?

I have an LG OLED, but I never use its "smarts"... I use Roku, noting that Roku works best in the USA.
 
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I own both Samsung and LG TVs and can say that LG webOS is miles better than Samsung Tizen to operate. I had so many crash issues with apps on Samsung that I bought a Chromecast Ultra and used that instead. By comparison I use LG webOS for all my movie/TV streaming needs nowadays.
 
I own both Samsung and LG TVs and can say that LG webOS is miles better than Samsung Tizen to operate. I had so many crash issues with apps on Samsung that I bought a Chromecast Ultra and used that instead. By comparison I use LG webOS for all my movie/TV streaming needs nowadays.
Sort of true, you're just considering "the now" aspect. Which is better i/f wise. Both have absolutely horrible app ecosystems. And btw, just wait until your version of WebOS is deprecated and isn't updated anymore and apps start falling off... etc.
 
Sort of true, you're just considering "the now" aspect. Which is better i/f wise. Both have absolutely horrible app ecosystems. And btw, just wait until your version of WebOS is deprecated and isn't updated anymore and apps start falling off... etc.
That's certainly a fair point. My understanding is that the apps are updated by their respective creators separately so the only thing that would make them not worth anymore would be something like an unsupported DRM or some other feature that requires Tizen or WebOS to be the latest and greatest. I always have the Chromecast if need be.

For daily use like changing TV settings I find the LG experience a lot more pleasant where access to most things is within reason even if there is still too much nesting of settings.
 
Imho nothing beats Android TV. Both Tizen and WebOS are unusable for me. Missing apps and features left and right so I'll end up getting another Shield or Xiaomi box..
 
That's certainly a fair point. My understanding is that the apps are updated by their respective creators separately so the only thing that would make them not worth anymore would be something like an unsupported DRM or some other feature that requires Tizen or WebOS to be the latest and greatest. I always have the Chromecast if need be.

For daily use like changing TV settings I find the LG experience a lot more pleasant where access to most things is within reason even if there is still too much nesting of settings.
I work with an app maker of a fairly popular/useful app. They tell me that Samsung is the worst, but LG isn't too far behind. Takes forever to get something into their respective app stores.

I too, like the LG and I too think WebOS is pretty good.... but these captive ecosystems.... no. They make it difficult to push updates and again, they deprecate (not a DRM related thing), and by that I'm saying within 5 years, which maybe is not a big deal if you're throwing away your TVs in less time than that. Meanwhile, using Roku, now I have independent paths, separating the "smarts". I have the same interface on my LG OLED as well as my incredibly incredibly old Toshiba TVs.
 
The words "best" and "smart" probably should never go together with regards to TVs.

Which is to say the "smart" OS's, especially, Samsung (Tizen) and LG (WebOS), are pretty stinky ecosystems (deprecation, show porting/updating of apps, hard to work with, delays, etc...)

Have you explored https://www.rtings.com ?

I have an LG OLED, but I never use its "smarts"... I use Roku, noting that Roku works best in the USA.
Why wouldn't they go togather? The best TVs on the market are going to be smart TVs. You not getting a OLED without smart features.
 
Why wouldn't they go togather? The best TVs on the market are going to be smart TVs. You not getting a OLED without smart features.
While "they go together", it was a bad idea. Not saying you can't have some TV smarts, but apps? Not well executed at all. Someone already mentioned Android based solutions. And it's weird that Samsung has chosen to stick it out with Tizen (investment?). The "goal" of all these TV providers buying up smart tech that they didn't/don't understand is "lock in". Plain and simple.
 
While "they go together", it was a bad idea. Not saying you can't have some TV smarts, but apps? Not well executed at all. Someone already mentioned Android based solutions. And it's weird that Samsung has chosen to stick it out with Tizen (investment?). The "goal" of all these TV providers buying up smart tech that they didn't/don't understand is "lock in". Plain and simple.
Samsung sticks to Tizen because they use it across their entire ecosystem on their propietery processors. From TVs over Smartwatches to IoT stuff. They try to be an Asian Apple clone.

WebOS though.. just plain bad imho. Kudos to Sony, Philips, Nvidia and co who stick to AndroidTV and make it an actual enjoyable experience for customers, especially Android phone users.

Most anti-android TV voices come from users that are jailed in their Apple/iOS world, because for them Android is the enemy and they dislike open and extendible systems..

Rant over.
 
I have webos on my old LG E7 OLED and it works fine. The apps all work and sure once in a blue moon there might be a app crash or glitch but overall I turn it on and it works as intended, so I can't complain. I have an HTPC plugged into it via HDMI but I rarely turn it on anymore. YouTube TV, Disney+, Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video - all the main apps are available there for you to log into.

Sure it's likely not the best thing ever but its not as horrible as people make it out to be - at least on the OLEDs.
 
Webos works perfectly fine for me. I never had a app crash for me and does everything I want. The web browser sucks I will give you that but I don't even use it. I do wish I could cast to it from my phone tho.
 
While "they go together", it was a bad idea. Not saying you can't have some TV smarts, but apps? Not well executed at all. Someone already mentioned Android based solutions. And it's weird that Samsung has chosen to stick it out with Tizen (investment?). The "goal" of all these TV providers buying up smart tech that they didn't/don't understand is "lock in". Plain and simple.
I think it has is place, specially if we consider the added cost with 2020 hardware to make the TV have apps running, are Android/Roku smart tv really that bad ? I have not many issue running plex/netflix/disney type app on mine.

On a low priced tv from a consumer it is interesting to not have to buy anything else and on expensive tv the relative cost to make a tv able to run apps with what you want it be powerful enough to do anyway is probably really small.
 
...
Sure it's likely not the best thing ever but its not as horrible as people make it out to be - at least on the OLEDs.
I'm not saying WebOS is horrible. I'm saying it's the worst of all options.

For me personally it's unusable because I have my SAT tuners go into my server in the basement and stream it around the house using tvheadend. Well.. there is no tvheadend client app for WebOS and there is no Kodi for WebOS either.

I could live without Kodi, but the lack of any good IPTV software kills it completely for me.

Jeez, you can't even access smb/nfs shares on WebOS..

For my wife it's the lack of a chromecast option that makes WebOS fall short.

And the wirst of all is that there are some processing options like BFI that are just unavailable on WebOS and can only be activated on HDMI...

If I wanted a smart tv for home entertainment I'd just look elsewhere (Sony) and stay away from Tizen and WebOS. Thankfully I got the CX for PC and console usage only. But it would be nice to watch TV occasionally on it during daytime or cooking instead of having to fire up my projector and my whole entertainment system..
 
I can see with your setup it's much more complex. I'm running everything via apps and streaming. Otherwise, I just run stuff on my "smart remote" - my old retired smartphone (a Note 8+) that now just sits on the wireless charger and works as a fancy remote - and cast the signal from it to the TV.

Jeez, you can't even access smb/nfs shares on WebOS..
Have you tried lately / latest firmware / app update? I swear I've used this function on mine to access a shared USB drive hooked to the router or my over the LAN, NAS device (smb). Let me doublecheck tonight and get back to you.
 
Have you tried lately / latest firmware / app update? I swear I've used this function on mine to access a shared USB drive hooked to the router or my over the LAN, NAS device (smb). Let me doublecheck tonight and get back to you.
I would appreciate that. I'm on the latest .25 firmware on the CX that came out a couple of weeks ago. The only option I have on the WebOS UI is DLNA to my networked AVR or a USB device plugged into the TV.

While I use Emby for my media library I'd welcome direct access to my file system for accessing various non-library stuff stuff.
 
Sorry for the late reply - totally slipped my mind until a few minutes ago. I just checked and the Photo & Video App on my LG E7 OLED can pull video files from both my NAS and the USB HD plugged into the router. FWIW!
 
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