What is the best dumb TV? • Hacker News Board

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#91

Post by bigbubba » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:23 AM UTC

wvenable wrote: post #82

aphextron wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's really concerning is that "smart" TV's are no longer an upgrade, but the standard. You practically cannot find a new dumb 4k TV. When I went to purchase one recently, Best Buy at least had no other option.

All smart TV's are dumb if you don't connect them to the Internet.

They won't spy on you, but you'll still have to deal with the laggy shitware they run. In some I've had the misfortune of using, simply changing the inputs was a torturous affair because of the shitty software the TV was running.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#92

Post by RandomBacon » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:24 AM UTC

sneak wrote: post #43

RandomBacon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope you never have a visitor in your house that connects it for you.

Who has visitors? Seriously though, why would someone in your house who’s this clueless ever be given the network password in the first place?

They could connect it to their phone, or maybe there is a neighbor whose WiFi has one of those default seperate gateways for other customers that they never disabled (Xfinity I think does this).

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#93

Post by choward » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:26 AM UTC

wvenable wrote: post #82

aphextron wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's really concerning is that "smart" TV's are no longer an upgrade, but the standard. You practically cannot find a new dumb 4k TV. When I went to purchase one recently, Best Buy at least had no other option.

All smart TV's are dumb if you don't connect them to the Internet.

If they have wifi you have no idea if they're connecting to open networks.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#94

Post by choward » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:28 AM UTC

t0astbread wrote: post #72

acwan93 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question: what kind of updates would a dumb TV possibly need?

Any digital TV could have a software bug that bricks it.

Any piece of equipment can have a malfunction that bricks it. That doesn't mean I want it connected to the mothership.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#95

Post by deeblering4 » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:29 AM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #31

deeblering4 wrote: post #16

I’ve had good luck with sceptre brand TVs. They are no frills and cheap. Plug in a $30 roku and hook it up to some decent speakers and you are good to go. I’ve had two of them going on 8 years strong now. Loads of connectivity to. From vga to dvi to component/composite, 1/8” audio in/out, spdif, hdmi, etc, etc. On the other hand the power supply in my (former) LG plasma tv died after 1.5 years. I DIY replaced that wi…

Sounds nice, what's the input lag though?

I’m sure it varies by model, but for whatever its worth I haven't noticed issues playing ps4 on my old models.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#96

Post by jerrysievert » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:29 AM UTC

aphextron wrote: post #75

davidhyde wrote: post #73

My advice is to stop seeing a “smart tv” as a feature and see it as an expensive piece of equipment subsidised by extra advertising revenue. Don’t get upset about this, just understand it for what it is. Now, what can you do about it? Easy, don’t connect it to the internet. They will tell you that it needs updates but come on, what is a security vulnerability going to to to something that’s only output is a screen an…

What's really concerning is that "smart" TV's are no longer an upgrade, but the standard. You practically cannot find a new dumb 4k TV. When I went to purchase one recently, Best Buy at least had no other option.

it used to be that way for "3d" tv's. I'm really hoping that "smart" tv's get relegated to the same fate.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#97

Post by pessimizer » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:30 AM UTC

sunstone wrote: post #2

You're probably better off the buy the screen you like and pair it with a low cost NUC to sidestep the privacy invasion of the "smart" part of that TV.

What we really need is a turnkey FOSS smart tv suite of software distributed as a NUC OS. I'd prefer for the NUC to handle the tuner part, too, and let the tv simply be a screen with speakers. Or even a screen with speakers, a few extra ports that are routed back into the NUC, an embedded antenna, maybe a microphone and a webcam... there's still a lot of cool things you could do as a manufacturer of televisions even if you gave up on the modern businesses of rent-seeking and surveillance. TV manufacturers actually make things, things people want and don't feel they can do without. They don't have to rely on the financial scams and deception that make up the rest of the economy to stay in business.

There's already a DRM standard for browsers. We don't need TVs to have proprietary bullshit preinstalled on them to have Netflix.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#98

Post by Teever » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:30 AM UTC

choward wrote: post #93

wvenable wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All smart TV's are dumb if you don't connect them to the Internet.

If they have wifi you have no idea if they're connecting to open networks.

I've heard the solution to that is to set up an AP in your house that is either firewalled or doesn't have an outbound connection and connect your smart devices to that AP.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#99

Post by john_moscow » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:30 AM UTC

In my personal experience, TV as a separate device has been obsolete for at least 15 years.

A home cinema projector together with a PC and a wireless keyboard/mouse does much better. You get to choose what you watch, you see no ads, you can use it for gaming & browsing, and as long as you can be bothered to roll the blinds, you get plenty of contrast. You just can't beat that with a regular TV, no matter if it's dumb or smart.

Re: What is the best dumb TV?

#100

Post by deeblering4 » Sat, Oct 03, 2020, 12:31 AM UTC

JohnBooty wrote: post #90

loughnane wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree. I use pihole + Roku with my dumb tv and it feels like a good balance. The pihole also gets rid of the big ad on the channel screen

Are there any issues with a Pi-hole'd Roku?

In terms of breakage, no none that I’ve found. I can say it successfully blocks the big ad on the home screen and probably a lot of other requests too.