How to

Slow Google TV: what happens and what helps

Google TV is the newer version of Android TV. The home screen revolves around recommendations: films, series and services, with images and previews that are loaded again and again. On a TV with little memory that makes everything slower.

Why Google TV feels slow

• The home screen keeps fetching new recommendations and images, even when you only want to open your own apps.
• Previews play automatically while you move through the menu.
• Many TVs with Google TV have 1.5 to 2 GB of memory; the home screen and background apps take a large part of it.
• Manufacturers add their own components, such as their own start page or clean-up function (see Slow TCL TV: how to make it fast again).

What you can do yourself

• Remove apps you do not use and clear the cache of large apps.
• Turn off autoplay in the home screen settings, if your TV has that option.
• Use a network cable or 5 GHz Wi-Fi.

The recommendations screen itself simply keeps running.

A calm home screen instead of recommendations

VYS TV replaces the Google TV home screen with its own light home screen showing only your apps, in rows you arrange yourself, with a background photo and the clock. No recommendations, no ads (see Removing ads from the Google TV home screen).

What else VYS TV does

With Optimise TV speed in the VYS TV app it happens in one go: VYS TV becomes the home screen, unnecessary apps and recommendations are turned off, streaming apps no longer run silently in the background, VPN apps may keep running and animations go to 0.5x. Before and after, the app measures free memory, storage, the number of processes, disabled apps, the home screen, animations, the connection, the Wi-Fi signal and whether the VPN is active. So you can see for yourself what it does on your TV.

Before every change the app makes a backup, and with Back to original the TV is as it was again (see Restoring the original home screen).

Questions

Further reading