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Can anyone answer these questions please

TheCatWoman
3 days ago

PLease treat me like I've just landed from another planet or time zone as I really don't understand and people seem to delight in confusing me more.

I'm thinking of getting a smart tv and know little about how they work, what they do and what would be suitale for me?

Are they wireless in connecting to broad band or would I have to have some sort of cable?

Would I have to have a box like my current humax box so as I could record stuff I don' want to watch imediately?

Would I have to have some sort of subscription, like sky or something to get any thing?

What is watching on catch up,  is it Iplayers and the like?

This would have to be fairly easy for my soon to be 90 year old, even worse at tech than me, Mum to use, at least for her to switch on and find stuff. Please remember that I am based in the UK, so stuff that works or is available in other countries might not work or be available to me. I dont' live in the south of the UK and services are more old fashioned here than there. We have no cable connections on the island. We have BT as our broad band provider, we are limited on who does provide here and they all seem fairly equal in service quality, in other words great when they work and crap when they don't. I'm reluctant to change providers as we'd still have to pay for a BT landline and I'm not paying twice.

Thanks in advance for any help you feel able to offer.

  • 3 days ago in reply to Bunny

    Thanks peeps, I did try looking at Which magazine but to get any useful information I'd have to suscribe.

    We do have full freeview access here so I'm not sure a fire stick would be the right thing, also I'm not sure if the telly itself has a USB port, it is quite old.

    Having looked at BT telly services I'm not sure it's worth paying for, unless I didn't understand what you were saying properly which is entirely possible.

    Because of the materials our house is built from, I may have to use a cable, we have 3 signal boosters around the house, including one for the boiler.

  • 3 days ago
    TheCatWoman said:
    I'm thinking of getting a smart tv and know little about how they work, what they do and what would be suitale for me?

    Smart TV’s are full of features, most are preinstalled with apps such as Netflix, and YouTube. Some of these apps require a subscription but some are free. Most smart TVs you can also browse the internet, look at photos, play music, play games… there are hundereds of other apps you can install. You can watch all your free view channels like normal. 

    TheCatWoman said:

    Are they wireless in connecting to broad band or would I have to have some sort of cable?

    smart TV’s connect wirelessly broadband router/hub, you don’t need a cable but there is an option to connect by an Ethernet cable if you’d like.

    TheCatWoman said:

    Would I have to have a box like my current humax box so as I could record stuff I don' want to watch imediately?

    You won’t need a box such as a humax box to record live tv, but you will need a hard drive to record onto. Some TV’s have a built in hard drive so you can record and pause live TV without needing anything else, otherwise if the TV doesn’t have built in hard drive, you can buy an external one which you plug into the TV by USB. Check that the TV includes the option to record, which I believe most do. 

    TheCatWoman said:

    Would I have to have some sort of subscription, like sky or something to get any thing?

    You don’t need a subscription for your normal  Freeview channels. Just a tv licence if watching live tv. Some apps, such as Netflix, which will likely come preinstalled on the Tv, require a subscription. But you don’t need to watch Netflix, and you can just enjoy normal free TV.

  • 3 days ago

    This is my set up:

    BT land line. No phone connected, a BT hub is connected, originally as part of an 18 month contract. This is the hub that all my WiFi devices connect to be it mobile phone etc instead of using mobile data.

    All I wanted was unlimited broadband with no phone.

    When you buy the smart TV if you are able to get Freeview in your area the channels can be auto tuned into the Tele. Furthermore you can connect the TV to the WiFi hub too. Depending on the age of the smart TV some apps will be installed like Disney etc. however some TVs won't let you install some apps.

    AND some apps require subscriptions.

    I've found for me personally an Amazon fire stick has been the best. The apps update, the fire stick also connects to the hub and is connected to the port on the back of the TV. Amazon is currently £8.99 per month plus the additional £30 or so to buy the stick.

    Amazon allows you to install other apps like Disney, Netflix etc. however Amazon also allows you to rent and purchase TV programmes and films. 

    The benefits to a fire stick is if you can't get Freeview in your area you can still watch Tele. BBC iPlayer, itv, etc and Freeview can all be installed as apps.

    So...

    - BT broadband package (wireless or connected hub)

    - Basic LED TV or smart TV

    - apps, or dongle device like Amazon fire stick

    Total cost for unlimited broadband plus subscriptions depending on what you want to watch between £30 per month all the way up to over £100.

    I've tried to explain this in basic form but even this sounds complicated Joy

  • 3 days ago

    Which? offers a good explanation (free to read, although you'd need a membership to see their product ratings):

    https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/televisions/article/what-is-smart-tv-aNeqk6F0RAAn