HDTV and Home Theater Podcast

The HT Guys are taking a week off!  We’ll see you next week!

On this week’s show we discuss Braden’s YouTubeTV price increase as well as a discussion on how to reboot your internet modem when it locks up even if you aren’t home. One of our listeners, Josh in Huntsville AL, shares his experience dealing with warranty service on a large screen TV. We also read your emails and take a look at the week’s news. News: LG stops making Blu-ray players, marking the end of an era Venu Sports backers lose motion to dismiss case Amazon’s 2nd & 3rd Gen Echo Buds Are Dirt Cheap Try this easy trick to delay your upcoming YouTube TV price increase Other: Pioneer CS-707 | hifi-wiki.com Contact House of Sound NYC for Audio Tours, Events & Partnerships YouTube TV price update Braden received the following email from YouTubeTV raising his TV service costs by $10: YouTube TV has always worked hard to offer you the content you love, delivered the way you want, with features that make it easy to enjoy the best of live TV. To keep up with the rising cost of content and the investments we make in the quality of our service, we’re updating our monthly price from $72.99/month to $82.99/month starting January 13, 2025. We don’t make these decisions lightly, and we realize this has an impact on our members. We are committed to bringing you features that are changing the way we watch live TV, like unlimited DVR storage and multiview*, and supporting YouTube TV’s breadth of content and vast on-demand library of movies and shows. The price of your YouTube TV Base Plan membership will change in your first billing cycle on or after January 13, 2025, and will be charged to your payment method on file going forward. To view your current plan, go to Settings > Membership for updated information. If you are currently on a trial or promotional price for the Base Plan, that promotion is still honored and unchanged. We hope YouTube TV continues to be your service of choice, but we understand that some of our members may want to cancel their subscriptions. As always, family managers have the ability to pause or cancel anytime. You can find more information in our Help Center. With lots of exciting shows and live events ahead in the new year, we’ll continue to strive to deliver the best of TV, all in one place. Thank you for being a loyal YouTube TV member. Sincerely, The YouTube TV team Cable Internet Going Down While Away On a recent trip Ara’s cable modem locked up and would not come back online until he returned home and cycled power. So how do you prevent this from happening again? Ara takes a look at a solution called Keep Connect, a $50 device that monitors your internet connection and reboots the system when connection to the internet is lost.  Features: Automatic Router Rebooter / Reset - Stop manually restarting your router! Automate the process to ensure highly reliable internet connection uptime  Constantly Monitors Router and/or Modem Internet Health. Keep Connect provides 24/7/365 protection to ensure that your smart home and connected devices are always online and available.  Notifications - Free Texts or Emails from Keep Connect notifying you of detected eventsif you choose to enter your phone number/email. You may also choose No Notifications.  Perfect for Smart Home Reliability - Schedule Periodic Resets to keep your connection fresh and fast.  Premium Cloud Services App Available (iOS App Store and Google Play Store) - Our Premium Keep Connect Cloud Services platform allows using our Online/Mobile App to monitor many locations in one place as well. Cloud Services allows remote management of devices at all locations as well as heartbeat monitoring of your Keep Connects to notify you in the event of an ISP internet outage at one of your sites. Large TV Warranty Experience I’ve meant to write about my TCL TV experience for quite some time.  What can I say, life is just busy.  I have two more kids than Braden! When I heard a couple of weeks ago a question about warranty experiences for large TVs, I thought I had put off writing this story long enough. After listening to Braden hype up TCL TVs for at least a couple of years, as well as reading many reviews for TVs and watching the developing technology trends at the time, in September 2020 I ordered a TCL 75R635, a so-called 6-series Roku 4K QLED 75-inch TV with a respectable 240-zone backlight array.  The TV had been announced earlier in the year, perhaps at CEDIA or CES and I was ready to replace my 10-year old Panasonic plasma HD TV with this TCL model.  I watched over the next many months for the TV to become available.  While I hoped for a sale, I also knew from watching similar TVs that the stock tended to get bought out pretty quickly.  Amazon finally had the TV available to order in September 2020 and I ordered immediately for a retail price of $1399 plus tax.  I received it on October 3. The TV worked great for about 6 months.  In late March 2021, the screen suddenly and mysteriously slowly faded to a sort of dark backlit state in the middle of whatever my wife was watching.  A backlight was on, but no picture elements were displayed.  You could still hear the TV making sounds associated with navigating the menu when pushing buttons on the remote.  I started a warranty claim March 31 nothing I was well within the 1-year warranty period.  I don’t recall exact timing, but a service tech was scheduled to attempt to repair the TV within 10 days.  The day he was supposed to come, he called me beforehand and said he’d already been trying to repair the same model TV for another purchaser.  He asked me a couple of questions about what the TV was doing.  His conclusion over the phone and based on trying to work on the same model of TV was that it was not repairable and he would elevate the case to sending a replacement. Here is where the process got a little frustrating.  TCL honored the claim.  However, the process became surprisingly slow.  As I said, I don’t recall exactly when the service tech came, but if it was Day 10, that would have been April 9.  TCL told me on April 23 the TV was finally being shipped.  It was considered a freight shipment, so TCL handed me off to Pilot Deliveries from that point forward.  I had to contact Pilot to arrange delivery if you can believe that!  I also had to coordinate with Pilot to pick up the defective unit.  I did all of this.  By May 3, I still had not received the replacement.  It took another call to TCL at this point to investigate the problem because tracking showed it bouncing all over the map.  I think it came from China.  Landed in California, then I think it made it to Nashville, then Chattanooga, back to Nashville, and hopped over me in Huntsville to wind up in Mobile, Alabama. By this point, Pilot seemed to finally acknowledge they weren’t handling this delivery well.  It did get flown one last time to Huntsville.  Then they sent the TV on an unmarked box truck (No "Pilot" markings) with a kid who was maybe 20 to deliver the TV to my home.  The TV was the only thing on the truck.  And, it had fallen over which I suspected when I came around to the back of the truck and saw the driver just finishing standing the box back up.  The driver admitted this was the case when I asked.  But, jumping to the end, the TV has always worked fine.  I had to help get the very large box in the house because they should have sent two people to handle this delivery.  This was May 6 when I finally took possession.  So, a little over 5-week process.  I never expected it to take that long. The rumors amongst forums at the time were that because this was most likely a first production run model (remember, I bought it as soon as it was available), there were manufacturing defects.  And the failure itself was likely because TCL was wiring the backlight array in-series, so if one light goes out, they all stop working.  I think the “dark light” that we could see came from the edges, so maybe the light array was separated into zones somehow.  I guess I’ll never really know. Finally, some anecdotes: Anecdote #1:  I am a sentimental sort and I was a little sad to see the original go as me and my kids had broken in that first TV watching the then new Mandalorian series which we greatly enjoyed. Anecdote #2:  My “finance committee” hates it when we spend “large” amounts of money all at once.  In all those years I was listening to you guys, doing research, and waiting for the TV to become available, I banked my Amazon credit card reward points just for a TV.  When the time came, I only paid $61.02 out of pocket for this TV. We’ve greatly enjoyed the TV ever since.  I couldn’t swing $4000-$5000+ at the time for the 55-inch OLEDs that were out then.  But the TCL has always been enjoyable.  HDR and Dolby Vision content especially look great for deep dark blacks.  Would I buy one similar to this again?  Maybe—the technology continues to improve even in just the last 4 years and prices have also come down.  There are lots of options.  Honestly, I think more about a short throw projector for my next TV based on Ara's experiences. Hope you and the listeners enjoy this story about my warranty experience. Josh Huntsville, AL

On this week’s show we give you ten Christmas Classics and where you can stream them. We also read your emails and take a look at the week’s news stories. News: Netflix promises smooth, family-friendly streams of ‘WWE Raw’ are coming Sports Central is one of DIRECTV Stream’s hidden gems Walmart Completes $2.3 Billion VIZIO Acquisition Is Amazon preparing to buy Roku? Other:  9.16.4 Channel Home Theater! McIntosh House Of Sound Tour House of Sound NYC 10 Christmas Movies and Where to Watch Them Each time this year our family loves to settle in and watch Christmas movies that are loaded on our Plex Server. This year one of my daughters decided to watch the 1994 version of Miracle on 34th Street when I said to her the quality of the movie was better than I remembered, our Plex Server has a DVD rip, she said that she was watching on Disney+. This got me thinking which of my favorite Christmas movies are available to stream and on what service.  So for this episode we give you ten Christmas Classics and where you can stream them. Die Hard, 1988  IMDB Rating 8.2/10  — Peacock, Hulu Elf, 2003 IMDB Rating 7.1/10— Max, Hulu Home Alone, 1990 IMDB Rating 7.7/10— Disney+ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, 1966 IMDB Rating 8.3/10 — Peacock, Fubo It’s a Wonderful Life, 1946  IMDB Rating 8.6/10 — Prime Miracle on 34th Street, 1947 IMDB Rating 7.9/10  — Paramount+ Miracle on 34th Street, 1994 IMDB Rating 6.6/10  — Peacock, Disney+ National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, 1989 IMDB Rating 7.5/10  — Hulu, Max The Santa Clause, 1994 IMDB Rating 6.6/10 — Disney+ White Christmas 1954 IMDB Rating 7.6/10 — Prime

On this week’s show we ask “Could Legacy Audio Brands Disappear Next Year?” We also read your emails and take a look at the week’s news. News: Peacock to Stream First Ever Animated Madden NFL Cast During Texans vs. Chiefs AT&T Sets a Date to Shut Down DSL Internet & Traditional Phone Service in Most Areas Max password-sharing restrictions coming soon Other: Hisense 85" Class R6 Series 4K UHD Roku Smart TV Could Legacy Audio Brands Disappear Next Year? Major audio brands, including Denon, Marantz, Klipsch, and Pioneer, are facing potential extinction as their parent companies, Masimo and Voxx International, struggle with significant financial difficulties.  Masimo, having acquired Sound United's brands for $1.532 billion in 2022, reported a decline in consumer audio revenue from $171.5 million to $161.4 million, leading to a loss of $31.3 million, including $12.9 million in Q3 alone. Similarly, Voxx International witnessed a 35% drop in consumer electronics sales and a 15.4% overall revenue decline, exacerbated by a $40 million court judgment and halted production of key brands due to licensing issues. The declines are attributed to a post-COVID market slump, where the surge in sales during the pandemic is now reversing, alongside structural corporate issues and shifting consumer preferences.  The post-COVID slump The pandemic created a surge in home audio sales as people built home offices and upgraded their living spaces. But those golden days are over. Since 2022, sales have crashed by up to 30% in some cases. For example, Voxx International’s consumer electronics dropped by 35% partly because people aren’t spending like they used to. Even turntables, which were flying off the shelves during lockdown, are now collecting dust in warehouses. The corporate structure problem The problems run deeper than just sales. Masimo, a medical tech company, lacks the expertise to run an audio business. They’re experts at hospital equipment, but high-end speakers are a different game entirely. Voxx faces similar challenges. They can’t even make Pioneer products anymore because of licensing issues! Perhaps because of these misalignments, both companies are trying to squeeze unrealistic profits out of these brands (around 300% to 500% margins). That’s like trying to sell a $100 pair of headphones for $500. Voxx did manage to cut costs by $5.3 million in Q2, but their operating losses continue to mount. Basically, managing multiple classic brands under one corporate umbrella has only added to their struggles, spreading resources thin and diluting brand identities. The changing consumer market Consumer preferences have also changed dramatically: Young music fans prioritize convenience over traditional hi-fi setups. They’re not looking for massive speaker setups anymore. Instead, they look for portable, budget-friendly solutions that fit their lifestyle better. Serious audiophiles are turning to vintage equipment, which often matches or exceeds new products in quality and value. Some Chinese manufacturers have come in to offer the same things luxury audio brands do but at less cost. So, customers have been leaning towards them more in recent years.