Samsung’s got a curved OLED TV. LG’s got a curved OLED TV. Sony just announced the first curved LCD TV. Did everyone just leave their TV factories out in the sun for a bit too long?
When you look at a TV, what do you look at?
I mean, what do you actually spend your time looking at? In the store, you’d probably duck your head around the back or side to check the number and setup of ports; you might look closely at the speaker grille see where the noise is coming from, although if you’re buying a premium TV the odds are pretty high it’ll be sending sound out to some proper speakers before very long anyway. In the store, everyone wants to appear like an expert appraising the purchase before plunking down their cash.
But once it’s home, what you do is stare at the actual screen itself.
This is where I don’t get the curved TV trend. Is it just me? I get that they’re kind of cool in a design sense to look at, and could be something of a brief talking point if you have guests around. But how long does that conversation last before you start watching Doctor Who?
Oh wait, that might just be me. Substitute your program of choice in your head if that makes you feel any better.
I’m personally not so fussed about the wall mounting issue (and apparently you can mount the Sony TV just fine), because I’ve never wall mounted a TV in my life. I like the aspect of being able to reach all ports and plugs far too much, but then I have a frankly ridiculous number of boxes underneath my TV, so plug access is a must.
I can’t speak for the Sony TV, but in the case of Samsung and LG, I have had a brief bit of hands-on time with the panels. They’re amazing to look at, without a shadow of a doubt. Really crisp, beautiful colour reproduction as long as you’re dead on, and while there is a sweet spot due to the curve, I can’t say that looking from the sides made me want to tear my eyeballs out in horror or anything.
OLED appears to be the future of TV, but I can’t help but feel that the “curve” thing is just a gimmick that we’ll look back on in a few years time in a “hey, remember when curved TVs were going to be a thing” kind of way. Can anybody convince me otherwise?