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Comment by jchw | Hacker News Reader

I hate smart TVs with a burning passion. They accomplish literally the bare minimum to keep people happy and sometimes not even that.

Samsung’s Tizen OS is the most genuinely frustrating experience I’ve had with a consumer device outside of printing. Advertisements on my home screen that can’t be disabled, dubious privacy, bugs that require me to reboot my TV, and of course security so bad that they recommend installing a virus scanner? Yeah, that’s great. It’s got a web browser at least, though that’s the only positive thing I can really say about the web browsing experience.

Can it run software? If you can find it! There’s no app ecosystem here, just the big apps it absolutely had to have to be worthy of shipping. If you want to watch Twitch.TV streams for example you are SoL. There was an unofficial Twitch app, but it was removed from the store.

I tried to set up development for Tizen. Yeah not gonna try that again. I always thought getting started with development on Android or iOS was a little cumbersome but it really doesn’t compare. Even getting into developer mode was challenging since I had trouble finding the instructions that were pertinent to my model of TV, and that was the last thing I accomplished successfully.

So I’ve got a desktop computer hooked up to my smart TV and now I am contemplating paying more for a TV so I can get one that doesn’t have any of this dumb crap on it. The only downside? You can’t really run many 10 ft versions of things, and there’s not many good casting solutions. Lame, but every time I run into a new pathological case with the TV OS and its set of subpar apps I reconsider how much it’s even worth to have fancy 10ft interfaces and smart phone integration.

(If you are looking for a casting solution for an HTPC running Windows, I tried Reflector 3 briefly and it looks pretty good. But I personally do not run Windows on my own HTPC, so I’m stuck in the dark.)

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I've long since run with the notion that if you must have Smart TV features, do it with an external box. Last time I checked the Roku devices were decent for this, but there's a bunch of alternatives, and some lovely FOSS stuff (Kodi comes to mind) that is much more privacy focused.

The TV itself is a black box of mystery, and does NOT get to go on my network. It doesn't need my wifi password, and I certainly don't want it sending screenshots of my desktop (with sensitive information) off to some advertising agency. No thank you! But far more importantly, the TV will last for years as a dumb monitor, and the external box is usually much cheaper, and can be upgraded and secured separately. This just feels like the correct model.

My last TV set I bought, I specifically looked for a non-smart TV. Got it for a bit cheaper than the smart models and there's no bloat. Everything else is handled by either PS4 or laptop via hdmi. I am not sure it's even possible to find non-smart TVs anymore.

impossible indeed. however a recent kickstarter is trying to change this: https://ironcast.tv/

lets hope they can deliver.

In Europe I buy dumb panels aimed at stores.

https://www.swedx.se/#horizontalTab2

This is great, thanks.

Yeah I just link one of those Intel NUC boxes to my TV and do everything through a real OS

I used to do this with an Nvidia Shield, but I've since switched to a Roku TV (meaning TV with Roku software built in). With this setup, I have a single remote that turns the TV on/off, can play Netflix or other apps, adjusts the volume of external speakers, switch inputs, but still come back from any input when you hit home.

I could not figure out how to do this with any other combination, and this strikes me as fairly baseline usability.

I've gone through many incarnations of HTPC's, plus tried with SageTV, Roku[1], Chromecasts, and several others... and can absolutely recommend the Nvidia Shield. It has a good 10-foot interface via Android TV (as opposed to regular Android), is kept updated, is a Google Cast target, has official apps for all the major streaming platforms, can run Plex and Kodi (for local content), and it's also possible to sideload APKs. Most importantly, it "just works".

I was never able to build a HTPC that worked with all the video sources I wanted (Plex, Netflix, Youtube) and was possible to control without ever having to touch a keyboard/mouse (or resort to a janky air mouse/remote thing). With the Shield + a Logitech Harmony Hub, a single dead-simple remote controls entire setup (Shield, TV, external amp, plus a BluRay player that I never use anymore).

[1] Note: I only have a Roku 2nd Gen. The newer ones look a lot better and are probably a fine option now, but I still really like the Android TV "Home" experience a lot more.

That's awesome. I used to be a big fan of Sage, before they sold out / shut down. Even did the direct capture from cable boxes. I've been planning to get a Shield TV, so good to see these endorsements!

Likewise. I still have some HD300's in my basement somewhere, along with a couple Hauppauge PCI capture cards, and a Silicondust HDHomerun.

Shortly after Sage was shut down my cable company started encrypting all their channels, rendering most of my PVR setup pointless. After chasing issues with Youtube breaking API changes, I finally and begrudgingly pulled the plug on Sage. Several HTPC iterations later I feel like only now (with the Shield + Plex) do I have a comparable setup.

I did briefly play with Plex PVR with my HDHomerun and an OTA antenna, but I don't get enough channels for it to be worthwhile, and never even bothered re-installing the antenna after my roof was re-shingled last year.

I actually had the HDHomeRun that supported a cablecard and got my Shield to show channels from it, but it was never great. I eventually abandoned the Shield when I needed to add another device, and I didn't want to return to the bad old days of having to use another remote to manage inputs.

Depending on your TV, the Shield can control the TV (volume and power) via HDMI-CEC (my decade old Sony LCD TV supports it). You have to go into settings but once setup, you can power on the TV and auto switch to the Shield HDMI connection with one button.

A screen should be dumb, though I should be able to attach something smart. TVs are trying to be what they are not.

The problem is that there is nothing else to compete on. TVs are two centimeters thick and have crisp displays. I don’t give a crap about 5k or whatever. So what can they market on except price? Apps.

Yes, having an external box can be a good idea, but some things you may want to have in the TV itself such as the picture adjustment settings. There might also be multiple inputs, and IMIDI interface which can be used to select between them and switch TV on/off and adjust volume and so on, allowing you to program other devices to control it.

> I've long since run with the notion that if you must have Smart TV features, do it with an external box

I'd go farther. I want everything to be external boxes. Right now I'm looking at having to get a new A/V receiver because mine cannot handle 4K video. It does all the audio stuff I need just fine.

If video switching and audio processing was handled by separate boxes, I'd just be looking at changing out the video switching box.

Now suppose that later I decide I would like to be able to control my receiver with Alexa or Google Home. As it is now that will be another "replace the whole damn receiver" moment. If it were all separate boxes, the preamps, amps, surround sound processor, and radio receiver would all be separate components, controlled by a controller box. If I decide I want Alexa, I'd just buy a new Alexa compatible controller box.

Or I decide I want to upgrade from 5 channels to 7 channels...buy a couple more amp boxes and speakers for the new channels (and might also need a new surround sound processor box).

Basically, take a block diagram of a complete full featured home theater system, and make every block in that a separate box so I can (1) just buy the boxes I need for my system, and (2) upgrade a box at a time.

That said, I doubt TV makers will ever stop primarily making Smart TVs. A Smart TV can function as the only component of a home theater system. Someone moving into their first apartment after school, say, wanting to start putting together their entertainment system can start with a Smart TV, stick it on their home internet, and then use the Netflix/Prime/Disney+/etc app on the TV to watch movies.

That Smart TV probably has a few HDMI in ports, so they can also use it with the cable box if they have cable, and with their gaming consoles.

With a dumb TV they'd need the TV, and they would need an A/V receiver, and speakers, and something to run the Netflix/etc. apps. Buying all that at once might be a budget buster for someone starting out.

By making the TVs smart, the TV makers greatly increase the chances that a TV will be the first component bought for a new home theater setup, and probably also increases the chances that that first TV will be a big screen, high resolution, high quality display model.

20 years ago, I was making the same argument about desktops vs laptops. I was also carefully selecting which stick of ram to buy. Now, the whole world buys laptops, except for gamers and linux users. I don't think non-enthusiasts want to think about that many boxes and arrows.

I support separate modules for everything, and am amused at the thought of connecting a Roku to an old console TV and running it through a 6-figure sound system.

You could perhaps keep using your receiver with a HDMI switch and a HDMI audio extractor. Like these two: https://www.aliexpress.com/i/4000102712226.html https://www.aliexpress.com/i/32850215019.html

I've had no problems with LG webOS. Media playback off usb and DLNA is flawless and supports every codec and container I've thrown at it, all the apps work well. I've had it playing 100mbit/sec H265 off network for example with no issues.

It's actually pretty hard to find a media player that supports Dolby Vision for example. No Android media box does, and as far as I know Windows support is very patchy. At least with webOS it supports all the video formats the TV supports.

I've tried Kodi and whatnot and found those sort of solutions to be confusing, slow, and not particularly confidence inspiring. I taken to just using mpv with --input-ipc-server==... --vo=gpu --gpu-context=drm. It can play anything from my NAS over NFS, or any URL that youtube-dl supports (which is most anything.) It works with youtube, twitch, vimeo, basically anything except netflix or amazon prime. And it doesn't need a new "app" or "plugin" for each, since youtube-dl is a nice piece of software.

I've read of "Smart" TVs that will scan for and connect to open WiFi. That's fun. Even if you don't let the thing on your network it might still be able to ruin your television watching experience.

Worse yet, Smart TVs often brick themselves due to failed software updates. My last Sony TV did an overnight Android update, and I found it in a state where it'd show the Android boot logo and subsequently shut down. Some Google research showed that this has happened to hundreds of people (youtube videos outlining the problem, etc). Sony refused to do anything due to the TV being out of warranty, and no amount of hackery could get the TV back up and running. The end result--perfectly fine hardware being taken to an electronics recycling facility because the firmware was totally hosed. It's maddening.

That sounds incredibly frustrating, and I can't believe Sony is able to get away with that. If it's not under warranty I can understand not replacing it for parts breaking due to wear or user error, but if it's an update the company pushed out that actively broke everyone's TV it seems cut and dry that they should fix or replace them.

> Sony refused to do anything due to the TV being out of warranty.

Interestingly, apparently in the UK (or maybe EU?) there's a defined period an appliance is required to work for, to be "fit for purpose". Note - not a warranty thing, it's a consumer goods thing.

Not living in the UK any more (thanks Brexit), so don't remember off hand the period of time though.

I believe it's at least two years and I thought it was an EU wide thing (though I used it in the UK).

I always laugh when I see something say "1 year warranty" as I know two years is required.

Similar in New Zealand, although the exact time isn't defined. The parent comment's case would almost certainly fall under the protection of the Consumer Guarantees Act[1][2] and Sony would have to fix or replace it. Of course, getting a company to actually do something can be harder than just telling them the law.

[1] https://www.consumerprotection.govt.nz/general-help/consumer...

[2] http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1993/0091/24.0/DLM...

In my experience the CGA is generally ignored until the Commerce Commission investigates. The best you could do is take them to the Disputes Tribunal (small claims court) and then the time and energy involved is probably outweighed by the replacement cost unless it's a ultra high end TV.

Would it really be that bad? Sounds like an easy win - even if they did show up (which they won't).

We have similar things in Australia. Hell our consumer protection laws are why people can get refunds on Steam

No Sony TV has ever had firmware updates for long enough that the retailer wouldn't be required to replace it under the Sale of Goods Act under UK law fwiw.

This Christmas I finally took the time (which admittedly didn't take long; I was just lazy until now) to set up LibreElec on my pi and hook it up to my TV, and I honestly don't know how I've overlooked this for so many years.

It's a DLNA/UPNP client so I can cast anything I want from my media server on my computer to it (Bubble UPNP is a great app to control all this from my phone) and even though it doesn't have "cast" built into apps like Youtube and Twitch, they're all supported as addons so you can still get 90% of the functionality, so I can finally throw away my Chromecasts. Plus you can either use the TV's remote with HDMI-CEC out of the box, or hook up a wireless keyboard.

With another pi running TVHeadEnd that I feed my aerial into, I basically don't need any of the builtin TV software anymore, Kodi just controls it all. It's a pretty liberating feeling.

Sounds cool. How easy is it to do what I talk about in the blog post and send it a URL from my phone?

With Kodi it's dead easy, actually I was thinking about it while reading your post: "he should use Kodi"

I think I probably should. But I also think I shouldn't have to. This is the first time the Roku has let me down.

I use Kodi, and while it probably isn't a complete replacement for Roku (Netflix doesn't work out of the box but I have to admit I haven't looked into getting it to work because it's one of the few "smart" things I let my smart TV do), it's pretty good for showing content.

There's a Firefox extension called "Send to Kodi" that I use to quickly cast Youtube videos and other videos from my PC to my Kodi. On my phone I use Kore, which can send a URL to Kodi using the standard Android share menu (hold a link, Share > Play on Kodi).

Kodi also supports UPNP so you can use one of the million available apps for that to allow some other media servers as well.

It's not perfect, but Kodi has managed to satisfy my video consumption needs quite well. I'm using an outdated version (it's running on my server which runs Debian stable) but I haven't run into problems thus far.

How have you found DLNA? I tried it briefly with the built-in PS4 client and MiniDLNA/ReadyMedia on a headless Ubuntu machine and I found it to be awful— the server side needed to be rebooted in order to discover new media in the folder, the PS4 client was clunky to use (missing obvious stuff like picking up playing a file where you left off), and iTunes instances on the same network would do weird stuff like suddenly peg the processor and burn themselves to the ground, apparently due to something in the protocol.

I haven't yet circled back, but my conclusion was to give up on it and instead pursue an end-to-end solution like Plex or Jellyfin.

The PS4 renderer is pretty bare boned, no getting around that. The newer versions of UMS support resuming and FF/RW, depending on the way the file has been encoded.

FWIW, I use a minidlna instance on a Raspberry Pi to serve my media around the house and I have never had an issue with it discovering newly downloaded media.

It currently serves around 3TB of video and audio files, and new files are added daily. I haven't restarted either the Pi or the minidlna service for many months.

I choose this option because it is a very light-weight solution with no features that I will never use (like trans-coding or metadata downloading, poster art etc).

My standard operating procedure for TVs is:

Setup sound bar.

Connect new TV to HDMI switch.

Get the TV working with my remote.

Throw TV remote in a corner somewhere....

I don't even try to use a smart TV's internal functions anymore. They're just big monitors to me.

Don't some smart tv's scan the local wifi networks and try to find one they can connect back home through? eg no password on it.

Guessing they haven't started shipping with a dictionary to try brute forcing the most common passwords. :D

That thought had occurred to me, fortunately I don't have a guest network.

I do worry that one day someone is going to buy one of those Comcast modems that has the automatic Xfinity guest networks and it will find that ...

In my experience, those networks only work if you are a Comcast subscriber. You have to have an account to authenticate.

There would be some kind of backlash if those TVs connected to one and was able to phone home. Don't know how bad, probably on the order of the smart TV that was phoning home with the name of the contents of and flash drives you connected.

No, they don't. All evidence is that this is an urban legend.

There are set top boxes (Apple TV, Nvidia Shield, etc.) that offer a much better user experience with thriving app ecosystems and regular feature updates, if you don't want the rigamarole of trying to use desktop software in a living room.

I used to do the whole HTPC thing but having to use an actual web browser to access half my content felt obnoxious and cumbersome.

As for avoiding smart TVs, I found it pretty easy to just ignore the WebOS garbage on my LG. I don't see why I would want to pay more to get rid of a feature I haven't had to interact with since setting the device up.

> There are set top boxes

But can any of them be trusted? Serious question...

Trusted with your viewing history? With a trivially regeneratable netflix password?

I like keeping privacy private, but I'm having a hard time imagining what sorts of private data you are concerned with that would be going over a set top box.

Or were you more worried about the STB being an attack vector into your home and other machines?

Trusted as in not reporting data about my use of the boxes or what I'm watching to anybody other than the sources of the video.

Almost certainly not, they're very likely collecting viewership data unless not doing that is explicitly called out. But there is some good news! Since you're watching a lot of things that are being served over the interwebs your data has likely already been entirely harvested by the provider companies anyways!

Reporting back information on your home network?

Trust is relative. They can certainly be trusted more than the Smart TVs because their incentives align at least marginally better with yours. They need to justify their price. The TVs are for the most part doing the minimum possible to check the "Smart" box.

What's your threat model?

Apple TV is a pragmatic option for the sort of person that doesn't mind the Apple Walled Garden.

Xbox One is a pragmatic option for the sort of person that doesn't mind the Xbox/Microsoft Walled Garden.

NVidia Shield and FireTV are pragmatic options for folks that prefer the more Android-ish "mostly a Walled Garden, but".

If your threat model is anything with a corporate or walled garden smell, then sure none of them can be trusted and just build your own media PC with Linux and whichever apps you feel you can trust.

> What's your threat model?

Avoiding tracking and phone-home things.

Then in that case you will have to go open source like a Plex or Kodi box. Raspberry pis work nicely for this.

Even PLEX includes Google Analytics now I believe.

Check out Vero 4k+, it runs on OSMC (open source media center) with Kodi installed. I run it on my 4k Philips TV and it works perfectly for any kind of media content...

I have an Apple TV and two Rokus. According to my PiHole and my UniFi controller, the Rokus (attempt) to do an awful lot of talking to domains associated with telemetry and advertising all throughout the day. My Apple TV is pretty quiet, though I do catch some ad/telemetry traffic when using individual apps.

I intend to replace the Rokus.

Are you aware of any that support the "play this URL" use case I talk about in the blog post?

A Sony Android TV would - you could paste the URL into either VLC or the Internet Browser provided with the TV using the Android TV remote app on your phone, as you can paste into that.

Ah so you can just cast whatever is on VLC? That was the first thing I tried with Roku but my TV doesn't support it, and I was disappointed there wasn't any VLC companion app.

Well, VLC does have casting, but here I more meant you can run VLC on the TV itself, and you can enter a URL directly into VLC on the TV itself. While that's a bit clunky, if you use the remote app on a phone you can enter keyboard data and, most importantly, paste keyboard data from your phone into an input field on the TV itself. So no casting would be required.

Kodi would also enable the same use case.

Wait does Roku have a VLC app? I swear I checked for one.

No, I mean for Android TV in all cases above.

I don't think this is a use case on Roku. Roku has zero international market share, so I don't think there's much of a developer market for it.

This may help

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rabidgreml...

VLC for AppleTV: https://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-appletv.html

A while ago I just rejected the concept of smart TVs (and TVs wholesale) in my residence. Hook a projector up to a computer, have a wireless mouse floating around and either use on-screen key entry or a keyboard to interact with the browser when not just working off of pre-set sources and call it a day. If you wanted to go above and beyond I guess you could set up remote desktop and get into the system from your phone, but I have never felt the need.

The computer can be as cheap as the video quality you want to view... and a decent 1080p projector can easily be had for ~300 USD, bump up the computer to gaming specs and run your entertainment off of it and you've got a nice multi-use solution for the house... unless there is competition for resources.

TV makers should stop embedding the Smart TV features, and focus on either bundling an external box on dongle, or establish a standard for smartTV circuit board that you can replace by a third-party or pull out completely when the inevitable happens (system is unsupported/EOL, has some security flaws the manufacturer doesn't take seriously, etc. And more importantly, make the display works without such card.

How would that benefit the TV manufacturers?

Unless average Joes start clamoring for that, all of the cost associated with what you're asking for wouldn't help them sell a significantly larger number of TVs.

Commercial grade NEC digital signage displays use the Open Pluggable Standard. You can insert a number of modules into the OPS slot, from a SDI video receiver, to a nasty Android based media player, or even a full x86 PC.

I've said it before here, but I'm getting a second hand NEC commercial display as my next TV. I've used them at work and they are excellent panels.

I agree with your frustrations about smart TVs but I also like the setup I have with my TV.

I bought an LG OLED last summer (a 55" C9) and to be honest I don't hate the software (webOS) on it. However my setup is not really normal.

Firstly my TV is connected via Ethernet to my router and is restricted to only Netflix, the LG web store and my internal network.

I don't watch live TV, instead my viewing is limited to Netflix and content on my Plex server. Turns out the LG Plex app is very good. The TV supports pretty much every video and audio codec so I can do Direct Play from my Plex server. I mostly have direct Blu-ray streams extracted and remuxed into mkv files so there is no quality difference with using Plex vs. the actual Blu-ray. The rest is a mixture of H.264 and H.265 video with AAC and DTS audio in mp4 or mkv files. Everything plays perfectly with quality on par with or exceeding Netflix to give a comparison.

This setup works great for me. I only really interact with the TV OS to switch between Netflix and Plex which isn't a big deal and the picture quality of the OLED panel is incredible with 4K HDR content.

The real star of the show is Plex though which is just god damn fantastic. As everything I have is Direct Play compatible I can (and have) run the Plex server on a Raspberry Pi with a USB HDD attached and it works perfectly. Even for 80GB 4K HDR movies (direct Blu-ray remux files are large!) plays back from a Pi running openmediavault and Plex media server in Docker.

In the past I have tried a few different solutions such as a HTPC running Windows plugged directly into the TV but nothing gave me as good picture quality with the same flexibility as using the native TV apps.

In fact the Plex on a Pi setup works so well for me I set one up for my mother when I visited over the new year. She can watch any content on my Plex server as well as anything I upload to hers (as she often wants things I don't care for so don't want using up my disk space :)

If you haven't looked into Plex I highly recommend you check it out. It really does 'just work' which is so nice when you want to sit down and watch a movie without having to deal with all the adverts and junk before the movie on a Blu-ray disc.

I fear that soon we're going to need an open-source alternative to Plex. Increasingly aggressive monetization seems to be creeping into the Plex experience. I keep finding things I don't own and don't want showing up on my home screen. "Suggested movies" and "Suggested podcasts" and the like. You can prune them back but a few months later you find some other garbage you don't want.

This is a very valid complaint however I understand their need to monetise and at least you can remove that items. At least so far.

I am always open to alternatives however with everything I have tried over the years nothing has come close to how well Plex works. From the flexibility of running the server to the superb automatic content identification to the frame perfect delivery to my TV it has been flawless for me.

However I feel I should point out again that I don't use the transcoding feature so I cannot comment on how well that works.

Eh, it's gotten noticeably worse of late, almost as if their resources are going somewhere other than UX. The client as picked up a habit of hard-crashing on certain files when "Automatic" transcoding or "original" is selected instead of manually choosing a certain bitrate.

I do not use the transcoding feature (it murders HDR content) so have never experienced any crashes.

The only UI prompt I recall seeing is some new streaming feature which I haven't looked into but appears to be some kind of partnership with content providers? I was able to get rid of it easily enough to not even remember how I did it and haven't seen it since.

Perhaps the mobile apps (which I assume are updated more regularly?) have had some more prompts? I only ever use the app on my TV.

> I fear that soon we're going to need an open-source alternative to Plex.

Alternative: Emby https://emby.media/

Open-Source Alternative: Jellyfin (fork of Emby v3) https://jellyfin.org/

> no strings attached, no premium licenses or features, and no hidden agendas

Subtle. :) Anyone know the motivation for this fork / dig against Emby, other than the premium licensing?

The gist is that they went from being open to closed source, mostly because they had to invest heavily into transcoding and client support. Naturally, some folks didn't like that and forked.

Here's my little suggestion for all those looking for an alternative to "Smart" TVs:

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=42+inch+computer+monitor

Can the monitor be removed from the stand, and hung on a wall?

I guess it depends on the monitor, but wall mounts are a pretty established standard.

Most monitors, except for the most bare-bones models, will have a standardized mounting hole pattern on the back called a "VESA mount" for which you can obtain a wall mounting bracket. It's the same way you attach a monitor to a desk-mounted arm.

Sure... if you want to pay twice as much as the similar sized TV.[1] I actually just buy 4k TVs and use them as computer monitors instead. As long as you research to find one that has low response times (rtings.com helps with that), it works fine.

1: https://www.vizio.com/tvs/v405g9.html

Yeah another person brought up that the cost is reduced based on the data their mining for usage.

I'd also like to point out that most of the sub-$400 Smart TVs on Amazon don't have any DisplayPorts, and the display is probably of a lower quality than something that's designed to be looked at from a couple of feet away rather than dozens of feet.

Bigger than 42", I'd just recommend a projector.

You can turn off the content detection features in most (all?) smart TVs that include it. I've turned it off on mine.

What's the main benefit of DisplayPort when most new hardware supports Hdmi 2.0, which does 4k at 60Hz?

How would you define lower quality based on viewing distance? What metrics are we going by that we might expect to be worse? There probably are some, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.

Reaponse time is the one that comes to mind, not because of viewing distance but because of different intended use cases, but I specifically account for that when looking for a TV to use as a monitor.

Huh. I will admit, I always kind of dismissed monitors out of a blanket assumption that they'd be wildly expensive, but $550 for 4K support is not that bad.

Yes, it's more expensive than a smart TV, but the only reason is because smart TVs are very literally subsidized by future data collection and monetization.

Not trying to minimize that this could still be too much money for some people, but frankly, a one-time extra $250-300 to permanently escape that whole tracking situation is just a lot less than I expected.

I also thought of using a computer monitor. Also it may help to reduce the lag (I know some people use a computer monitor for their games due to this). Also I don't need such a huge TV set, I think.

As an alternative to getting a smart tv and treating it dumb, I came across this dumb tv a few weeks ago: ironcast.tv

The last time I tried to buy a decent TV, I really wanted a non-smart version. It seems that this is an impossible ask. I was even willing to pay extra. Now that I have a smart TV, I really don't understand most of what it does. Whenever I turn it on it is playing some Soccer (Futbol) station. How? I don't know. I don't have cable or an internet connection to the TV. I assume it must be getting it over the air. Can I turn it off. I don't know. I haven't found anyway to do so so far.

Tizen could be a great OS if Samsung did not lock it down and enabled building from source. It is a lot closer to Linux than Android. I use it on a watch/fitness-tracker and the whole package would be great if the development was not hamstrung by Samsung.

You need to sign packages with a certificate you get from Samsung and tie it to your device ids for sideloading. For that, you need Tizen Studio, which is a custom outdated version of eclipse, depending on outdated versions of some external libraries. I tried it in a container, which worked fine, except for the signature generation. So I ran it in a sufficiently outdated VM.

Unfortunately, this developer cert will only get you so far and for the complete API, you need a partner level cert.

If you put up with all this, there's the documentation[0]. It takes ages to load and you can't easily download the damn thing, because they pull in the content via XHR. Why, Samsung, why?

[0]: https://developer.tizen.org/development/api-references/nativ...

I've had two Samsung smart TVs, neither of which were capable of letting me share my screen from a Samsung Galaxy phone..... (well, technically, I did get it to work once or twice, but I'm very good at troubleshooting and it took me over an hour and three different apps).

>I hate smart TVs with a burning passion.

Me too! When I bought a new Samsung 32" last year, I went very, very slowly as I set it up, so as not to inadvertently connect it to the internet. I succeeded in not connecting and life is good.

Pretty sure some tv's scan the local wifi networks looking for way to call home.

Not sure if Samsung is one of the manufacturers of those though.

Yes! As I recall, a screen came up with a bunch of local wifi networks — including my own two — asking me to put in a password to connect. I was able to move on to the next screen without doing so, and I was home free.

> So I’ve got a desktop computer hooked up to my smart TV and now I am contemplating paying more for a TV so I can get one that doesn’t have any of this dumb crap on it.

Yeah, call me when you find one…

I have an nvidia shield which more than fulfills the "smart tv" needs, and I think that's probably the way it should be and stay. I love this setup and just want to disable all the smart features now. It's not like they're in the way but sometimes the tv does decide that "I see you're watching a movie. Now might be a good time to ask you to reboot for the latest software update innit?"

Can't you just remove the smart TV's internet access (no wifi pw, no Ethernet) and treat it as dumb? Then attach a Chromecast or whatever "smart" dongle you think has the best UI.

This is definitely one approach, but I would actually just prefer a full computer, because I do sometimes run other software that is simply not available on any dongles.

One downside though is that I only have a couple HDMI ports to work with, so between a Nintendo Switch and a full desktop PC I'm already using all of the ports.

Also, even though I love the NVIDIA Shield, I find it does not really integrate as well as I hoped via HDMI CEC. It's a bit clunky to be honest, and though it's cool I can use the TV remote over CEC, it is definitely not as good as using the Shield remote, due to latency and some weird behavioral differences. So there are also downsides like that, too...

My shield also keeps stealing focus. When I turn on the switch, the TV turns on, then the shield turns on and steals focus from the switch, and I have to go grab the tv remote and turn it back to the Switch again.

Pressing the Home button on the Switch controller automatically changes the input source to the Switch, on my TV.

Get a Sofabaton u1. Programmable universal ir and Bluetooth remote. You can map the buttons to control both at once.

Typically you'd buy a receiver to take all the HDMI inputs and power speakers and control which source went to the TV via a single HDMI cord. My receiver has something like 6 HDMI ports. Smart TVs have attempted to invert this relationship by accepting HDMI and splitting audio out to the receiver, but you don't have to play along.

Depends, but generally yes, for now. In the near future though you're likely to see smart TV's and similar devices with dedicated SIM cards and cellular modems that can't be disabled.

What do you mean by similar devices?

Other appliances. Set top boxes, refrigerators, washing machines, doorbells, anything someone thinks should be part of the "Internet of Things" product line they sell.

> similar devices with dedicated SIM cards and cellular modems that can't be disabled.

All such radios can be disabled, if not by removing the antenna, then by enclosing it in a faraday cage. It is chilling, though, that these things may become necessary for basic things like appliances.

It also really affects the viewing angle.

I remember reading in another of these threads that the TV will try to connect to open networks or neighboring networks that they know the passwords to (like Xfinity). But I can't find any good source through a quick search, so this might just be HN rumors.

Keeping the comment in case anyone does have a source. If no response, let's assume rumor.

> If you want to watch Twitch.TV streams for example you are SoL. There was an unofficial Twitch app, but it was removed from the store.

I still get worked up about this. I was able to watch streams on my TV using this app and someone somewhere just decided I shouldn't be able no more. The TV has lost value with this change, to me at least.

While I agree, and know of all the evil repercussions of smart TVs, Samsung's software is terrible but LG's is pretty good, because I believe it's just WebOS from Palm Days. It's easily been my most positive "TV OS" experience yet.

That said, I wish there was a dumb TV option.

I used to write software for samsung smart tvs along with other TV OSes and games consoles.

Samsung/Tizen was one of the worst in my experience (the only thing I found more annoying was PlayStation only giving a windows sdk when the box itself is basically a BSD. Let me develop on Linux dammit!)

> I hate smart TVs with a burning passion.

Yes, me too. I have an old dumb TV, and will use that until it breaks. When that happens, I won't be buying another TV at all, since as near as I can tell, the "smart" kind will be the only kind on the market.

A few years back I bought a cheap one at a black friday sell and it is plain ol' dumb model. I feed in an HDMI from a laptop and all I use the remote for is on/off and volume.

I hate them too. So I just have a large monitor.

> You can’t really run many 10 ft versions of things ...

Huh?

My media server is in a ventilated closet, so I'm using ~15 meter HDMI, USB and audio cables. It was admittedly an expensive HDMI cable, but it seems to work well enough.

I believe they're referring to a 10 ft UI, meaning optimized for viewing from 10 feet away (bigger text, not requiring precise mouse clicks, etc).

Oh, I see -- "10ft UI".

Isn't it easy to tweak all that? It is in Debian, anyway.

I miss the days when my TV didn't need rebooted and didn't crash. I want a TV that is basically just a multiple input dumb monitor. I don't even want a tuner built in.

Pretty sure they stopped shipping ads enabled by default a while ago. Pretty sure both of the Samsung smart TVs in the house didn't have them enabled out of the box.

Never experienced those problems with Tizen but sometimes it lags like hell. After it warms up it's pretty fast; Unfortunately there's no Crunchyroll app yet.

I have a Tizen Samsung TV. It is super laggy. Like 3+ seconds to respond to a button press on the remote. I found some anti-virus options (?!) deep in the TV settings. Turning real-time anti-virus scanning off made that TV almost usable again.

Really ? Antivirus ? Jeez. Gonna try to find and disable it as well; Sometimes after you turn the tv off it turns on by itself. Probably another bug;

I just want a TV that lets me ssh/sftp/scp/VLC. The VLC app would be the "smart tv".

I have a dirt cheap TLC smart TV w/ Roku that works great. 55 inch for ~$250 or so.

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