The Consumer Electronic Show (CES) is starting tonight with press events and officially on Thursday. So what should cord cutters look for from CES 2017?
Smart TVs
Every year CES is a launch pad for new TVs and in 2017 that means smart TVs. Last year the big news was from Roku TV launching 4K TVs and Android TV being available on all Sony-made smart TVs. There was also a big push to HDR TVs that offer brighter pictures and more colors.
So what should we look for at CES 2017 with respect to smart TVs? Expect 2017 to continue the trend of consolidation. A few years ago every TV manufacturer had their own smart TV OS. This created a huge issue for new streaming services because getting their apps on smart TVs meant building apps to work on a wide range of devices on top of making it work on streaming media devices and gaming systems.
In 2016 TV manufacturers started to consolidate behind a few big names of smart TV OS. Roku TV and Android TV came out as the clear leaders as TCL, Sony, RCA, and others ditched their customer smart TV OS to replace it with an OS from other companies.
Expect this trend to continue in 2017 as more manufacturers look to buy into the growing Roku TV and Android TV OS and smaller OSes such as Opera TV and FireFox OS.
Streaming Services
Every year CES is a launch pad for big streaming service news. In 2015 Dish announced Sling TV. In 2016 Netflix announced it was going worldwide.
So what will 2017 bring from streaming services? Right now we do not know but hopefully we will get new details from Hulu, Google, and Vidgo on their new live TV streaming services.
We are also expecting Sling TV to release a new streaming device called AirTV. We know a lot about this device but no release date. It is likely to be announced at CES, but as with all things not officially announced anything could happen.
DVRs
It has been a few years since cord cutters had a major DVR announcement at CES. 2017 seems to be the year that we could get a lot of DVR news as current cord cutting DVRs on the market start to age.
That is my hot list of news we should expect from CES 2017. Is there something you are hoping will be announced at CES? Post what you are excited about in the comments below.
Please follow us on Facebook and Twitter for more news, tips, and reviews.
Need cord cutting tech support? Join our new Cord Cutting Tech Support Facebook Group for help.