Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by DaneelO 4817 days ago
I recently bought an LM558600 and my experience has been contrary to almost everyone elses here.

I've found that the remote is very sensitive and usable, and a large improvement over standard n/s/e/w remotes due to the nature of modern interfaces requiring more complex input. It makes entering alphanumeric input far easier too. It takes a little getting used to, but I didn't have the problems others mentioned, nor those in the article. I will admit that not putting an input change button on the wii-style remote was a big mistake - I often have to go into the input list program to change it.

By far the biggest plus of this TV over others is the integration of Plex, which can't be overstated. Plex has such a good experience out of the box that my initial idea of setting up an HTPC just wasn't necessary. It's on par with XBMC, and indeed can actually use several XBMC themes such as Aeon (I don't bother.) In comparing similar TV's from other brands, Sony's solution is called Homestream[1] which is just a transcoder. Other brands try to integrate interfaces similar to Plex, but unsurprisingly usually screw up the UI and are left with an unusable experience. LG has something similar out of the box, so thank god for Plex! The media server is excellent to use as well - as good if not better than XBMC for a server.

To address the problems others have mentioned, I do think that most of the 'premium' stuff that comes bundled is mostly useless and I don't use it, however ABC iView integration is amazing, as is Plex's channels which allow you to install video RSS-style feeds. There's more to explore as well, I haven't found the need to touch much else past Plex.

My TV has a startup time of about 15 seconds, which I don't find too bad at all, I have no idea why others experience worse times - it might be that there's only actually 1-2 LG owners in this thread.

One last thing to note is that since I bought it (~2 months), it has received 3 over the air updates which were installed only on prompt. It seems that LG is committed to improving them, which I greatly appreciate.

[1] http://www.sony.co.uk/hub/1237485339460

3 comments

I have a similar experience. This thing has replaced an Xtremer Ultra box running XBMC on an atom cpu, and despite the slow start, it is still better than a dedicated htpc (one remote). Plus the plex software is working adequately. Sure not the best experience ever, but for the price, it has been a confortable experience. (added bonus: 3D with passive glasses).
plex isn't all roses on LG tvs, it's missing a 'watched/not watched' that lg has known about since 2011, but it is pretty damn good.

I've been using plex for some time now, and is one of the reasons I actually chose LG. but they are arsey bastards, integratings ads into their own interface.

http://twitter.com/posty/status/318213380311748608/photo/1

see here for known bugs and missing features: http://forums.plexapp.com/index.php/topic/28419-bugs-and-req...

the lack of an input button is maddening to the extreme, it basically forces you to use the interface.

i thought the magic remote was ok too, until i started using the other one, it actually makes so much more sense to me.

> Sony's solution is called Homestream[1] which is just a transcoder.

Sony's Homestream is just string replace s/Serviio/Homestream :)

Serviio: http://www.serviio.org/