Smart TV
Samsung has unveiled a new flagship 75-inch television, named the ES9000 LED Smart 3D TV. While the TV sports a curved bezel of just 0.31 inches (0.78 cm) and boasts plenty of on-board features, most eyes are turned toward the game that ships with the colossal product: a gesture-controlled version of Angry Birds. Though the ES9000 enjoys the benefit of debuting the gesture-controlled game, owners of existing Samsung Smart TV's will soon also get to battle those perennially pesky critters while gesticulating wildly, as the new iteration of the title will eventually be rolled out to both the Plasma 8000 and Samsung's 2012 LED 7500, and superior, models. Read More
Hot on the heels of the announcement of Sony’s NSZ-GS7 set-top box, Vizio has unveiled its own Google TV-based device that merges live TV with streaming entertainment in the form of the Vizio Co-Star Stream Player. Connecting the device to a HDTV will turn it into a smart TV capable of surfing the Web full screen using Google Chrome with support for HTML 5 and Flash content, accessing Google Play apps, streaming online video content, and – in a media streamer first – playing games via the OnLive cloud gaming platform. Read More
Smart TV manufacturers are making a smart move. Instead of offering competing technologies for connected TVs, they're looking to partner and form a universal platform. While manufacturers are currently pushing Smart TV technology as a way to sell more sets, the disparate platforms being developed by individual manufacturers leads to consumer confusion and requires developers to customize their apps for different platforms. In order to develop a standard that can create a thriving ecosystem for developers, a number of TV manufacturers have established the SMART TV Alliance and are looking to bring competitors into the fold. Read More
Samsung has partnered with cloud gaming provider Gaikai to make games available on Samsung LED 7000 series Smart TVs. The announcement was made earlier this week at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, E3, in Los Angeles. Read More
E3 2012 is in full swing right now, and while there haven't been any new game consoles announced, that doesn't mean there aren't some new ways to play video games being revealed. Cloud gaming service, OnLive has announced that its library of instant-play games will soon be available both on LG's line of Smart TVs and through almost any PC or Mac browser. In addition, the company will be rolling out a new MultiView spectating mode along with several new games being featured at the show. Read More
Following its announcement at CES in January, Sony’s 2012 flagship BRAVIA LCD TVs have hit stores in the U.S., with other markets set to follow. Coming in 46- and 55-inch screen sizes, the HX850 line offers Dynamic Edge LED backlighting with fully local dimming, and W-Fi internet connectivity and 3D capabilities out of the box. Read More
Now you don't necessarily need to own a “Smart TV” in order to get Android apps on your television. Always Innovating will be showing off its HDMI dongle at CES this week, a compact device that can turn any HDTV into a Smart TV. Essentially Always Innovating's HDMI Dongle is a portable version of a set-top box. The device is based on the Texas Instruments Cortex-A9 OMAP 4 ,which can run from 1GHz to 1.8GHz depending of the configuration, and offers 1GB of RAM as well as a micro SD card for local storage. Read More
