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Samsung's Smart Hub certainly has the widest selection of video-centric catch-up and on-demand video apps. Movie services include KnowHow, PictureBox, Lovefilm, Netflix, Curzon On Demand, Acetrax and Blinkbox.
Video apps include YouTube, Viewster, Dailymotion, Vimeo, HuffPostLive, FluxPlayer and the not-to-be-missed Fishing TV, while catch-up TV apps comprise BBC iPlayer and ITV Player. The latter is exclusive to the Smart Hub - at least for now.
Luvvies will lap-up the brand new Digital Theatre app, which presents on-demand stage recordings including Much Ado About Nothing (starring David Tennant and Catherine Tate), Lovesong, Billy the Kid and A Doll's House, complete with trailers.
Nice idea, and although the choice is somewhat limited, the red and black interface is clean and simple to use.
Although it's largely a load of tosh in terms of content, this is one well executed app. It clearly takes its lead from the BBC iPlayer, with its simple carousel of programmes centered, as a default, on the most popular programmes under the heading of 'Don't' Miss', which dynamically unfurls a tab underneath of a further carousel of thumbnails and programme titles.
Go into any one of them and the entire series is often available. The colour scheme of black and blue works well, and there's an info box at the bottom containing data such as programme length, and how many more days it's available for. The only problem is that everything starts with an advert.
Another new app that might pique the interest of movie-goers is Curzon On Demand, an app that seeks to complement more mainstream offerings from the likes of Netflix and Lovefilm with some hard-to-find titles right out of left-field.
'All films' leads to another screen where an A-Z list can be inspected, as well as innovative collections by country, decade, genre and language, as well as a section for new releases and best sellers.
Indie hit 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days, along with the likes of Carravaggio and Hidden, cost £2 each. However, this is a classy, upscale app for serious film buffs, where some titles cost as much as £10 each.
Other new apps include Yabazam 3D (where you can watch - sometimes for free, sometimes for three-five US dollars - 3D shorts such as Elephant's Dream), S[edition] (contemporary art in digital), a full suite of Your Fitness apps (Your Yoga, Your Squat and, err, Your Side Bend…eh?), Krb (a fireplace…that's it), African Cooking Recipes and Funny Sounds (Meow!).
There are dozens of others, and it's worth exploring, since little is natively loaded up on Smart Hub out-of-the-box. It was another app squirreled away in Smart Hub that ought to cause a stir - Spotify.
Sadly we couldn't get it to load, instead getting a message telling us that 'the device firmware does not support this application', despite the firmware being totally up-to-date.
Music fans should know that apps for Absolute Radio and the fabulous TuneIn are also featured, both of which work quickly and simply.
AllShare Play is Samsung's latest name for DLNA networking, though home networking and USB playback now extends to linking with the brand's phones.
Picture-wise, it's down to the mid-powered 3D HyperReal Engine to supply the fireworks. On top of a Full HD resolution, this adds Wide Colour Enhancer Plus, 200Hz Clear Motion Rate, and Motion Plus.
The latter frame interpolation tech is hidden away in the Picture Options menu, with Clear, Standard and Smooth settings, each with different levels of judder and blur reductions.
The accompanying Advanced Settings menu contains white balance, 10p white balance, flesh tone, colour space and gamma sliders. We did notice than when engaging Smart Hub the Samsung UE46ES6300 often switches from default to custom picture settings, and back again, for no apparent reason.
Connectivity comprises three HDMI, three USB, component video, composite video, LAN, an optical digital audio output, and a headphones slot. Unusually, all of this is on the right-hand side as you look at the TV, which is the opposite to most models.
