Google Gives TV Bugs (Google TV Review)
Television used to be a bug free zone. Now it's a computer science problem complete with bugs.
I was reading David Pogue's review of Google TV. Having recently purchased one I can say that he is spot on with many of his points. In general, the usability of the device needs a lot of work. It's not just surface stuff either, it's deep and pervasive from the controller to the GUI.
The pain starts with the initial setup. Why? Because it is exactly like doing a Windows OS install. Several updates and reboots with a full set of wizards to run through. The updates took an hour on my relatively fast Comcast cable connection. I understand the need for updates but why can't the device start up and play while doing the updates in the background? This is a TV right?
By adding new unneeded buttons and interface conventions somehow Google managed to make the controller (which is essentially a full keyword and mouse) more complicated than a keyboard and mouse. It's got buttons everywhere like it will eventually be some kind of joystick type device but it gives no joy now. After having it for a couple of weeks I still don't understand the difference between a left and right controller button click. I think this confusion stems from the fact that they "could" add more buttons to Android so they did. The designers shouldn't have let that freedom get the better of them. Android will be a much more compelling platform if it works the same everywhere.
Also, as Pogue points out the claim that you can browse the web while watching TV is a farce. The video goes in and out as you navigate through various modes. The video also blocks content on web pages and Google TV's menus. Why the video couldn't be transparent or movable I don't know. It's like Google couldn't figure out what people were really going to do with the device so they didn't know what should have priority. Is it a TV? Is it a web browser? Ideally, it would be a blend of both. Right now it's one or the other with the TV or the web browser just tacked on like some bad fashion accessory.
Another big negative for me and other Xfinity users is that you can not get Xfinity on demand videos from the web. Not sure if this is just a programing glitch or oversight. I can make up reasons for Hulu and the TV networks not liking Google TV (crazy conspiracy type theories) but I don't understand why Xfinity wouldn't work since I'm already paying for that.
Surprisingly, even with all usability issues, there is a lot for a nerd to like about Google TV. What I'm enjoying most is that it can play most of the content on my Windows Home Server, Netflix streaming (not the new slick interface on the PS3 so finding video takes longer), and the couch potato mode on Vimeo. I also love that Google TV has Picasa web albums access so you can turn your TV into a giant picture frame. It also connects to Pandora so your slide shows have nice background music.
I would buy it again because I like the video streaming options, picasa, pandora, and I was really curious about Andriod on TV. Would I recommend it? No. Well, maybe, if you already have a lot of content on your home network and you use Netflix streaming and you don't already have a PS3 connected to your TV and you're an engineer. However, there are a lot of other non-Google enhanced TVs that do the streaming video thing... so, no don't buy it. Really, it's hard to justify the cost tradeoff versus say something like 3D and 240Hz refresh rate.
I was reading David Pogue's review of Google TV. Having recently purchased one I can say that he is spot on with many of his points. In general, the usability of the device needs a lot of work. It's not just surface stuff either, it's deep and pervasive from the controller to the GUI.
The pain starts with the initial setup. Why? Because it is exactly like doing a Windows OS install. Several updates and reboots with a full set of wizards to run through. The updates took an hour on my relatively fast Comcast cable connection. I understand the need for updates but why can't the device start up and play while doing the updates in the background? This is a TV right?
By adding new unneeded buttons and interface conventions somehow Google managed to make the controller (which is essentially a full keyword and mouse) more complicated than a keyboard and mouse. It's got buttons everywhere like it will eventually be some kind of joystick type device but it gives no joy now. After having it for a couple of weeks I still don't understand the difference between a left and right controller button click. I think this confusion stems from the fact that they "could" add more buttons to Android so they did. The designers shouldn't have let that freedom get the better of them. Android will be a much more compelling platform if it works the same everywhere.
Also, as Pogue points out the claim that you can browse the web while watching TV is a farce. The video goes in and out as you navigate through various modes. The video also blocks content on web pages and Google TV's menus. Why the video couldn't be transparent or movable I don't know. It's like Google couldn't figure out what people were really going to do with the device so they didn't know what should have priority. Is it a TV? Is it a web browser? Ideally, it would be a blend of both. Right now it's one or the other with the TV or the web browser just tacked on like some bad fashion accessory.
Another big negative for me and other Xfinity users is that you can not get Xfinity on demand videos from the web. Not sure if this is just a programing glitch or oversight. I can make up reasons for Hulu and the TV networks not liking Google TV (crazy conspiracy type theories) but I don't understand why Xfinity wouldn't work since I'm already paying for that.
Surprisingly, even with all usability issues, there is a lot for a nerd to like about Google TV. What I'm enjoying most is that it can play most of the content on my Windows Home Server, Netflix streaming (not the new slick interface on the PS3 so finding video takes longer), and the couch potato mode on Vimeo. I also love that Google TV has Picasa web albums access so you can turn your TV into a giant picture frame. It also connects to Pandora so your slide shows have nice background music.
I would buy it again because I like the video streaming options, picasa, pandora, and I was really curious about Andriod on TV. Would I recommend it? No. Well, maybe, if you already have a lot of content on your home network and you use Netflix streaming and you don't already have a PS3 connected to your TV and you're an engineer. However, there are a lot of other non-Google enhanced TVs that do the streaming video thing... so, no don't buy it. Really, it's hard to justify the cost tradeoff versus say something like 3D and 240Hz refresh rate.
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