The reporter’s use case actually makes a lot of sense to me. I would never buy one of these, but I wouldn’t be opposed to using something like this if I ever ended up with one.
It’s not like I stand in front of it and watch a whole movie in my kitchen. But I like to have the T2 Tennis Channel on while I scramble eggs or pop on a news show while cooking dinner. Plus, it’s nice to have a kitchen screen that doesn’t take up counter space.
Smart fridges are such a stupid idea. Fridges last like 30 years, why would you integrate a computer that is going to reach end-of-life in less than 5 years?
Just get a fucking tablet and use it in the kitchen.
Samsung who won’t even provide price estimates/quotes for reparation of utensils WITHIN WARRANTY without being paid $25 before hand. Their products suck that much.
Samsung isn't what they used to be. 5-10 years ago they were fine but they've really gone downhill with customer support and quality. I'll be looking at another manufacturer next time I need an SSD.
So I don't need all the features of a smart fridge and shit because I habe a phone and a tablet hub for that sort of thing, but a feature I've only seen on LG smart fridges is something I'm frequently annoyed more don't have these days with how cheap the tech is: remote fridge monitoring
Slap a few cheap cameras in there so I can see 2 angles on every shelf and monitor the current fridge levels from my phone.
"Are we low on ketchup or am I stupid?” know for certain!
Saw a feature close to this but not quite as good on an LG smart fridge years ago and have been vehemently disappointed by every fridge ive looked at since not having that.
And I'm in the market for a new fridge goddamnit. I don't want to have to install my own cams but I'm close to doing it at this point
No, fridges last 10-ish years, 15 if you're lucky, especially if you buy Samsung or LG. My LG compressor went out twice in 10 years, and the second time the tech said it would cost way more to fix than it's worth, even if the part is under warranty (I fixed other stuff myself as well).
I just got a new fridge, and looking through reviews, even the "best" fridges (unless you go industrial) last 10-15 years on average. I got Whirlpool this time, because they were near the top of recommendations (Maytag was #1), so hopefully those 10-15 years will be relatively trouble-free.
30y seems a bit optimistic. I have already replaced the control board on our fridge once and I think I need to again and it probably is less than 15yo.
Not so much "optimistic" as "the way it used to be"
I've got a fridge that's nearly 30 years old that we've never had to fix anything on (other than the ice maker). I thought it died about a week ago, turns out I just accidentally turned it off (issue with the coldness dial) and it's colder than ever right now.
I've also got a 6 or 8 year old fridge that I wouldn't be a bit surprised if it needs replacing before the old one.
I’d be happy if my fridge had some sort of optional rack for an arbitrary tablet, with power supply or even a traditional paper calendar . Even happier if it had cheap simple Zigbee/z-wave/Thread sensors - let me choose to do or not do anything with them
If these things all used Raspberry Pi compute modules, they could be reflashed with custom roms. Just loading stock Kodi would do most of what you might want put of a kitchen computer.
Unfortunately, they're kinda hard to find. We recently got a new fridge, and most of the French door fridges (fridge on top, freezer on bottom) were smart or didn't have a water dispenser.
We ended up with a Whirlpool without smart features, other than the "smart" water dispenser (touch screen to auto-fill cup to X liters), and it still has "dumb" buttons for that as well. I haven't taken it apart, but hopefully the dumb buttons act as a fallback when the smart buttons inevitably fail.
The first is that it has a camera with a large fisheye that can show you the inside (though this is more useful when away from the fridge rather than using the screen). The issue is the camera is only at one point. The fisheye helps see more, but it can never see all the fridge.
The second is as a home assistant in the kitchen. This is actually useful. It can display recipes and whatever in it whole you cook. You can also use a phone, tablet, or other home assistant device for this though, but if you want to throw away money this does seem convenient.
They also can show arbitrary stuff, so it's great for todos, family reminders, etc. We bought a chalkboard-like thing (wet chalk?), but a thin whiteboard would work too.
My wife prefers using a tablet to cook since she can move it around (from the prep counter to next to the stove). I use my phone.
We bought a new fridge recently, and while the smart features looked cool, I don't trust them to get security updates, nor am I willing to pay a premium for cool features on a fridge that's likely to have problems (Samsung and LG have the coolest features and the worst repair track records).
Yesterday morning, I woke up to a notice on my fridge alerting me that one of my favorite features was going away.
And while that turned out not to be the case — the confusion highlights how precarious smart appliance features can be.
“The notification was sent in error, and a correction will be released.” I also asked Langlois if he could explain why this happened and how many fridges sent out this message.
It offers hundreds of live TV channels with news, sports, and plenty of classic TV (there’s an entire channel dedicated to Baywatch reruns and another to Degrassi Junior High), alongside movies on demand.
I’m still waiting for that pop-up telling me all is good, but I’m definitely relieved I’m not losing the option to watch TV Plus on my fridge.
But I like to have the T2 Tennis Channel on while I scramble eggs or pop on a news show while cooking dinner.
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Sometimes I wonder why people buying smart fridge in first place, it's just fridge with touchscreen panel on it, what makes it's so special compared to other fridges that has better cooling technology or bigger capacity or better electricity consumption