Samsung TV 2018 Settings Guide: What to Enable, Disable and Tweak

How to Connect Devices to 2018 Samsung TVs

The TV is usually just one piece of a larger home-entertainment setup that includes cable or satellite boxes, media players and/or gaming consoles. Connecting these external devices is a smooth and simple process, thanks to the automatic device detection built into the TV.

1. Connect the device. To connect a new device to your TV, such as a cable or satellite box, open the Home menu.

2. Select the source. Navigate to the source icon on the far left of the menu. Once you've plugged your device into an HDMI port, the relevant input will show up in the source menu as an unknown device.

3. Detect the device. Once you select the source and power on the device, the TV will automatically detect the new input.

4. Wait for the detection to complete. Once a device is successfully detected, the TV will give you an update to confirm that the device has been detected and will then switch to that device as the source.

5. Look for the device on your source list. The newly detected device will now show up on your list of sources, and you will have the option to add it to your Home menu alongside live TV and apps.

6. Rename the device. If you want to give your devices specific names, you can do so in the device manager, or by selecting a device from the source list, pressing up to open up more options and selecting Edit. From this menu, you can give new names to every device you have connected.

Brian Westover

Brian Westover is currently Lead Analyst, PCs and Hardware at PCMag. Until recently, however, he was Senior Editor at Tom's Guide, where he led the site's TV coverage for several years, reviewing scores of sets and writing about everything from 8K to HDR to HDMI 2.1. He also put his computing knowledge to good use by reviewing many PCs and Mac devices, and also led our router and home networking coverage. Prior to joining Tom's Guide, he wrote for TopTenReviews and PCMag.