I think people have been writing this device off prematurely. I received my Roku TV this morning and in less than 3 hours I've been able to set up all the apps I needed (Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, Warner Instant Archive, HBOGO, ShowtimeAnytime, etc) and am peacefully enjoying my new toy, perfectly happy with the video quality and all other customizable features.
Let me take you through it step by step. The TV was surprisingly lite and easy to take out of the box. Installing the stand was simple and took maybe 5 minutes altogether. The first thing I noticed was the size of the screen. This 48 inch TV was an upgrade from my 39 inch Samsung. Still I didn't think it would make that big of a difference. Well it did. Part of this is because the black border is so thin (maybe a little over an inch).
The rest of the set up was again extremely simple. I had never had a roku account so that was the first thing I did. One nice thing about this I noticed is that Roku only has you input your credit card info once and then assigns you the option of using a pin the make purchases. Again an extremely simple solution to something that could prove to be a real hassle with hundreds of different streaming channels. I kept my macbook out while installing the rest of the additional channels which I think made the process easier.
It's worth noting that while attempting to customize the screensaver I hit my first snag. The program froze and none of the arrows would do anything. Worst yet was that turning the TV off did nothing as when I turned it back on I was taken to the same spot I had been frozen in. Fearing the worst I attempted to go on the support website, thinking I may have had a defective model. I was informed the wait would be 25 minutes (and this was just the chat service, I imagine on the phone would've been worse). I tried unplugging the set and plugging it back in and luckily that did the trick. Since then the set has been working flawlessly.
After this what took the longest time was customizing the video settings on the unit. I was worried at first as it seemed from the main screen settings menu the only thing that could be changed was the brightness level (with 6 different settings- brightest, brighter, bright, dark, darker, and darkest). This worried me, but I was comforted by the fact that the video quality itself seemed nearly perfect. This is usually not the case when I buy a new TV. Eventually I realized that you can reach the advanced video settings while playing any program and hitting the options button. This was a relief. The one thing I feel could be improved though would be an option to adjust the refresh rate. As it is you have to make due with having the refresh rate at 120 Hz at all times. I'm not too upset about this as it's something many other TVs are doing and truth be told the result is much better on this TV than others I have viewed.
While I know refresh rates may be confusing for some, basically all you need to know is that there really isn't any overriding reason to have a refresh rate that is monumentally higher than the frame rate of the programs you are viewing (23.98 in most cases). Some people like the effect this has on sports, but I don't watch sports. I would rather things be presented in the way they were meant to. The higher refresh rate can make certain programs look jerky and also give you that British Soap Opera Effect we all hate seeing. In any case, I fiddled with the backlight, contrast, and sharpness and this made the effect much less noticeable. All TV manufacturers would be wise to note the lesson "If it aint broke, don't fix it."
Next was sound. The internal speakers on the unit were surprisingly strong and I honestly wouldn't mind listening to them on a day when I'm too lazy too turn on my sound system. Still it was always my plan to hook up external speakers as I'm quite happy with my pair of rokit 6 speakers. I plugged in a Y adapter (heaphone to RCA) and couldn't be more happy with the results. It's worth noting that this is something that is now more convenient than if you were to buy the roku 3, whose only audio output separate from hdmi was on the remote.
The next step was to see how well the device handles playing movies off of a hard drive. This can be a real deal breaker for me as I have thousands of movies on a digital library, spread over two hard drives. I was worried that the device would only play mp4s and not mkvs as is the case with most streaming devices with a usb input. This was not the case. Not only did it play mkvs fine, it also handled subtitles perfectly. An added plus was that the interface between the TV and my hard drive is the most sophisticated I have seen yet. The Roku tv will even remember where you left off while watching a digital file (again something I just have never seen).
After that checking out the different apps was just an incredibly satisfying experience. The interface and design is much larger and easier to use than my previous streaming device (no more squinting at hard to see movie titles). Overall I was just shocked to see the number of options that this device afforded me. In many regards I think that units like these will be the future of TV, simple for those who want it simple, but also customizable for geeks like me.
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