Hasta La Gadget!

LG’s putting webOS to good use – as the basis for its new smart TV platform. The operating system has taken many turns in its long and varied history, starting out as a smartphone platform under Palm and then later finding a home at HP through acquisition, as a basis for the doomed HP TouchPad. Finally, it’s now ended up at LG.

I spoke to LG’s Itai Vonshak, the VP of Design and Product Management for webOS at the company, about what his newly integrated company brings to the table for LG and for smart TVs. The key ingredient is bringing the power of HTML5 and the native web to LG’s TV hardware in as seamless a way as possible.

This is just the beginning for LG’s webOS plans, too. Vonshak didn’t have anything more specific to share about the company’s plans for webOS on other platforms including connected appliances and smartphones than what LG said on stage, but the company did reveal it’s at least taking steps in those directions.

WebOS may end up becoming the platform that outlives us all at this rate, but for now just watching to see how it impacts the race for the best, most-connected smart TV platform is interesting enough.

[CES 2014] Vizio, the folks behind reasonably priced TVs that offer plenty of bang for your hard earned buck, has just announced that they will be offering the P-Series which is touted to be the “most complete Ultra HD solution”, where it will boast of advanced picture quality, powerful performance and a beautifully simple Ultra HD experience that will hopefully deliver what consumers would like to see in a Smart TV. Just what kind of hardware does the P-Series TV come with? For starters, it will feature advanced local dimming technology, a backlight that consists of 64 Active LED Zones, HEVC Codec for Ultra HD streaming and Vizio’s V6 six-core processor which will combine a quad-core GPU and dual-core CPU. This calls for an unparalleled performance as well as maximum speed, and you can choose from 50″, 55″, 60″, 65″and 70″ screen sizes depending on your budget.

If you want to check it out at CES this year, you will have to mosey to the Wynn Hotel, although it will be by appointment only. Apart from Active LED Zones technology, there will also be Advanced Color Management and Active Pixel Tuning that will enable viewers to enjoy precise color operation for richer, more accurate colors in addition to micro-brightness controls at the pixel level for luminance adjustments. This will further increase contrast and picture detail accuracy, while sports fans and action enthusiasts will appreciate Clear Action Rate 960 that will be measured using high-speed effective refresh rates as well as precise synchronization of backlight scanning in order to enhance motion clarity and deliver incredibly crisp fast action scenes.

VIZIO Announces P-Series Ultra HD Full-Array LED Smart TV Range original content from Ubergizmo.

As hinted over the past weeks, LG had something in store regarding the nearly dead WebOS platform in time for CES 2014. While the Korean manufacturer hasn’t yet unveiled a … Continue reading

Rumors have circulated for some time now about LG working on an open, webOS-powered smart TV. Now, a leaked image provides a glimpse at what that might actually look like.

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The age of smart TVs is upon us with a number of major manufacturers already having thrown their hats in the ring. Samsung is one of the companies that has a major presence in the smart TV market and it is due to make a number of related announcements at the CES 2014 next month. The company has announced that its 2014 smart TVs will come with enhanced features that will increase usability. The company will showcase one such 2014 smart TV at CES 2014.

Samsung’s voice interaction service, which is capable of understanding natural languages, is available in 11 countries right now and next year it will be expanded in 12 additional markets. The service has been enhanced to focus on frequently used functions and usage patterns of the users. Changing the channel will get easier as well, users will simply need to say the channel number as opposed to giving the “Channel Change” and “Channel Number” commands right now. Motion control gets enhanced with the introduction of a “finger gesture” feature that lets users change channels, adjust volume and search through content using just their fingers. Motioning the fingers counterclockwise takes users back to the previous screen or stops the video. Samsung is also expected to make a number of other exciting announcements at the show, we certainly look forward to all of them.

Samsung 2014 Smart TVs Will Get Enhanced Features original content from Ubergizmo.