Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

451–460 of 518 posts

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#451

Post by nickthegreek »

bo1024 wrote: post #316
cgriswald wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Projectors require dark rooms; the less dark it is, the less contrast you'll see. I've got a 1080p projector on a wall at 100" and it looks fantastic. But it's in my bedroom and I use it only at night. I imagine for most people's living rooms, especially for daytime viewing, a projector won't work.

I'd like to see a side-by-side comparison. A projector will have problem with direct sunlight on the screen, but so will a TV. I've found projectors okay in a reasonably bright room, depending what's on screen.

A laser short throw projector with an Ambient light reflecting screen can be used in a well lit room. There seems to be a lil boom happening in projection screen tech.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#452

Post by kitsunesoba »

throwaway81523 wrote: post #446
danielheath wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plex, if you have a spare machine to run it on. Free if the household share a username/password.

Plex also phones home, I thought. I could never understand why anyone uses it. What is wrong with mplayer running purely on a local client?

Local playback is fine, but greatly restricts your options for media boxes. The top end Apple TV 4K for example only has 64GB of storage, and the Nvidia Shield TV caps out at a paltry 16GB. The Apple TV would fit a few shows if you were willing to rotate them out, but wouldn’t be able to provide a “library” experience. The Shield supports external storage, but who wants an external HD or NAS taking up space on their TV stand?

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.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#453

Post by kingcharles »

femto113 wrote: post #294
haunter wrote: post #32

4K monitors. You need a soundbar though or some kind of audio setup + remote. Also no built-in tuner or such but I assume you get a set top box from your service provider or use a streaming device (Apple TV, Fire stick etc.) 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…

Another approach is to look not for things advertised as "monitors" but instead look for "digital signage"[1]. Nowadays most of these contain some networking features but they'll be oriented at local control (i.e. by you via something on your LAN), not some third-party control center accessed via the internet. Anecdotally this is the approach I took ~20 years ago when buying a (then slightly exotic) plasma flatscreen…

Same thing I did 20 years ago. IIRC it was the only way to get a flatscreen at the time. Mine was a NEC. 40" plasma. 1366x768. Not even full HD. I think it would work out to about $7000. It pissed me off that it didn't even come with a wall bracket and I had to shell out another $600 for that. For the price of just my wall bracket you can now buy a pretty nice 65" 4K screen I'm sure.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#454

Post by dddddddan »

wodenokoto wrote: post #144

Iron cast TV aims at exactly this market. In my recollection HN wasn’t impressed when they hit the front page https://displayy.studio/ironcast.tv/ https://displayy.studio/ironcast.tv/

Doesn't look like you can actually purchase anything from them yet.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#456

Post by zamadatix »

thom wrote: post #164
zamadatix wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For literally trying to make a dumb TV out of a monitor and sound bar https://www.amazon.com/OREI-HDA-912-Audio-Converter-Extracto... 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…

These all look good, thanks! I basically just want Chromecast/Apple TV or equivalent in an HDMI port, as high quality as possible with no weird latency issues between video and audio. I don’t mind paying for a good panel, I just don’t like the software and the slow boot times.

I'd definitely go the Nvidia Shield TV (2019) route, I use one for exactly that. It is a tiny box that runs Android TV (which includes Chromecast functionality plus the ability to run apps local) and even the original 2015 model is still getting updates. For control it comes with a hardware remote or you can use your phone or you can cast to it. Supports 4K HDR10, Dolby Vision, and Dolby Atmos as well as full DRM support for Netflix/Amazon/Hulu/etc allowing it to actually receive the 4k versions (or you can just use the Plex app if that's your thing or VLC for local files).

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).

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#457

Post by austinshea »

bscphil wrote: post #450
austinshea wrote: post #66

Sceptre is fantastic for this. 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.

I assume the tradeoff is probably panel quality, right? I doubt they have OLEDs on the level of an LG or Samsung TV.

I think the trade off is a subsidized price point, and associated specs, and an unsubsidized one.

I’d guess the panels are all pretty common.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#458

Post by austinshea »

syntheticnature wrote: post #336
memco wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently purchased one of the Sceptre TVs and overall am happy with it. The only drawback I found was the sound is not great: it is tinny and muddled (possibly because it's wall-mounted). I'm planning to buy some external speakers.

Yes, I have a 4K Sceptre purchased for a song, and the sound isn't great (and HDMI-CEC doesn't work as reliably as I'd like to bring up the soundbar on HDMI-ARC, etc.)... ...but it doesn't have any of the smart TV BS. Still takes too long to power on, IMO.

This is a very real annoyance for me too.

It takes wayyyyy too long to power/boot up.

That being said, I just hook up my own speakers.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any 4K “dumb” televisions?

#460

Post by rdtwo »

scoopertrooper wrote: post #295
beagle3 wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon had (perhaps still has) whispernet - a global coverage of cellular networks. It was used to download books to your kindle, essentially anywhere in the world, without having to have a local plan or WiFi. 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.

Whispernet is dead from what I understand. As countries began shutting down 3G networks, Amazon was no long able to get connectivity at a price point where it was economically feasible.

Why not use helium network?
Post reply on HN