The remote that comes with the TV is a sore spot here and I 'll tell you why
How is the remote?
The picture is pretty GOOD. I'm not going to say great but it's pretty good for the price. I did some extensive homework before I bought this as I was looking for a smart tv that offered an alternative to hooking it up to several components for a guest bedroom. Instead I liked it so much that I ended up putting this in my bedroom and switching it out with a slightly older Sylvania flat screen I had (great picture) for the guest room. The slim, sleekness of it takes a little getting used to in terms of the screen- you have a thinner frame and more screen to look at if that makes sense. The apps and streaming are pretty good for what you get and Vizio is constantly updating to add more apps. There is a slight learning curve when trying to link it up with your wifi however I found that by turning it off & on after the initial info is entered helped in terms of getting the tv to connect. It took two tries for me but afterwards it was smooth sailing. Again the Netflix, Hulu and other apps are good. There's some interesting freebie channel apps where you can watch old tv shows in there too at no cost so that's kind of nice to have. My favorite feature of this television hands down is the ability to plug in a usb drive and play multiple types of video files automatically without having to hook it up to a PC or DVD player. You can also play mp3 files and look at photos, etc. but I was really impressed by the number of files it would play without too much of a problem. The remote that comes with the TV is a sore spot here and I'll tell you why. They provide you with a smart tv that allows you to access online streaming and other applications yet you get this remote that is more for a basic TV with no buttons such as for launching Netflix or other hotkeys for the streaming apps it offers. This is where Vizio literally Cheapens out this model. The remote is also small, lengthy and complicated in terms of a million tiny keys. There is also no keyboard. You would think that a smart tv would come equipped with a remote that offered a keyboard yet it does not. I realized this is part of the reason why this tv is a bit of a bargain compared to other smart TVs out there. At any rate, I resolved this by replacing the remote with the VIZIO XRV1TV Qwerty keyboard remote (bought here on Amazon for about $12). I know this is not ideal for some because the idea is that you get a brand new tv and you shouldn't have to spend extra $$ on an additional remote however I recommend it in this case as the little cheap universal that comes with this set will drive you mad. You really do want a remote with a Qwerty Keyboard on the back as this will come in handy if/when you do a search on youtube or Netflix or Hulu--you won't be there forever trying to navigate letters on-screen with the up/down remote toggle keys (eyes rolling). Now for the rest of this thing- it's got great picture and some pretty good choice settings for gaming, etc. You just have to get in there and explore it. Some people have complained that the picture looks dimmer than when they saw it on the showroom floor however I just found that I adjusted the controls and it seems to be fine. I believe also that this set has an automatic sensor built-in that adjusts the brightness of the screen depending on the level of light in the room. I have not played with it enough to find out for sure whether or not this is something you can turn off or adjust. There are only two HDMI connections and that can be bothersome to some. For me this wasn't an issue as I don't always hook this up to a PC however it was good to have it hooked up to my cable box but honestly two connections was fine for me. Gamers and PC enthusiasts may get irritated at this small amount of HDMI connections so buyer beware there. Again, this was one of the cheapest smart tv models out there with good reviews that I found so i'm not too surprised it lacks a few things. Some folks have complained at the slowness of the TV to power on and I will say it takes about 20-30 seconds which can get on your nerves. All I can say there is to just have some patience and resist the urge to keep hitting the power switch as I learned the hard way you might actually activate a hard-reset of the television by doing that. That brings me to mention a safety feature the tv has built-in in the event of a power surge or storm. I came home one evening after a wicked rain storm to find the tv buzzing at me every few seconds after I'd turned it on. It kept making a noise similar to those you hear when a weather bulletin flashes on your screen from your local news, etc. I couldn't get the TV to stop doing this so after trying to adjust the settings for a good half hour and finding no solution to this I did some research on the net and found this was a result of a built in sensor that is designed to protect the TV from shorting out if an electrical surge occurs (which apparently did). So the solution to this was to power it off and unplug it from the power source for a good 20 minutes. Once we did this, it came right back on and adjusted to normal as if nothing had happened. Overall it's a very interesting unit with good picture and a fairly good amount of &#34;smart&#34; apps for an entry level smart tv. 