[Philips, Sony, TCL Android TV] jamesstringerphoto:
After a bit more than a week with my 2015 Sony 4k Android TV

40K60 32-bit colour works via HDMI fine, just doesn't do 4:4:4, there were some drivers giving me issues I think

Sky go app runs great on the TV, you do need to plug in a mouse (or use a bluetooth mouse) to move around the app though - playback works great though they need to improve the quality because 1500Kbps should be the minimum - this is probably one of my favourite features of the TV because previously we had to run a PC to view Skygo which becomes powerbill expensive if your flatmates like to watch cricket all night.

Netflix 4K runs great, though doesn't look hugely different from 1080P on my 49" TV, and close up it doesn't look much better either - credits and titles look sharper though so seems like it's actually a limitation of the camera equipment used to record 4K.

Spotify runs on the TV and can be controlled with a cellphone or another spotify device if you're using premium - once again requires a mouse if you want to control from TV.

I have both a PS1 and N64 emulator installed on the TV, playing with my xbox 360 controller, it works great and is plenty of fun - you still need a mouse though.

Sideloaded and install from browser apps are hidden from the main launcher scree, so you need an app called sideload launcher to view these apps - this is dumb and needs to be changed.

There is no obvious way to quit an app, there is also no 'card view' so you can't switch apps or check what is open.

My 49X8300C has 1.5GB ram and usually has about 1GB used and the CPU sits at about 70% usage when doing not much. This needs to be improved by optimisation. Sony has a lot of junk apps running in the background that you can't disable.

Touch remote is useless compared to the IR remote - it's touch but isn't as mouse cursor, so you have to swipe left, right, up and down to move about rather than an HTPC touchpad which would make most sense.

Doesn't automatically turn off when no input is detected, so you will need to buy a Pulse-Eight CEC controller for your HTPC because GPU's don't support CEC.

I'm not sure what is the link speed of the Ethernet connector, but playing a 4K HVEC movie over the network wouldn't play fluidly due to constant buffering (my pc is more than capable to serve it as it is on a gigabit switch with that movie on an SSD) - locally stored 4K HVEC works very well.

You need at least an Nvidia GTX 960 to playback 4K HVEC fluidly on PC, as that's the minimum card to have a hardware HVEC decoder - it's a total slideshow on the 750TI

The TV tuner is essentially an input on the TV, like HDMI 1,2,3,4 and it is basically has its own software.

There is no Freeview recording functionality on the TV - it says it will be enabled in a future update but don't count on it.

It has a headphone jack, which can be used as a speaker out which will either power the speakers along side the TV speakers, or turn off the tv speakers and run all audio through the headphone jack.

There is an opera browser, but because the TV uses so much ram and CPU without doing anything...the browser isn't worth using - there is no Chrome browser.

DNS geolocation services works after forwarding 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 to the correct DNS.

Android Device manager works on the TV which seems to have a GPS. You can locate very accurately, lock, call and remote wipe the TV. This could be helpful if theives don't realise the TV is running android and you want to locate it (if they connect to network) , or if you want to piss off your flatmates because the call function turns the TV volume to max and pumps out the loudest chime you've ever heard.