Toshiba has taken to IFA 2018 to debut its first-ever Android TV set. The TV maker is announcing just one model with Android TV, which is a 55-inch version that does have a 4K display with HDR10 support, and Dolby Vision is also included here. On the audio side, Toshiba has partnered with Onkyo once again, to provide some great sounding audio on this TV set. Toshiba says that this is going to “place TV at the heart of the smart home experience”, and that is because the Google Assistant is here along with Android TV. That’s not a surprise, since Google Assistant has been shipping with Android TV for quite a while now, and it’s good to see it available out-of-the-box here on this TV from Toshiba.
The experience with this Android TV is similar to other Android TV sets out there. Instead of having a bulky, proprietary operating system on the TV, you are getting Android TV, which has access to thousands (if not millions) of apps and games that can run on your TV. This includes big names like Netflix, Hulu, HBO GO, YouTube, Google Play Movies & TV, Spotify and much more. Toshiba is also promoting the gameplay experience here. Though it won’t be as good as using an NVIDIA SHIELD TV, as that has a much more powerful processor and graphics chipset inside. But this TV will still work well for playing casual games, and it can support up to four Android smartphones or tablets being used as controllers, at a time.
Toshiba has Android Oreo running on this TV, so you are going to be getting a home screen that is tailored to what you are watching most. That includes being able to rearrange the apps that are shown in the top row, as well as seeing what you should watch next, and much more. Of course Chromecast is built-in here, so if you are looking to watch content from an app that does not support Android TV, you can instead Cast it from your smartphone, tablet or even Chrome browser, to the big screen to watch. As expected, Google Play is also available, so you can find all the apps and games you want for your TV.
Currently, there is no pricing or availability announced for this Android TV, which is pretty common for products announced at trade shows. As they can take several months to be released – not to mention pricing and availability will also vary on regions and countries. Toshiba should be announcing region-specific pricing and availability in the near future though.
