Hey, im thinking of buying a android TV, either a philips or a Sony. but I have read alot of comments on the reddit and av forums where people complain about their tvs crashing all the time. is Android stable on TVs? How often does a app crash? Can a TV crash just like on normal, when you are just watching it? all info would help. Thank you for your time
I only use my television as a display, completely ignoring any "smart" features it has.
The HDMI-CEC feature of the Nvidia Shield means I don't even require a remote for the TV. Once I calibrate the colours, the tv remote goes into a box.
The good thing about not relying on the television for Android features is updates - companies selling televisions have less interest in supporting a two or three year old system. Also having the google play store app ecosystem coupled with sideloading is a major factor in me not caring the slightest how smart my television is, just how good it is at doing it's core job.
I have a Philips Android TV that I got in 2015 and it's just awful. I would stay away from that brand if I was you.
Here's just a few things that are broken:
It's a 4k tv but the interface is 720p, you can theoretically bump it up to 4k with the terminal emulator but the performance just goes to shit if you do it, also it causes problems with some TV channels displaying them on 1/4 of the screen. No apps can play 4k video apart from Netflix which actually works pretty good. I'm stuck on lollipop btw.
The warranty expired and during the period that it was active I got frequent software updates so I was hoping most of the problems would go away. I was also hoping that the community would root the damn thing and make a better rom but the bootloader is locked.
Save yourself the trouble and get a Sony if you can, although I would check their forums for specific models to figure out if they have problems or not.
I have a Sony with it, got it a month or two ago. No complaints here, works well. I haven’t had a crash yet
I have a Philips, and can say that crashing is a rare occurrence, but of course YMMV. It all depends on how much of a heavy user you are. Ideally you do not keep too many processes in memory as it slows down the TV. Of course that then depends on the specs of your TV.
I have a 2017 Sony Bravia 4k Android TV. I feel it is the worst purchase I've ever made. I wish I paid half the money for a TV that is just a decent display and connected a Chromecast to it.
Chromecast is great. Android TV is crap. It's slow. Crashes or locks up in some way bi-weekly.
I bought a Philips Android TV half a year ago. Had no problems with it on the Android part, the only thing that sucks that I was unable to connect anything to it via Bluetooth.
It depends of what brand or model you buy, personally I bought an cheap 4K Philip's TV which was a nightmare, it kept crashing all the time, I had constantly a lot of errors messages. So after almost a year of battle with Philips, they changed it with a newer and better model that support 4K and HDR and since that time I don't have any problems anymore, everything works perfectly. Plus, I have Ambilight now wich is really great. So from my opinion, you should buy a good Android TV model or buy a cheaper 4K TV and maybe buy separately a shield or a mi box.
Hope that helped;)
I have an NVIDIA Shield which is a box separate from the TV itself, the device has crashed on me maybe twice in four years.
I have a Sony Android TV. It works ok, maybe sometimes a bit slugish, every app I want runs ok (except Amazon Prime which is slow as fuck to navigate but playback is fine) but I would still recommend against choosing your TV based on the OS.
Just buy the best display (image quality, contrast etc) you find at your price point, then buy a Shield TV to go with it.
Of course you can buy a Shield for your Android TV but then you would likely have wasted some money on your TV.
I have an Android TV from 2015, and I love it. The only time I've managed to crash the thing was when I was doing something stupid (AKA sideloading and running apps not built for AndroidTV) and even then, I think I only managed to crash it 2 or 3 times at the most.
Get an Nvidia Shield, coupled with any good TV used as a monitor. It's just brilliant.
My advice echos the advice of Dont-Fear-The-Raeper . A TV's lasts quite a while. Many will last beyond a decade or more. Meanwhile, the smart features of a TV will go obsolete in maybe a couple years before manufacturers will stop updating the software and things start breaking. So it is best to keep your smart features in a separate, easy to upgrade or replace box or dongle. (Granted, it's getting harder and harder to find a "dumb" TV these days.) If your tv has smart features, ignore them. Buy a TV with one thing in mind: Picture quality. (And maybe sound if you don't have a decent surround system.) If comparing two TVs with equal picture quality, but one is marked up because it has Android TV, buy the cheaper TV. Then get yourself a Shield or Mi Box.
I have Sony but let me tell you development is still beta. Cost are too high use is low . Software updates are limited. Better buy TV and get Nvidia shield or something similar.
Sony is fine, issue is they're usually underpowered so it may take time to load up apps, which was the main issue I found. Android TV on my Shield however is one of the fastest devices I have at home, even after a couple of years.
I had an old smart TV for a few years that had terrible smart features that I never used. Bought a mibox that worked well with it. Bought a new TCL 4k android TV a month ago and thought I could just sell the mi box since they must run better now. I was wrong, the OS is still laggy as hell. As cheap as the mibox is, it still runs way smoother. But even mibox had a problem with 4k youtube videos (my old tv was full HD) , but I got an ethernet adapter for it and now can stream 4k perfectly, even from Kodi. It was just the mibox wifi that sucked. So yeah, dont buy the TV for smart features.
If you can get a good dumb tv, go with that. It's much easier and cheaper to upgrade a box or switch OS than a buying a new TV.
Have a read of this and you will soon realise a TV with a user friendly remote, decent HDMI connectivity and a good display panel with great picture processing capabilities connected to a far more powerful external media player like a Apple TV 4K or NVIDIA Shield is a far better idea:
The Sony Android TV Experience (2018/Nougat)
(Scroll down the bottom for a summary)
If Sony cannot do it right what hope do the other Android TV - 4K TV manufacturers have ?
The Chipsets used in Smart TV's are pretty underpowered and the extra crap most Smart TV manufacturers burden the OS with can slow everything down. LG's Linux based webOS on their smart TV's is the fastest.
Android TV is in no way a very optimised OS and it's why it's so slow on low powered hardware. Google even acknowledge this and their aim is to try and address it with upcoming, better optimised Android OS releases (Oreo & P).
These newer OS releases will very likely not even make it to mainstream Sony TV's. It's my bet Sony will come out with new TV models.
If you need 4K HDR Youtube support - buy a LG TV that supports it or a Chromecast Ultra. Because Google's own Android TV OS does not even support Google's own 4K HDR Youtube.
I am also in the market for a new 4K HDR Smart TV - and it's definitely NOT going to be one running any form of Android TV.
I have a Sony TV with Android TV installed and honestly, I can't remember the last time it crashed. For me, it's the only TV OS I would consider now because it means most of my Android apps (Kodi, YouTube etc.) are the same as the ones I deal with on my phone.
If you go for a Sony, one piece of advice I would give is to look online for how to disable certain apps. Apps like Sony Shelf and features like Recommended Apps can make the TV sluggish at times but disabling them makes a world of difference.
Also look into enabling Developer Options and switching off the UI animations. Also, while you're in that menu, limit background processes to 3. It makes a huge difference to the speed of your system.
Good luck!