TV & Home Theatre

Western Digital (WD) has been around since 1970 and is one of the world’s largest hard disk drive manufacturers. I have two Western Digital external hard drives for backing up my computer and they have been great! But WD makes other devices including media streaming devices, which they have had a lot of success with. I recently had the opportunity to test out the WD TV Live Media Player, which is their third generation device so they have continually improved it. Since I already have an Apple TV and a Roku device, I was able to compare the WD TV Live to its’ competitors, and it did extremely well.

If you’re a bit of a technophile or are in the market for a new television, you may have heard of something called OLED; but what is it? How does it differ from LED technology? What makes it special? In an effort to demystify OLED, I’ve put together what I call OLED 101 – the bare bones facts about this technology that is very likely here to stay. 

  When it comes to getting a brand spanking new TV for the home, size is always one of top decision-making factors. Naturally, we all want the biggest, best TV money can buy. But you also need to be cognizant of what size will make the most sense for the room. And sometimes, that might mean scaling down your ambitions a bit; or conversely, looking at a TV bigger than what you intended.  

    When was the last time you cleaned your TV screen?  How did you do it? For something that you probably spend so much time looking at, you really should clean it every now and then – every HDTV needs it at some point. The screen is electrostatic so it will attract dust and dirt, plus the occasional beer or other spray won’t help you see a clear picture. Cleaning it seems like a simple thing to do, but you really need to be careful as you could ruin the screen.

Surround sound systems can be very confusing, with all the different channel configurations and associated technologies. If you are in the market for a surround sound system you need to break through some of the clutter here is a basic primer on surround that I hope will help.   Surround sound is one of the best ways to improve the entertainment value of your big screen TV.

Every year we spend more time on the Internet and less time watching TV and this trend isn’t slowing down. The younger demographic typically spends even more time on the Internet than watching TV. There are a lot of contributing factors including the plethora of Internet devices, the ubiquitous nature of the Internet, and the amazing growth of excellent content. When at home why not view some of that content on your best viewing device – your big flat screen TV? Especially when watching videos or films, why huddle around your computer, tablet, or Smartphone? There are many simple ways to stream that content to your TV. Here is a Reader’s Digest description of a few of them.

  Flat panel TV’s keep getting more incredible. Clearer pictures with Ultra HD 4K, and bigger screens that keep getting thinner and thinner. While the picture keeps getting better, the sound isn’t improving much because it is next to impossible to put decent speakers in a very thin panel. This is why sound bars have become extremely popular. They are very easy to set up, they look good, are non-obtrusive, and very cost effective. But are they really worth the investment? Like so many things – it depends!

New Televisions were a big part of last month’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Vegas, and the big brands were all strutting their stuff trying to take a lead position by showing off their latest and greatest technologies.  Some of it was a bit of fluff, but fortunately there was a lot of great stuff too. I am going to give you my take on the “best-in-show.”

  For most of you that have an Apple TV, I am betting you simply set it up and have been enjoying it ever since – and you haven’t touched it since (except to watch stuff) to customize it for your particular needs. One of the nice things about Apple TV is it is easy to set up and use, so most people just plug it in and away they go. Well I am going to let you know of some simple things that you should do to improve the experience you have with Apple TV.  Easy!

Turn your favorite movies into a whole new experience with the JBL 3D Blu-ray Home Theatre System.