[1] https://hackaday.com/2021/11/29/samsung-bricks-smart-tvs/
[2] https://www.theverge.com/2021/11/10/22773073/vizio-acr-advertising-inscape-data-privacy-q3-2021
4K OLED https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=384002160&P=7
4K IPS https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=384002160&P=2
4K VA https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=384002160&P=4
4K 55" or bigger monitors (there aren't many choices) https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#P=2,7,4&r=3840021...
The 4K 55" OLED Alienware has speaker but I doubt that it is any good https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/new-alienware-55-oled-gaming... (actually comes with remote too)
Linus made a video of it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3oqktdx2a8
Last but not least you can go even higher resolution than 4K but these are all IPS only and they are not bigger than 34" https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=768004320,57600...
It looks like the situation is still that in the 4k OLED space there are a few ~$4000+ monitors and dozens of ~$1000 TVs. Per the pcpartpicker link, maybe the Gigabyte FO48U will change that, but it's still out of stock. Besides, I feel like this has happened before with HDR and 4k and IPS. First it shows up in TVs, a year later it is cheap in TVs, a year later it is expensive in monitors, and finally it becomes cheap in monitors. But it takes years. Which seems odd, since surely they use the same panels? Is it an industry structure thing, where panel manufacturers integrate and co-develop with TV manufacturers but monitor manufacturers are separate, only get the panels after release, and need a year or three to turn things around?
because there's more money to be made selling TVs than monitors?
consequentely, it's TV manufacturers pushing the entire display maker industry ahead? and so they get the newer tech first??
What does this even mean? The same companies that make panels for monitors usually make panels for the TVs as well. They already have production facilities that can manufacture panel sizes ranging from cell-phone size to 200" commercial wall panels.
https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2021/11/10/22773073/vi...
Yeah, I thought $3000 sounded silly, and my only mistake was that I thought it was one order of magnitude silly when in fact it was two orders of magnitude silly.
That number is specifically for their SmartCast subscriber service. It's not clear what the rate is, but they subsequently talk about Roku making $40/mo; so it's possible that's the monthly rate. Assuming it is monthly, a television lasts for five years, and that is their only other source of revenue from the televisions, that's ~$1200.
The telling part of the article:
> ...[Vizio's] Platform Plus segment that includes advertising and viewer data had a gross profit of $57.3 million. That’s more than twice the amount of profit it made selling devices like TVs, which was $25.6 million, despite those device sales pulling in considerably more revenue.
Are sports channels really expensive? Is that what I'm missing?
"Vizio execs said 77 percent of that money comes directly from advertising, like the kind that runs on its WatchFree Plus package of streaming channels, a group that recently expanded with content targeting. The next biggest contributor is the money it makes selling Inscape data about what people are watching."
sigh.
That and expected maximum market size (or, more precisely, expected shape of the demand curve) do, I thimk, explain the delay, and higher price even before considering subsidy from advertising/data revenue, because there are fewer units to amortize fixed per-design production line costs across.
4K OLED laptops are more available and at a much smaller premium, perhaps because people buy a lot more laptops than desktop and larger monitors.
Speaking of booting into Windows, I finally figured out how to make it painless: use a separate hard drive, not a separate partition. I wish I could go back in time 20 years and tell myself that. The number of hours I wasted debugging poorly written installers, bootloaders, and updaters exceeds the cost of hard drives by a factor too terrifying to calculate. Ah well. Now I know.
Even if I were not taking these steps and generally abusing the monitor, I wouldn't expect to see burn-in yet, so I can't really speak to how the situation will develop.
I will eventually go to OLED but 48" is the smallest size OLED TV available, and that's a bit bigger than I'd want on my desk.
Hopefully a reasonably-priced 43" OLED will come out.
A “dumb tv” would just be a monitor with a remote to control power and volume.
Just because OLED tech "exists" doesn't mean the equipment exists to make it economically at any particular size, format, etc. We have affordable TV-sized and phone-sized OLEDs because LG has invested in the equipment to make those particular panels in those particular sizes.
Speaking of low to mid end tvs, the ones I saw on display in local shops, they were just overpriced junk..
Even though it's smaller, I installed my 7? year old 24" benq fhd e-ips monitor as a tv for my parents. $120 + $20 for the cheapest 2.1 sound (I think 2x10W + sub), cranked the bass much higher than advised, put the speakers behind the monitor and the sub on the floor + ISP tv box with remote. Speakers and monitor are always on, they got their own power saving stuff. My parents are ecstatic, guests are asking where they got the TV from... apparently it looks better that the ones you could buy for $500+...
Last time I checked, I remember finding somewhere most tvs don't actually operate at the advertised resolution, they got all kinds of "prettifying" algos. Not going to trust them ever.
Game mode. This turns off most/all the image processing, which greatly increases the lag.
Overscan. Also turn it off. This zooms in the picture a little to crop out artifacts around the edge.
Monitor used to have "much" lower input latency, higher PPI, much higher refresh rate and generally higher reliability because they are expected to be constantly on. i.e Their panels have different specifications.
Although I am not sure if most of the above are true anymore especially with OLED. Given how TV manufactures have also had focus on gaming. But reliability is still a thing on monitor. That is the similar to reference TV that uses panel from one of two years prior.
Edit: I had to look up Panasonic TV set and panel and then I discovered they are pulling out of TV production and outsource to external partner. Sigh.
https://www.flatpanelshd.com/news.php?subaction=showfull&id=...
My dedicated monitors have had dismal reliability: one died right after the warranty, one died inside the warranty and they flaked on the warranty anyway. My reliability expectations are rock bottom, my TV will have to work hard to undershoot them.
Well, “always” seems like an exaggeration; consumer monitors were far beyond 480i before consumer TVs were.
> It looks like the situation is still that in the 4k OLED space there are a few ~$4000+ monitors and dozens of ~$1000 TVs.
That’s not monitors being behind in tech, that’s TVs being cheaper because of economies of scale and opportunity for ad serving and data harvesting.
> Is it an industry structure thing, where panel manufacturers integrate and co-develop with TV manufacturers but monitor manufacturers are separate
AFAIK, LG, Sharp, Samung, and Sony are all four panel/TV/monitor manufacturers; I dont think that’s an issue.
Monitors and TVs are manufactured with the same "tech", just to different specifications to fit their desired purpose/niche, and to capture the maximum possible value from that market.
You could maybe make an argument that Samsung panel tech is behind LG's or something, since companies have separate R&D labs and actually have different technology, but in order to do so you'd have to be an industry expert.
> the same "tech", just to different specifications to fit their desired purpose/niche
Clearly not. I am using a TV as a monitor right now, because 4k + OLED + HDR + 120hz was just not available for $1100 in the monitor space six months ago (I think there was a $6000 offering, lol). Looks like it still isn't. This situation has been going on for years. Before OLED it was HDR, before HDR it was 4k, and so on. TVs are always far ahead, monitors are always far behind.
I'd rather not use a TV as a monitor because it's a PITA. I have to put up with substantial non-panel-related silliness to make this happen (turn the TV off/on with a remote, deactivate the laggy filters, tolerate the "smart" BS, etc). If monitors are so well tailored to their own niche, why are they losing so badly to a competitor who isn't even trying?
> to capture the maximum possible value from that market
That's the only explanation I can come up with: monitors are a backwater that the industry just doesn't care much about because volume is lower. Tech has to trickle down, and that takes years.
Your own description isn't of TVs being ahead in tech, but offering the same tech at a lower price point. (There often is some actual tech lag, for many of the same reasons, but it's much shorter.)
> I'd rather not use a TV as a monitor because it's a PITA. I have to put up with substantial non-panel-related silliness to make this happen (turn the TV off/on with a remote, deactivate the laggy filters, tolerate the "smart" BS, etc).
Usually, all of those except for the filters are effectively bypassed when using an input that supports CEC.
I specified consumer TVs. You didn't read what I wrote, and then you decided to nitpick anyway.
> Usually, all of those except for the filters are effectively bypassed when using an input that supports CEC.
Yeah, I heard about that, but evidently it needs more work before it Just Works.
And like the other person said, one of the reason is just basic scale. TV is multitude much bigger market than monitor ever is.
EDIT: Actually, I did specify that I was talking about consumer TVs. You didn't read my post, and then you decided to nitpick anyway. Bravo.
On the other end of the spectrum is professional industry displays which are ahead of consumer facing devices, like are shown at NAB (vs CES) and there you'll find 8k monitors for tens of thousands of dollars.
Most business uses for monitors don’t require high definition, so you’re really looking at specific industries and gaming.
Meanwhile, no one is buying non-smart TVs, so lower quantities are more expensive.
(Or they know that non-smart TVs are a niche product that they can charge more for.)
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1533261-REG/nec_led_f...
Powered bookshelf speakers are also an alternative to soundbars.
I personally use a monitor as a TV. One con is that some devices like the Fire Stick don't send HDMI display off signals but instead a black screen in sleep mode which wakes the monitor and keeps it on. You need a smart switch to easily turn it off.
It's definitely overkill given that I'm only driving stereo speakers anyway, so maybe next time I have issues I'll go this direction.
I don't want a 72-inch wall monster. I'm going to be viewing it from about a meter from my face.
But that's just my face. Other faces might work better.
In OP's link for IPS, a monitor of the same size and brand that seems to be the next version after the one I got is $550. It's hardly a premium over a comparable TV.
That's just offloading the problem to a separate device.
Our smart TV seems to actively try to figure out what is attached to the HDMI. Its probably reporting that back. At least every time I plug my notebook into the tv it seems to wait at least 20 seconds before forcing me to select "PC" as the input device. The old tv the notebook shows up instantaneously.
Anecdotally this is the approach I took ~20 years ago when buying a (then slightly exotic) plasma flatscreen from Panasonic. It is still working flawlessly today, though I keep hoping it will die so I can guiltlessly replace it with something newer/bigger/higher-resolution.
[1] A random example https://www.usa.philips.com/p-p/86BDL3050Q_00/signage-soluti...
It's It's bit ugly, but as long as you are okay with that.
This is one of the ones with an android board in it, and if I did it again, I’d be getting someone sold as a computer monitor.
If your company red is too washed out, or one section of a video-wall menu board is inconsistent brightness, it looks bad on your brand.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Flat-Panel-Displays/ci/16...
I have a big 4k tv that was destined for a sports bar but it was slightly damaged, got it for a great price. Sadly it doesn't have HDR either, but it is an older model. Anyway, its great as in there's no WiFi. There is a network port but there's no streaming apps or anything installed on it. I use it paired with an nvidia shield and a nakamichi soundbar and have been enjoying the experience.
But I digress, look for business displays
Planar makes incredible and also expensive displays for the commercial market. They offer a "luxury living" solution but the smallest is 100".
But they seem to have a good feeling about tomorrow.
so, are there any TVs where this is not possible? For example as part of turning on there is a setup procedure that makes it phone home and connect to wifi? If so (I wouldn't know but I would expect because natural cynicism) then the question naturally becomes what TVs is what you suggest actually possible on.
on edit: I see jiveturkey just posted that in fact what I suspect would be the case of difficulty to keep it from connecting is often the case https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29383963
E: And in the ongoing arms war, then manufacturer's ship remotes that no longer use tried and true IR but instead go over the same bluetooth or 2.4ghz chip. Some probably already do, I would expect.
If you are having issues because of physically fixable issues there are surgeries that can help (I had 2 things fixed). Most of the time however its just being fat and physical. Loosing the weight helps and the effect can be tracked in the data the CPAP collects. The doctor can then use the data to adjust then pressure down.
I am speaking from experience. My pressure setting has dropped as I took off the beer gut. This time next year I will likely be able to be done with it.
No need to include a modem when your customer's neighbor has an internet-connected toaster within bluetooth range of the TV.
We’ll be okay for another 5-10 years before they securely start locking that down too.
There are a lot of ways this can (and has) gone horribly wrong for privacy.
In terms of what, lines of code? Engineer days?
It was 2G iirc, enough for book download. Uploading a perceptive hash of what you are watching - e.g. a frame every few seconds - also fits on 2G speeds.
Ford, iirc, places it on the floor under or behind some seats making it much easier to deal with.
I think MA just passed a law about not allowing vehicles sold there to sell your telemetry data or something.
i believe they just have to share the data with others, which they don't want to do.
https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Sidewalk/b?ie=UTF8&node=213281...
TV phones home a lot, with info about stuff, some info big lots of bandwidth.
could there be an attack with buying some tvs and putting them on public WiFi - and could one find a way to increase the amount the tv was sending so it amounted to an attack - but still have plausible deniability.
If tvs were put on public wifi, which I guess there is no reason why you shouldn't put your tv on public wifi, and the tv is using lots of bandwidth, and your tv is popular in a country with lots of free wifi, is that tv manufacturer guilty of an attack on the free wifi infrastructure of that country?
I'm asking for a short story or several I might write some day.
1. Scan the HDMI content and send information back to the mothership to help vendors know what you're watching.
2. Scan the local network for shares and look at media on them, again to send back to the mothership.
The problem isn't just that they want to be connected tot he internet, it's that that they're terribly written buggy bloatware devices that glitch continuously when not connected to the internet.
Of course from what others have said it seems like they're also glitchy and terrible when connected to the internet?
/s
Aything with an IR remote does not betrays it's users like that (through the remote)
Or it does that by itself, with a mesh network that your neighbours have setup by accident with their Alexa or Ring - Amazon Sidewalk is an amazing end-run around your own firewall rules.
Actually, when I build my next house in 5-10 years I think I might do exactly this
Makes you wonder about the opportunities for poisoning of Sidewalk networks, just to get some petty revenge.
I assume you’re referring to the US constitution. The rights you’re referring to constrain the government, not companies. You do not have a legal right to privacy w.r.t. your TV spying on you.
note that a right isn't a passive trait, but an active assertion. every time we give in to what's easy, we lose a little bit of our rights. you maintain rights by speaking out and living by them. we wouldn't need a second amendment were that not the case (n.b., i don't personally own nor desire a gun).
Challenge accepted! <grabs pliers and soldering iron>
The profit margins are quite thin on consumer equipment; they can't afford to investigate into the chassis, having someone look at every chip that might have been tampered with.
...if there is one to snip, of course.
Why would you do this? Initial configuration but then never again? I can't think of a technical reason it meaningfully helps when you can already type in a wifi password with the remote, so I'm inclined to assume that the feature isn't for the customer but rather because they want you to use their app on your phone because the data on your phone is more valuable than the data on your TV.
I would feed them and they’d fall asleep in my arms but sometimes I would be terrified to move them in case they woke (and sometimes I’d just enjoy cuddling them as they slept). However the TV remote might have been too far to reach, whereas my phone was always in my pocket.
BT became useful again when they became older and started playing with the TV remote. It was always getting lost. Whereas my phone wasn’t.
But in terms of involving installing an app on your phone to emulate a remote, both are the same so it's no different. At least it's for more than just to configure it, mandating a connection to a phone you may or may not have seems like a stretch. At least by making it possible to use your BT for a remote you're expanding the features rather than breaking them.
Since I use a Roku stick for streaming, I have no need for the WiFi module in the TV. I was able to follow the instructions in that post, which involve removing the back of the TV and physically disconnecting the Wifi Module, and correct the issue.
I suppose that's one way to make sure the TV is not silently connecting to WiFi, although I'm not sure how difficult that operation would be on other manufacturers.
So local playback implies something more like a mini-ITX PC or SBC running some flavor of Linux. That’s fine, but it’s not going to be terribly couch-friendly since it’s going to have a bog standard desktop UI.
So the most popular option is to put all your media on a server in the closet (usually an old laptop or raspi or something), with a client on your streaming box like Plex, Kodi, Infuse, etc connecting to your server.
Never heard of Infuse but don't Plex and Kodi both contact the vendor's server? That is enough to make me not want to go anywhere near them. I do know there are home media center distros for the RPI and PC and they are supposedly nice. I'd be ok with using one in principle, but I haven't cared that much about media UI to bother. I just use command line mplayer on my laptop if I want to watch a video, and that's good enough for me. I can understand other people wanting a more TV-like experience, which is also fine.
Kodi I’m not sure about. It was originally XBMC (XBox Media Center) and is open source so even if there’s so phone home element, it can be built without that. Another open source option is Jellyfin, which is a fork of Emby from before that project was closed off.
I didn't realize Kodi was XBMC or that you could build it yourself. Thanks for that info.
The server and clients use plex.com to authenticate users.
There are alternatives like Jelly Fin that should better alleviate your concerns.
* Plex tracks what you've watched so you don't have to remember what episode you left off on
* Plex serves up rich metadata when browsing your library
The Apple TV is a drop-in replacement for a Roku or Fire TV that lacks built-in advertising
[1] https://9to5mac.com/2021/06/29/apple-tv-channels-services/
The physical device is the Roku competitor, and supports Netflix/Disney+ etc.
Then there's the Apple TV app, which runs on the Apple TV box. This can integrate with some other streaming services and show you their content in the app. Not Netflix or HBO (or some others) though.
And finally (that's all?) there's the Apple TV+ service that's 4.99 a month and lets you watch shows that Apple produces in the Apple TV app on the Apple TV box (or your iPhone, iPad, etc.)
It's all named very well and clear.
I really enjoyed this.
Apple’s handling of the Apple TV product names are baffling to me, given their once brilliant marketing department.
It can connect to Plex, Jellyfin, SMB, NFS and more. Bought a lifetime licence a while back before the price was increased and no regrets so far.
From the link: > I taped the loose ribbon cable to the inside of the TV with a note saying, "Wifi Module disconnected, so as to disable 'Unknown Device is Disconnected' message." That way if anyone ever looks in there in the future, it will be known what was done :-)
excellent :)
Eg LG Connect Apps
I’ve also often wondered if “store mode” disabled all of the radios because that’s the kind of thing you wouldn’t want enabled in a store.
I only turn on bluetooth when it is needed.
Wired headsets and wired keyboards will work with some of today's phones.
Anyhow, late one night we saw something popup in the list when I was pairing my headphones. "$crappyneighbor's TV". And we saw an opportunity to be a little petty back for once. We connected my phone, and apparently their TV model features no confirmation because it went right through, and started blasting Rick Astleys "Never Gonna Give You Up" until my phone disconnected a couple minutes later. Bit of good harmless fun at their expense.
While the remote does have a menu button, many settings continue to be available only via the mobile app.
You can bypass the acceptance of the privacy policy entirely and it just disables all the smart features (can't use any of the apps or cast to it with Airplay or Google Cast), but will still download firmware updates and install them.
From the network capture I did on it, if you don't accept the policies it only reaches out to the update servers for the firmware, and that's it. Nothing else.
As of right now I have an Apple TV hooked up with my Vizio sounder and it all works really well. Have had no issues.
Never intend to use the "smart" features on the TV, internet browsing, Netflix etc., I handle that perfectly with my "broken lid" laptop, which is a well maintained machine, typing these very words on it.
So I can vouch that at least for Sony TVs in the KD or KDL series XD, XE, XF, XG (most of them launched a few years ago), you can use them just fine without internet, and you can even update them. You can also turn off Bluetooth and prevent the TV from advertising its presence.
Don't know about the newer OLED and QLED devices, you should try them on in the store.
I agree that the target is low value and that the attacker will most likely not bother infecting Android TVs; he would need to force them to connect to WiFi to exfiltrate any data, a very complex and unlikely attack if your TV is not used to monitor uranium centrifuge data.
Most TV's will lock on any open wifi network given the chance - and that's all it takes to upload saved data and pull down updates and ads etc
Unless there are new features or fixes you want. My TV needed updates to support Dolby Vision and to fix ARC/CEC bugs. More recent TVs have required updates to support HDMI 2.1 features.
At least you can download the firmware separately and update through USB instead of a network update.
Satellite receivers have had this type of capability for a few decades.
It's hard to imagine streaming services like YouTube, NetFlix and whoever agreeing to do anything of that sort.
Indeed, my guess is right about this seems to be in the right ballpark:
My dumb TV's remote is so simple, it has room for a dedicated button for each HDMI input. I don't have to go through any on-screen widget to pick an input: just hit a physical button on the remote dedicated to going to that HDMI input.
Cycling through picture modes is just a button also.
Never enter menus? What if you'd like to adjust something related to the display; sharpness or something.
There are also quite often free public wifi in the neighborhoods. Bluetooth may also be an option. Or they can just add a cellular network to get your data. Or maybe they can create a wifi mesh network between nearby TVs and share the internet if one has access to it.
edit: I believe it's called HbbTV
* extra-large gaming monitors, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29383077
* Sceptre brand TVs (they can be purchased from Walmart) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29383298
* Projectors maybe, but 4k projectors are very expensive. (On the other hand, 1080p projectors look great in my opinion.)
* Most big brands such as LG, Samsung, etc. have "commercial displays" or "digital signage" that are dumb or at least have fewer problematic features. One kind you'll see is marketed for putting in hotel or hospital rooms. Another kind is marketed for displaying at e.g. a bar/restaurant, building lobby, etc.
e.g. https://www.walmart.com/ip/Sceptre-55-Class-4K-UHD-LED-TV-HD...
Zero smart features, and all modern capabilities. It's also a TV, as opposed to a computer monitor, so it has the expected TV speakers and ports.
(e.g. https://www.sceptre.com/TV/4K-UHD-TV/U557CV-UMRB-55-4K-UHD-T...)
...but it doesn't have any of the smart TV BS. Still takes too long to power on, IMO.
It takes wayyyyy too long to power/boot up.
That being said, I just hook up my own speakers.
I've always had a poor opinion of Sceptre from this, but again, it could just be an out of date prejudice.
I’d guess the panels are all pretty common.
That means usually in order to get the best imagine quality you also have to buy the model with the most smart features at a higher price point - even if you don't intend to use them.
I often forget to consider stuff like consistent/quality back lighting, but it really does make a difference.
For example, there's the Alienware 55" OLED Gaming Monitor and the ASUS ROG Swift PG65UQ that's 65".
The smart one's are subsidized by their ads and spyware; so you'll always pay a massive premium to get a dumb one.
Same reason nVidia's AI cards are so expensive even though they're very similar to their graphics cards. Or "audiophile" speaker cables are expensive even though they're identical to cheap ones.
Product prices are partly a function of the price people are willing to pay (demand).
I was looking for something similar and it's frustrating to see you can pick up a 65inch Samsung Q90A for about $2500-$3000 but a similarly sized comercial display will cost significantly more and use significantly more power (at least as far as I've seen, I might be wrong on this one). Comercial displays are rated for 16/24 or 24/24 usage, so they should, in theory, last significantly longer.
As far as my search went, I ended up going with a Dell U4320Q (43inch monitor) instead. It cost a bit more than the equivalent Samsung Q90A display, but it does have a USB C port with power delivery support, I can keep my desktop and laptop plugged in and it works/looks great. It also doesn't have Smart features, it's just a display. Depending on country you might be able to get some cashback on it and make it even more competitive price wise and the stand + warranty are pretty solid.
Hope this helps!
Your 5 year old is now magically holding BrandNewKoolAid™ instead of the original Coke. You grandpa has a fishing rod from BobsFishingEquipment®.
But what happens when the platforms get into it themselves?
Today using a loved one's image in a deepfake advertisement might seem invasive and wrong. But I wonder in the future if this would be seen as something acceptable. I'm sure somewhere there's a social media site that is carefully constructing their T&C's to allow them to do this if they so wish.
For some tiny group that's below-board anyway with hacking people's social media accounts, I guess maybe there's not much you could do. But for any social media site or other platform, I imagine that IP lawyers trying to protect their client's likeness would descend in packs, which is a probably a genuine deterrent to a group considering implementing something like this.
But seriously, what can we do here? How to I inform people like my parents of this kind of thing without being an alarmist? Should I even care?
Don't buy one with other networks either, if they exist...
I just bought a Samsung 4K TV a month ago. I didn't connect it to wi-fi or do any setup. I just plugged my computer in.
I have not seen any ads. It seems to work fine offline in all respects.
If it actually did this I would definitely return the TV.
In case it matters it was this Q60A "QLED" 43 inch 4K TV: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-43-class-q60a-series-ql...
Basically Samsung TVs at least used to grab any open Wifi to connect to if you don't provide them with credentials to your own. Also there is no way to fully disable the wifi.
The solution was to set the connection to manual configuration and set all addresses to 0.0.0.0.
Of course this is not an issue if the only network your TV can see is your own, more of a problem in apartments where there might be 20 wireless networks available at any time.
If enough people do this, I anticipate that in the next model, they'll replace that blinking light with an forced on-screen overlay.
You only get the blinking light if you take away access after having given it.
I have noticed a marked increase in youtube ads in the roku app. Prob due to roku has updated itself without permission.
Now i dread having to deal with pihole hacks + routers to fence it out of our home network :/
That's a cursed scenario...
. o O ( I wonder if some hostile antifeatures go away if you buy a TV in the US but then activate it from an EU IP address ).
Not exactly a user-friendly option, but an option nonetheless.
I can confirm that Roku firmware works great without the internet and doesn't nag. I just turn it on and switch to my Apple TV.
So pay attention to the hdmi cable you use.
There are some TVs that will try to connect to the internet via non-obvious means (Samsung TVs were mentioned elsewhere in this thread). TV manufacturers aren't spy agencies though. They're not going to put in that much effort to sneak an internet connection, when most users willingly connect their TVs to WiFi anyway. If I can't find an article about a given TV sneaking in an internet connection, I would be pretty confident that it doesn't.
The profit from collecting data on you and displaying ads on the TV is greater than the profit from the sale of the TV.
They absolutely will go to whatever lengths they can.
https://www.cnet.com/news/as-smart-tvs-become-the-only-optio...
https://www.theverge.com/2021/11/10/22773073/vizio-acr-adver...
There's no reason to own a television with a shitty computer built-in, when I can just buy a screen and plug it into my actually good computer.
Right now I have a 27" ThinkVision display and a pair of studio monitors, with both laptop and Switch connected to it. Media comes over the computer (who even buys cable in 2021 anyway?), audio patches into the display over USB-C/HDMI and out to the speakers.
I'm moving soon and I'll probably spring for a 30+" 4K for the living room at some point, and look into a receiver and theatre speakers but honestly I don't see the point.
You do pay a bit more for the display-per-inch, but the reason those "4K smart TVs" are so cheap is all the adware money, so they're only "cheap" in the way that Facebook is "free".
It's a real shame to have a TV that runs Linux and can't be used as an X Terminal...
If you're looking for something smaller I'm using a 43 inch 4K monitor, LG 43UD79 / 43MU79, that was around $450. I'm using it as a monitor, but my backup plan was to use it as a TV if I didn't like it as a monitor. It even comes with a simple remote that is better than common TV remotes because it leaves out all the superfluous buttons (its primary up/downs are volume/brightness). They've since discontinued it and the new model is up at $700 though.
As I posted in another thread [2] a few days ago:
In Canada, LG's Business site has tvs branded as "Commercial Lite" that are all dumb, and work great. I have a 55" 4k and I enjoy its simple features and minimal remote-control. The only downsides IMO are that it only has two HDMI inputs and it doesn't do HDR. But for $1000 CAD four years ago, I'm still happy with it! I bought mine from CanadaComputers in-store. I don't know if it's as easy to get one nowadays, and I don't know if/how they sell them in the US.
Sometimes you can just remove the network card easily, but usually the easiest thing to do is find and break the antenna. It's inelegant, and of course the smart features are still there, but it at least reduces or eliminates the tracking crap.
Apparently some TVs are bad at nagging about missing the hardware, so another suggestion would be to add a load or something to the antenna. I forgot what that's called, and at the time, couldn't really find any details online.
However, even dummy loads radiate a little bit. It's common to test handheld radios a few feet from each other with dummy loads screwed onto the antenna ports, because when you've got 115dB of link margin and your dummy loads are only eating 50dB on each end, that's still plenty!
Ah, here it is: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/02/the-best-feature-of-...
> The new Google TV is a fine smart TV interface, but when it gets integrated into some TV sets later this year, its best feature might be that you can turn it off. A report from 9to5Google details an upcoming "Basic TV" mode that will be built into Google TV, which turns off just about all the smart TV features. Right now, Google TV is only available in the new Chromecast, but Google TV will be built into upcoming TVs from Sony and TCL. Basic mode means we'll get smart TVs with a "dumb TV" mode.
> ...
> When the new feature rolls out, you'll be asked to choose between "Basic TV" or "Google TV" at setup. 9to5Google says that with basic mode, "almost everything is stripped, leaving users with just HDMI inputs and Live TV if they have an antenna plugged directly into the TV. Casting support, too, is dropped." The UI notes that you'll be turning off all apps, the Google Assistant, and personalized recommendations.
Also, Amazon and other companies are building out networks of their wifi devices. I assume at some point they will start selling access to other companies. So, even if you decline to set up wifi, the appliance might be able to get online through your neighbor's doorbell.
Doing that to get around a feature they put in themselves just seems like conspiracy theorizing at that point.
Some will laugh at getting 4K resolution and then projecting it on a regular white wall, but honestly, you'll get used to it as you project a much larger image than you'd otherwise get with an lcd. Also, there are special paints you can get - or a retractable screen if you feel the need after testing out the projector.
Note: if it is a room with windows make sure to have decent curtains. It's not as FC v bright as a LCD screen.
RTings maintains a list of smart TVs that are completely ad-free:
Your best bet now is to get an industrial display or find a generic driver board that is compatible with the panel from a smart TV and then DIY a smart TV into a dumb one.
On the DIY perks youtube channel, the host builds a water cooled backlight for a 4k panel in order to make an outdoor-capable TV, and he uses one of those generic driver boards for it.
You can put those into a special HDMI dumb screen mode using the service remote.
I suppose newer systems would use the LAN to update drivers and take over smart functions. If in the US, go by Best Buy and ask them for the remote for the display tv you like and see that it lets you kill internet function. Also that there aren't any always-on apps (or if there are, the menus let you disable them).
All of their screens come in a "TV version" with a tuner, and a "monitor version" without one, but are otherwise identical.
The speakers are pretty crappy, but that's to be expected.
(European company, so not sure where they ship to outside the EU)
I have a SwedX FHD or UHD or something screen, not 4K. The remote is simple. The menus are simple. Turning it on could be quicker, but is not horrible. The sound is not great, but functional. It has digital audio out, so I use an external amp and speakers.
The price is quite nice. The lack of any "smart" features even nicer.
That doesn't mean the TV isn't still reporting your viewing habits back to them; it's still running Android, still has a network connection.
Hilariously, they allow you to go back to "smart" Google TV with a click of a button, but going to 'basic' mode requires a full reset.
Oh, and they're petulant about you disabling "smart" functions; you lose chromecast, even though there's no technical reason for it. Probably because it's the only actually useful feature people want if they have an external streaming box.
What's stupid is Android TV means I can run any app I want, and they can't stop me, so Chromecast ends up being a kind of idiotic solution that never quite finished its search of a problem.
As in, I can use Steam Link or Moonlight to become a thin client of a real computer, I can Plex my entire (legal) library, or use any cloud service natively from the device.
All the things I ever really wanted to Chromecast felt like it was a third class citizen compared to the Android TV experience; and I just mean the purely playback part of it, not the client UI part (which Chromecast doesn't, and isn't meant to, have).
It is a bit ridiculous that TVs have to be a computer with internet access to sell nowadays, but that’s coming to just about every household appliance.
Not sure I would buy it again, but sure can't live without it.
https://www.projectorcentral.com/Mitsubishi-UD8350U.htm
Its 6500 lumens DLP and has 2 bulbs. DLP tech is kinda neat (Its literally a chip with flippable mirrors). but modern projectors are usually laser or led based. New ones have gotten brighter for less money too.
I've used it day to day initially and now mainly to project movies. It does draw a lot of power and it does get warm. They're really best at night or in a dark room and with a proper screen. Basically went back to an flat panel tv for TV watching.
I also ended up getting a HDMI/ audio breakout box, because sometimes we used an appleTV or Roku with it and those don't have audio out and my projector lacks it.
The projector central site I found as a decent source of information, you can even enter a model and see how big it will project. https://www.projectorcentral.com
Also note they may have an HDMI implementation that is 'cheap' and doesn't implement the CLEC protocols or HDCP so you may have to jump through hoops to drive them from a PC with commercial content.
The question then is why would any company pay 5x for a device without smart functionality? Does that mean there's now a market for buying smart TVs, stripping out the "smart" tech, and reselling at, say, a 4x markup?
That said, I think there is solid market for "monitors" which are just the display and an industry standard interface.
Sometimes you can get a "tunerless" TV which has fewer smarts.
Give me a shout if anyone needs a hand accessing it - or wants to know what some of the set specific features are.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Theatre-Projector-Lumens-Soundbar-Ins...
They are mostly built in Turkey now, but they are pretty decent and don't include bloatware
Buy the best TV for the money (which will be smart), then don’t connect it to the internet. It will be better and so much cheaper than trying to get a dumb TV that you could get a new one if - against all odds - its dormant smart features become an issue. And you’ll likely have money to spare.
Sure, if you are paranoid you can’t be sure it doesn’t connect to open Wi-Fi or even contains it’s own radio hardware - but let’s face it, so could a “dumb” screen. If you are extremely cautious you can likely disable radio hardware via hidden service menus or worst case physically.
Computer screens or commercial screens sadly don’t offer the processing you want for broadcast TV (Which these days is a lot a about upscaling and smoothing poor video). If you watch high quality streaming you’ll want the latest HDR standards.
So your best bet for a dumb tv is a smart one without internet and just ignore that it connects to the neighbors phone via BT, shows an ad (that it shipped with), or pesters you about letting it connect to the internet.
I find it a little remarkable that there isn't a similar "scene" built around lobotomizing smart TVs. The desire is obviously there, and surely rooting Android isn't terribly hard. The OS's for smart TVs are barely maintained.
https://www.walmart.com/ip/Sceptre-50-Class-4K-UHD-LED-TV-U5...
> Let's you view your pictures as a slideshow or listen to your favorite music via the USB port. Just insert your flash drive into the USB port for the ultimate entertainment.
I'm pretty sure this is the one I have. But even if it's not, the fact they're advertising playing music via USB flash as the "ultimate entertainment" tells me this is not a smart tv.
Enjoy.
Edit: Oops, looks like it's out of stock. But you can probably find others if you just look for the shittiest 4k you can find. (You'll probably need to wait a bit as black friday probably annihilated the stock in this class of dumb tv.)
Far easier to just not use the smart features than try to find a dumb tv.
You will absolutely pay a premium for that though.
Look also for used signage monitors; they're built for heavy work, from 18/7 to 24/7, and used ones would last more than new consumer TVs anyway. Be aware however that some of them have already been plagued by Android and other "smart" features. Samsung has however some smart models using the Tizen OS, which is Linux based and potentially more open to hacking if compared to Android.
[1] https://www.usa.philips.com/c-p/559M1RYV_27/momentum-4k-hdr-...
A smart tv with no internet connection that only uses its HDMI ports is a dumb tv, isn't it?
Unfortunately, many manufacturers are now forcing you to stay connected to WiFi to use the TV. “TV phone home!”
That was a good solution for me because I can still use the inbuilt apps for playing local media from my NAS, but no possibility of firmware "upgrades", ads or firmware "upgrades" that include ads.
I have a 4K Dell 55" which is really a Samsung panel.
Been eyeing it as one of the better displays available right now
Fwiw I don't mind on-screen menus for even basic functions like some people seem to; I just don't want it doing anything nefarious
In my recollection HN wasn’t impressed when they hit the front page
I have an Ethernet to WiFi bridge that is already configured on my wireless network, so I don't need to pull an Ethernet cable all the way, and the TV never knows the network passphrase.
I have started to see first industrial then consumer devices with embedded SIM cards towards the end of 2000. They were soldered in, now mostly socketed. To access them, the device had to be disassembled, and connect SPI header.
No average consumer will think to or able to disable or avoid using that.
New latest one comes with an Ethernet port. If you connect to internet will communicate with the mothership. I had extra that I hooked up to the internet and can see pining lg.com everyday after midnight.
You can put your streaming box into your pocket and take it anywhere where there is a HDMI panel. For instance, when there is no pandemic, you can take it to a hotel room in another country. Depending on geographic restrictions, you can view all your regular content.
One thing that is very important to me is that my livingroom streaming box has its own audio out. Bluetooth would be okay; in my case, I use a 1/8" jack: even better. That goes straight to a stereo amp.
What this lets me do is turn off the TV while listening to audio-only material, like music. The streaming box doesn't care that the TV is off; it keeps streaming audio to the speakers. Once I introduced this practice, my wife takes advantage of it all the time, to play music for the kids without the distracting screen.
Can smart TV's do this at all? Completely power down everything related to the screen, but keep audio going?
If you want actual OTA TV on your dumb TV https://www.amazon.com/ViewTV-ATSC-Digital-Converter-Clear/d...
If you have many sources consider https://www.amazon.com/Output-Switch-Switcher-Support-Contro... or getting a receiver instead of all the above (more costly).
If you want to make your own smart TV look at the Shield TV with a USB TV Tuner, the extractor is probably still best for the sound bar in that case.
That extractor will passthrough whatever the output is and break out the audio to SPDIF for your soundbar.
Overall it's on the more powerful side and has full hardware acceleration so weird latency issues but you'll want to match the audio offset in the Android TV settings to whatever the display latency of your monitor of choice is to get the audio/video timing to perfectly match (supports both positive and negative offsets in case your soundbar has its own latency problems).
I think they just don't want people stream high bitrate stuff directly
Another option is a projector.
This isn't the best option, and it's a giant pain in the ass, but it's very effective.
https://www.theraffon.net/spookcentral/tcp/2019/07/10/lg-sma...
I'm not the most technical guy in the world and I was able to do it pretty easily, took about 30 minutes.
I for one will stay on Smart screens, but never another Samsung again.
I also strongly suggest voiding the warranty and disconnecting the wi-fi antenna. That's usually easy.
Dell has a 43" 4K monitor that, with a soundbar, can probably be a reasonable TV, but it lacks a tuner. It's, however, 3x as expensive as an average Smart TV from a rent-a-brand like JVC. Mine (5 yo, FHD) has an ethernet jack but all it ever did was getting an IP address from the DHCP server and nothing else, ever. There hasn't been any traffic for a month or so, before I just disconnected it and reused the cable for a small cluster.
Dumb thought...DD-WRT for TVs?
https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B07V9ZYV7Q?psc=1&th=1&linkCode=gs2&...
Here are a couple of past threads on the topic.
It seems ironic that people are complaining about smart TV ads while the [2] link in the OP has an absolutely MASSIVE video ad that takes up 2/3s of the screen.
And it's not like you're not being tracked when you stream from a Roku stick / Chromecast.
Edit: I have a 4k Samsung that isn't laggy and in general is a very good experience.
Since there are effectively no dumb TVs on the market anymore, I bought a fancy Sony TV with AndroidTV built-in, hoping that'd it'd be decent enough to use out of the box. Nope. Slow, laggy, and some of the big name streaming apps from the app store just plain don't work.
Also when the TV updated itself it broke HDMI-CEC for a good couple months before another update fixed it. Screw that.
Bought an AppleTV and it's been great. Unplugged the SmartTV from the network and treat it as a dumb TV now.
Yes I know AppleTV is tracking me, too, but at least the user experience is great with no ads.
And many of the cheap dumb TVs have shitty audio and often break or burn in after short enough periods of time.
If you buy a cheap smart TV I don't expect it to be a great experience, just like I don't expect a cheap dumb TV to provide a good experience.
With smart or dumb TVs, you get what you pay for like anything else. I've had a mid-range Samsung for years without issue.
Everyone buying a Spectre/Insignia to avoid smarts is getting a considerably worse picture quality (which I would think is almost number one TV criteria after size) in exchange for nothing.
People could look at TV OS as a differentiating factor, not a burden. Make picking your OS your first choice, and find the best panel at budget within that category.
In my opinion it doesn't matter if outdated software is "baked into your hardware forever" because all I have to do is disable the Internet settings, and plug in a roku/chromecast just like you would on your dumb TV. Difference is my subsidized TV cost way less. In terms of value over time (which is what I assume you meant by calling it an investment) a smart TV makes way more sense even if you don't use the smart features.
[1] Having an ad on a web page about concerns with Smart TVs is not the same as the TV manufacturer selling ads on your TV. For one, it's just one more opportunity for the TV to fail. My smart TV won't load its' UI enough for me to select an HDMI input if it can't connect to the internet.
[2] Again, there are levels of tracking. I don't know about Roku, but I imagine when you use one, you have tracking from Netflix while watching Netflix, Hulu while watching Hulu, etc.. At least, this is my expectation of my Apple TV. If you're streaming to a Chromecast, you can limit what it sends to Google.
[2] None of this has to do with the fact that a manufacturer can apparently brick your TV remotely, and while this is meant as an anti-theft measure, it's pretty easy for them to accidentally include your valid serial # in a CSV or whatever. I'd imagine un-bricking it is very difficult, if even practically possible.
All in all, over several years of having Smart TVs, I've still not ditched my Apple TV or Chromecast, and I find that both tend to give me higher quality, though I expected the inverse by avoiding dependence on an HDMI cable.
Smart TVs are also amongst the most notoriously poorly updated smart devices, and over time this becomes a risk to your entire home network.
Also smart features on most TVs feel like they are fairly slow and seem to get in the way of using the TV as a device driven by a media stick etc. If I've decided that I only want to use an Apple TV (or Roku, or FireTV or my L33z plex client running on a Raspberry Pi), then I don't want to have to wait for my TV to load and boot its own network stack and pile of applications.
The AppleTV is the minimum I accept, and non of the TV make are able to produce anything that comes close.
We hate Smart TVs because the manufactures make shitty software.
Besides ads and tracking, there seems to be a trend: People on here are buying shitty TVs and complaining that they're shitty.
If you buy a cheap TV, you can't expect it to be good. Dumb or smart.
Many of us still have large personal media libraries. Samrt TVs do nothing for that.
You are a massively small minority if you're mostly using personal media libraries as your entertainment on your TV.
Minority, sure. But "massively"? Like, who is your demographic? Gen Z?
Believe it or not, there are ways to deliver content to a display that don't involve Roku, Chromecast, or any other instrumented "platform".
From the baseline of a society already saturated with ads, I don't think there's anything unusually evil about giving people the choice to share analytics/see ads in exchange for lower hardware prices. But when that choice is obfuscated or taken away entirely, and it becomes difficult or impossible to buy hardware that doesn't spy on you and/or hijack your attention, I see that as a big problem. It's one more step along the road to a world where consumers simply don't have access to general-purpose computer technology.
The reason why people don't like smart TV's is in literally every other comment on this post: we don't like ads and other data collection activities TV manufacturers are pushing on us. Is that not obvious?
> It seems ironic that people are complaining about smart TV ads while the [2] link in the OP has an absolutely MASSIVE video ad that takes up 2/3s of the screen.
For the life of me I can't understand why I should dismiss my TV automatically downloading uninstallable apps and unmovable icons in prime UI real estate, serving ads and generally being a menace because there are ads in one dudes link on the internet.
If you buy something marketed as a monitor, it will have no (or terrible) audio, and you will struggle to find something in the >=65” class. I think it’s a fine option for a spare TV, but it doesn’t cut it for the living room.
I get why HN hates smart TV’s, but unfortunately the ship has sailed. I’d rather have a nice TV than be an activist, gotta choose your battles.
Vote with your dollars every time you can.
If I don't vote with my wallet how can I hope to be able to buy what I want in the future?
Now you have a smart TV which can whine all it wants, but can't phone home.
Whatever your position, OP is justified in not wanting (and looking for an alternative to) a potential surveillance device in their home.