I should be happy.

[Scrooge_Mk2]

Woo-hoo. Got a brand new TV (KD-43XG83xx) loaded with all the latest features and widgets. And also picked up a sound bar (HTS350) and a Blu-ray player to go with it (UBPX800). I should be happy. Except that I’m not. And these are things I did not spot in the shop and things that I’ve come to expect from software developers – the propeller heads that develop the “apps” that appear in your telly or you get to put on your smart phone. So far, two things stand out. First the design of the TV stand is poor and secondly, this thing is both invading and giving away my privacy. (The latter observation will always be denied, and by every manufacturer. The only way you can successfully stop it is to prevent any the TV / BluRay player from accessing the internet.)

Let’s start with what I found was good. The packaging of the products came in. This part ends.

What could be improved. Well, in the shop, the TV was stood on a shelf and only had a small sound bar. But I know from past experience that the sound quality from a flat (thin) LCD TV leaves an awful lot to be desired. And the small sound bar that was attached to it was not doing the TV any favours. So I went for something a bit bigger, the HTS350.So far so good. My TV at home will stand on a three level glass corner unit. So when it came to unpacking all my new toys and setting them up, one step at a time, TV first. One minor gripe here. When first powered on (and even after a power cut), the TV goes through what can best be described as a start-up ritual. It takes a few moments to complete and while it’s doing it, you get some animated objects on the screen (a la Google). I did not spot that as being mentioned anywhere. Might have missed it, but don’t think so. Anyway, got it tuned and adjusted the settings as suggested by the Sony store. Nice, but as has been mentioned, really lousy sound quality. So on to the sound bar installation…. Read the installation instructions and promptly come to a halt. There is no HDMI cable supplied, just an optical one. (Hint: Might be an idea to include a suitable HDMI cable.) Optical connections are a far from perfect solution in a home environment. Bend such a cable wrongly and it stops working. HDMI cables don’t suffer from this problem. Rummaging around I find a suitable HDMI cable and plug everything together. The sound bar is now situated in front of the TV’s stand (feet) and on the same shelf. Look’s quite neat. Turn the TV on, the sound bar is recognised and there is now some sound that has a decent quality about it filling the room. So I sit back to watch something. Except that the TV zapper now seems to be “woolly” in its operation. It worked OK before the sound bar was installed but not now. Why? Simples. The sound bar is obstructing the line of sight the zapper signal needs to get to the infra-red (IR) receiver on the TV. (On the 43XG83 series TV, the IR receiver is located on the centre of the bottom edge of the TV’s frame.) With the TV on the supplied stand, this IR receiver is about two inches (or 5cm) off the shelf the TV stands on. The sound bar itself is roughly the same in height, two (ish) inches. So the line of sight the zapper had to the TV is gone…. I would suspect that this sort of problem can and does affect other Sony models. There are three ways this snag can be overcome. Two involve a re-design of the TV (shelf) stand feet and then there’s the cheap option. In redesigning the feet, one solution would be to increase the eight of the existing design such as the TV is raised up by another inch or two (or 3 to 5cm. A second solution is to supply a different set of feet such that the TV stands over the sound bar. The cheap option is to resource four pieces of a hard, solid material that is/are 3 (W) x 3 (D)  x 2 (H) inches in size and get some non-slip matting. Paint the selected blocks black and cut eight pieces of non-slip matting to the same size as the blocks. Now fit these under the TV’s existing feet so as to raise the TV up. Zapper problem resolved! So all I’m left with is to set up the Blu-ray player. Like the sound bar, this does not come with an HDMI cable either. Another rummage in my squirrel stocks to find another suitable cable and we’re up and running without any further problems. Time to investigate the TV a bit further. Leave the TV on mute for too long and the sound bar will turn itself off. Not an unreasonable thing to do. But once it has turned off, if you unmute the TV, you only get the crappy sound from the TV speakers as the sound bar does not turn on again. You have to track down where you left your sound bar zapper and use it to turn the sound bar on again in order to get the sounds from the sound bar again.

My home network has a NAS (Network Attached Storage) box where I keep some of the TV programs that I’ve recorded. The facilities / interaction between the TV and the NAS box have remarkably deteriorated. With my old Sony TV, it remembered if I was part way through watching a program and picked up where I’d left off. This new one doesn’t. Black mark. The facilities on the old TV allowed me to fast forward or back at 2x or 4x speed without having to keep a finger on a button. Not so the new one. Second black mark. On this new TV, if you accidentally hit the stop button when watching a program from or off the NAS box, that’s it. End. So if you’re half way through the program, you have to start over again. Third black mark. That you have to keep a finger on the >> button to fast forward through the program is not at all helpful as it only does it at what looks like 2x speed. Trying to go fast forward through a program does not always work. I have found that you may need to go << (backwards) before the >> forwards option works. Fourth black mark. This new zapper is smaller than the one the other TV had, so it’s easier to hit the wrong button accidentally. Got fat fingers? If you answered yes, you might like to find an alternative product as you can’t get a bigger zapper. Not a great inducement to buy these products is it?

Oh man, this is bad! How much do you value your privacy? I strongly protect mine and am loath to give it away. Targeted advertising is another pet hate. Which is why I will not have a “smart phone”. Yep, I’ve tried one, was going to be a Sony one too. But I gave it back after a week as it was doing too much spying on me. (I’ve now got a brick for a phone. Makes and receives calls, sends and receives texts – no smart features and so no tracking aps installed.) Do you really know what information your smart phone is harvesting about you? What information is it collecting, when and what is it sharing about your habits, and with who? You simply do not know! This TV is going down the same route. I’ve looked at the APPs and the privacy settings and have come to the conclusion that (as supplied), I only have to fart and the TV will report it to someone. Yes there is a setting to disable the Alexa type functions, but I have no faith that if I set this to off, that the unit will stop listening . Where is the microphone located such that I can rip it out? Then we have the supplied “free” apps. That if I want to use them, I have to register - WHY? If they’re free, I don’t need to have to register so that I can use them. The fact you have to register to use them very strongly suggests that you are about to be tracked. That is to say, when you used the app, for how long and what you looked at. Big brother is watching, all so they can send you some “targeted advertising” that they think you want. Here’s the news: GET LOST!! You want this information? Then start paying for it! I’ve spent some time rummaging around the TV privacy settings. Stopping, disabling and deleting stored data. Only find that next time I turn the TV on again, that some settings have magically re-enabled themselves. The only way to stop an app from spying on you is to delete it. But for some reason, they don’t give you the option to delete anything. They want you to have this rubbish so they can spy on you. That, dear reader is a) very poor programming and b) smacks very strongly of big brother. Very strong hint: Give me a way to delete any app/apps that I do not want.

Given the level of spyware in the TV, I’m no longer going to let it see the outside (internet) world. I’ve blocked it. But I needed the correct MAC address to do it. I did eventually find it…. The TV can now only see devices that exist on my wired network. If someone does try to use an app in the TV, there is a network error message that appears. Try as they may to reset the network settings of the TV, they are not getting past my firewall. Big brother is no longer watching or tracking me. OK, so this has a downside in so far as I’m not going to get the regular (automatic) firmware updates that the TV needs, the “apps” or access to updated internet content. I can live with this. I can get the new TV firmware by downloading it from the internet and using a USB stick to update the TV. The other rubbish I just don’t need and am not going to go looking for.

I would have liked to hook the TV into my (Sony STR-DN850) HiFi system via an HDMI connection. But if I do so, the sound bar gets ignored in favour of the HiFi amplifier. I can’t use the three together (TV, sound bar and amp). Just two items, and the wrong two. Not happy!

I’ve also now investigated what rubbish they’ve pre-installed in the Blu-ray box. Damn, same pile of rubbish as is in the TV. This box, like the TV, is now blocked from having access to the outside internet world as well.

Sony is not the only manufacturer that supplies TV’s in this state. All of the rest of the different TV brands in consumer land are up to a similar disappointing standard, pre-loaded with rubbish that not everyone needs or wants. To make things worse, they’re all trying to cram as many “new features” and tricks into their boxes as they can. But all have the same thing in common, one way or another they’re spying on you and your habits. Then giving you targeted advertising based on what they’ve seen you do / watch.

Perhaps all new TV’s need to be supplied with just the necessary firmware to allow us to watch a broadcast TV program and to see Network Attached Storage (NAS) or Freeview recorder box where we’ve got some favourite programs recorded . After all, these new TV’s are just basically a laptop with a dirty great big high res screen and some very customised software. Then give us a “store” option where we can go to and obtain all of the other features that they’re currently building in. That way, we only have to have the features in the TV that WE want, and not the rubbish that they think we want. Extra strong hint: Provide a “lite” version of the TV operating firmware that does not have all the rubbish such as Netflix, Google Play (to name but two) and all of the other interactive TV offerings pre installed.

In closing, I’m a long standing Sony customer. That I’ve been buying Sony products for over 45 years says a lot. I’ve always been happy with their products and their reliability. My latest purchases may not have been the best, but is any other manufacturer out there any better?