Jan 15 Vizio Firmware Update Fixes Issues with P-Series
As many of you know I (Ara) have not been very happy with my VIZIO P702ui-B3 70-Inch UHD. There were three issues that made it hard to watch.
First, every so often, the TV would start stuttering and take on a film like look. This would happen mostly when I was watching sports. It was so bothersome that I created a button on my RoomieRemote to Pause, Play, and Advance the DVR. When I did that the processing in the TV was able to recover and return to a more normal picture. It seemed to happen more on channels that were overly compressed but I saw it happen on over the air signals as well. But since updateing the firmware I have not seen the stuttering issue. That has put a smile on teh face of everyone in the house!
The compression artifacts were yet another issue. I was giving the TV the benefit of the doubt and was saying that the signal coming in was bad. And for the most part that is true, but readers/listeners would send me emails telling me that their large format UHD TVs did not seem to have a similar problem. I scoffed, but now I have changed my tune. The firmware update has greatly reduced compression artifacts. Yes you can see them if you are looking for them but nothing like before. I actually like watching TV again.
The last thing that seems better is off angle viewing. I would never expect a firmware update to improve something like that but it did! Maybe its all in my head. I'll investigate further.
Vizio also updated the Amazon app and added UltraFlix and Toon Goggles which all support 4K streaming now.
A great update that probably should have been there from the beginning but better late than never.
Reader Comments (3)
Great to hear. My slight frustration with my Vizio purchase (P702ui-B3 as well) is that there doesn't seem to be a way to force the firmware to update or downgrade if needed. I still haven't received my update (east coast, not sure if that makes a difference). BTW, what version number is the new one?
Keep up the good work.
Hi David,
The version number is 1.1.14
Ara
I have been reading about this update but I still don't have it on my 60" P-Series Vizio. I read that in the System Information menu item if you did a System Check function and then turned off the TV for 20-30 minutes it would perform the check for new firmware. Well, I've done that several times with no update. I've also heard the update rolls out based on the device's serial number but no one seems to know when/how the updates are really scheduled. The automatic update feature sounds nice, but I would prefer to have a manual update method available also so we could obtain the update on demand.