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Comment by gigel82 | Hacker News Reader

I wish a reputable manufacturer would just make "dumb TVs" (aka monitors). I don't even need a TV tuner, just a display panel with the latest HDMI, ARC and CEC support such that I can control all features from my media player's remote (including turning on/off the TV, sound, etc.)

There are things like AW5520QF, but they tend to cost 3x - 4x as much as a TV with the same exact panel because of all the "gamery" features.

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Maybe look at "commercial monitors"?

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1557462-REG/sharp_4t_...

> There are things like AW5520QF, but they tend to cost 3x - 4x as much as a TV with the same exact panel because of all the "gamery" features.

You just made the article's point. What you say you want does exist, but you're not willing to pay for it.

The article says that regular "smart" TVs are being sold at or near cost. That means conceivably sone manufacturer could sell a dumb TV at just 50% markup and still make a nice profit. I think that's what the grandparent post is wishing for. It's true there are those expensive reference monitors and so forth, but those are overpriced because they're geared for the corporate market. There's nothing comparable geared for the ordinary consumer. Honestly despite the frequent calls for their production, there probably isn't enough demand to sustain a dumb TV consumer market. It's like how small-screened smartphones never sell as much as you'd expect given the Internet's seeming love for them.

Anyway, I know nothing about the project but there is a WebOS root/jailbreak that works on some LG models. GP might want to look into it.

https://github.com/RootMyTV/RootMyTV.github.io

Because I am being charged 3x more for less hardware.

Is it possible that all the software that makes a TV "smart" is near zero marginal cost, but it can be used to market and sell a lower quality panel. Whereas the higher quality panel will sell itself due to being higher quality.

I have also never been bothered by the "smart features" of Sony TVs. I just do not connect it to a network.

Pretty much this. The "smart" features of a TV really don't cost much at all, and make a TV a LOT more marketable. Given that perspective, why would a TV manufacturer choose to remove the smart features from the TV? This wouldn't enable them to sell the TV for a lower price.

The "smarts" of a smart tv is just spyware(adware) by a different name that actively subsidizes and reduces the cost of low-end TVs.

I've found the opposite to be true, gaming monitors have a ton of specs that their buyers will sacrifice panel quality for, and manufacturers take full advantage of it.

You won't find normal users willingly playing the panel lottery for example

(for those not familiar, that's buying $1,000+ monitors knowing there's a good chance you'll need to return them because of panel defects, and just returning them until you find one that's acceptable)

I wonder if this is going to be a market. I would also like "dumb" options, to more than just TVs, and I'm hearing the sentiment elsewhere. Probably expensive and considered niche or high end?

Agreed. If this ever becomes a market, I think it will be very niche and stupid expensive like high end audio systems.

Why not just buy a dumb TV and not connect it to WiFi?

There's been a bunch of gnashing of teeth about how they'll connect to open WiFi networks, but I can't remember the last time I came across a public WiFi network without a captive portal that would block their attempt to phone home. That seems to have died off in the last few years.

And if you're prone to tinkering you can just as easily connect one through an SBC and block all traffic

> I can't remember the last time I came across a public WiFi network without a captive portal that would block their attempt to phone home.

Better yet, how many open WiFi networks are there around your house? For me, the answer is currently 0. People don't leave their WiFi open today like they did 15-20 years ago. Even the wireless hotspot feature on your phone makes you use WPA.

> People don't leave their WiFi open

Yes they do. From my 1st WRT54G to my latest AX mesh, I have never had a WiFi password. My friends and family that were visiting over the Holidays apricated it. Everyone used it, no one asked me for the password.

Are people still Wardriving? Even if they are, the odds of a malicious hacker coming to my neighbored is up there with getting stuck by lightning. Not losing sleep over it. Why should I?

1) Besides access control, having an unencrypted WiFi network is not great because your entire internet/local traffic is open to be sniffed. High-gain antennae, etc. You are essentially screaming the contents of (what would be) your ethernet cable into the void.

2) Access control is exactly the point. I suppose you could ban the TV's MAC address from your open network (and I suppose a sufficiently malicious TV firmware could randomize its MAC address), but your stated purpose (allowing open network access) is not exactly compatible with what you presumably wish to do (disallow network access to a smart TV).

Even more importantly, anyone can jump on the wifi and start downloading illegal software and it'd be tied to GP.

Wifi encryption is the wrong layer anyway. Point to point tls is what you want to depend on. and sometimes I dream of the never realized ad-hoc ipsec connection, the actual correct layer to do encryption on. but ipsec was killed by it's own incompatible complexity, so tls is a good second best.

I run an open access point and depend on tls or ssh to protect my traffic.

Sounds like its time for a wifi password unless you want all your neighbors smart TVs using your bandwidth to update firmware and send telemetry and download ads :)

The amount of risk people will subject themselves to in exchange for a marginal at best increase in convenience never ceases to amaze me.

There are a dozen good reasons why every piece of consumer grade networking hardware released in the past 15 years is not configured this way by default.

Amazon is working on things like Matter which is just turned on by default on all Alexa devices and I'm sure they'll sell access to this "backchannel" if they're not already using it.

And there is precedent with Apple for example using everyone's phones to send airtag location data (enabled by default), or Xfinity / Comcast opening a second SSID (hidden or not) if you use their modem / gateway combo.

You don't need to have any of those things, it's enough that your neighbors do for future "unconnected" smart TVs in your home to piggyback on.

I monitor my TV and it attempts all sorts of dirty tricks, calling home via HTTP on different ports, large DNS packets to random AWS IPs, all sorts of things that might work on a captive portal network.

I believe this exists, you just want to search for "commercial display".

Subcategories of this include things like "digital signage monitors" and "hospitality monitors". For example, here's a B&H search for those subtypes which support 4K and are 65" or larger.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/products/Flat-Panel-Displays/...

Commercial displays often omit consumer oriented features like "gaming" / low latency modes and modern display technologies like microled carry even larger premiums than the consumer alternatives.

Just be prepared to spend a lot more money on a worse display.

> I don't even need a TV tuner

ATSC is a pretty awesome standard. There's parts of the newer ATSC standard that even supports 4k over the air. Other parts are more concerning from the data tracking perspective but it seems like there's an opportunity for a SmartTV that actually acts in the user's interest that is actually desirable and has a tuner.

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