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Plasma Bigscreen

plasma-bigscreen.org

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Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#181

Post by jeroenhd »

ze0ng wrote: post #155

Misleading to state that this turns your TV or set-up box into a fully hackable device, while the software just runs on a RaspberryPI

In theory this runs just as well on TVs if the right drivers are present. They ship postmarketOS versions of their firmware, for example.

Sadly, pmOS doesn't support any TVs as far as their website is concerned (https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/TVs) but with some work (getting the mainline kernel to boot based on the GPL sources or getting the built-in kernel to boot pmOS) you can flash your TV with this firmware. In practice you won't be able to do much with it as TV SoCs are almost always shipped with underperforming hardware and as little RAM and storage as possible, but you could.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#182

Post by jstanley »

gkhartman wrote: post #111
jstanley wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does this get you over connecting up an old laptop to a TV screen and controlling it with a bluetooth keyboard?

A much cleaner implementation that doesn't clutter the room with cables and an old laptop. Added bonus that I wouldn't have to explain how it works to each guest that tries to use it (assuming that the UX resembles other TVs people have used).

But people have used computers before. It works exactly the same as a computer. I think it's much easier than using typical smart TV interfaces.

It has the added bonus (over typical smart TV interfaces) that typing text becomes much faster. You can use the web browser as a web browser. You can use uBlock origin. You can have several tabs open at a time and switch between them at a sensible speed. It's so much better than a smart TV.

You don't need the room cluttered with cables, you can put the laptop in a cabinet underneath the television.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#183

Post by jeroenhd »

jokethrowaway wrote: post #122
bee_rider wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows is also pretty unpolished, I think it is impossible to get people to work on polishing unless you have infinity dollars, like Apple. At least Linux has the excuse that it is a community project -- things that the community decides not to work on are sort of definitionally not annoying enough to be worth working on, or they would.

Windows is polished, but their product people are terrible / constrained by someone higher up to do terrible stuff. Apple is getting there though, probably because of the same managerial culture.

I disagree. On my laptop running Windows 11, the edges of context menus are horribly pixelated because of the round corners they've added. Maybe there's a setting to fix that but I shouldn't need to look for that after I hit the "update to Windows 11" button.

This is something GNOME does better for God's sake and they can't even show thumbnails in a file picker!

I'd say Windows is selectively polished. Some parts are worked out beautifully while others are hacked together. macOS is a lot better in terms of polish (but a lot worse in many other aspects).

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#184

Post by capableweb »

water8 wrote: post #180
Retr0id wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Truly modern TVs have much better scaling and frame interpolation than whatever your OS or media player can do.

What makes the TV software better than OS software?

Usually software designed explicitly for the hardware where it runs, while OS software is designed to run on general hardware. If there is hardware specific fixes, they might be skipped as it'll make compatibility worse while software designed for exact hardware doesn't make tradeoffs like that at all.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#185

Post by capableweb »

dataengineer56 wrote: post #176

I bought an LG OLED recently after giving up on my dream of finding a dumb consumer OLED. I assumed I would disconnect it from my network and use my Chromecast for media, but instead I've recently unplugged the Chromecast. The interface is surprisingly good, it has every app that I want and it's fast. I can press the Netflix button when my TV is off and be watching a show within seconds.

Same here, surprisingly good compared to the last LG TV we had in 2012 or something, they've made it a lot snappier. Maybe as time goes on, with more updates, it'll end up in the same situation...

What I really miss though, is being able to write my own apps for the TV without having to jump through 1000 hoops, sign 5 EULAs/NDAs/contracts and be able to develop said apps on my computer and then simply push them to my TV, just for me.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#186

Post by mcv »

Lammy wrote: post #58

I realize "Plasma" is the name of the KDE presentation layer across all platforms, but it's mildly awkward to see in this context considering plasma TVs have only been a dead technology for six years or so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_display

Also, calling a home device "hackable" is not exactly going to make it attractive to most people. I know what they mean, but most people will read that very differently.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#187

Post by capableweb »

antongribok wrote: post #23
da768 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NEC has commercial displays with builtin Pi CM4s. https://www.sharpnecdisplays.us/products/displays/ma551-mpi4...

The fact that it actually comes with a Raspberry Pi is incredibly cool to me. Oh, and of course there's a review of it from Jeff Geerling: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-epPf7D8oMk Actually, this thing has some pretty decent specs... my initial reaction was that it was overpriced, but now I'm thinking this is a decent deal for what you get.

Looking at the product page, quite prominently this is displayed:

> WARNING: This product can expose you to chemicals including Styrene and Formaldehyde (gas), which are known to the State of California to cause cancer, and Lead

I'm not sure the risks are worth the price, I've never seen such warning on any product, but I don't live in the US. Is that a common warning to see? How likely is that to happen? Is it a thing that happens in case the TV breaks in half, or is something that slowly slips out in the air around the TV?

The linked website says "Exposure to these chemicals may take place when products are acquired or used", am I supposed to believe that just buying this TV and bringing it home can make those chemicals to leak out into the air in my home?

The statement brings so many questions but so few answers...

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#188

Post by weberer »

qbasic_forever wrote: post #7
deusum wrote: post #5

If I understand correctly it uses a RPi or other ARM device attached to the TV. Is there anything out there tbat overwrite the TV's "smart" firmware? Something analogous to OpenWRT and its router support? It would be bet cool if you could use the controller and buttons "natively".

You might be able to use your native remote if it's infrared and LIRC supports it, and you get a little USB IR receiver dongle: https://www.lirc.org/ Or what I like is to get a generic air mouse/keyboard remote that has programmable IR buttons for volume, input select, power on, etc. to control the TV's native settings. There are a ton of inexpensive options: https://www.amazon.com/air-mouse-remote-keyboard/s?k=air+m…

I use LibreElec on a Raspberry Pi 4 and it already supports receiving remote control messages from the TV. So if you hit the play button on your remote, your TV's IR receiver will pick it up, then pass the signal to the Raspberry Pi over the HDMI cable.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#189

Post by dmantis »

mcv wrote: post #186
Lammy wrote: post #58

I realize "Plasma" is the name of the KDE presentation layer across all platforms, but it's mildly awkward to see in this context considering plasma TVs have only been a dead technology for six years or so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_display

Also, calling a home device "hackable" is not exactly going to make it attractive to most people. I know what they mean, but most people will read that very differently.

I highly doubt that "most people" would ever change their stock TV or TV dongle OS. So it targets geek and privacy-aware auditory and geek auditory understands what that means.
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