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Comment by gonehome | Hacker News Reader

I think there’s a market for this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26290427

“Make it OLED, dumb TV, instant on, Apple TV box plugs in. Separate box with front facing ports that connects to screen with one cable. A remote designed by someone who thought about it for ten seconds (why do modern TVs have dozens of buttons no one ever uses?).

This entire market is in desperate need of someone to make something decent. The best available option today is LG and it’s still laden with ads and takes a few seconds to boot up.”

I would buy one at least, there’s definitely some low hanging fruit.

I'd probably even lean into it and name the company 'dumb electronics', plus there's a nice sort of symmetry to the word 'dumb' and 'db' would be a decent logo.

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Define a standard form factor for a box that can have attachments to it. (Say approximatly 1 x RPi or 1.5 x RPi), that has a secure modular connector that is fed HDMI IN/OUT, Power, a data bus (Ethernet?), and space so custom connectors can be on the other side. Offer panels with a 'startup' block, and maybe 1 or two others for other devices. Ensure there is enough ventilation for passive/silent cooling.

Set up partners to make custom boxes. Things like SSD's in the same form factor storing media to be shared with other media block devices, (HDMI would be unpopulated), a Roku in the secondary/primary position. DTv Tuners with a Coaxial F-Connector for the antenna, etc.

This "Standard media block" connector could even be retrofit to legacy panels by means of an external box, and one master upstream connector.

Does anything like this exist yet? If not, what would be preventing it?

Existing manufacturers make more by locking their hardware into their platform for ads.

This is not a show-stopper.

You can buy a simple office keyboard for $25, but there is a market for custom mechanical keyboards 10x as expensive.

You can watch YouTube for free, but a lot of people buys the premium subscription to remove ads.

Sam thing here: there may be enough people wanting to buy an ad-free, surveillance-free premium TV with user-inspectable, user-updatable open-source firmware, latest HDMI, and in interface for network boxes to taste. Given that it has a good panel, is well-built, has a minimal but premium look, and the producer offers a modicum of tech support, it can easily be sold for at 150% or even 200% the price of an ad-ridden smart TV from big names.

Such a business can be a good business, even though it won't show hockey-stick growth.

>You can buy a simple office keyboard for $25, but there is a market for custom mechanical keyboards 10x as expensive.

Or 100x even

I am 100% in on making this. Another recent thread where I chimed in on making something with fewer buttons. I also lament about the latest LG offerings. I even propose ditching a first party remote in favor of just connecting with your favorite one. Why add to the problem of too many remotes by adding yet another one?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26993846

I would love to chat with someone who knows more about the hardware side. How do you get a panel with a "dev kit" where you can load on the copy protection and all the modern stuff needed to play DRM content? I would be up for building a new OS from scratch.

My 2020 Samsung TV remote has only 3 or 4 buttons (I still don’t use it)

Yes thats why I am saying just get rid of these remotes :)

They exist[1]. The pricing is likely out of your budget though.

The included ads, large volumes, and low margins all drive down the cost of consumer displays. Your dream might also end up quite expensive. [1] https://pro.sony/ue_US/products/broadcastpromonitors

I think that's a different product/market? Aren't those displays targeting high end video/movie production that requires perfect color correction? I'd also guess they're marked up a lot given their customer (movie studios/enterprise). They're also small.

I think there's a middle ground 'good enough' panel that's still high end (think like LG E6) that doesn't have the extra crap and where someone has thought through the design elements (input box, remote, industrial design of case).

I'd expect that to be possible for around $5k - maybe that's just not feasible?

As noted elsewhere, broadcast hardware has much higher manufacturing and performance requirements, so it's not an apples-to-apples price comparison.

I'm sure there's a market for $600 (or $1000) TVs that don't have all the "price-lowering" (I'm skeptical) features of $300 TVs.

I mean, maybe the prices of ad-TVs are so low as a loss-leader to get a new advertising vector into your house? Yes, of course TVs already have ads, but they don't have this particular pipeline, one that benefits the manufacturer/brand more than normal OTA ads.

How much is a less-annoying TV worth to people? I'm guessing more than is usually estimated, and at any rate probably pretty close to price+ad revenue of a "consumer display."

The last time I bought a TV, >10 years ago, a high end, but not top of the line quality dumb TV was ~$1000. I'd gladly pay that again, especially if I think it's going to last 12 years or so.

Ironically, they sell those $300 TVs at a profit of about $500, after advertising deals.

Do you have a source for this? Not that I don't believe it but that sounds like a really good deal for them.

Are they really that expensive? I looked up the device that I probably would want, and that would be the 55 inch 4k TV. Searching for a place to buy it revealed this link, that gives a price: https://www.uk.insight.com/en-gb/productinfo/lcd-tvs-and-dis...

It seems pretty reasonable to me. Is there a catch with that device that makes it not appropriate to use as your main TV?

Unlike the broadcast OLED displays, those Bravias use normal LCD panels. They're closer to consumer TVs, but lack the TV tuner for legal reasons.

If you're just using it over HDMI, it would work fine as a main TV. The added brightness would may be appreciated.

The gotcha is that it already runs an outdated version of Android(9.0). Sony consumer TVs that released back then didn't have ads. It was only a later Google update that added ads to the UI.[1] No guarantees these signage displays will be safe if you updated them over the internet.

[1] https://www.rtings.com/tv/tests/ads-in-smart-tv#remove-sony-...

> I would buy one at least

Would you? At 2x the price (based on the last time I bought one of them) for just the panel, plus an apple tv ($200) plus a speaker/soundbar (let's say $500) - and you're not getting an OLED with ARC at that either.

Doesn't Spectre fill basically all of these requirements? For example, this 4k offering on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Sceptre-U550CV-U-Ultra-2160p-60Hz/dp/... There is no smart functionality, just some HDMI ports. I haven't owned one myself, but I plan to when it's time to eventually replace my 10-year-old TV.

I have two tvs from them, bottom of the barrel Black Friday deals and they work great and seem fairly durable (they've both been through a few moves)

It's not OLED, also looks pretty cheap?

I don't want a crappy, cheap, panel with no smart features. I want a premium panel without smart features.

Think like Apple Pro Cinema Display in TV form.

Exactly. That's my biggest struggle with finding a TV these days.

I want to make sure that the networking functionality is what I attached to it, not something built into the TV that I have no way of possibly disabling or removing entirely. With some of the relatively recent PiHole posts, it's become clear that some of these smart TVs are including some level of DNS resolution on their end to get around ad blocking functionality. They'll say it's for ensuring they can always download updates, but it's really for retrieving ads.

I want a display that's going to last longer than 3 years. This is one of my concerns with Spectre displays. I'm not sure of their longevity.

I want that display to have a great picture. I also don't think Spectre displays looked particularly great when I looked at them in the past. Maybe that's changed over time.

Just don't give it your network password, don't connect it to the wifi.

And turn off 99% of the picture enhancement options

Ironic advice given what this post is about :}

I find the easiest way to make the TV dumb is to reject every EULA and ToS I'm presented with. Basic TV functionality can't really be disabled (not without making the device unfit for the purpose it was sold), and any further collection of data would expose the manufacturer to some massive legal liability.

As I commented below in another thread: If the demand is high enough, a custom controller can be developed to match controller on-board Apple Pro XDR while keeping the price point significantly cheaper.

Picked up a few of these, they look fine and work great.

I have a Sony x90ch, it has no ads, just a thin panel with some content suggestions which we ignore. It may be because I run it through pi-hole but I don't think Sony tvs do ads in general. I had to make to not accept a particular option for a service, don't remember the name, which does tracking. Pretty stock Android from what I can tell.

Compared to what I've been hearing about Samsung and LG it's been rather nice in this respect.

The controller in my industrial display accepts serial commands for control and has a fairly simple IR remote you can use as well. For customer application, we developed a simple .NET utility that they use to control approx. 240x individual displays at each facility from a single control room. Knowing that RS232 can be controlled using NodeJS these days, I'm sure more creative solutions can be developed for a personalized remote control.

I'm not sure why TVs still use IR - haven't all other forms of wireless moved past that to much better performing standards that don't require direction or line of sight?

Nobody is pointing their xbox controller at the console.

Cheap IR supply line?

My Roku remote takes several seconds to wake up and connect (over bluetooth?) every time I turn on the TV. It's infuriating. Give me back IR with its line of sight limitations!

It's simple and it works. It's cheap, it's responsive (button presses are responded to instantaneously, all of my game controllers take several seconds to power on and connect before they're useful), it's completely passive when not in use and gives you great battery life, in regular use (i.e., one TV per room) there's no practical issues with pairing or interference.

The only limitation is that you need line of sight to the TV.

Which might be an issue except generally if you're using a TV, you have line of sight to it because... it's a TV and that's its function.

I guess I've had more issues with it.

Line of site is often a pain with things in front of the TV or appliances in TV stands behind a cabinet.

The responsiveness is often slow (granted this is the fault of the TV's UI/software more than it is the fault of the infrared).

Having to point the remote at the TV is annoying - often it doesn't register unless you're sticking your arm out (takes a few tries for me most of the time).

The Xbox controllers work instantly and it doesn't matter what's blocking them. Latency is also low (latency matters in game consoles).

I'm not sure I'm persuaded to IR benefits.

The latency is low once the controller is on and connected. How long does that take? With all of my game controllers (switch, ps3, xbox 360, steam link) it's several seconds.

Latency to register a button press at the other end doesn't really matter for a TV remote unless it goes to extremes. It doesn't matter if you try and turn the volume up and it takes 50ms instead of 10ms. It does matter if that jumps to several seconds.

And since your remote can now travel through walls (and your TV can now receive remote controls through walls!) you now need to worry about security and pairing since there's no longer isolation being provided just by the simple act of having walls. I definitely don't want to try and support my mother in pairing her remote after the batteries need a change every three months.

Have you tried replacing the batteries in your remote? Is your entire room covered in mirrors? It could be something silly like that or maybe that your remote is just terrible. The basic technology has worked for pretty much everyone for decades now without much issue.

I generally just leave my remote sitting on the floor when I'm down there playing with the kid or resting on the arm rest of the chair or something and press buttons on it without picking it up. If it's pointing anywhere within like 60 degrees on either side of my TV whether at the floor or the ceiling it registers every time. This has consistently been my experience across pretty much every TV I've dealt with in 20 years (and I still have a 20 year old LCD TV here I use frequently whose batteries I've replaced maybe 3 times now).

Because an LED to transmit and a photodiode to receive cost essentially $0.00 at volume. The rest is software.

When you finally do make such a TV, you must sell it for more than a smart TV to be taken seriously, and only use the highest quality materials.

I think the market for this product is very small.

A disconnected roku works well once you fumble around and bypass the mandatory setup then activate HDMI-CEC so Google TV can simply and easily power, unpower, and switch inputs without issue.

The remote is simple enough only containing maybe 6 unused buttons.

Roku has ads built into the UI? I'm also not sure how it meets the qualifications of everything else I listed?

What I find amusing is that I never noticed the ads on my cheap Roku TVs until they were mentioned on HN. I never spend more than a few seconds on the home screen, and that's the only place they appear.

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