Live data from Hacker News

Plasma Bigscreen

plasma-bigscreen.org

91–100 of 276 posts

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#91

The killer feature of Kodi (on most hardware, for example the Raspberry Pi) is that it can switch the output resolution to match the video you are playing. It also bypasses things like ALSA in order to be able to bit-bang audio in supported formats directly to an external receiver. These are basic functions of normal video playback devices like blu-ray players or cable boxes. A Plasma skin can't do any of this. So wh…

You don't typically don't want to switch output resolution to match the resolution of whatever your outputting on modern displays, but instead want to match the panel resolution and software scale the content. You're way too likely to confuse the monitor trying to match resolution. There's something to be said for matching frame rate, but there's even more dragons in that practically.

Doesn't that depend on how good the implementation is? Some modern TVs and receivers have exceptionally good scaling built-in.

I'd also bet with certain types of displays (eg: OLED, HDR and/or local dimming) there's benefits when there's a different aspect ratio (eg 21:9), letting the TV do something different to the backlight when it knows there there is no content in parts of the display vs getting a black signal.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#92
post #63
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's talking about the embedded Kodi derivatives. (CoreElec, OpenElec, LibreElec etc) They run their own audio stack.

I would really like to know more about this, and I can't seem to find anything about it. Are these projects implementing their own drivers for all the various audio hardware they can use instead of using ALSA? That certainly wasn't the case some years back when I used OpenElec.

"ALSA" has two meanings - there is only one set of Linux kernel audio drivers, and they're all ALSA no matter what distro you use. I think you're talking about this meaning.

The other meaning of "ALSA" is libasound / asound.conf / dmix, the old userspace audio stack, which is deprecated since Pulseaudio except for a few holdout distros. ALSA had difficulty mixing multiple playback streams, let alone bitstreaming DTS. I think the GP is talking about this meaning.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#93
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most new TVs are smart TVs so even if you do this you are still running on like Samsung have been caught screen capturing your TV and phoning home for advertising.

Your TV can't phone home unless you give it internet. Haven't heard of them shipping with mobile network access yet.

But when everyone keeps buying ""smart"" TVs and accepting the spyware, pretty soon they will start shipping with baked in 4G chips, and there will be no other option. Vote with your wallet by never buying a smart TV under any circumstance. They are cheaper than actual TVs because the data collected is so lucrative - buying one is implicitly supporting that slimy business model, even if you don't connect to WiFi.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#95

Given the Steam Deck runs KDE, I'm surprised I don't see Valve down on the list of patrons at the bottom of the page. Seems like this type of functionality/framework could be beneficial to the Steam Deck, since anything that looks good on a 10-foot display should also look good on the Steam Deck's display.

I get an impression it's close to direct competition to their console UI. I wanted to see a gaming UI like that that's fully open source.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#97

I wonder how long it will be before cheap TVs have no input ports (just a WIFI connection). That way the TV gets to decide what you watch to some extent. For example by interrupting your Netflix stream with a few ads from time to time.

I suppose they could do this even with ports - they could have small adds pop up in the corners, overlaying whatever is playing. They could charge $5 a month to disable the ads.

It would be hard to achieve unless it was somehow necessary to connect the TV to wifi in order to use it at all (even when something is plugged into a port). That would be pretty confusing for people I think.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#98
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your TV can't phone home unless you give it internet. Haven't heard of them shipping with mobile network access yet.

But when everyone keeps buying ""smart"" TVs and accepting the spyware, pretty soon they will start shipping with baked in 4G chips, and there will be no other option. Vote with your wallet by never buying a smart TV under any circumstance . They are cheaper than actual TVs because the data collected is so lucrative - buying one is implicitly supporting that slimy business model, even if you don't connect to WiFi.

There are no non-smart/"actual" TVs. Find a 55" OLED that doesn't have "smart" features.

I mean personally I don't care so long as I don't see ads, but the advice you're really giving is "don't buy a TV". Can't say I disagree though.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#99
post #87
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

Yup. I wandered around page for about 20 seconds before realizing it wasn't some sort of open source hardware plasma TV.

I only realized it after reading this thread. Seems like a very confusing name chosen.

Re: Plasma Bigscreen

#100
post #88
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would not be GPL compliant (both v2 and v3), so would not conclude the lawsuit. https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2021/mar/25/install-gplv2/ https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2021/jul/23/tivoization-and-t... https://events19.linuxfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2017...

A lawsuit against Vizio for GPL violation cannot compel them to open or release software from their OEMs. For example you are never going to get a functional driver for the display panel made by Panasonic. It isn't even clear that Vizio would be able to comply with GPL enforcement, since they largely just OEM TVs built by AmTran in Taiwan and don't do much more than slap a logo on it.

That's a pretty strong statement to make.

It would highly depend on the contract between Vizio and their suppliers no? In particular if the lawsuit finds that anything from the supplier (like e.g. the display driver) is part of the GPL violation the contract likely contain clauses that would force the supplier to provide source code. Otherwise Vizio has grounds to sue their supplier.

That's the beauty about going after the big customer facing companies, it offers the strongest leverage.

Post reply on HN