If you’re an electronics manufacturer, then you’re goal right now is to connect as many devices to the internet as possible. When it comes to appliances in the home, its now decided the fridge will be the next frontier for displays.
Following Samsung’s lead, LG are now showing off fridges with a massive 29″ touchscreen display, but there’s some very important differences between the two.
While Samsung’s family hub refrigerator used a series of cameras to let you see what’s inside your fridge, LG went a completely different direction, instead making the display see-through. The InstaView panel lets you see the products inside, while also augmenting your view of them with digital overlays like expiration dates.
The operating system that runs on your fridge is also important, given you’ll want it to interact with other smart devices in your home. Samsung are running a version of Tizen OS, which also is seen on their wearables like the Gear S3 as well as TVs. LG on the other hand, went with a full version of Windows 10.
The display is in portrait orientation which makes sense as it needs to fit within the constraints of one of the 4 doors, so this makes Windows 10 much more like a giant phone than a computer. Despite that, the large tiles are actually going to work pretty great for touch interactions, and with the power of full Windows, means you have access to any app in the Windows Store.
For those of us who’ve always wanted the hands-free cooking experience with digital recipes, this is a far more elegant solution than a dedicated, barely used display mounted awkwardly in your kitchen. The fridge will have microphones, which allow you to command it via Cortana.
It’s an interesting competition happening here for the premium tier of fridges, one that we’ll need to watch closely as Samsung confirmed this week, they are bringing their model to Australia.
More information at Cnet.
