We will finally buy a TV

[HH_Sailor 3,624]

15 minutes ago, Dembo said:

Of course you only need an aerial or satellte receiver if you want to watch German TV. 

 

If you want German TV as IPTV, then you'll need a contract with Kabel Deutschland

 / Vodaphone or

with Deutsche Telekom (Magenta TV). Then just need a receiver to convert the IP to TV.

This receiver gets attached to the TV using HDMI. ( as does your blue ray player).

 

Now will your new TV remote control also run the receiver / blue ray ?

Or vice versa ?

Don't want too many of those "mouse pianos" lying on the coffee table...

 

We've got the TV next to a window. Half the wall is window - other half wall (with TV).

Floor length curtains neatly cover the TV during the daytime. 

Daytime visitors often don't realise we have a TV at all...

 

Sound boxes ? 
Boom box ?

TV attached to a separate home cinema surround sound ?

 

You won't miss that (unless changing girlfriends  ) but the family will appreciate

the better sound for their film evenings.

[MikeMelga 7,312]

2 hours ago, Dembo said:

 

This. This is a furniture question really and not a TV question. You probably know if you're the sort of person that wants a giant TV dominating your living room (and the fact you haven't had one up to now suggests not). Whatever size you buy you'll get used to very quickly and every other TV will look ridiculously small or ridiculously large by comparison.

 

Forget furniture, the future is a TV wall. Every house will have a big wall reserved for the TV. Mine is hanging on the wall.

TVs will keep growing in size. Right now 55-65" is standard, but 80-100" will be standard in 5-7 years. No furniture for that, you will need to hang it on the wall.

[kaffeemitmilch 1,294]

The problem with mounting the TV on the wall is moving it becomes a hassle, and some people like to re-arrange their rooms every now and then. My partner likes to do this and it annoys the hell out of me (maybe mounting it on the wall will deter her from doing this at least in the living room), but she has that right, and for that, wall-mounting can be a huge pain.

 

We bought a 43 inch plasma TV in 2013 because the lady wanted one for the big move. I would have been happy with the 13 inch crappy CRT, but whatever. She gets what she wants I guess. But, we bought it for about 350 at MediaMarkt when they were not charging tax. Basically, the cheapest plasma because we were poor students and I'd read at the time that a plasma would be good.

 

Cut to 8 years later, I would love a new TV because this one is quite bad. It has a buzzing sound that we've come to ignore and he menu options are quite meager. I finally made it smart with a Chromecast with Google TV (great product, by the way), and I can't justify getting a new one because it would be a huge waste of resources, but we did get a soundbar early on to fix the horrible built-in sound. In all, though, we are not super picky, and we are farily happy with keeping this set up until the kids destroy the TV with a BB gun or something.

 

Long story short, good for you for foregoing a TV all this time. I would personally not have too much of a problem getting a used TV for dirt cheap and just sticking a smart stick into the HDMI and getting a soundbar. If everything is built in, you an't update components (well, you can, but you can save money buy avoiding them in the first place). And, if you pay very little for a working TV, who cares about a warranty for such a small outlay. Plus, you get to keep an old TV in circulation for just that little bit longer.

[fraufruit 42,185]

Now I have TV envy. Our very large wall cabinets only accommodate our 40 incher. We can't go bigger. Anyway, we like it just fine and can watch everything. Himself built a computer for our old TV years ago. We still use it even with the smart TV. Wouldn't be able to hang all of that on a wall, mind you.

[kiplette 8,712]

3 hours ago, kaffeemitmilch said:

until the kids destroy the TV with a BB gun or something

 

 I like your solid grip on reality. 

 

17 hours ago, PandaMunich said:

I first went for a 55" 4K TV, thinking it would be a nice upgrade from my old 32" Samsung TV

 

I have just realised that effectively we just bought your old TV  - 55 was a bit of a storming upsize!!

[MikeMelga 7,312]

3 hours ago, kaffeemitmilch said:

The problem with mounting the TV on the wall is moving it becomes a hassle, and some people like to re-arrange their rooms every now and then. My partner likes to do this and it annoys the hell out of me (maybe mounting it on the wall will deter her from doing this at least in the living room), but she has that right, and for that, wall-mounting can be a huge pain.

 

It will become unavoidable as TVs grow. I bet architects will start designing living rooms around "the TV wall".

 

Of course this all matters if you love movies or live sports. It's a completely different immersion from 55" to >65".

[Gambatte 927]

@MikeMelga

are you trying to convince us that "because bigger TVs are nicer, people will want bigger houses or apartment" ?

 

Both the 'cardboard' test and the store visit are on my to-do list before buying. 

If I was forced to buy absolutely now, with our 3.5m distance, I would buy a 55" on the cheaper end of the range.

[slammer 888]

4 minutes ago, MikeMelga said:

It will become unavoidable as TVs grow. I bet architects will start designing living rooms around "the TV wall".

 

Of course this all matters if you love movies or live sports. It's a completely different immersion from 55" to >65".

I can imagine "Wallpaper" TV´s where the screen is laminated to a wall or all four walls, in fact floor and ceiling too for that matter. And from then it´s only a short burst of tech until the Holodeck.

[fraufruit 42,185]

8 minutes ago, MikeMelga said:

I bet architects will start designing living rooms around "the TV wall".

 

They've been doing this for years in the new builds in the US. TV walls along with whole house sound systems and security. My sister and her husband used to do it before they retired. They once worked on a new horse farm where the owner wanted big plasma tv's in the stables for the horses. 

[slammer 888]

23 hours ago, MikeMelga said:

Not entirely true. Human eye can see at the limit 16K, but typically 8K.

 

But these are in ideal conditions, with a curved screen at the exact optimal sampling distance, etc.

Worst, Netflix and others compress the data to the point where you are not actually seeing 4K.

 

One point where 8K is required, is if you expect a very immersive image and you move yourself very close to the screen. You won't be able to see/focus the entire screen at the same time, you will need to move your head a bit.

 

Example: my current TV (4 years old) is a 4K 65". My next TV (within the next 6 years) won't be smaller than 90" and 8K. Maintaining the same distance.

Quote

 

No it´s not.

To see the difference between 4k and 8k you can´t sit more than 3ft away from the screen.

 

 

Jein... Long story short, for starters your eyes can only process up to one percent of your field of vision in high resolution, that´s like a 20 cent coin held ca. half a meter away. I also don´t think that screen resolution and eyeball resolution can be used interchangeably. In theory the hardware, or "jellyware" in your eye and the processing power of your brain could resolve 8 or even 10K, 16 is stretching it a bit. But your eyes are constantly micro twitching therefore losing and regaining focus all the time, the gaps in between as your eyes twitch get compensated by the brain, your brain is infact interpolating the last clear image you see to the next clear image and deleting the unusable data. This interpolating is (to use a term you will understand) is a using a  kind of "lossy format" much like a .jpg instead of a .png, further reducing your resolution.

All in all the (looking for a term here) resolution payload is around 4 to 6k on a good day. Maybe more for some, maybe less for others.

[yesterday 2,022]

To me, MTbiking has the best setup, a normal TV, maybe 50 inch in the living room, and a huge screen in a basement room.

 

Cannot see why anybody would want to watch the news program, on a whole wall or 75inch, its just too big, if you are not living in in a palace ...

 

But it would be great to go into another room and watch a special effects movie on a hugh wall of a TV

 

There is no right answer on this, its all down to personal preference, affordability and available space, many different people will come to different conclusions

 

[MikeMelga 7,312]

41 minutes ago, slammer said:

 

Jein... Long story short, for starters your eyes can only process up to one percent of your field of vision in high resolution, that´s like a 20 cent coin held ca. half a meter away.

...

All in all the (looking for a term here) resolution payload is around 4 to 6k on a good day. Maybe more for some, maybe less for others.

The screen doesn't know where you are focusing, so it needs full resolution all across.

 

Here is an interesting article of resolution vs perception. They are not the same.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/09/virtual-perfection-why-8k-resolution-per-eye-isnt-enough-for-perfect-vr/

 

 

[LukeSkywalker 7,631]

1 hour ago, fraufruit said:

They once worked on a new horse farm where the owner wanted big plasma tv's in the stables for the horses. 

Did the horses watch Mr. Ed 🐎?

[PandaMunich 16,704]

10 hours ago, kiplette said:

I have just realised that effectively we just bought your old TV  - 55 was a bit of a storming upsize!!

Well, the idea of getting an upgrade was nice as long as it lasted, i.e. until I actually saw that monster TV in my room ;-)

But I'm happy with the 32" Philips TV (with apps) I ended up with, even if I only moved sideways. It has much slimmer bezels than my old Samsung TV, so it takes up less space :-)

[kaffeemitmilch 1,294]

8 hours ago, PandaMunich said:

Well, the idea of getting an upgrade was nice as long as it lasted, i.e. until I actually saw that monster TV in my room ;-)

But I'm happy with the 32" Philips TV (with apps) I ended up with, even if I only moved sideways. It has much slimmer bezels than my old Samsung TV, so it takes up less space :-)

Well this has been mentioned before, but you only need the size of TV that suits your viewing distance. If you have a small room, you need a smaller TV, else the pixels will be visible, and you neck will hurt when you try to look at different parts of the screen. We sit about 6 feet from the TV, and so 43 inches is just about right (maybe we could do with 50-55 inches, but again, wasteful).

[Gambatte 927]

9 hours ago, PandaMunich said:

But I'm happy with the 32"

and what's your distance?

[sluzup 254]

On 10/01/2022, 09:51:45, HH_Sailor said:

 

If you want German TV as IPTV, then you'll need a contract with Kabel Deutschland

 

 / Vodaphone or

with Deutsche Telekom (Magenta TV). Then just need a receiver to convert the IP to TV.

This receiver gets attached to the TV using HDMI. ( as does your blue ray player).

 

 

We have a Samsung smart TV - 5 years old now.  As well as apps for the usual streaming services it also has apps for ARD, ZDF and there are apps (e.g. Joyn) that have the German commercial channels too - this is all free.  I would look into those before signing up for any other service.  We are planning on cancelling our Vodafone cable TV contract.

[PandaMunich 16,704]

1 hour ago, Gambatte said:

and what's your distance?

2.5m.

But again: my case is not typical.

 

I don't watch German TV, I only use the TV to watch films/series, mainly from my DVD collection.

And DVDs look bad if watched on anything above 1920x1080 resolution, i.e. the DVD constraint would have anyway (as I found out) meant maximum a 43" TV.

By that time, I was sick of buying TVs and having to send them back (I had also ordered a 50" from Amazon), and Amazon had just reduced the 32" Philips, which costs 299€ at MediaMarkt, to 206.71€.

So I played it safe and got the 32" Philips 32PHS6605, i.e. the same size (32") and resolution (1366 x 768 pixel) as my old Samsung, since I knew that my DVDs look crisp and good at that size and resolution.

 

***********************************************************************************************

 

Without that DVD constraint, I would have gone for the "new" technology, only 2.6cm thick, 4K (3840 x 2160 pixel) Samsung GU43AU8079UXZG at 43": https://geizhals.de/samsung-gu43au8079-a2508260.html

Or maybe for the next size up of that model, the 50" Samsung: https://geizhals.de/samsung-gu50au8079-a2508273.html

 

There is also a 55" version of that Samsung, but 55" is too big for my room: https://geizhals.de/samsung-gu55au8079-a2508278.html

 

[LeonG 14,811]

1 minute ago, sluzup said:

We have a Samsung smart TV - 5 years old now.  As well as apps for the usual streaming services it also has apps for ARD, ZDF and there are apps (e.g. Joyn) that have the German commercial channels too - this is all free.  I would look into those before signing up for any other service.  We are planning on cancelling our Vodafone cable TV contract.

 

I haven't had a TV subscription in years.  I have been using zattoo and joyn.  They have some free channels but some are locked unless you subscribe.  They both have free shows available to watch on demand. I don't even have a smart TV, just using chromecast to watch through my phone.

[kaffeemitmilch 1,294]

16 minutes ago, LeonG said:

 

I haven't had a TV subscription in years.  I have been using zattoo and joyn.  They have some free channels but some are locked unless you subscribe.  They both have free shows available to watch on demand. I don't even have a smart TV, just using chromecast to watch through my phone.

You would benefit greatly from the Chromecast with Google TV. I upgraded last year and you get a remote and apps directly on the TV.