Hello mate. Have you updated the firmware via WiFi?

Thanks!! You saved a lot of people a lot of hassle.

Thats my mind made up then... thanks for your info

I've got mine against a flat wall with nothing to stop the light emitting in any direction. When it's dark, the light creeps everywhere to be honest, so in my opinion this does the job fantastically as is.

You could, think it's about £100 for Ambi strip kit and a extra strip tho which is still cheaper than the high range Ambi TVs, not sure via tv settings you can place strips behind the tv tho, the options are where you are placing Hue lights near the TV, can't even check settings just now as I'm painting and everything is unplugged. But I assume as I don't have any spare strips to try it would be near to being as good as the inbuilt Ambilight on L and R, just not exact, in fact I think the top strip would be enough and the bottom strip may deviate away from the inbuilt or other Hue lights if you had them - I would bet the top strip and a few Hue bulbs would be much more better placed than a top and bottom strip that would omit colour based on the Hue lighting placement setting as top or bottom, the bottom strip rear of the screen would display either top or bottom setting on both, better with top & Hue bulbs - the Hue bulbs generate room, the Ambilight & extra strip the wall, so a Hue bulb/s with the top strip would be much better placed for a full on room dramatic immersive effect. I don't know if you could have a second controller unit/striplight on the system if you wanted a 4 side Ambi wall experience (with or without Hue bulbs) as I never thought about doing it, just bought the Hue 3 set from Argos to complement - I rarely use Ambilight movies/live concerts only, I think it's overkill if you were watching the soaps/news etc and not good for the eyes when then adjusting to non Ambilight away from home - that may not be the case but certainly I strain away from home more using Ambilight constantly at home, even using the TV as a monitor with Ambilight on which I stopped doing at home as non Ambilight monitors then gave me headaches, now I only use it as a home cinema screen with Ambi on.


I hope that allmakes sense LOL

Try TV10, TV10OFF or TV15 (15%)usually one of them always works along with TVSAVE, they change them about in my experience in the last few years as I've used them.

My mate did, also he had a old school tv stand holding his 'box units' simply put them on a shelf (between radiator and tv) below holding his box units (the HTPC, Sky (or was it Virgin?), amp & bluray player). With Hue bulbs threw in to the mix the only place you can put everything really is under the screen.

I've also seen someone who added a additional shelf ontop of the fireplace (and painted it in to match) to take the depth of 'units', they also got a few bits of similar decorative wood fireplace bits and wooden coving from B&Q to tie it all in to the original fireplace as the shelf was out of place due to depth. A few double bits of 3x2 screwed in round the top under the shelf then repeat in top of them but glue on, then glue on coving and then glue on decorative wooden bits wherever to tie it all in, painting all or bits optional of course.

I did a similar thing for someone who could not get permission from a landlord to put run new cables in the wall (and replaster) to the back of the tv. Placed a shelf on top of the fireplace, by cutting out a chamber at the bottom back middle to the right where the power sockets were located to run the power cables up and in to the 'units', also ran power lead and HMDI cable from middle of shelf up the wall to the middle of the tv, the key to 'hiding' wires neatly in this scenario was running them through a slightly stretched (it looked better) nailed to the wood underneath at the middle exit hole and tied at the back of the tv - a old spiral telephone cable with HDMI cables and the power lead running through the middle of it (or have a HDMI changer unit with just one cable, but might be a bit of a pain for the one 4K HDMI, guess a more expensive HDMI changer unit might be needed.

If you go this route, use matt cables (shiny cables somewhat reflect all light sources and for me become a distraction) and a matt spiral telephone cable, also paint the wall the same colour or as near to the spiral cable colour as possible to blend it in well.

Further: you could also replace the Philips original 8 power lead with a spiral 8 power lead and run HDMI cables through that up to whatever side of the tv you want, I choose telephone spiral wire as the owners cat liked to bite wires and they had a toddler so the power cables were slightly more protected from bites and possible electric shocks.

How is it for gaming?

Surprisingly very good. It's the best SD picture I've ever had on a flat / large TV. My last 42" Panasonic was shockingly bad though

I can't comment on that at the mo sorry as I haven't plugged my PS into it yet. One of the posts above says it's fine with a PS Pro, but I'll have a tinker and get back to you

Chuffed , bet you are.Love to have a reason to buy another tv. Have an Led strip round the back of the tv, not axactly Ambilight but nearly there..

So is it running android or not?

Almost all philips model names start with PUS and 49 is just the size, it's the numbers after that which are the specific model. At that price it was likely the 6401 which was popular on HUKD.


This is a brand new model that's just become available, the 50" variant is still marked as coming soon.

EDIT: This model doesn't have android, the new 64_2 model with it doesn't seem to be out yet.

Do you mean this only has ambilight functionality not an actual light built in or that you can tag extra lights around your room onto the same loop?

Update the TV, there have been loads of OS updates for the UK since loads of Argos buyers (prob HUKDers :grin: ) bought these cheap babies, the first update I got was crap, but the recent two updates have been especially a really smooth responsive Android TV OS, my TV remote has gone from slow and patchy to flawless like most the OS. Also get Ambilight colour bulbs.

Like borntooslow I agree...The Ambilight feature is amazing, no need for a light on in the lounge, a very immersive experience, and the screen may not be top of the range but when the eyes are immersed by the walls not just a screen it really isn't noticeable as your eyes and brain isn't 'wholly focused' on a just screen but the whole experience.

My Philips 43" AmbiTV replaced a Philips 42" plasma and the quality of both has been amazing, my previous (still going strong) was a 2007 JVC HD LCD.

In my my opinion this updated 55" is hot to trot!