Scott Wilkinson joins Leo to talk about the Seiki UHD $1500 4K TV. Scott says that CNet reviewed the TV and the word is that there's plenty of pixels, but that doesn't equate to a good picture. In fact, they say the picture is pretty poor. Leo says that to be fair, there really isn't any content out there to push 4K, only gaming can show it off. The TV can only accept 30fps, so even for gaming, it's lacking.
Kapeil bought a Blu-Ray player not too long ago and video from it looks plastic, like a soap opera. Leo says that Kapeil's Panasonic LCD TV is set to a high frame rate (either 120 or 240Hz), but the Blu-ray streams it as 30fps. So the TV "interpolates" by adding frames, and upconverts the video. Kapeil needs to go into the program settings and disable interpolation. Panasonic calls this "Smooth Motion".
Max bought a Panasonic VT50 and the sound is terrible. Leo says that TV manufacturers put speakers on TVs almost as an afterthought since a home theater system is now the norm. They just put the speakers in to say the TV has sound.
Mark recently upgraded to a Samsung 42" TV that he wants to connect to his old VCR. He's connected it, but it looks terrible. Leo says that's because the VCR is inferior in quality and it's a lot more obvious with an HDTV. There are VCRs that have built-in DVD recorders. They may have digital out options. Leo recommends Overstock.com, but the future isn't bright for finding one.
All of these TVs are actually LCDs. LED actually refers to the way some LCD TVs are backlit. Older LCD TVs had fluorescent bulbs backlighting the screen, which gave uneven lighting. A couple of benefits to LED is that the light can be made more pure, they last longer, and it can light the screen more evenly. The newer TVs are LED edge lit now.
Leo says that the GoFlex is a good one. It's a USB Portable hard drive that has Wi-Fi built into it, so he can stream to a laptop.
Connecting to a TV, A machine with Plex would be a good choice.
Leo says that won't work because Chrome OS is very limited.
A GoogleTV is a better option because it's designed to do just that.
While Leo was gone, Scott filled in on the Tech Guy Show. And while he was there, Scott stayed at Leo's home and calibrated all his TVs to make them look more color accurate. He not only used Digital Video Essentials: HD Basics, a great utility for tweaking your video signal, he also pulled out some complicated gear like a test pattern generator to really dial in the quality. If you don't have that (and who does), you can get actual test patterns from HDNet or stream them from the Internet.
Mike would like to know more about the RGB analog video signal. Scott says that RGB has four connectors (red, green, and blue) plus one for the sync signal. RGB is a professional spec that was used back before HDTVs when CRTs had better resolution and color - especially in black levels.
This week, the Giz Wiz was thinking of Scott with this new gadget from Vizio. It's a new 70" E701i LED TV for $1999. It even comes with a smart remote and qwerty keyboard. Dick says that Vizio's current 60" model now costs as much as their 40" back in 2009. They are really a bargain for those looking to boost their buying power and still have a great TV.
