LG Google TV Review
by Jason Inofuentes on October 2, 2012 9:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Google TV
- Media Streamer
- Media Player
- LG
- Honeycomb
- Android
- LG L9
- LG G2
Let’s talk a bit more about the Google TV experience. There are three components to Android, and every other operating system: platform, ecosystem, and access. Providing a structure within which developers can produce powerful applications is important. Ensuring an ecosystem within which users can find and purchase these apps is equally vital. Designing an elegant and intuitive solution for accessing these apps is the most user facing component, and so we spend a lot of time talking about it. In this case, LG has interjected their interface, for better or worse.
Android’s app platform has proven every bit the equal of the alternatives at producing excellent apps for smartphones. While expanding on the new features for Google TV and Honeycomb, several sessions at Google I/O 2011 were spent discussing how developers could use new UI design frameworks within the SDK to build apps whose UIs could extend to displays of all sizes. We’ve had two iterations of Android since then, and this design framework has been built upon; and yet here we are, and one of the most common complaints levied against Android tablets is that there aren’t nearly enough apps. And the same is true for Google TV.
In an age when rich apps are being produced with elegant UIs and immense functionality, too often the “apps” for Google TV are little more than links to a website. In medicine, there’s an old saying: “Salt follows water, and water follows salt.” There’s no need to expand on this particular analogy, but it can be revised to fit this scenario as, “Apps follow hardware, and hardware follows apps.” If there’s a rich selection of apps to be had, sales of hardware will flourish; if hardware sales are high, developers will flood that market with apps. Sales of Google TV hardware have been lagging since its inception. And app selection is poor. So, lose/lose there then.
So who does get it right? Five years before the first Google TV device was launched, Microsoft released a simple white box designed to play video games. Having made its way into millions of living rooms, Microsoft unleashed their plan to extend the function of their little white box to include all your entertainment needs. Truth be told, there’s no way that Microsoft could have known in 2005 that apps and streaming video would be all the rage today, but the Xbox 360’s capabilities were expanded and the result is arguably the most satisfying way to engage in streaming media. It’s not the multitasking app experience that you could expect from a modern operating system, and it’s certainly not perfect, but for a television UI and video experience I’d rather have easy to use and complete than complex and lacking.
We're not sure what's next for Google TV. It's been a year since version 2.0 rolled out, and Google has made nary a mention about the platform publicly. Their partners have released some hardware, including Vizio releasing a Marvell-based box, and Samsung will be joining the Google TV initiatives later this year with Smart TVs that offer Google TV services alongside their own content. Samsung's effort, like LG's, will not be vanilla Google TV. Rather, the Korean conglomerate will skin the software with its own UI, including its own take on motion controls (think Kinect, not Wii). I suspect this is an indication of what we'll see going forward, OEMs providing their own interface atop the core of Google TV.
That should all sound quite familiar and a bit worrisome. Skinning on Android handsets is a component in their fragmentation, something they surely would like to avoid with Google TV. Users will not tolerate discovering that a new app or service is unavailable on their two year old television when it's supported on the latest hardware. Whatever Google TV 3.0 and beyond look like, Google has promised that their core apps (YouTube, Search, TV & Movies, Play Store) will be updated on legacy hardware. This includes those based on x86 hardware. This mirrors what we see on Android elsewhere, as even Gingerbread devices are running the current iterations of Gmail and what not.
There's something else we should expect out of Google TV in the future. This year Google anounced an initiative to make YouTube a host to content portals, akin to the more traditional channel model of television. It's this sort of model that should be front and center on Google TV, but instead it's buried within the YouTube app. By elevating YouTube within Google TV, we could come closer to a more traditional television viewing model, but with web video. If you want to get a feel for what this could be like, try out Redux for Google TV.
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JasonInofuentes - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
Great points, though I take issue with the tablet-as-remote concept. That's a lot of baggage and the technology exists to make a smart remote that is aware of device states. If all your components (source, display, receiver) are connected via HDMI 1.4 and use CEC for command and status, and Bluetooth is used as the protocol for communicating with the remote, then you could have a Logitech-like remote with macros that can modify the macro on the fly to reflect current states. Trouble is, not everyone implements CEC.I entirely agree that the ideal would be for a single interface to be able to query the full range of possible content options, and I think Google has a great first step towards that. Though it's a clunky affair, their access to EPG's and ability to adjust cable set-top boxes through IR blasters (and someday, hopefully, CEC) means that from their search you can do this with cable content along side streaming video options. That local storage component is still missing, and though it's a big one for those of us that have terabytes of storage devoted to movies, we are the most minor of minorities. The vast television audience mostly watches . . . television. So, for Google to put up the effort to implement a protocol for indexing and searching your media server (and to do so in a the many countless ways that your server may be configured) is not really worth it. Sad, though.
Jason
will2 - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
The last 2 posts cover what I would like to see in an intelligent Multimedia/computer system, but with 1 major difference: Instead of assuming every home wants a TV with integrated tuner - a fine concept before it was seen screens could be used for other things - but which necessarily dedicates, if not limits, part of the box to a narrow form of media consumption, I would prefer the display to be just a Monitor with just numerous HDMI, USB, & Wireless connections, where the consumer is free to buy either a USB tuner with BT4 Remote for traditional 1 room viewing (cost little different from tradional TV), or next up, a small 'pendroid+WiFi' or HTPC/XBMC where, if the user wants to view TV or compute, from different parts of the home, where only additional Monitrs need be purchased (a great saving over buying a standalone TV for multiple rooms). That way, the owner is not tied to any mode of consumption, (can buy TV Tuner, or Internet feed, or Cable) and where makers can focus developments on providing a UI that allows integration of all of these flexible configurations in an easy to use mannner. A BT4 remote, that improves on the model of the Boxee Box mini-double-sided keyboard, so all you need in the room you are working in is a Wireless Display and the smart keyboard remote. If integration is done right, this should work for non-technical consumers also - so big market potential. Any problems with this idea ?Sureshot324 - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
I have a similar remote for my HTPC (Wiimote style with a thumb keyboard) and IMO it's the best system for controlling a PC/media center from the couch. I use keyboard shortcuts for a lot of things like play/pause.zeiker - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
On my wishlist is a device (right now it's an HTPC /HTLT with video playback software) with 5.1 digital sound output, HDMI 1080p output and capabilities to stream internet content as well as BluRay, DVDs and - .iso files of DVDs and BRDs. Trying NAS devices, streaming routers, DLNA devices, it just isn't happening with what I see available.Therefore my current optimum solution (for all things video) is a discrete BRD player and HTLT and pull the net content from the laptop and mpgs and .iso files from a NAS through the laptop to the TV via Cyberlink playback software.
Anyone know of a better implementation out there?
JasonInofuentes - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
I'm actually pretty solidly against consolidation of functions in lots of cases. The best disc player, are just disc players. The best streamers, are mainly just streamers. I think we'd all love to have something that played all of those, and any other content you wanted, and did so well; but I don't see it happening, just as I don't really see it happening without compromises in the tablet space. Want a reader? An e-ink device is your best bet. Want a gaming device? Pretty solid on some SoC's, but with a dedicated handheld you know the games will work, and how well they'll work. Want a productivity device? Tablet's might be good for that, but how much more convenient for writing is a tablet than, say, a MacBook Air?Point is, maybe you're living in a good place if you have a good streamer, and a good BR player.
smartthanyou - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
A few quibbles...HD did not require a federal program for the digital tuner box. The box was for the switch to digital signals and to free up the analog spectrum. HD was part of what was being broadcast digitally, but the main reason was to free up the spectrum so the Feds could auction it off. And the program was BS to begin with. Just a waist of money, people should have been forced to buy their own box if they needed it.
The AppleTV was always meant as device for people buying into the iTunes/Apple universe. It was never meant as the next big thing.
Finally, it will never matter what hardware and software comes out, the only way we are every going to get a fundamental change in our television viewing is if there is massive change of heart with the content producers. In other words, it won't happen anytime soon.
With corporate consolidation, the companies involved just want to protect/grow profits. They don't want massive change, just massive piles of cash.
As consumers, we could force change by simply walking away from their products, but we refuse to do that. We complain, gripe and bitch about the evil media producers and corporations while we hand over our money.
JasonInofuentes - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - link
The HD switch did require federal programs to coordinate, and the tuner box was part of it, and a response to the actually flagging rate at which consumers were upgrading equipment. That issue was somewhat isolated to more rural areas that were underserved by big cable, but the tuner program was a part of it. One reason why the tuner program ended being such a flop, though, was that TV companies saw that demand had become rabid for their products and rapidly lowered prices to compete. And that's how we ended up with so much attention being devoted to 3D and now Smart TV's. Set manufacturer's need to be able to raise their margins to be profitable. Adding $50 in compute components to make your TV "smart" and providing some tag along services is cheap, and allows you to add a lot more than $50 to your price tag.Kracer - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
It seems that every technology space is crappy until Apple comes and does what us geeks want in a closed ecosystem so that everyone likes it.It happened with PCs, MP3s, Smartphones and tablets.
And after Apple comes along and moves things to where they should be we have to wait again for a proper open eco-system learns from Apple.
It happened with PCs, Smartphones and Android tablets just need the apps.
So until Apple comes along and gives everyone a kick up the back-side, we are stuck with customizing XBMC to kingdom come.
JasonInofuentes - Friday, October 5, 2012 - link
I think Apple has a certain undue influence, or perhaps 'undue' is to strong a word there. But there I think PC's should be left out of your list. The greatest innovations were in the openness of the Apple ecosystem and the ability for developers to extend the functionality of the OS through add-ons like Growl. It's only recently that Apple has opted to close their desktop ecosystem, and I think it's to the detriment of developers, even if it is to the benefit of Apple's pocketbooks.And note, Apple has thrown in with the Apple TV with just the structure you're talking about. And that has largely been a draw. It sells well, but it isn't a revenue driver. Nor is it, I suspect, a big iTunes revenue driver.
Kracer - Saturday, October 6, 2012 - link
On the Apple TV;I was thinking about the all so rumoured iTV or Apple television or whatever.