Home » Technology » What is a Smart TV

What is a Smart TV

First, let’s define a Smart TV and what makes it “smart.” Smart means clever and intelligent.

When we apply this parameter to a TV, we give it some smart function.

What are the Signs of a Smart TV?

Internet Connection

First of all, it knows how to connect to the Internet. It just has to be connected to the Internet for extra benefit.

Therefore, it either has an RJ-45 connector for a local network to connect the cable, or TVs are often connected via a home Wi-Fi network.

Smart TV Tizen
Smart TV Tizen

Media Player

The Smart TV always has some media player.

Let’s say you’ve downloaded some video or movie, no matter where. If you transfer it from your computer to a flash drive, insert it in the TV, run a particular application on the TV — a player or whatever it’s called, and directly select this file, turn it on, and it works, plays with sound, and so on.

Apps

These apps, like those on your phone, tablet, or computer, can give you certain functions. For example, they can stream or watch TV channels.

Everything, even shopping, is available now. You can install a separate app for a company, which will show you its products there. All of this is already available on the smart TV.

Voice Assistants

Modern smart TVs know how to listen to you and have voice search and various voice assistants. You can press the button to dictate something on the remote control, and the TV will understand you and follow your commands.

Several TVs come with a webcam built right into the screen. You can make online calls and participate in training at some conferences. The webcam will work with built-in Skype, Zoom, teleconference, or whatever.

Video Streaming to Your TV

One of the most common features that makes your TV smart is the ability to play content from your mobile device, whether an iPhone, Android, tablet, or personal computer running Windows OS, MacOS, or any other operating system. This means streaming video from your phone to your big TV screen.

You’ve probably heard of technologies like AirPlay, Miracast, and Chromecast. These make it so convenient to send your favorite pictures, music, and videos directly to the television.

Updates

Well, a smart TV has to update itself over the network over the Internet.

All of the things we’ve listed above, all of these intelligent things on your screen, are done by the regular operating system on your TV. It sometimes flies through an update, and it automatically over the air via Wi-Fi knows how to update, adding new functionality to your set of intelligent apps and innovative features on your TV.

Conclusion

Suppose you summarize all these functions and think logically and physically about what has changed in television after it became brilliant. In that case, it has a media player with an operating system in which you can install specific applications.

This media player has these or those inputs or outputs. They’re just on the side or the back of the television but are built into a separate device, giving it these smart functions.

Are There Useless Features?

It’s like a phone: Someone needs these apps, other apps, someone uses this, someone uses that. Here, we are just given features that catch up with the features of our smartphones.

Is it Almost as Good as a Computer?

You can connect a keyboard and mouse to it and surf the Internet. The TV will do if that’s all you need from a computer. However, the laptop has no competitors if you want to create complex content.

The Most Popular use of Smart TV

So, what can you do with Smart TV? How do you use it most often?

Watching YouTube

First and most apparent, watching YouTube on a smart TV is very convenient and easy.

There’s a YouTube app listed on every TV. You open it and get an excellent user-friendly interface to play your favorite videos, search, see your subscriptions, turn on any video, rewind it, select the quality, or do whatever you like from the remote control.

You can do the same thing on your phone or tablet and then press the streaming button on your TV. Then, you can subscribe to your favorite channel. It’s easy: You press two buttons and are now subscribed to a channel.

You can use the search or do a voice search with the remote.

What else should you be happy about when you get the main video content from YouTube?

Streaming Video

The next most common use case is probably streaming video of all kinds. Take Apple TV or Netflix, for example. Here’s everything available in general. On your phone, it’s usually available on your smart TV. It’s no problem taking it, putting the streaming you want in the app store, and running it.

The app can automatically update. You’re the one who controls that process, too. If you want them not to update automatically, they won’t. You’ll have to go in manually to update it. But this can also happen automatically over the air, like magic, and you’ll always get the latest app version with all the functionality and content.

Here’s an example of running Apple: I don’t need to buy an external Apple TV; I’ve already saved. Here, all the streaming from Apple is as much as possible in the same quality that it’s available through the box, right here in the app on the TV, just on its smart TV. I want to watch a show and turn it on in Dolby Vision with a 5.1 Atmos sound. You get the possibilities you can get from the box and also often from the built-in smart TV.

You can play content as natively as possible because this smart TV device is directly part of the TV, directly soldered into the boards. And in the first smart TVs, Dolby Vision was already available.

That is, Dolby Vision was initially only available with Smart TVs, and only then did the Apple TV come out with Dolby Vision support. Before that, you could only see Dolby Vision on your TV through Smart TVs.

And so features like this often appear here, and only then do external devices introduce them.

However, external devices have their disadvantages; for example, you still have HDMI cables with which you have to connect these devices. Sometimes they glitch, sometimes they fall out, sometimes they’re of poor quality, and sometimes they start to strobe or give you some digital noise. And here, it’s all built into the TV, and it either works or doesn’t. It usually works. It is not only video streaming that is available here. Here, you can listen to music, for example, if you subscribe to the same Apple Music.

From the Phone Streaming

Streaming from your phone is probably the most common way to use a Smart TV because it often has an audio system connected to it.

It’s often easier to send a file directly to the TV to quickly take something from your phone and turn it on on that audio system. When you have it playing, the sound goes automatically through an HDMI cable in the return channel, through the eARC protocol to your AV receiver or processor, and is output through your stereo system or home theater.

IPTV

Another scenario for using Smart TV is different IP TVs.

YouTube has replaced a lot of TV channels for us to watch now. But if you still, for whatever reason, like certain TV shows and want to watch them online, you don’t even have to have an antenna connection or cable TV. You plug the TV into the socket, connect it to Wi-Fi, start, for example, the application of the desired channel, and watch your favorite shows or news, watch the record, even what programs you missed.

In addition to viewing IPTV online through native applications of each channel, you can also access other TV channels in the general lists. That is, there is so much content for free now, and it’s all here that you don’t even have to pay anyone.

So, no antenna, no cable TV—forget all about it. Various other services now provide all the essential information and even more for free.

Art Gallery

Another feature that is becoming increasingly common with these TVs is the gallery. The TV always hangs on the wall, not a black screen, which makes your living room attractive.

In this case, you can turn on an art gallery-type app and install some pictures here. It’s a picture gallery in your home. When the TV is on standby, it doesn’t show you any content; it doesn’t play anything, and you can make it part of the interior.

This kind of usage scenario is becoming increasingly common in all modern televisions, significantly when screen diagonals increase because a big black square on a beautiful wall is very rarely a decoration.

If you choose one or the other scenario to show pictures, your TV will become a picture gallery, decorating your room.

Media Player

The next feature that is used quite often is the media player. It may look unattractive, but it has all the necessary functionality. You can insert a flash drive into your TV and connect it to your local network.

If you have a computer in the network with a shared folder with movies, pictures, or music, you can watch all the content directly on the TV via this built-in application called a media player.

Depending on the brand of Smart TV, it may have a different form, but the essence does not change. The application spins content you insert on external media and can connect to a hard drive or directly from the local network.

Any TV set can automatically become an advertising board, for example. You put it in a showcase and plug a flash drive with your commercial. The slide show, with pictures of your product, runs.

Gaming

The following usage scenario is gaming. There’s an app like GeForce Now.

This means that you can connect your joystick to a smart TV. Yes, you can use Bluetooth; take any joystick and connect it. Start GeForce Now, put your account there, and play any available games on this service. And games are available there. All available on powerful computers is bought, downloaded, put, suffer, and all the rest. You buy an expensive computer. With Geforce Now, you stream the game directly from the Geforce servers.

Here, you manage and play directly from a smart TV. No joystick is left to be added, just wireless headphones and controllers. All your entertainment and content are available right out of the box.

What Else?

Well, there are various other scenarios that we haven’t talked about. But here’s everything that will come to mind for the creators of these applications. These applications can use the capabilities of this smart device with a screen and various wireless connections with this remote control, which picks up and does like a mouse.

Anything that comes to mind and is supported by the functionality of this powerful computer, which is built right into the television, should be and will be available to you right out of the box.

When you buy a television, the possibilities are limited only by usage scenarios and your ability to interact with it. But everything we have now is bright, and our televisions are so smart.

Is it Necessary to Buy a Smart TV?

In conclusion, is it worth buying a smart TV now? I’ll tell you this: It will probably be hard to find a TV without a smart TV in 2024 because they cost little anymore.

Only the most junior models, the most basic TV series, don’t have this built-in smart TV functionality. Most televisions already have some built-in smart TV functionality.

What if the TV is Old?

Any old TV with an HDMI input on the panel can be turned into a smart TV, and you need to add to it as a source of some set-top box. Almost all of the functionality is available through these external devices.

So it would be best if you did this. And you do not have to run out and throw out your TV, especially if you have a good, big one, and the picture on the screen pleases you.

Disadvantages

Security and Privacy Risks

Because your TV is connected to the Internet, it’s at risk of hacking, and the manufacturers themselves may be watching you when you don’t even think about it.

Manufacturers track your activity online or while watching TV to show relevant ads to you.

Disabling these features is sometimes hidden in menus, and the user is unaware they are being tracked.

Set-Top Boxes

Set-top boxes like Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, and Chromecast compete with Smart TVs. They offer the same functionality or even more, and the interface may be better.

Such set-top boxes add even more wires; you need another remote. It’s good if the STB doesn’t process video with its processor according to its algorithms because the TV has a video processor. The TV already has everything inside and is set up and coordinated.

The disadvantages of Smart TVs can include an uncomfortable interface and poor performance. However, this depends on the manufacturer, less on the number of TV series in the line. The more expensive the model, the better the built-in functions, including smart TV.

However, such disadvantages decrease with each year and update. Manufacturers remove such shortcomings and try to keep their products in good condition.

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top