Samsung forum: New Samsung Wireless Keyboard & Remote

Will the Samsung VG-KBD1000 Smart Wireless Keyboard work with the Samsung UN32EH5300F Smart TV? Using the remote (provided with the TV) is difficult, slow and not user-friendly.

1. You make a new post. This one is too long and unwieldy.

2. You call the 1800SAMSUNG in your country.

Hey there.Im new to this forum .Yesterday I purchased a new Samsung Smart TV and like everyone else I would like a keyboard for the internet.

I see Samsung have just launched a new wireless keyboard.Any idea when this will be available in the UK and will it support all models with Smarthub.?My model is 6530.

Your help is much appreciated.Already frustrated as to how long it takes to input.I have also tried I phone App.Still slow!!!

All,

I don't believe that the new hardware will work for previous 2011 or earlier models. At this time, I can't confirm it will work for 2011 or earlier models.

--HDTech

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I Can't believe that with the 'smart' TV I bought this week, I can not connect a wireless keyboard? Most of the 'Smart' features are useless, you can't even easily add an internet address to the browser, I am going to actively inform everybody not to buy Samsung TV's as you are only paying for useless 'SmartTV' add features... Other TV's will be cheaper and won't have this feature that is useless anyway

I was so happy with my new TV untill I found out this incredible fact

Yes, it would be nice to use a full sized keyboard that integrates flawlessly with the Samsung Smart TV's but....didn't picture quality play into your decision to select Samsung? I too have a Smart TV (6000 series) and yes I am a little disappointed in that the browser is a joke and that many of the apps are almost useless, but still when I kick back and watch whatever I watch, I'm very satisfied with the TV. I'm still very happy with my purchase and understand I didn't buy a "TV" to do other things besides watching TV. I guess I'm old school.

This thread, and the previous thread that also addressed the Smart TV has done it's job of educating the buyers.

Yes, it is a great television.
Yes, connectivity to the internet is horrible.
Yes, once in a while we all buy an Edsel.
No, Samsung doesn't care enough to fix the PROBLEM. Call it poor design, call it less than honest marketing, this is a TV, not a smart TV.

d00002 -

None of our SmartTVs in the past 3 years have had a keyboard, except in 2011 when we added one to select remote controls.

Why would people say that this is dishonest marketing? Did the store display it with a keyboard and a mouse attached? If so, we didn't approve.

If there were expectations and demands, you should express them with your retail salesperson and do what it takes to be happy. It doesn't do us any good for you to be unhappy with a new TV.

--HDTech

Online Brand Ambassador

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HDTech,

I own 2 Samsung Smart TVs, both UNxxD8000s (46" & 55"); purchased within last 6 months. I need these two problems fixed:
- The web browser is unusable because of user experience and performance issues
- The 2 most important apps, Netflix & Hulu, do not allow you to use the keyboard on the remote

Ideally the problems get fixed via software. Next best option, and one I would happily consider, is buying a keyboard [such as the newly announced Samsung] to solve these problems. However, buying a new TV is *not* an acceptable solution for these problems.

Additionally, I assumed that Samsung would continue to update the software for the lifetime of the TV. Can you confirm that this is true? More specifically, could you state that Samsung is making an effort to improve the experience on my generation of TVs?

Thank you.

timj0 -

I'm not sure what you mean the the browser is unusable "because of customer experience and performance issues".

I can't confirm any development of a privately owned App. That would have to be addressed by the App content and copyright owner - in this case, Netflix and Hulu.

The models you have weren't designed or advertised with a keyboard or mouse.

Firmware updates are for fixing issues or optimizing for proper operation of the set. Every year, I see a few complaints from people who believe that they will have all the new features added onto older models by means of a firmware update, and most manufacturers can't do that, including us.

These features may be available on some of the new 2012 Blu-Ray players, which also have SmartTV so that people can upgrade their features without having to purchase a whole new television set, so that may be an option. But the lifetime support we do offer is technical troubleshooting for your model.

--HDTech

Online Brand Ambassador

- Click here to visit the Samsung forum
- Click here to visit the Samsung store on CNET

I removed my emotion from my post intentionally to try and get a straight-forward response, but cable_dave is right - your answer seems rather defensive, perhaps evasive.

You have a hard job, no doubt. So I'll try to respond appropriately: Since you asked for clarification, here's what I meant by "The web browser is unusable because of user experience and performance issues":
- Both actual performance (loading/processing time) & perceived performance (what the user actually sees) are very poor in all aspects of navigation, scrolling, selection, and data entry. Rendering may be one area that is decent, but this is an overrated performance stat. Often developers focus on it as the only thing that matters but most users won't get that far for the reasons I mention in this post.
- Smart Hub takes >5 secs to load. The browser takes >5secs to load; another few seconds to load google.com (I verified that almost none of this is network traffic nor latency). These numbers wouldn't pass a performance test on any browser of any platform, including mobile devices.
- Field focus is not highlighted properly. Initial focus is seemingly random. Using the keypad to navigate left/right/up/down results in non-deterministic, or rather page-specific (even for the nav bar) results
- Typing a URL requires clicking on the address bar *and then* two additional popups and two more clicks before you get to use the keyboard
- Switching to pointer mode results in lost focus; sometimes pointer mode fails with no way to get it back besides closing the browser; pointer is lost in full screen (as is focus)
- Scrolling down is nearly impossible when there is a video loading
- Images get resized after they're fully downloaded; which throws off the very delicate pointer navigation (user ends up clicking on the wrong item many times)
- Full-screen takes >3secs to start, restarts network traffic, and >3secs to recover from; again, none of which are acceptable; progress bars are static images

I could go on, but I don't want you to think I'm being belligerent. I'm not; I used to design and implement web browsers so I'm tuned into their challenges, subtleties, and shortcomings. I'm happy to file bug reports for each of these issues, with exact repro steps, if you could tell me that would be helpful.

Re: Netflix/Hulu: I understand you can't officially speak to their development. However, you need to be able to represent them, their quality, and how that reflects on your brand. This picture of my TV from Samsung.com shows both Netflix and Hulu logos: (http://goo.gl/CUKCf). This isn't a blame-the-sales&marketing team type issue. Netflix & Hulu (& browser) should be at the top of the list for tested applications.

Samsung should set and enforce baseline standards for the Smart TV platform. For example: If your app is to be pre-loaded in the Smart Hub, it needs to support the keyboard remote input. And while I'm being so presumptuous, to limit your QA matrix, you should try to homogenize big chunks of the Smart TV OS. When you have >12 products, you can't have a new platform released every 12 months. You'll upset the customers, online brand ambassadors, engineers, testers, and eventually [but often too late] the decision makers.

HDTech- upon further thought, I've realized:
1) I'm pleasantly surprised at how responsive & candid you are. Kudos to you.
2) By spending so much time here, you may be sacrificing taking our feedback back to the development team. This is evidenced by "Every year, I see a few complaints ... " First of all, you can add new features. Second, every year? Is someone told you "it's not possible", then it's because of policy, not a technical limitation. And finally, to be clear, I am not asking for gesturing support (although it would make sense to sell an add-on module to support this). If my current remote/keyboard worked flawlessly and the browser was fast enough, I wouldn't ask for a new keyboard.

So I'm not asking for a new feature. I'm asking for Samsung to make the existing product work properly.

Is there a more appropriate forum on Samsung.com? I'm happy to rewrite my feedback as needed.

timj0 -

Thanks for the kinds words.

Guys, I'm here to help people try to get the most out of their products and provide feedback.

Let me look into seeing if there's a place for App complaints or ideas or development and engineering can go. I don't think there is, but I can ask.

As far as speaking for Hulu and Netflix, we are partners, but I'm not their spokesperson, and I don't represent Netflix or Hulu. You say I should. But I don't.

Samsung gets the brunt of the blame if their servers go down for a few hours on Friday night. I've been on the wrong end of that shotgun as well, and regardless, I simply cannot speak for our App partners. I get accused of finger pointing all the time, but it's not the case. I'm merely pointing out "what is".

I send up issues to our development team when people post feedback. There's no reason the assumption that by spending time on the forum equates somehow to sacrificing feedback to the development team. One of my jobs here IS to summarize information, but I more often than not don't receive a response or feedback from the team that I can post in public. No company does that in full public view of every critic, media person, lawyer and competitor, and for obvious reasons. In our defense, you could be a competitor trying to understand our business model and "why" and "how" things work. We don't divulge that just because we're demanded to as we participate at C|Net. I'm passionate about information being shared, and feedback being sent. That's what makes us compelling.

And I'm willing to do that with your list, and anything else you'd like to add. People read what I say, and that's because we're listening to the customer.

But sometimes people ask questions I can't answer. That's a fact.

Companies don't traditionally host forums, either, and I think this speaks well for us. We are listening and engaging and trying to be useful to consumers. Not all things can be changed, but I'll be happy to forward any information you'd like our developers to know. Personally, I think some of your observations above are good ones, and I believe this feedback is useful, but I'm not sure how it would change the SmartTV interface at this point. But it's not up to me. Let me pass it on and see what happens.

No employees will allow their email to be published, so this is the next best thing we can do. I'll be happy to take your post verbatim and send them to one of my contacts on the development team.

The browser may not be as fast as a PC. And it wasn't advertised to be a PC. Compared to other TV browsers, it still holds its own, and quite well, considering load times and the ability to view pages that other manufacturers have on the market.

As far as I know in 2011, no television manufacturer had an App program with as many available apps, browsing features (sparse, if at all!), or the wide range of options offered on Samsung's Smart TV. Even top of the line in the industry, it may not meet the needs of everyone who is expecting a PC-like experience.

I've got some of your points already, and I'd like to organize them and send them up. If you (or others here) have more, post them before Friday and I'll work on that over the weekend.

But I'm afraid that the information I presented earlier stands: the wireless keyboard point probably isn't going to work for 2011 products. I'm stating that ahead of time so that people don't get their hopes up.

I'd rather be straightforward about that, being the main topic of this thread.

--HDTech

Online Brand Ambassador

- Click here to visit the Samsung forum
- Click here to visit the Samsung store on CNET

Thanks for the prompt, genuine, & comprehensive reply. You definitely have a hard job speaking the truth. Reality is even harder to explain to anonymous & obnoxious whiners.

The reality here is that I have two of the best TVs on the market; they just have a few issues. I even wrote a review in November (score=9.0!) that echoes similar sentiments to this thread: http://gdgt.com/samsung/un46d8000/reviews/h96/. As you can tell by my gdgt profile, I'm a dedicated Samsung fan and look forward to future products (and product updates . So I'm motivated to help the products get better.

I truly wish I could count on my TV's browser getting better because right now I'm in the process of hooking up a computer to the TV. I'm lucky to be able to have this ability, but a) others won't, and b) I had hoped the TV would be the source for all entertainment. We'll get there someday...

Most of not all people get frustrated when the suggested answer to a problem (that could more likely than not be fixed via software) is buy a new $2000 to $4000 tv to replace the $2000 to $4000 tv that they just purchased less than a year ago. Your answer seems defensive which seems unproductive.

Adding a full size bluetooth keyboard to a piece of electronics that already has a mini bluetooth keyboard isn't rocket science. Fixing the browser's shortcomings isn't rocket science either. As I understand the browser used to be able to do Flash but it was removed for some reason, which perhaps was Adobe wanted $ for the use of their programming in your browser.

We have a UN55D8000 which we are very happy with minus the couple of Smart TV issues like the browser and keyboard. We also have a UN55D7000 which we are also please with minus the above issues and what I think is the 'flashlight issue' on one part of the screen.

cable_dave -

Nobody here was defensive.

I mentioned I can't speak on App development.
Models last year weren't advertised with keyboards or mice.
This whole topic is based on the new models having a feature that 2011 models do not.

If you want the new features, it's available on the new TV. If people get frustrated by that, there's nothing I can do to change it. I see people complain about this same topic with features on cars, or tablets, or laptop computers or refrigerators, or any other innovating device in the marketplace.

I didn't recommend purchasing a new TV. I did mention to Vincent that he speak with his retailer if what he purchased "last week" wasn't what he wanted - he might be able to return it to most retailers and get any model or brand that best fits his needs. Retailers often give a grace period where you can return something that doesn't fit your needs for something that does fit your needs.

I did mention that new features are also often available on the Blu-Ray players, which are a fraction of the cost of a new TV, and some people replace those every year, or every other year to have the latest and greatest Apps and features. I'm very specific so as not to upset people here, but also to be straightforward and give a direct answer.

--HDTech

Online Brand Ambassador

- Click here to visit the Samsung forum
- Click here to visit the Samsung store on CNET

I appreciate the response and also understand that you mostly hear complaints instead of praise.

Our TVs were recently purchase so it sounds like if you have the qwerty mini keyboard/remote, which we do, the new keyboard should work. That seems to make plenty of sense to me. If it turns out to be otherwise then I will still be here raising the issue I brought up.

The browser should work at least as well as the browser on my Droid phone. Not supporting flash is an issue. One reason is we have an IP camera we would like to be able to pull up from the TV. Knowing the TV had a browser it seemed logical that we would be able to do that. Most IP cameras need you to use a browser that supports flash to get the images.

cable_dave,

And thank you also for keeping it civil. In some rare occasions, people get angry and lose it, and that really murders the spirit of discussion.

I checked with a few of the guys at our testing lab, and this is what I have found out - this is the best information I have today, so "subject to change and all that", but for the moment, here's what we know:

The 2011 models don't have HID support (human interface devices, like keyboards and mice), and I'm not aware of any plans set to implement that. The remote with a keyboard is not considered an "HID", but instead a "remote control", like any other TV would have. No HID support is available for 2011 models, and it's unlikely that development is going to go into last year's models. (Remember, just the messenger here).

IP cameras need drivers, and it's highly unlikely that any IP device maker has made drivers or an App available for SmartTV's interface. I'm not sure what you mean by wanting the camera to "pull up from the TV", but if you want monitoring or broadcasting options, that's not available even in the 2012 models except in the limited capacity where Skype or other apps might take advantage of it. (It's also used for gesture and facial recognition, so those are other software options not available on 2011 models because they're new for 2012).

Pro-tip: If you're looking for that kind of advanced functionality and at an affordable (I know, that term is vague, so I'll leave it to you) price tag, consider a small computer next to the TV with a wireless keyboard and mouse. Then, you have full browser support, multi-browser support even(!), free Hulu, and the benefits of that go on and on. Additionally, IP cameras offer many options for PCs, and don't require much beyond a small, inexpensive processor. Movie junkie.. err.. enthusiasts often do this because they have videos in all sorts of formats that are supported by computers, but not by all TVs or DLNA standards. No TV or streaming box on the market plays all formats like computers do. None of them. Not yet, anyway, and probably not in the next few years in my professional opinion.

For what it's worth, to add all that functionality to a TV would be prohibitive. Nobody would buy ours over the competitors because the price would outweigh the draw for those features. It's a point of view you're free to debate, but at the end of the day, we have to appeal to everyone with features and a price that are better than our competitors.

Not to mention, the Samsung panels are some of the best on the market.

Flash IS supported with our browser, and if there's something that we can test that's not working for you - such as a website, I can see if maybe we can duplicate it and send it over.

I hope that explains a few things, and maybe puts some of it into perspective. Companies usually don't offer that sort of insight (and I hope I'm not stepping on someone's toes in management), but you asked an honest question that deserved an honest answer. We respect our customers, and I think the dialogue is good for both sides.

--HDTech

Online Brand Ambassador

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We just got out TVs about 2 months ago. How do I tell if it is a 2012 model?

Our IP camera just uses any web browser supporting flash to see the images. I will check it out further and see if I can figure out why it doesn't work.

Might be a nice app to have someone create . . .

The 2012 model numbers would be UNxxExxxx.

If yours is "D", it denotes a 2011 model.
The "E" denotes a 2012 model.

--HDTech

Online Brand Ambassador

- Click here to visit the Samsung forum
- Click here to visit the Samsung store on CNET

I am looking at buying a Samsung 50" LED 6150 Smart TV (model UN50ES6150F).
I have researched compatibility with the new smart wireless keyboard and gotten conflicting info on whether it will work with the TV or not.

Will the VG-KBD1000 and/or VG-KBD1500 wireless keyboards work with the above TV?
Are both these keyboards still available? Seems like the 1000 is now unavailable.

Thanks in advance,

Seeking_keyboard

http://forums.cnet.com/7726-13973_102-5291915.html?tag=posts;msg5291915

As you see they don't tell you exactly which works. Only that HID should work on these new models.

Given a HID keyboard is under 10 bucks here, why would you pay more?
Bob

It's not the cost of the keyboard that I am worried about. It's the cost of the TV.

I don't want to buy that particular TV if the wireless keyboard will not work with it. I have trouble imagining using a browser or search without a real keyboard.

When will the new wireless keyboard featured in the fourth slide at this site be available in the U.S.:

http://www.samsung.com/us/2012-smart-tv/index.html?cid=ppc-&K_CLICKID=6e3b2d5b-b1fb-7a49-ba4f-000034128b86#accessories

ALSO... will my TV support this keyboard? I own the following SmartTV model: PN51E550

Any word on pricing, as well?

You are posting at the limit of this forum so no one can reply.

I'm not able to watch events on ESPN3.com on my browser. I have a UN60D8000 TV..
I also can't watch Vevo YouTube music videos.

I offered the link to the reply where they don't have a list.

And the browser is not that good. Did you try it? It fails on so many sites that you may wonder why you thought it was offered.

It's a shame you are posting at the limit of the forum and can't get a reply.

But about that browser. It's not even close to what you get on a PC.
Bob

If you tell someone you can surf the web with this television, there is an expectation that you can actually do that. Why don't you just tell the truth. It's a great television. However, suggesting that you can surf the web with it is just plain dishonest. Please don't waste time worrying about my unhappiness, I have only posted to make others aware of what the TV is capable so that there expectations are realistic of what the TV can actually do.