New TV advice

[JimKiler]

I don't want to say that I'm thumping my chest. My 12-year-old LG died like the HAL 9000 computer. I'm just happier than a pig in s***, now:

1. Big enough for this room until I hire people to rearrange the furniture.
2 4K. I was happy with HD, but I have a 2560x1440 gaming monitor for my main PC.
3. HDR -- check.
4. 120hz -- check
5. Very smart, Google-TV/Android features. But no app at Play Store for Spectrum TV -- an incentive to drop our subscription and renew the free trial for YouTube TV. Voice control -- Tested! So check.
6. I paid about $600 for my 2011 LG LED-LCD 43". The total bill for the Sony Bravia X85K was around $700 after purchase of a pedestal stand for it -- maybe $30.
7. Who makes "Bravia"? You know! . . . I remember people in the 1980s who'd had their Sony TVs for 15 years. Much better brand reputation than Hisense. I haven't seen Hisense around long enough to determine it, and their main customer base is across the Pacific. LG was good. Samsung had been good, but more recently too much bad news. But this is Sony. They have as much of a grip on the media world as Dick Wolf has with crime-drama TV.

I went to youtube TV a year ago and while it is not perfect i prefer it and also as someone who never had a DVR having that built in to the cloud is awesome!

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I went to youtube TV a year ago and while it is not perfect i prefer it and also as someone who never had a DVR having that built in to the cloud is awesome!

WEY-ULL . . . . I'll try and modify my anti-cloud perspective. But then, you have several different cloud recording offerings from multiple streaming services. Lemme think for a moment: I've got Amazon Prime, Roku, Hulu, PBS, Peacock, Spectrum(!!), You-Tube TV (still in the trial period). With bundled premium channels, that's the extent of my subscriptions, in addition to free services like Pluto. Of course, PBS is "free", but you have to donate to have PBS-Passport, which gives you access to all of their wonderful top-end stuff, like the entire Ken Burns Series.

I DO have DVR through Tablo for OTA HD broadcast TV, but the recordings are stored on an HDD I added to the Tablo box, and I can't port them to my HTPC.

My HTPC is posing complications for me. Problems with my ONKYO receiver likely derive from the combination of HDR features for both the PC and my new Sony TV, but the long HDMI cable is not HDR-compatible. I think I need to upgrade the cabling for all component-AVReceiver connections. No problem, but for the 25' HTPC-to-Receiver connection.

Ultimately, we're all constrained by the Jack Valenti Media-Nazi tyranny of DRM and HDCP. They threw this crap at us 15 years ago, and we just laid down like sheep. That's partly because the mainstream computer and entertainment electronics customers didn't care enough. And how would you effectively organize them, anyway? The Media Nazis called all the shots.