I'm surprised no one has mentioned that KDE revived the Plasma Bigscreen project. No idea on the ETA but assuming all goes well I can see it becoming my daily driver very quickly.
Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
141–150 of 548 posts
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#142I'm confused. Every TV is a dumb TV if you don't give it your Wifi password.
i have a vizio which I opened up and removed the WiFi module. it never complains about the internet now.
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#143I'm confused. Every TV is a dumb TV if you don't give it your Wifi password.
I have a Mac Mini hooked up to my TV. We never use anything mode of the TV. (Then again, I have zero streaming services, so perhaps I am not who this article is for.)
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#144> Any display or system you end up using needs HDCP 2.2 compliance to play 4K or HDR content via a streaming service or any other DRM-protected 4K or HDR media, like a Blu-ray disc.
This plus all the notes below about how various apps won't stream 4k in various circumstances depending on platform or web browser just lend further credence to the idea that it's best to say fuck it and deploy a jellyfin instance and sail the high seas. Or at least rip blu rays.
I mean why would I pay all these streaming services for such subpar service?
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#145What I'd really like is a TV with DisplayPort. How is this not a thing? IIRC you cannot buy a display with DP that's larger than 45 inches, give or take - they just don't exist. I think this is really weird. Like, I'd pay an extra $100 for that port, but I'm just not allowed to have it.
There was the 55" Alienware OLED monitor, but unfortunately it never received a follow-up after its 2019 release.
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#146As a Plex user I'd recommend a used last-gen game console as a TV source. In my AV room upstairs I've had an XBOX ONE S for a long time and more recently I got a PS4 Pro for the spare room downstairs -- both at Gamestop. I have some games for both of them but I am more likely to game on Steam, Steam Deck or mobile. Every Android-based media player I've had tried just plain sucks, the NVIDIA Shield wasn't too bad but…
What does a last-gen game console offer over an Apple TV if you don't care about games?
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right - I'm wondering why this article is so important and maybe I haven't seen enough intrusive "smart" TV's -- but is it not the case that for the vast majority of smart TVs, you can still just connect whatever to the HDMI (e.g. a computer) and keep it on that? Mine are Roku's, but I feel like the Samsungs et al are the same?
The point is what if you DON’T just connect something to bypass all the slowness. Maybe in a tech forum everybody has done it, but certainly not out in the “real world”.
Your choices are
1. Spend money. AppleTV and the Nvidia Shield have the best hardware followed by high end Roku devices.
2. Use a computer. That’s a horrible experience.
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
No the justification for the article is TVs that track your watching no matter what you watching and selling it to advertisers. Apple tracks what you are watching on AppleTV only. I’m on this thread because I understand technology. Are you saying that if you are watching something like “South Park” you wouldn’t want the service that you are watching it on to keep track of where you are in its 25 season run?
> Apple tracks what you are watching on AppleTV only. So the solution they propose to TVs that track what you're watching is to switch to AppleTV where Apple will track what you're watching? And you still justify this somehow?
Names are confusing no sarcasm intended. I meant Apple tracks what you watch when watching AppleTV+ (the streaming service) on the AppleTV box.
How else are there going to mark what you watched and whdfd you are in a TV series?
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#149I have the exact setup shown towards the end of the article - HTPC and K400 keyboard/touchpad. I have tried all "smart" platforms in the past, and this setup is an order of magnitude better in everything. I used to have issues where a specific content provider doesn't have an app for my type of smart TV[1], this is no longer an issue because I just use a browser to access anything. And I can browse the web when I'm not watching something[2] (in fact I'm using my HTPC right now as I write this comment).
The only change I had to make starting from a "standard" Linux UI is bumping the screen zoom level to 150%. This may vary depending on your TV size and how far your couch is from your TV.
Building the HTPC was very cheap, I just boughs a horizontal form-factor case, and used spare "donor" parts coming from our household PCs after upgrades.
[1][2]For comparison, the only streaming platform that had all apps I wanted was Apple TV, but that one doesn't have a browser.
Re: Sick of smart TVs? Here are your best options
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's worse? I don't want my car to track me, I'm def not going to volunteer that information to Uber.
Your car is tracking much more than rideshare apps even can. Uber, Lyft, whoever gets point to point trip information, maybe audio recording in the car. Modern personally owned automobiles are getting everything, all the time. It knows when you're home, when you're not, many record all audio all the time, some are recording video, some are tracking your sexual activity in the car. At this point, I treat rideshare lik…
There are still 2025 model cars where you can just pull the fuse for the modem and telematics module with no real ill effects.