from perishthethought@lemm.ee to technology@beehaw.org on 07 Jan 2025 03:38
https://lemm.ee/post/51919648
Reposting this from here from 2023, after I stumbled across it tonight and it hits hard.
The text in the image:
I love my smart TV. I love the way it takes a long time to boot up because it’s trying to refresh the advertisements on the home screen. I delight in the way it randomly restarts because it’s downloaded an update without asking me, each of which makes the TV slower and slower with every subsequent install. I adore the way it buries the apps that I want to use, and that I use without fail every single time, below the apps that it’s being paid to promote and which I have never touched in my life and would never use without the cold metal of a glock pressed hard against my sweating temple. I am infinitely thrilled by the way the interface lags constantly, due to the need to have one thousand unnecessary animations rendered on hardware ripped wholesale from a ten year old phone. I feel myself borne aloft on wings of pure joy when I am notified that my data will be collected and analysed to determine my usage patterns. Even now I am writing this from a field of beautiful flowers and soft luscious grass as I lie and look up happily at the bright blue sky, smiling happily to know that this is the future of technology
threaded - newest
My 2017 Shield pro is starting to die and I’m dreading getting another TV box. Anyone have good experience with LibreElec or a similar distro? I am thinking of getting some sub $100 USFF from eBay
Another Shield Pro?
What do you mean by starting to die? Have you tried factory resetting it?
My recommendation is still the 2019 Shield Pro, unless you’re all-in on the Apple ecosystem, in which case the Apple TV is pretty decent.
One issue with a PC is that you won’t be able to stream 4K or even 1080p content from services like Netflix if you run Linux, as Linux only supports Widevine L3 which is limited to 720p. Widevine L1 is needed for 4K content, and it’s only available on more “locked down” OSes (Windows, MacOS, unrooted Android, etc). Of course, that’s not an issue if you’re using Plex or some other form of non-DRM-protected content.
The HDMI Forum are also blocking open-source implementations of HDMI 2.1, so it likely won’t come to open-source Linux drivers for a long time: www.phoronix.com/news/HDMI-2.1-OSS-Rejected. DisplayPort is superior to HDMI (as it does basically all the same things except it’s an open, free protocol) but TVs tend to not have DisplayPort ports since the major manufacturers are on the board that receives royalties from the usage of HDMI. That’s an argument for another day…
Good thing the Shield TV Pro can serve as a Plex server. Just don’t store your content on short thumb drives plugged directly into the device - they can overheat and corrupt, since the device appears to be using them as heat sinks. Use a USB extension cord or hub.
Yes, I’m on CoreELEC with an Odroid N2+ but I only play content without DRM. If you’re streaming DRM protected content you will have an easier time using Android.
No HDR support kiils LibreElec right away for me.
An Android device like the Shield Pro really does seem to be the best choice. I think mine is the later model. The only thing it doesn’t seem to do is AV1 hardware decoding, and it does struggle a little with full 4K BR remuxes. Sometimes I have to reboot it before playing one.
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For me the icing on the cake on that image is the “Translate” link which makes me wonder how you might translate this into say Klingon or CEO talk or ELI 5.
Other than that, it’s a sad state of affairs that we’ve allowed this to happen unchecked and wholesale across the planet.
It’s for people that are confused because there’s no /s at the end.
I honestly wonder how hard it would be to do a full lobotomy on a smart TV and if there would be a big enough market for that kind of service.
best thing is to never hook 'em up to the internet. provided the manufacturers don’t all start requiring internet to ‘set up’ a tv.
next best thing would be a revert of firmware or a full ‘reset’ of settings; if possible. to return it to an ‘out of box’ state–then above, never connect it to the internet.
replacing a cheap streaming device is a hell of a lot cheaper than replacing the tv once the software gets obsoleted for whatever reason.
my coworker (and boss, technically) just casually mentioned that her inlaws ‘updated’ their tvs when they were visting over the holidays. i cringed so fucking hard because i have the same model, just smaller–so i know what happens.
they had just recently hooked-up wireline internet and could actually stream stuff now… so i had just given them a new streaming stick to use instead of connecting their now 3 year old tv to the wifi.
You'd still have the TVs default OS running on a potato. I'm thinking more along the lines of replacing that with a bare bones old school OS that was responsive.
True, but a 3 year old TV with original firmware would have been pre-adpocalypse. My never-connected LG boots pretty quick when it was last on an HDMI port before turning off.
I have heard that some TVs attempt to connect to every WiFi they can find using default credentials even if you never connect it yourself
Wifi doesn’t have default credentials any more… These days, there’s legislation (at least in California) that requires default passwords to be randomly generated, but it’s recommended to have no default password at all and instead prompt the user for a password when setting up the device.
That’s why some access points have the default password either printed on the box or on the bottom of the device.
Oh yeah, that makes sense, thanks!
They’ll just connect via yourneighbors’ smart tv
i wonder if they were dumb enough to just use algorithms based on mac or the default ssid or something… so if you knew the scheme and knew the password composition (characters used, or wordlist, whatever), you could come up with the ‘default’ password for a wifi point.
Companies are probably doing the easiest thing, and it seems easier to make it completely random. I can imagine something very basic like a giant spreadsheet of all the devices being produced, and running some formula to enter a random value into every cell in a particular column.
but then they have to keep that data–and you just know they keep all those passwords. (support call… q:i dunno what the password is/can’t read the sticker. a:gimme x or y off your unit, and i’ll look it up for you).
but if they do it programmatically, all they’d need is the code to recreate any password if given the constant used to create it (the ssid or mac or sn, for instance).
hopefully they would use something that can’t be obtained off the wifi broadcast, like the sn on the unit.
Hmm, yeah, good point. It could be based off a hash of the serial number or something similar.
That’s an important caveat. And it appears that increasingly manufacturers are adding that requirement.
Yup. I bought a roku tv last Nov for a spare bedroom. Thing would not operate without a wifi connection and roku account.
I have mine disconnected from the network, but a certain non-techie member of my household (who doesn’t understand this stuff) keeps re-connecting it when they want Netflix to work, even though I’ve shown them how to do this without connecting the TV to the network.
I connected it once, then set it in the router as „enable child protection -> disable internet access“, gave it a static IP address and also blacklisted that address on my pi hole so that DNS won’t work for it. Then I immediately disconnected it. The router recognizes the TV with its MAC address when it gets reconnected and immediately bans internet access when it gets reconnected.
I’ve set up mine to automatically start on a specific HDMI port, that fixed the issue for confused family members.
To find the feature though was not easy. Had to look up how to access the hotel mode hidden menu. Apparently LG has extra features it only wants hotels to be able to use.
It’s more that hotels will buy in bulk if a TV has the features they want - and those “hotel mode” controls being hidden from typical hotel guests is one of those features.
Connect the TV to wifi, then go into your router’s settings and block it. It’s usually under “Access Control” or “Security”.
I have simply blocked internet access (but not local network access) for mine. I only use it for jellyfin and Nintendo Switch tho.
i haven’t even turned on my tv in over a year because of that bullshit. i’ve just been using a monitor + laptop + 2.1 pc speakers.
Same, but I go the other route. Laptop to wall sized tv and sound system.
We still watch free, over-the-air TV, so need the tuner. Free PBS and NHK for the win.
You can get an HD Homerun. It’s a network tuner so you plug the antenna in it and then, you can watch tv on pretty much any device through the app (pc, google tv, android, iOS, etc). You can even record, pause live tv, etc…
Well that’s way beyond the original question, sorry to derail the thread ;)
Never heard of that option so thanks for the info! That could be the missing piece if I ever get a non-Smart TV.
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99.9% of all these “problems” can be solved by using an ablocker DNS and a couple of adb commands (on Android).
I’d be setting up a pihole if I had a smart tv
I went from pihole, to Adguard Home to (finally) ControlD. I chose to eventually outsource the DNS because I was letting all family without connection when playing with my miniserver :-P
I thought this doesn’t work cause AndroidTV forces its own DNS server, specifically 8.8.8.8, Googles own.
It works, but it needs a bit of work. In particular, you need a router capable of redirecting all DNS call to the DNS you specify (Asus routers can do that, for instance). Moreover, one should also use a blocklist to forbid the connection to most common DoT/DoH public servers, such as
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists/main/adblock/doh-vpn-proxy-bypass.txt
tl;dr It can be done and it’s relatively easy, but one has to learn how to do it and choose proper tools (HW and SW).
Too bad adv commands are blocked on firetvs 😢
Well, yeah, though luck… Amazon (the store) is entirely banned from my house.
Last I looked, we could still buy commercial displays. They’re dumb TVs. They cost more, of course.
Can you give a recommendation? I too looked for big displays and found commercial ones to be used as digital billboards but the specs weren’t all that good (no oled, no hdr).
www.techforless.com/products/NEC/…/M431.html?id=7… This one is HDR.
OK, but it’s edge-lit and extremely tiny. You can get much better Smart TVs for less money, and then just never connect it to the internet
I can’t, unfortunately. I still have an old Smart TV that isn’t too offensive and doesn’t show me ads. If it starts showing me ads sometime, then it’s gone. But I’m not really a videophile and I’ll watch shows on anything so I haven’t really looked at what’s better, only at what’s cheapest. I do hear it can be tricky because the commercial displays are meant to be brighter than TVs and maybe it can be hard to get them dialed in the way you want.
We have a Samsung “smart” TV, hooked up to an AppleTV box. The TV’s original remote is in a drawer somewhere, forever unused.
I have the apps that I need, the tiny Siri Remote turns on the TV and handles volume, and, apart from the aggressively, insanely, mind-blowingly horrible on-screen “keyboard” / text input (we don’t have Apple phones we can use to mitigate this, sadly. Also, what the fucking fuck, Apple?!) we’re happy. For now. I trust Apple to make the experience incrementally worse as a fact of life.
Not perfect, but leagues better than dealing with Samsung’s interface.
I remember the ancient times when you could buy something, turn it on, then have it do what you want it to do. Setting the clock was the difficult part. Other than that, it just worked.
Learning ESPHome has been the most liberating thing. Take back control of your home. Local first. Privacy respecting.
I spy a research rabbit hole in my near future … 🐰
Edit: ESPHome is a system to control your microcontrollers by simple yet powerful configuration files and control them remotely through Home Automation systems.
Maybe give nowsci.com/only-sensor a shot? I built the guides/schematics/models for ESPHome devices as a learning experience for myself.
@SkyNTP@lemmy.ml I felt the same way. Now I just keep making new things for it, currently on garage door opener, blinds opener, and may even automate turning on my DIY solder fume extractor.
Esphome is limiting though. Want to have a sensor that spawns a camera stream only on PIR detection, and then sleeps? Forget about it, those two will run in parallel, and the debug messages are terrible.
I find it more liberating to write in C, and then setup my own mqtt protocols when I want for HA to interact with
I agree. A few years ago I wanted to activate a fan based on temperature in a server cabinet, and offer a REST and MQTT APIs (for HA). It was impossible with ESP Home for some reason, if you added the Bosch 280 sensor you couldn’t use MQTT. Very arbitrary limitations.
It took me less than 2 hours to build it with an ESP32 + Arduino. It’s all libraries that you just need to put together at this point, barely any logic at all.
I may never recover from this rabbit hole. ESPhome works with so much of the crap I already have.
Get in car after SO used it. Her BT connects. She goes into BT settings and disconnects. The phone auto reconnects. She turns BT off. The phone turns it back on. She is stuck in a loop. I can never connect phone ever again.
Technology is amazing.
Ah! I was reading that post yesterday lemmy.world/post/22309068 as I am looking for a 55’ 4K oled dumb display.
So far no joy.
Apparently some manufacturers makes internet mandatory at first boot and even if you block or disconnect it later it will nag you for firmware update every now and then.
The only possibility I have found for an EU customer at the moment is Sony Bravia. Yup Sony sucks but apparently Bravia’s let you choose to refuse the terms of service and not use the smart things, thus making them dumb tv.
But maybe I’m wrong, maybe it’s not the case anymore or maybe they will decide to change that.
That sucks, if any of you knows about a commercial display/computer monitor/dumb tv in oled 4K hdr 55’ available in Europe, I might fall a little bit in love with you.
I recently got the Bravia XR-55A95L probably going through the same thought process as you. You can indeed just skip all the TOS and set it up as a Basic TV.
However: The software is crap. Complete garbage. Random reboots - I already had to reset it once completely because it no longer showed a picture (and then set it up again). Every day it will show you a notification that it’s not connected to the internet DESPITE having networking disabled completely.
I tried to update the TV from USB and it failed every time. I eventually gave in and connected it to the internet to update it only to see that I‘m already on the newest version (which I assume is also why updating from USB failed with a generic error).
I never had this much trouble with a device that costs as much as a MacBook or a high end gaming PC and I would’ve already returned if the competition wasn’t even worse.
Ah shit.
Thanks for the feedback, it is greatly appreciated as those things are expensive.
I guess we are fucked until the EU make a new pro-consumer law. But that would take years (if they ever make it).
Another possibility would be to use a projector (it is only for homelab NAS movies afterall). I have a xgimi in my bedroom and it is somewhat great once connected to the free AppleTV my ISP gave me. Otherwise the default google tv OS on it is pure shit.
The competition doesn’t sound worse to me. My smart tv from 2019 is rock solid.
Sony is just known for amazing picture quality and abysmal software, so that’s just par for the course. If you want a stable TV return it and get some of the other models using the same panel (IIRC a QD OLED from Samsung Display).
AFAIK, LG still do not require internet access on first startup.
At least on their medium/high end lines (C and G series).
This was a hard requirement for me. Mine has never been on the internet.
That’s good to know, thanks.
But after my message this morning I decided to try out my xgimi projector in the living room instead of the bedroom.
It is perfect like that and I will give the tv (old LG 1080p). A bedroom is not a home cinema anyway, because you don’t want crumbs in the bed 🙄
I love having a projector in the living room.
I won’t lie, it gets used far less than I’d like.
But it cost me almost nothing, and it’s just fun to have a massive wall of video.
I’m sure they exist (though at what price point?) but I have a hard time imagining a projector (and a surface to project on), that can reach anything close to the black levels of a modern OLED panel.
Again, I’m sure they exist, but at comparable prices?
That’s a room treatment issue. You need to control light and reflections, because your “black” is just however dark the projector screen is.
Is that true? Because I was under the impression that even the darkest “blacks” from a projector, are still made from the light coming from the device. Which is not necessarily the same thing as a pixel on an OLED TV being set to “off”.
But I am far from an expert. Also, as I said, I’m sure some really amazing projectors are out there, I just imagine they’re cost prohibitive for most people.
You’re probably thinking of contrast, which is the ability of the projector to avoid bleeding light into areas that shouldn’t have any. But as far as the darkness of the black levels, that’s down to room treatment (and the screen surface, to a lesser extent). After all, a projector emits light, and darkness is simply the absence of light. You can’t “make” darkness, you can only remove light.
I understand all this… But when I watch a movie, the “black” that I’m seeing in a particular scene isn’t the absence of light, because it’s not actually “black.” It’s a very very dark shade of grey or brown or whatever. And that requires light. Even if there is some actual “black” (spots where no light is coming out of the projector), there will still be a gradient, and immediately after “no light,” you will have a light attempting to project a very dark shade. And that will need light from the projector to display.
Maybe there is a way to encode a video for projector that accounts for this, I don’t know.
What you’re seeing are the deactivated TV pixels absorbing light. This doesn’t work with a projector screen because the screen is of course designed to be reflective, otherwise you wouldn’t see anything. Point a projector towards a piece of black velvet and you see… black velvet.
This is the contrast I was referring to earlier. It’s basically the accuracy of the projector in defining a limit between the areas it’s lighting up. But if you do this in a room with the lights on and the windows open, the image will be completely washed out regardless of how high the projector’s contrast is.
Maybe the best way to think about it is not dark, but the absence of more light.
On a DMD projector, we use tiny micromirrors for each pixel which flash thousands of times per frame of video.
The flash/no-flash ratio decides how much light makes it out of the projector. This gives us over a thousand light levels per colour channel, from near dark, to full light.
When the mirrors are not in position, the light output is very low. (1/1000th of the full output, on a projector with a static 1000:1 contrast ratio)
The screen is designed to reflect light well, which means in a non-perfect room, it will have a light floor of the reflected ambient light, plus whatever still makes it through the projector (as Cygnus mentioned, room treatment).
If you do treat a room well enough that the small amount of light that makes it through the projector at all-off is a problem, you can do things like fitting an ND filter to the lens (reducing the full light output, while also reducing the minimum).
Or you can use the dynamic iris fitted to some projectors (which reduces the amount of light being put out based on the overall scene illumination, similar to the way LCD TVs lower the backlight level to “reach” contrast ratios of 100000:1).
To have a massive wall of video, you need to have a home spacious enough for a whole spare wall first! I haven’t seen a <1m screen that would fit in the kitchen corner my TV occupies on an arm - I don’t even think a projector would work with a screen this relatively small. And where would the projector itself go if opposite of that corner is the couch/bed? Sit on my lap?
My LG so far doesn’t nag about no internet. If you have all AI features disabled at least.
Does Sony suck? I mean, their “SmartTV” software is garbage, but so is every other brand.
The picture on my Sony Bravia OLED is better than anything I’ve seen, including relatives’ LG OLED panels.
But yeah, the software side is trash.
I recently got a TCL TV that has Google TV on it. The reason I chose it, even tho it’s not the highest quality 4K capable TV, is that on first boot it gives you the option to choose dumb TV or smart TV modes. Have never connected it to the internet. Maybe you would have some luck looking into that!
I also recently got a tcl with google, and haven’t hooked it to the internet.
The OS on it isn’t very good (seriously too many menus in too many places), it sets full brightness and then reduces to setpoint when you change inputs, and I haven’t figured out why it boots up my ps4 every time I turn on the tv, but beyond that I’ve been pretty happy with it.
It’s a very decent dumb tv.
Same. TCL is pretty good at being a dumb TV.
Wouldn’t trust it if it is connected to the internet though.
Have a difficult time relating to people who still tolerate this from leisure technology. A screen one can liberate can be found pretty readily at hand for any range of prices in the rust belt but maybe it is different where you are.
Any suggestions? When I moved out I looked everywhere for a dumb TV. The only catch is I’m not willing to downgrade to standard definition.
<img alt="1000009274" src="https://sopuli.xyz/pictrs/image/4c95f84a-433a-4c4b-873d-971ddf2a8fb0.webp">
<img alt="" src="https://lemmy.zip/pictrs/image/c2b24475-b515-4275-a050-0556f5002c13.webp">
Its only a matter of time.
Is Sony actually a good guy for holding this patent so that no one else can go and do this shit either?
Is there any indication that they won’t implement this shit at some point?
Also, should we be trying to come up with the most insane “features” in this vein that we can imagine (knowing full well that some corporation will come up with them eventually), and then patent them to protect humanity from them?
Is there any organization that collects patents just to block them (in the consumer’s favor)? A kind of white-hat patent troll? And, if not, should we create one?
As if they’d ever let you skip adverts, even by dancing for them like a monkey.
Insert verification can copy pasta
Sir, yes sir!
Actual Post
Thanks!
And it won’t stay on the selected input. No signal? Gotta go back to the screen with ads.
Which brand is this? So I never have to go near it…
I have a Samsung TV from a few years ago, never connected it to the TV, so when I turn it on it just goes to the last used input (HDMI1 in my case). The bootup isn’t even that slow , maybe 5 seconds or so. Not great, but not terrible…
Vizio.
Same here, Samsung from 2019.
And this is why I went back to an iPod classic
Maybe I got lucky with my Philips oled running Android TV, but it’s pretty quick, no ads other than recommended shows from networks, and I can choose which ones. I don’t recall it asking about data collection, but whatever the streaming services are doing it already. I like having all the streaming apps built in, then I don’t have to manage another device for this. Overall I’m surprisingly happy with it.
Fucking ads on my tv home would be an instant refund, unbelievable.
I got no ads on an lg oled, but it’s infuriatingly slow.
Isponsorblock can be run on a local docker machine with the original youtube client to make the experience more bearable.
Mine isn’t any slower than the AppleTV I used before. No issues there either. My only wishes would be for it to have parental controls and let me change the screensaver.
OT, and I'm usually not the type that comments with gun trivia, but
Wasn't Glock famously made of ceramic polymer and became popular for evasion of metal detectors?
Sorry for the sidetrack, that single point irks me even if it's way outside my wheelhouse.
Nope, that's a line in Die Hard 2 that the armourer hated.
I recently got into amateur radio and the radio usage in Die Hard 1 is bonkers. They both talk at the same time a ton, it’s just all over the place.
As a qualified amateur operator, I’ll just say: that problem isn’t exclusive to die hard movies, nor die hard 1.
Over and out!
Just don’t.
I was in the signals corps as a cadet and every time I hear it... grrr...
Yeah, I recently got licensed and have had an interest. Someone mentioned the movie Frequency and I saw the same thing in the trailer lol.
Pretty much everything gets it wrong in stone capacity. Some get very close, but fall short of representing radio in reality.
You may find this video fascinating. I didn’t realize how much of it would be about radio technology. It’s about Amelia Earhart’s last flight and how she navigated and stuff. Really interesting.
youtu.be/zTDFhWWPZ4Q
I think I’ve already watched this. Interesting stuff.
That tells you all you need to know about my sources for firearm trivia! I don't even remember watching DH2 😄
It's such a legendary bit of misinformation that it gets an explicit mention on the Wikipedia page!
Incidentally, the carbon-fibre pistol from The Dark Knight isn't a real thing either 😉
How about using computer for all the smart stuff and leaving all the visual stuff to the display? Besides, you can run Firefox and ublock origin to watch YT without ads, so what do you need a smart TV for?
Because it’s “convenient” and people are lazy.
Because finding dumb screens is actually difficult and smart TVs are cheaper.
Last time I was looking for a TV I couldn’t find a single dumb TV unless I wanted to roll back to standard definition, which makes the text in a lot of modern video games unreadable.
From my experience, it’s best to just buy a used dumb screen. Check if it’s working properly and doesn’t have any screen problems and you’re golden.
That’s what I did, hence only finding standard def. :( I assumed that was the only option, actually. If someone is even making new ones, I’d probably have better luck there.
Yeah… I got a Sony OLED as my most recent TV and the picture is incredible. Best I’ve ever seen.
Even if I could find “dumb” TVs, I doubt they reach that level of quality.
But you don’t need a dumb TV.
The smart part isn’t what makes those TVs bad. It is the internet connection that sends you ads, scrapes your data, causes lags and reboots because of updates, and makes your network less secure.
Just connect an other device over HDMI like you would a dumb TV, and never connect it to the internet like you would a dumb TV.
Except some models won’t let you do anything until you “activate” your smart TV, which requires an internet connection.
Wrong
The “smart part” absolutely makes those TVs bad. The meme even addresses this with the line about hardware being ripped wholesale from an old smart phone. Smart TV hardware barely functions when it’s brand new. Fuck everything about smart TVs.
What if I just want the screen to turn on, displaying the last output I used? No, we gotta boot Android and then select the output through a menu for no reason
My TV boots to the last input selected. It’s a smart tv.
Mine too, just takes a while to go through all the google, android, TLC screens before it gets there.
Good thing that is only at the start.
That’s true. I was even more tech illiterate back then than I am now and couldn’t figure out how to switch inputs without going through the menu, which I couldn’t get to without connecting to the internet and going through the whole setup process.
No going back now since I mostly cast from my phone these days since it’s the laziest way for me to watch without ads.
People don’t hate ads enough to go through the trouble of using better options. Once you’ve lived without ads for a while, there’s no going back.
I have a cheap N100 mini-PC with Lubuntu on it with Kodi alongside a wireless remote as my TV box, and use my TV as a dumb screen.
Mind you, you can do it even more easily with LibreELEC instead of Lubuntu and more cheaply with one of its supported cheap SBCs plus a box instead of a mini PC.
That said, even the simplest solution is beyond the ability of most people to set up, and once you go up to the next level of easiness to setup - a dedicated Android TV Box - you’re hit with enshittification (at the very least preconfigured apps like Netflix with matching buttons in your remote) even if you avoid big brands.
Things are really bad nowadays unless you’re a well informed tech expert with the patience to dive into those things when you’re home.
There’s no HDR on Linux solutions. And I do like the HDR.
You can at least swap out the launcher and remap the buttons on the nVidia Shield Pro if you’re that way inclined. It’s not perfect, but there’s fewer compromises.
You get the full fat versions of paid streaming services as well, although I mostly use Jellyfin now.
The only MiniPC solution that does everything right now is going to involve Windows 11…
Meanwhile, the marketing department reading this: “Boss! It’s working! The people are actually enjoying it!!”
“Also, can someone get the engineering team on the phone to figure out that glock thing?”
Don’t worry, silicon valley is already making headway into government (where all the big guns and the monopoly on force is).
Sounds like an obvious spot in the market for a bullshit-free smart TV. You’d just have to get the UX right.
Yeah, it’s bound to happen eventually, although they’ll probably never be exactly as good or cheap as the ones for the sucker mass-market. Think Fairphone.
In the meanwhile, we just have to keep kludging in old solutions or alternate solutions, like a monitor. Or you could personally launch an enterprise if you’re so positioned, I guess.
I’m surprised I’ve yet to hear of a homebrew industry of completely cutting out the microcontrollers and soldering in a Pi or something to drive the raw display. I don’t predict it to be easy, but it doesn’t seem completely unobtainable?
Flashing a custom bootloader would be even better, but I assume that hasn’t been done because they got that shit cryptographically locked down at the chip level.
There’s definitely custom ROMs; I run one on my current phone. You should too, if your model makes it possible - they tend to be OSS Android forks and can do whatever the stock one can, but better. (DivestOS being my personal choice, for the Google-freeness)I suppose I could have cut out the SoC and replaced it with the same SoC but not locked already. I didn’t think of that, lol! Maybe I still could - it’s still relatively new, but selling the thing feels like letting a great evil back into the world. I have no idea how hard the particular one is to pull apart in a controlled manner.Using a different chip would be pretty hard. You said microcontroller, but a phone is closer in function to a desktop PC than a dishwasher. There’s high-bandwidth things going on and you’re going to need a lot of bespoke circuitry and software to kludge it. Forget about the end product having the same form factor, too.What?
This is a discussion about televisions.
Fuck, wrong thread.
Somewhere else I was talking about a phone I bought expecting I could flash it, but that I couldn’t. I read this as a reply to that.
Yeah, it seems like it should be doable. Actually, it’s weird that big monitors cost so much considering it’s the same size of display.
I’m in the market for a new tv and all this crap just makes me want to scream in frustration. But prolonging the decision will just make it even worse.
On top of that my 2017 shield is starting to show its age and there is really no comparable 4k (streaming) alternative thats not a security risk. I feel more and more pushed towards piracy, so that I can use my linux box and decide how and where to watch content. I hate it…
smart TVs mostly can be used as a dumb TV if you reject the terms of services when you set it up. I understand they are annoying, but people making such a big fuzz about them are clearly just fabricating drama.
You don’t even have to reject the terms of services, just never connect it to the internet. Not even once.
Won’t even be able to send rejections to a server.
I can recommend TLC, they can be used as a dumb TV and never need an internet connection if you just use it as a screen. Wouldn’t recommend them with internet though since the remote literally has a microphone build-in.
But I want to use the Internet. I want it to be able to access my network files and to cast video from my phone. Why does it have to be either all or nothing?
And the next generation my well have capability to connect to cell towers or something (for your convenience!). Or just refuse to work without internet access (for security!).
If you don’t allow us to track you, you’re probably a terrorist and a pedofile!
Consider an Android TV device. Fire TV Stick at the low end, Shield TV Pro at the high end. Not much point to anything in between.
Or a Raspberry Pi. Is more expensive ($60 for my Pi 3), but I think it was worth it due to versatility and privacy. Stock Android TVs would be uncomfortable as they spy on you.
You can do that with any small connected pc.
I think it is a drama, because it’s not just the tvs doing that. Almost everything is getting more and more annoying and restricting. Things are starting to constantly nag you one way or another, shove things into your face you don’t care about, take away functionality and generally worsen user experience… It’s just mentally exhausting.
And yes I know you can reliably turn that data collection stuff off (at least in the EU) but hopping through those hoops each and every time for each and every device and service can and will hollow out your resolve (and you have to find all the buried options every time…). Thats how you get masses that just don’t care anymore.
I honestly think the issue is that these people want a SmartTV but are annoyed about its downsides. When I bought my current TV I disabled the smartOS but ended up enabling it back because I did find value on its features.
I think the complaints are not well articulated. They do want the smart TV they just want good ones that dont spy on them or show ads.
Exactly! I just don’t want constantly have to fight my devices. It tires me out and sucks the fun out of them.
Interesting. I wonder how long that will last.
You really think the technology being inside there and capable of switching on at any time is just drama?
Found any promising leads? My Samsung is still holding on but I know I’m counting the days until it’s time to replace it
I’m still agonizing over it. However, I stopped caring as much and decided to focus on picture and capabilities. I’ll use it as dumb tv and try to beat whatever streamer will follow my shield into submission. Saves me getting a new dac for my hifi as well as none of my possible choices seem to support usb audio passthrough.
My biggest problem right now is that I always end up in the premium oled section ;)
Generally it’s not too hard to disable the smart TV part of it and just use HDMI for TVs running Android. But on Roku TVs for whatever reason you need to connect them to the internet and a Roku account at least once to unlock the picture settings. Hardware features of a TV like brightness adjustment have no business relying on some random server.
I wish there was a company like Fairphone or Framework laptops but for TVs.
LCD panels do exist. They are just very expensive because they are not made for consumers and have no ads or data collection.
It’s almost like ads and data collection subsidize the hardware and make it cheaper…
Tbh I bought my last tv when 1080p lcd was the hot new thing and it was NOT cheap. If buying a dumb tv/“display” is just the same thing I’m used to? Fine.
That lcd is still kicking though so I won’t find out until it’s dead.
I’m surprised nobody has yet jail-broken Samsung and LG TVs and made a custom Tizen ROM
Probably too many models with too many varying components for anyone to bother trying…
Maybe that is why they make 20 slight variations of every model.
sceptre.com/…/4K-UHD-TV-category1category73.html
These don’t seem to be particularly new panels. $600 and only 97% of the sRGB color space (= ~78% DCI-P3), meanwhile a similarly priced LG “QNED” can do 90-95% of DCI-P3. I’m not sure you can even call those TVs HDR if they’re only 8-bit color. None of these models can even remotely compare to a brand new OLED TV.
I never understood why people hated smart TVs until one day mine decided to install an update that presents me with advertisements and a hub screen when I turn it on. If I don’t select something in time, the screen disappears, which locks all of the controls, and I can only reset it by turning it off and on again. Why??? Just why?!?!
You know why.
Here is what I do: I use a firetv with Kodi, Plex, Smart tube Next (free YouTube), and various live TV apps. That’s it!
Unfortunately there is zero way to disable the home screen in order to run a custom desktop environment and there is zero way to replace the Netflix, primetv, DirecTV, etc. buttons on the remote.
Seems like every year it gets harder and harder to change settings on the TV and all the things I just mentioned not being able to do used to be things you could hack together.
It sucks!
I used a Fire TV for a while (because it was cheap and you could sideload almost any Android app), but at some point I got tired of the awful (and increasingly worse) UI and sluggishness of the device, so I splurged on a Shield TV Pro a few years ago. It’s night and day in terms of performance alone - and yes, you can change the function of any remote button with the Button Remapper app. Custom launchers are also possible, although I haven’t tried this in a while.
The main downside is that the device has much less reliable WiFi, for some reason. After some infuriating days of troubleshooting attempts, I solved that issue once and for all by relocating a meshnet satellite close to the device and running an Ethernet cable.
This is why I am dreading when my 2017 dumb TV dies. It’s really telling that dumb TVs, which should be cheaper to produce and sell, are either not available or very expensive (as in commercial displays). Really proves the point that the consumer is really the product.
Projectors come with their own set of issues, but at least you can still get a really good one without all the “smart” features.
I have a Samsung smart TV and the operating system on it is so annoying. It’s so slow, has dumb ads, and I can’t cast to it like at all.
I’m even more pissed that they just disabled the Steam Link app for essentially no reason; it worked great for streaming games from my PC.
I’ve been thinking it would be cool to flash a different OS onto it, but I’m not sure if that’s actually possible.
I was dumb enough to get a random Samsung phone for a while. The ROM was on the SoC so it wasn’t possible to change short of getting out an atomic force microscope.
Sounds like smart TVs usually have older hardware, though, which could actually be a saving grace.
Rented a house over the holidays that had a Samsung Smart TV.
The UI is mind-bogglingly bad and slow.
The remote is also absolutely terrible and unintuitive. The keys that feel like they should be the arrow keys… aren’t. So even simple navigation through menus is painful.
There is a brand that makes dumb TVs.
sceptre.com/…/4K-UHD-TV-category1category73.html
Good to know about, thanks a lot!
Keep in mind that these are low-end TVs with, according to reviewers, generally subpar picture and sound quality, with quality issues that make them worse to look at than even old TVs. If you just need “a TV” and your only concerns are that the device is flat, the image in color and some sort of noise is escaping the speaker holes, they’ll do, but don’t expect anything more than that. To me at least, it makes more sense to not connect a smart TV to the network and use a separate streaming device attached to it.
I would even buy a slightly older used dumb TV from a reputable manufacturer over one of these sketchy things, since it’s not like LCD TVs are finicky technology - they tend to last for an incredibly long time in my experience, easily 15 years or more. On my parents’ 2008ish Toshiba (1080p and every analog and digital input in the known universe, which, in combination with an excellent analog upscaler, makes it awesome for old games consoles - but it’s of course no looker in terms of colors by modern standards), the only thing that has broken so far is the spring of the power button, so I bent a wire press it in and a switch at the plug to be able to turn it off completely.
This is getting a bit off-topic, but a relative of mine replaced her flatscreen TV from 2002 (!) just two years ago - and it was still working fine, but since it only had an analog tuner and SD resolution, she was looking for an upgrade. I got her a small 4K OLED from Samsung (since discontinued) and she’s very happy with it (even the “smart” features are quite inoffensive), although I did have to get her a soundbar as well, because if there’s one thing that has regressed on TVs, it’s sound quality, in part due to how ever thinner and lighter designs have reduced speakers to little more than phone speakers on some devices.
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Good luck finding them though, we’ve never found a place either offline or online that sells them.
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That assumes we are in the US, whomp.
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Not really, apologies we came off that way.
We just haven’t seen them where we live, online or offline, though we would really like to.
Thank you, hope you have a great week!
Hey no worries fellow human, context and tone are hard on internet text chat. I probably came off as a snarky bastard. Enjoy your month! ;)
None of us are a guy, thank you though. We appreciate it!
Edited
We aren’t human as stated in our profile. However, we appreciate you trying 🙂
I don’t know why you’re being so argumentative. They mentioned that they’re hard to get. You countered with one store in one country that has them. They then pointed out that actually, no, it’s still not easy to get. It’s a pretty damn common interaction between Americans assuming everyone has the same experience as them, and the rest of the world whose experience is very different.
I will remove comments, sorry for offending you.
At only double the price of an equivalently priced smart one! Bargain ~/s~
The smart ones are sold at cost or at a loss, and your privacy is then sold to subsidize the profits. A dumb tv costs more money up front (since it’s not subsidized by your privacy), but it costs far less in overall value. It’s a tradeoff that the consumer needs to make. The lovely thing, is that (for now, at least) it is still a choice we can make.
Which is an entirely fair compromise for people who use Lemmy, but means precisely nothing to the majority.
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Well that’s not true. They have been in business for 40 years. They sell TVs for people who don’t want anything except video in. Mainly commercial places like offices, stadiums, etc.
Yes because the majority own/buy TV’s commercial places like offices and stadiums.
I’m not understanding what the point is that you’re trying to make? I’m sorry.
I said that the privacy concerns being worth the cost of a “smart”-free TV means nothing to the majority of people.
You said that this isn’t true, and that their main customer is commercial places.
I suggested, in response to this, that the majority of people don’t own such commercial places.
What part are you not understanding?
Ah ok…
I was disputing the implication that this type of dumb tv only matters to Lemmy users. I felt as if that was an implication you were making in your first message. You left that out of your summary here.
Agree that the majority of people don’t want to pay for a dumb tv, and in fact I’d think that the majority of people would not even like a dumb tv. A tv with built in apps to access services is far more desired by the vast majority.
Or you could just block the Spyware TV from accessing the internet.
Not all tvs allow you to do that. Some require you to be online. Some took it a step further and are equipped with 4/5G modems to bypass your network restrictions.
I’d take it back to the store as broken. Never heard of that though.
Never heard of this either and it would raise a massive stink in the EU. Can you share an example?
Both of these were in the USA. The first was with a friend’s purchase, the latter was an article he sent me. It’s been a little while, but I know one was Samsung, but can’t remember the other brand or which was which.
I wouldn’t put it past Samsung to try and force you to have internet access enabled so they can spy on you.
However having additional hardware to directly access the internet via cellular is a bit much. That might have been an Aprils fools article by some IT site.
When Sony tried to install root kits on PCs of folks just trying to watch a movie on a legit purchased DVD there was a quite large shitstorm.
Not an April fools, but it might have been a plan they (whoever it was) chose to later not follow through with.
I vaguely remember the Sony fiasco.
A set of torx screwdrivers and an exacto knife will take care of that. Pretty hard for a cellular modem to transmit data when the traces to the antenna are cut.
We have an older 2012 1080p Sony 55" TV. Super thin, still works great. It had a few “smart” things it could do, like local tv guide, weather. Very simple stuff, nothing like streaming apps. Those basic smart things haven’t functioned in a while. Support ended for them a long time ago. I’ve had a negative opinion for smart TVs since then. Having those functions sitting there broken drives me nuts.
We always used some type of streaming box. Started out with some Roku’s for a long time that worked okay until they updated them enough to run like shit. Ads were never egregious but you could tell where the trend was going. A friend let me have an older Nvidia Shield TV. It was FILLED with ads for shit we didn’t care about. Google Play store shit, Nvidia shit, advertisement shit, AHHHHHHH. It too eventually was updated enough to where everything runs like shit. I looked into a lot of self contained media systems from no names on Amazon, but I just didn’t trust them. I could set up a PC to do it all and I’d be fine with it but my wife wants something easy to use.
Sooo I ended up going with an Apple TV. So far it’s been really nice. Zero ads on the home screen. It lists the previous content we were watching and then our streaming apps below it, that’s it. When you move the cursor over the Netflix or other apps it lists what you previously watched and some recommendations for other shows but it’s not in your face or moving anything around to do it. There are some apps you can’t remove, but I just made a folder and threw them all in there. It’s nice but it’s costly at around $140. So far for me, I’d say it’s worth it. We only use Netflix, Hulu and Plex on it, but all of them work great. It also supports the Steam Link app. I use it some, but I’ve started to use Moonlight that is installed on my Steam Link device instead, since the picture and stream quality is a lot better.
I also have an Apple TV and like it a lot. It’s the only Apple device I use regularly, I’m definitely not an Apple fanboy, just heard that run well and there was a specific app they support that I wanted so I went with that. Only thing I dislike is the remote. God that touch pad thing is awful. My wife says she thinks it’s because my hands are big, but idk. But other than that, great experiences with it overall.
I just never connect my TV to the internet and never have any problems. My old Chromecast is showing its age though.
Same on the old Chromecast :(
I actually did connect my TV when I first set it up. One of the first things it did was download an update which bricked the wifi on the TV, so the problem kind of solved itself
Hah, I was going to say, I do check for updates at least once when I first get it, because I have run into TVs that shipped with HDR bugs in the stock firmware.
For the Chromecast, what happens with yours? Mine randomly restarts, or reconnects to wifi, or sometimes Plex has trouble buffering until I reboot it.
I recently bought a raspi5 to try out FCast, though currently afaik only Grayjay supports it.
Exactly that.
I’ve never heard of FCast, I’ll look into it
You can always get a new Chromecast (we were forced to as the ancient bullet proof one told us to “fuck off, I want to die”). The new one has a remote control and apps, which I always thought were missing from the minimalist Chromecast family of products. So look at us, now we have a shitty roku when all we wanted was a device that I could send things to from my phone. Needed and wanted nothing more, but I got it. My tone is muddled here, so I’ll make it clear that it’s worse than it used to be, and I’m annoyed I was forced to pay to downgrade.
Yeah, i don’t like that all the more recent devices all added remotes and explicit apps you have to install and launch. Also the “newest” 4k-capable chromecast is from 2020, so I would already be upgrading to old hw that’s a worse experience.
I’m actually quite happy with mine I don’t think it’s shown me a single ad, the only nuisance is it doesn’t stay connected to my WiFi and only joins when I launch an app or something.
Its a Toshiba with Vidaa Os I think, not saying it’s perfect it has all the UK channel apps but not Stremio which I would like it to have.
That said it hasn’t done a single thing ad wise to annoy me unlike my firetv cube.
Luckily the YouTube app gets way worse with each update. Mine now tries to dark pattern you into signing in, and now features extra ads when you pause a video.
I’m switching to sideloaded SmartTube on a GoogleTV with Chromecast dongle.
I’ve been using smart tube on my fireTV for about 6 months now and it’s amazing. No ads, so many playback options that YouTube doesn’t offer, built in sponsor block is a godsend.
Or: buy a computer, once
It’s not that hard, the original author is just lazy or ignorant or both.
My smart tv is a mid ranged i5 from 2012.
that and never connect the TV to the internet, it’ll nag you occasionally asking if you want to connect but that’s easily cancelled out.
Electricity must be cheap where you are. If you have to use an x86 platform, please use a modern one that is both vastly more powerful and adept at decoding video while also needing a tiny fraction as much power and producing next to no heat and noise.
These fucking televisions have less ram than my fucking 8 year old phone
At some point it’s just better to factory reset this bitch and paste an RPI in the back with my own android TV so it can actually run with 8gb ram 256gb space