Replacement TV

melbury

Does a smart TV do away with the need to have a fire stick or suchlike?

We had a horrible experience with our fire stick on Saturday night. We were trying to watch a film and suddenly a message appeared saying "critically low on storage" so after looking for some help online to try and find out what to do, we deleted data and cache on the few apps that we have installed. However, this still continued to happen three more times and completely ruined the film.

This has never happened before:(

ballyblack

yes

Get a smart Tv either Sony, Lg or samsung and stop fiddling about!

melbury

ballyblack wrote: »

yes

Get a smart Tv either Sony, Lg or samsung and stop fiddling about!

Yes sir, will do;)

almillar

We were trying to watch a film

On what platform? Check that your TV will support that platform. If it was iPlayer you should be safe but don't expect your TV to run Kodi!

Takmon

psychic_teabag wrote: »

My concern with smart TVs is that the manufacturer has no incentive to issue firmware updates for older models. So as protocols evolve, apps such as iplayer could stop working and there's not a lot you can do about it. If the smarts are external (eg firestick) it's a lot cheaper (and less wasteful) to replace that to restore the functionality, rather than having to replace the whole TV.

If you buy a decent TV then it will be a Smart TV, you can't get a decent consumer TV without smart functionality these days. But this is isn't a problem because even if every internet connected app stops working the TV will still work and you can just buy a firestick or similar. So buying a smart TV doesn't need you need to buy a whole new TV when apps stop working.

melbury wrote: »

Our 12 year old Panasonic plasma TV needs replacing and I just wondered if anyone has any recommendations for a good replacement, which I know wouldn't be plasma now.

I have been looking around and there is a brand called LG (which I personally know nothing about), but OH favours Sony Bravia or of course another Panasonic.

Looking for something in screen size 47/49 inch max.

Thanks.

melbury wrote: »

Budget is up to about £600.

I would recommend that you buy a decent LG OLED TV which will probably cost you £1200+ and will be 55" (All the good TV's are 55" or larger these days).

I know this goes against what you said but if you keep this one for another 12 years then that it only works out at £100 a year or less than 28p per day. Most people watch TV almost every day so it's worth paying more considering how many hours you will spend looking at it!

getmore4less

LG 55 OLED come in at just under £1k when on sale.

Enterprise_1701C

We have a Hisense 4K TV, 43 inch from Argos.

It has a good picture, Freeview Play, it also has a Freesat tuner (ours does anyway).

It is a reasonable TV for a reasonable budget. The colours are good, it is a good picture, the sound is OK but not remarkable.

We have had the Hisense for a little over a year and have had no problems so far. The sound is OK too, though might benefit from a sound bar. That said, we have it rigged into a surround sound system and have not bothered with it yet.

There's a lot of problems with screen burn with OLED TVs, if you are considering going with OLED google it first, I would certainly want the tech to progress first.

neilmcl

Enterprise_1701C wrote: »

We have a Hisense 4K TV, 43 inch from Argos.

It has a good picture, Freeview Play, it also has a Freesat tuner (ours does anyway).

It is a reasonable TV for a reasonable budget. The colours are good, it is a good picture, the sound is OK but not remarkable.

We have had the Hisense for a little over a year and have had no problems so far. The sound is OK too, though might benefit from a sound bar. That said, we have it rigged into a surround sound system and have not bothered with it yet.

There's a lot of problems with screen burn with OLED TVs, if you are considering going with OLED google it first, I would certainly want the tech to progress first.

No more than plasma TVs had in the day and as the OP is replacing a 12 year old plasma I'm sure he's au fait with preventing this.

Sharon87

For the OP's budget a Samsung or Sony Smart 4K TV.

something like this would work:
https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/samsung-ue43ru7400uxxu-43-smart-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-led-tv-with-bixby-10191834-pdt.html

Or a larger screen
https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/tv-and-home-entertainment/televisions/televisions/samsung-ue50ru7400uxxu-50-smart-4k-ultra-hd-hdr-led-tv-with-bixby-10191829-pdt.html?intcmpid=display~RR

I think the most important thing is future proofing, so a 4K television would be best. 4K for most TV is a few years away yet (or more), but it's a good idea if you want it to last for a long time.

The Smart aspect potentially may not work in 5-10 years time, but then you use a firestick or similar to make it smart again. Before I got a smart TV I had a Smart Bluray player instead

ih8stress

Might be totally wrong here but I read somewhere that if you buy a 4K tv, then you also need to buy other stuff that is compatible with it