HDTVs

McQueen said:

How bright is your living room? OLED isn’t as bright as LED, so that might be another consideration. Viewing angle won’t mean much if the OLED is getting washed out by large picture windows.

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Heh. I have a 13-foot bay window in the living room. Definitely some food for thought. Thanks guys.

Captain Suave said:

Heh. I have a 13-foot bay window in the living room. Definitely some food for thought. Thanks guys.

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I have patio doors and a south facing garden. Daytime viewing was not an issue with my 2015 OLED, nor with my 2023 OLED G3 which is noticeably brighter

Yeah, still get an OLED imo- if you have tons of sun, pay for the newest, wait a few months and get the 2024 model - usually the biggest increase between models is total brightness and some cpu increase to "upscale" better.

I have large windows with just normal blinds, no drapes, and mine does fine, I think its a LG C3?

admittedly I only use my TV in the evenings and draw my curtains (in Summer) but I've just tested it now at 848am, it's bright outside, clear sky. Brightness is a complete non issue on my LG G3

I ended up getting a 65'' Hisense U8 on a Black Friday sale. Couldn't quite bring myself to spring for the OLED. Put it up with a Mantle Mount and I love it already. Only hitch was that I have a metal lath plaster wall and it was a bitch to find the studs. Mount is super sturdy. Four lag bolts in the studs, everything is bolted together, solid steel, nice gas pistons. It's a little high when flat to the wall due to the mount point necessary to clear the 15'' mantle at the bottom, but I like that now I have space underneath for storage. 10/10 so far. Just have to work on cable management.

Falstaff I'd definitely recommend this if it fits your use case.

Denamian said:

Now that is interesting. My parents have their TV off to the side of the fireplace at a bit of an awkward angle because putting it over the mantle would make it too high. This might be exactly what they need.

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Yeah. My old TV was just sitting on the ~5 ft mantle and it was at a bad enough angle I'd get a crick in my neck watching a movie. This drops down something like 18'' below the mantle height now. Much more comfortable.

Intrinsic said:

Speaking of old people…

Neighbors are a real nice older couple. We always chat about yard stuff, kids, all the white people stuff. They’re both retired but he still flies his plane and does side job stuff with his company. Veteran.

Invited me over to help take apart this very nice, old, $2k wood TV cabinet in their living room bc they were getting a bigger TV and the space would only fit their 48”. So we backed out some screws, lifted the top off, ended up having to cut the side panels down because they were both single solid pieces. Then remounted the old top to the base to give it a nicer finish. It actual looked pretty good if you like older style furniture.

So I say, “Very nice. Did W get the new TV already or does he need help picking it up?”

Wife says, “Oh no, he got it. They didn’t have the 55” though so he just got the 50.”

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What a funny story

Captain Suave said:

I ended up getting a 65'' Hisense U8 on a Black Friday sale. Couldn't quite bring myself to spring for the OLED. Put it up with a Mantle Mount and I love it already. Only hitch was that I have a metal lath plaster wall and it was a bitch to find the studs. Mount is super sturdy. Four lag bolts in the studs, everything is bolted together, solid steel, nice gas pistons. It's a little high when flat to the wall due to the mount point necessary to clear the 15'' mantle at the bottom, but I like that now I have space underneath for storage. 10/10 so far. Just have to work on cable management.

Falstaff I'd definitely recommend this if it fits your use case.




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I have the MM540 in my living room, which is basically the same thing - I actually didn't use the main feature that differentiates (paintable covers) it since I had to install it off-center in order to reach two studs (one of my studs is dead center in the wall - the tv is still centered, just the bracketry is shifted) . I'm happy with the end result, but installation was a pain in the dick - I had to be sure to triple check my calculations since I only had about an inch of margin and there was no ability to really do a test fit. There were some other stupid quirks with the process I've forgotten including pretty poor instructions and I couldn't follow any youtube videos as they had just redesigned it. If I had to do it over again, I'd probably spring for one of the motorized versions - pulling it down isn't as effortless as they make it look, so, my wife tends to just leave it up if she's watching tv.

Kobayashi said:

I had to install it off-center in order to reach two studs (one of my studs is dead center in the wall - the tv is still centered, just the bracketry is shifted)

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I had the same problem and had to open the lever arm and install the locking pin to access the hole for the top center lag bolt. I ended up installing the brackets shifted 2 inches to the left of center and put the mount arm on the center stud. It offends my OCD but you can't see it behind the TV anyway.

That was my one complaint about the setup. The directions very clearly state that you should be able to install on a 32'' stud gap, which would have been perfect for our cases, but the mounting bars are only 29'' wide. WTF?

Captain Suave said:

I had the same problem and had to open the lever arm and install the locking pin to access the hole for the top center lag bolt. I ended up installing the brackets shifted 2 inches to the left of center and put the mount arm on the center stud. It offends my OCD but you can't see it behind the TV anyway.

That was my one complaint about the setup. The directions very clearly state that you should be able to install on a 32'' stud gap, which would have been perfect for our cases, but the mounting bars are only 29'' wide. WTF?

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Ahh, yes, that was one of the issues - the arm mounted right over the one lag bolt. They really should have just made it longer.

For my install, you can see the brackets in the lowered position, so it kind of annoys me when I see it.

They make an adapter for installation on a single stud, but I didn't 1) want to spend more money 2) have less margin on something I'm essentially going to be pulling off the wall on a regular basis and 3) didn't want to have another week of my tv being on the floor.


Overall, I love the concept and functionality, but they really need to do a better job in the execution. I'd probably try that one Lanx found if I had to do it again - it's identical to the monoprice one I was looking at a while ago.

Okay, this will sound pretty stupid, but I haven't watched TV for well over a decade. My wife watches cable programs on a plasma TV that I bought a long time ago so there's no need for an antenna. I never used it or even set it up.

Anyway, I'm thinking about getting a TV for my shop because there's a couple jobs that an employee can easily do while still watching TV if they want. Basically to help pass the time.

I'm not going to get cable installed. Can they watch local programming right out of the box, or do you still need to get some type of converter or special antenna?

If by cable you mean they wont even have internet, then yea - Lanx has a good option for you. But just generally having a smart tv there for them to turn wifi on their phone on, and connecting the TV to it will allow them to watch Netflix or w/e on it. I have backup internet at my office, so I never lost it there but I do at the house and I do this exact thing there. Most phones have an unlimited plan now. As the business owner, you're doing more than most by just letting them watch TV while they work.