Sunday
Jun072015
Where's the TV Going?
Sunday, June 7, 2015 at 11:24AM 
I’ll start by saying what an TV fan I am. Well, there’s a revelation, right? OK, OK, I get it. I’m an admitted (and unapologetic) fanboy, so what the hell else would I say? Well, this may be hard to believe, but I do try to evaluate Apple hardware, software and services with an objective eye. To that point I’d like to start with what I don’t like about the TV…First, I see the little “wait” spinner way too much. Now, I’m the first to admit I don’t have the speediest Internet connection in the world, but even when streaming video from my home network the TV makes me wait a lot more than other devices like ROKU or Amazon’s Fire Stick. I know what you’re thinking, “MacTexan, your home wi-fi is messed up.” Wrong! I’m not using wi-fi. My TVs are both connected to a wired Ethernet gigabit LAN. I can hook my MacBook Pro to the same connection and transfer files at over 100 MB/sec. (that’s a big B, as in Byte, not bit) When we built our house I wired the whole place with Cat 5e cable and it’s all connected using Cisco gigabit switches. So, if the network ain’t the problem, what is? Gotta be the TV, right?
Second, the TV’s GUI is getting dated. This is a little harder to put my finger on and may just be a matter of personal preference. The channel “tiles” or icons, or whatever they’re called just pile up on the home screen. There’s no way to logically organize them save moving them around one at a time (which is clumsy and time consuming) or hiding them altogether. Some kind of folders or categories or separate pages would be helpful.
Third, the remote is 1) too tiny and 2) virtually featureless. I have been an Apple fan long enough to understand the minimalism infused into every Apple design, but c’mon. A person could lose an TV remote in their own pocket, much less a coin and Cheerio hungry sofa. I’ve seen people tape TV remotes to the back of their TV remote and various kitchen utensils to give the thing enough heft to keep it from disappearing. Also, the addition of just two or three more buttons would make a huge difference without destroying the minimalist vibe. The one that immediately comes to mind is a “Home” button to take me back to the main screen when I’m seven or eight layers deep in some channel’s menu. Next, I’d like a “Sleep” button to turn the TV off. Now, I know there are existing button combinations to do these things, but do you remember what they are? Well, neither do I. Besides, Apple’s users shouldn’t be required to climb such a steep learning curve to use the TV.
Now the positive.
