Trouble with Power On/Off

I am not able to control the power on or off commands consistently to my Samsung TV's using the Tizen driver.  Volume works reliably every time, but power is completely hit and miss.

To clarify, I am getting consistent power on/off with the remote, but when testing within the myServer 6 dashboard it is inconsistent.

So the Power Command for Samsung, Power~On, is actually a toggle so it will also turn off the TV.  This is a bit problematic as when you switch to a different device on the same TV, the Macro uses the Power~On command, which actually turns off the TV, forcing the user to press the power button.  Not the end of the world, but a bit annoying.

Too get around this, I am sending a serial command through the Samsung Ex-Link control.  This seems to recognize Power On, and if sending it again while TV is on doesn't toggle the switch.

Samsung's power commands are a bit funky. There are multiple ways to deal with this.

The Ex-Link port is definitely one way, assuming that you don't need the port for other devices.

If you ever need that port back you can always go back to using IP control and precede the tv power command in your macros with a conditional. I don't know how your macros are configured but it would probably look something like:

If|IsEQ##{{av_1_power}}##false##AV|1~Power~On!

where you substitute the device id of your television for the 1's in the command above. Then myServer will only send the Power On command if the television is currently turned off. Otherwise, it skips to the next line in the macro.

Personally I prefer to use the old Samsung TV driver instead of the Tizen driver for state tracking, but I send discrete commands (including power on/off) via IR using an ip2ir. It's fast, bulletproof, and completely sidesteps the jankiness of Samsung's ip control scheme.

You are very likely seeing why we don't recommend (but do support) Samsung TVs in our commercial installations.
Their power handling is terrible.
they: Don't support discrete Power On / Off, they don't provide power status (so it's a guess if it's on or off).
The ethernet / Wifi modules don't turn off immediately (Nillaz "trick" is already built into the driver).  You have to wait for them to time out and each TV has a different rate.
And - each model can be different.

Their commercial line of TVs ($$) are better at this.
The Frame TV is terrible.  It also screws with which HDMI port is default on turn On.  And you can't discretely select which port to switch to....dumb.  Several projects we have had, the FrameTV that was there got replaced with a Sony.  Maybe someone found the Frame in the garbage?

We have done as good a job over many iterations on what Samsung throws at us as is possible.  I don't think there is a driver in our arsenal that has had more updates.  Note that most all of our drivers support many SKUs.  So, it doesn't look like we have many drivers.  But we support as many devices as most any other control system who throw out a driver specific to one SKU.

My meeting with Samsung at Infocomm next month centers around how many TV sales they have lost because they have no power strategy across their line.

Sony is the best.  LG isn't bad.  Samsung is terrible.  They all have great glass (picture).  Samsung is bought because it's a bit less expensive.

In every day practical usage, Samsung works fine as you aren't toggling the power on / off like you are during system testing.  Most of our commercial installations use Samsung (because of the cost X 50-150 TVs).  Know that Power On (a WOL event) the TV has to be off the network to turn ON (so have patience!).  turn Off is based on having authentication accepted by the TV (another set of issues there).

that's my rant for the day!
 

camens wrote:

Too get around this, I am sending a serial command through the Samsung Ex-Link control.  This seems to recognize Power On, and if sending it again while TV is on doesn't toggle the switch.
 

How do you do this?

It looks like I would need a Global Cache IP2SL, a 3.5 mm to rs232 cable, and use the Generic Serial Driver.  I found the Samsung Consumer RS232 Control Worksheet, which looks like it has a full set of discrete commands.  Am I on the right track?  If the Samsung TVs are such a PITA, why not use this driver for every command?