How "Smart" are"Smart TV's"?

370Dancer said:
There's a reason Roku stock has tripled since March. Get a Roku TV. Tons of 1080P models on clearance, and even the 4K models are a bargin. One remote, and your antenna, and other inputs are just apps on the Roku menu. You won't have to teach anyone how to use it or switch inputs. I've been fighting that challenge for 44 years. She is estatic with the Roku interface, and I can still get to all my apps for streaming. Of course you will need internet connection for the apps. Mine is wired ethernet to a wireless bridge. I switch from my home internet when at the dock to a wireless hotspot when out on the water.
Click to expand...

Roku is great! I’ve got a couple of their devices on some older TV’s in the house. Been using them for years, never had a problem with any of them.
 
The last 2 replacement TVs (home) have Roku built in. I really like the simple interface, and more importantly Mrs. PMC can control it without help. Roku for the win!

I have chromecast devices on the boat that run off the boat WIFI (Ubiquiti Bullet to repeat signal). All the control is through a tablet.
 
We cut Dish Network 3 weeks ago. My 2 yr contract was up in September and I knew the price was going through the roof. Not sure if you are on Allatoona or Lanier, but we are up just below Browns Bridge on Lanier, we get 30+ OTA channels with the original Glomex. Put up a $40 Amazon antenna on the dock and it picks up about 50 channels. From the OTA standpoint, my main interest are the major networks and we get all of them. We have 5-TVs on the boat. One smart Samsung TV mounts on a drop down mount in the cockpit to watch football on the dock or out in the water. Streaming the ESPN app is simple as is the CBS sports app. We have an Apple TV in the salon and can stream most anything to it. We use a “Lightining to HDMI” adapter on the bridge or in the MSR if we want something different there. All TVs are hooked up OTA.

My work phone is unlimited Verizon data and we can stream live TV in HD (2160 and 1080) with my phone and 2-bars of strength. We have no marina supplied WiFi. The provider is a company called Brightlan. They offer several plans with different speeds. Pay by the day, week, month, or by 5 months and get one for free. We are planning to try a sample of the different speeds and see what works.

The Apple TV Gen 4 is really a neat machine. You can download any app you want....Most apps you do need a provider sign-in to use it. The Samsung TV also allows you to download many apps.

You likely know all of this, but this is where we are after trying most everything....

Bennett
 
guys, question for you on wifi access via ubiquiti bullet or other equipment. In the area we boat in, there are a couple wifi signals to choose from (super slow) but they are paid access even at our 1300 slip marina. Are yall saying that in a lot of areas you can pick up free wifi via some kind of antenna/repeater on the water?
 
Most of the local marinas do not have WIFI and I will turn on my phone hotspot and repeat the signal. If I'm close to the mainland, I can usually pickup a cable WIFI. This is convenient to one of my anchoring areas.
 
I'll take a shot at 'splainin some terminology.
At your house you typically have some wired access to the internet, whether it's over cable, fiber, or telephone line. It is made available to you through your ISP (Internet Service Provider).
On the boat, you don't have the luxury of dragging around a wired connection, so you have to look to the sky for internet access. One of the more common ways to do that these days is through your cellular provider, and a data plan that won't break the bank. This is known as a WISP (Wireless Internet Service Provider). A lot of cable companies are trying to add value to their solution by turning your home and a lot of businesses into public Access Points for their network. That's why you see ATT, Brighthouse (Spectrum), Xfinity (Comcast) "hot spots" all over the place in heavily populated areas. To gain access, you must have a subscription to their service, i.e. a login to their network.
Using your phone as a hot spot for the boat is good where you have good cellular signal. However, it ties up the phone (don't go for a walk on a call or you'll mess up the kids cartoon channel), and will drain the battery pretty fast. Most devices have wireless connectivity, but they will vary widely on signal strength, and adaptability to changing access points. For example, a Roku doesn't know to just connect to the nearest strongest signal, and then let you login or whatever you need to do. You have to manually set or reset that as you visit different places. For that reason, many of us have decided to setup our own Local Area Network on board, and connect a mixture of wired and wireless devices to that single router, which won't change as you visit different places. This simplifies connectivity to various internet access points by only having to reconfigure one thing, the router. There are routers that have multiple "inputs", and some claim to be able to automatically switch over to whatever is available. This is known as Fail Over mode. For instance, if I am at the house, my boat router is set as a wireless bridge to the home router. All devices work the same as if they were in my house. When I leave the dock, I fire up a cellular hot spot, which takes the place of my home network. Using a fail over router, this should switch automatically. If I don't have that kind of router, then I would have to go into the boat router's settings, and set it up to use the cellular hot spot as it's ISP for the WAN (Wide Area Network) side. I am currently the latter, because fail over routers are still pretty expensive, and I have read varying success stories on automatic fail over.
So, keeping with the original thread, a smart TV is only as smart as its internet access. Doing it at home is easy. Doing it in a remote anchorage is not easy.
 
Cocktail Time said:
guys, question for you on wifi access via ubiquiti bullet or other equipment. In the area we boat in, there are a couple wifi signals to choose from (super slow) but they are paid access even at our 1300 slip marina. Are yall saying that in a lot of areas you can pick up free wifi via some kind of antenna/repeater on the water?
Click to expand...
I have a Rouge Wave WiFi antenna hooked to a router and it picks up WiFi at a distance, and my router broadcasts (repeats) the signal for all our connections on the boat...
 
I replaced the stock TV this year with a flat screen roku. I think it 22 or 24 in. Since the flat screen wont slid into the existing hole I modified the existing sliding mechanism by building it up with a block of wood about 5 in thick so that the sliding mechanism will still lock in place and the TV will be flush against the cabinet. When deployed it swivels fully forward or af . Lucky for me the marina wifi system was fried last year in a storm so they replaced all hardware including a repeater at the end of my pier. so I can stream Amazon prime, Netflix etc no problem. If no wifi i create hotspot thru my phon . Cut the cord and be SMART.
 

Attachments

  • 20190526_210914.jpg
    20190526_210914.jpg
    121.6 KB · Views: 162
bbwhitejr said:
Put up a $40 Amazon antenna on the dock and it picks up about 50 channels.
Bennett
Click to expand...

Can you provide a link to the specific antenna you bought? I get sensory overload when searching for these things and you seem to have already figured it out. Thanks!
 
bobeast said:
A Smart TV is only as smart as the apps that were installed by the manufacturer. That collection may or may not meet your needs. You are better off with something like an AppleTV box on which you can install and delete apps at your whim.
Click to expand...

I have to agree with this. Smart TV's are ok as a concept. But...you're paying to be locked into what the TV manufacturer supports and their support plan.

I have a Samsung Smart TV in my living room that I use occasionally. Last time I tried to use some of the embedded apps they had been discontinued. The embedded platform does not support the latest APIs for Netflix so it doesn't support individual Netflix account selection. The embedded browser sucks and is massively outdated. Samsung support says that the model is too old to be updated and they have stopped app development. So the "Smart TV" has become a "dumb TV" because of the lack of app support.

I'd suggest going with a regular TV and a 3rd party streaming solution like Roku, Amazon Fire Stick, Apple TV, etc. They tend to have better long-term support. And you won't have to pay twice when the embedded TV service stop being supported. At least don't pay extra for a Smart TV.
 
Guys, thanks for all the replies. There's definitely more than one way to skin a cat, and I've got some time before Dish jumps their rates. We do have a chromecast device, and a tablet at the lake house, so I'll probably bring these to the boat, and well see how the streaming works. I do have a small digital tv to try as well. It's also probably worthwhile to climb on the arch and make sure connection is tight on the glomax, hopefully without breaking my neck in the process!
 
Windjammer said:
Guys, thanks for all the replies. There's definitely more than one way to skin a cat, and I've got some time before Dish jumps their rates. We do have a chromecast device, and a tablet at the lake house, so I'll probably bring these to the boat, and well see how the streaming works. I do have a small digital tv to try as well. It's also probably worthwhile to climb on the arch and make sure connection is tight on the glomax, hopefully without breaking my neck in the process!
Click to expand...
There is also an amplifier in the loop between the Glomax antenna and your TV. Make sure it's working, the gain is turned up, and you are not switched to "shore cable". That's usually a 2 or 3 button push switch likely labeled A and B.
 
370Dancer said:
There is also an amplifier in the loop between the Glomax antenna and your TV. Make sure it's working, the gain is turned up, and you are not switched to "shore cable". That's usually a 2 or 3 button push switch likely labeled A and B.
Click to expand...
Glomax amplifier is in a cabinet and when the knob is turned "clockwise", a red light appears on the front. No "A/B" switch installed anywhere that I have ever seen. I did run over with another tv, bypassed the cable box, so it was hooked directly to Glomax. Let it run its own channel search and it found 5 or 6 channels (QVC, Shoppers network, etc). No local OTA.
 
Phasma said:
Install a Ubiquity bullet and antenna then installed a WiFi router. I get full speed stream no matter what day of the week it is.
Click to expand...

I have a Ubiquiti bullet, but im looking for a cleaner install than the standard c clamp to an existing pole/antenna.

I have seen an adaptor for directly mounting to a 1" -14 marine mount, but not in production.

I was going to have one machined, but wondering if one could be 3D printed?

The big hold up for me is i haven't had time to determine the threads on the base of the bullet. Anybody know what they are or measured them?
 
I removed my Glomax and used the same mount. I had to run Ethernet through the arch to an inside cabinet. Pretty clean install
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Forum statistics

Threads
113,115
Messages
1,426,325
Members
61,027
Latest member
NeilS
Back
Top