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Comment by NichoPaolucci | Hacker News Reader

I have a pretty nice Samsung that I purchased maybe 5 years ago. When I initially purchased it, it was great. No account needed. Did every thing I wanted from a TV (I want it to be dumb)

I refused to update it, because I knew that at some point they would add mandatory accounts or other bloatware. Fantastic for 2 years or so.

My gf started living with me and updated it accidentally/didn't know. It now has it's own entire OS that requires 2 accounts - a Google account and a Samsung account, I believe. Devastating.

Mandatory accounts for everything. Forcing people to download certain applications. Turning off functionality if there's no subscription to X or Y. I feel we really started to take a step back for software usefulness in the late 20teens...

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Never let your TV know your wifi password. Use a firestick or a little PC for streaming, etc.

I read they’ll find xfinitywifi or any open access point and do it without your consent

If you join them to a black holed or tarpit said I wonder if that protects against connecting elsewhere.

Sure you can connect, but you’ll find all your tcp connections dying.

Enjoy watching a spinning wheel for the whole time then "Your TV is trying to connect..."

I've had great success blackholing and haven't seen this.

I have an LG I bought around three years ago. The first year-ish it was connected to the internet normally. That's when I first heard about the LG spying issue, and also had noticed that the TV seemed to slow down a bit with every new update it got (what a surprise).

I then isolated it to its own VLAN with no internet access whatsoever. Only other device on the same VLAN is a virtual interface on my Home Assistant server that allows me to keep using the LG webos integration and send Wake on LAN packets to the TV.

Surprisingly most of the slowness seemed to also disappear after cutting the TV from the internet. It's probably not quite as fast as it was when it was brand new, but the most noticeable difference is when turning the TV on. It's almost instant again now, compared to something like 5+ seconds it took when it had internet.

You can read a lot and this is a real possibility, but I have yet to see any evidence that this has happened yet.

Factory reset?

And if that doesn't work, RMA and/or small claims because breaking your device through an update shouldn't be legal.

My two year old Samsung still works as a dumb display. I think it would even do cable or OTA TV without any smart nonsense but I have no need for that. Trying to use "smart" features like voice control pops up a consent form that I just never accepted so maybe that's what happened to you.

I have a 12-year-old Samsung TV I got off Craigslist for under $100 that displays images, and that's it. Oh, and it plays video off a USB stick if you plug one in.

Friend of mine used to hassle me about my TV, and how his one has much better colour saturation and soundstage and notes of vanilla, toast, smoked bacon, and chocolate. It's a network-connected (to make it work) LG smart TV...

Well my used-a-dumb-display relatively recent Samsung also has great color saturation and perfect OLED blacks. AFAIK you can use LGs in the same way but I haven't owned one myself. I wouldn't take anyone who cares about the sound of built-in TV speakers too seriously though, especially with everything in there having to be as flat as paper - just get external speakers or at least a sound bar and even average options there will blow any TV out of the water.

You let Facebook pass... What to expect?

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