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Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

theverge.com

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Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#131

Post by anal_reactor »

iamleppert wrote: post #65

I hate to break it to you, but you are only a tiny fraction of the users of something like Roku. The software isn't developed for individual users, it's developed according to a product roadmap, which is itself driven by the behavior of the largest and most profitable cohort of users. If you don't fall into that category, you don't have a choice. Things that may be irritating or upsetting to you, if they make money o…

We tech people throw a tantrum whenever something isn't perfect, while most people don't give a fuck - if it works it works.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#132

Post by paulcole »

thfuran wrote: post #122
paulcole wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If Roku doesn't want to run afoul of these laws perhaps they should make these kinds of features optional instead of forcing them on people? Maybe they don't care about running afoul of these laws? Or feel that they are on solid ground? > The whole point of these laws is to prevent manufacturers from squeezing people by making products that fail early, or that are difficult to use. But neither of those things happe…

I can understand not caring about motion smoothing, but I cannot fathom being totally okay with manufacturers being able to retroactively change features of a product after you've purchased it and without your consent. Would you not mind if your car got an over the air update and suddenly had a governor at 70 mph and half the acceleration? Would you be okay with your airpods suddenly deciding that they can only pair…

> I cannot fathom being totally okay with manufacturers being able to retroactively change features of a product after you've purchased it and without your consent.

I can! It's a thing that presumably I was happy with for some amount of time. Things change.

> Would you be okay with your airpods suddenly deciding that they can only pair with sufficiently new apple devices

Yes! It's a risk of buying something. I can evaluate that risk and I can make different buying decisions in the future if I get burned.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#133

Post by paulcole »

kstrauser wrote: post #121
paulcole wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's not akin to not having blue anymore. Not having red anymore is akin to not having blue anymore. Having the video play in a way you personally dislike is perhaps upsetting to you, but it's a TV and the video still plays.

So if it downscales to 512x288, your contention is “the video still plays” even though the quality is horrid. If not, what do you imagine the important distinction to be?

> So if it downscales to 512x288,

Sorry I misread the article and didn't realize this happened. You're right, my bad.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#134

Post by thfuran »

paulcole wrote: post #132
thfuran wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can understand not caring about motion smoothing, but I cannot fathom being totally okay with manufacturers being able to retroactively change features of a product after you've purchased it and without your consent. Would you not mind if your car got an over the air update and suddenly had a governor at 70 mph and half the acceleration? Would you be okay with your airpods suddenly deciding that they can only pair…

> I cannot fathom being totally okay with manufacturers being able to retroactively change features of a product after you've purchased it and without your consent. I can! It's a thing that presumably I was happy with for some amount of time. Things change. > Would you be okay with your airpods suddenly deciding that they can only pair with sufficiently new apple devices Yes! It's a risk of buying something. I can ev…

Are you okay with a bait and switch executed on a shorter time frame? How about a third party breaking into your house and breaking your things, or is that only alright when the original manufacturer does it?

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#135

Post by azinman2 »

hagbard_c wrote: post #82
azinman2 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disable wifi on the TV and use an AppleTV.

Better still, use Kodi or Jellyfin on whatever you have lying around - Kodi works fine on a Raspberry Pi 3 - so you're not swapping one spy for the other.

AppleTV doesn’t spy. Downstream whatever apps you do will, but they already know what you’re playing anyway.

It’s mostly diff use cases for if you have media already or use streaming platforms.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#136

Post by jmb99 »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #127
hedora wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got an Apple TV 4K a while back to replace my Roku. It sets my ancient sony 1080p TV to 24 fps when playing back 24 fps content. On top of that, it let me recalibrate the colors using my iPhone camera. Anyway, I bought it to reduce ad tracking, and was pleasantly surprised that it was roughly equivalent to buying a new TV.

What are you doing for audio? That's been my big stumbling block when trying to use a newer AppleTV with an older TV and 5.1-channel amp. I've tried several HDMI audio extractors and found them all to be pretty terrible.

The best solution I’ve found is an HDMI matrix. If all you need is to connect your HDMI devices to the TV and an older receiver, get a 2x2 or 4x2 matrix, have one of the outputs go to the TV and one to the receiver. This solves the problem where the TV supports newer HDMI standards than the receiver.

Now if the receiver is old enough to not have HDMI at all, there aren’t too many options. S/PDIF from the TV to the receiver works, but is lossy above 2 channels. HDMI audio extractors work, but most suck. I had a monoprice one for a few years that was decent, but not great. There aren’t any other options than that though, unless your sources have discrete channel outputs (an RCA jack for each channel), which these days are effectively non-existent.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#137

Post by devilbunny »

lherron wrote: post #94
longtimelistnr wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes that is my favorite part of the apple tv as well, that it adjusts output to the source frames and resolution. As long as you have a good looking panel with nice color you'll never need to get rid of it. 1080 can really look gorgeous even with everything today being 4k

My 2013 Panasonic plasma is still going strong with AppleTV as the primary input source.

Well, short of Pioneer Kuro units, the Panasonic plasmas were the best screens of their time and are still very, very good.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#138

Post by devilbunny »

romwell wrote: post #126
adamomada wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was trying to say that we’re in an extreme minority; they didn’t even think more than ten people would disable it. What’s the reason that makes sense? They forgot?

There were way more than 10 people who read, commented on, and liked that Verge article. Both your assumptions (that we're an extreme minority, and that Roku thinks that way) seem to be only supported by the conclusion you make from them. All that said, putting the feature in enabled by default and seeing how many people end up disabling it would be how they could be grounded in reality and avoid creating a shitstorm…

Yeah, we are not an extreme minority. My wife - who really doesn’t notice SD vs HD, let alone 4k, if the aspect ratio is correct for the screen - went ape when we got a TV with motion smoothing.

I said yeah, I hate that too, give me a few minutes to fix it, believe me I don’t want it.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#139

Post by devilbunny »

pseudosavant wrote: post #66
iamleppert wrote: post #65

I hate to break it to you, but you are only a tiny fraction of the users of something like Roku. The software isn't developed for individual users, it's developed according to a product roadmap, which is itself driven by the behavior of the largest and most profitable cohort of users. If you don't fall into that category, you don't have a choice. Things that may be irritating or upsetting to you, if they make money o…

A ton of people ask me for TV recommendations. Rokus were my goto, but not anymore. I won’t buy one. Their response so far suggests this isn’t on accident (it’s a feature!) and they won’t change it back. I’ll probably have to not hook up the internet on my next TV. Use a steaming box instead.

I have a TCL Roku TV. It is not, has never been, and will never be connected to the Internet. I have to restart it periodically because there’s a strange sound system bug that makes the audio insanely quiet, but it sure was cheap.

It gets its video from a TiVO or an AppleTV box. I’m not using the internal software for anything - I don’t trust it at all. You might think the same of Apple, and that’s fine, but I’m posting this from my iPad, I have an iPhone and an Apple Watch and a Mac; they could screw me any time they wanted to, but other than pushing out strange UI they haven’t.

Re: Dear Roku, you ruined my TV

#140

Post by devilbunny »

hagbard_c wrote: post #75
mikenew wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're still greeted by a full-page ad on the main menu. But yes; it is better.

Tell me, mr. Ad-man, what good is an ad network... without an internet connection? I recently got my hands on a "smart TV" for free because the power supply was broken and the replacement the owner had bought did not work. That turned out to be due to the fact that he bought the wrong board so I used parts from both boards to create a working power supply and there I was with a working "TCL 50DP660", this turned out…

Totally off topic, but I have wondered for 30 years where Information Society got “a knife and a fork, a bottle and a cork, that’s the way to spell New York”, because it was clearly intended as a sample or re-creation. Now I’m one step closer.
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