My parents are getting a new tv, and are asking for recommendation. I think all I can influence is the brand/model (not realistic to propose rpi and more complex systems). I instinctively avoid google/android and lean towards anything else open source, so probably LG WebOS… But I had bad luck searching for more detailed comparisons. Maybe you have experience or opinions?
I asked the same question some time ago. I now use an old laptop with libreelec on it. https://beehaw.org/post/15312388
Home theater PC
I have an older Samsung Tizen device – you don’t have to worry about privacy because the piece of shit has basically 0 servers to connect to and most of the time if you set a DNS server manually it will completely fail to connect to the internet anyway
Just don’t connect it to the internet.
This is the way. I have an LG and bought one for my parents. Do the initial sign up/registration, then turn off Internet access. I actually thought mine was broken when I got it, but it was just my pihole blocking it. Temporary whitelist for setup, smooth sailing since.
That’s generous of you. If I’d mistakenly bought one that wouldn’t work without ever having a network connection, I’d be returning it and demanding my money back. Hasn’t happened yet, though.
But you can just block all the ads on the home screen with pihole. Then you can still use the native TV apps. It’s a win-win.
If you turn off Internet access then your parents can’t stream.
Won’t work without setup?
It was required for setup, and the latest update shoves ads at you.
This is why I buy my TVs from Costco. If it needs internet at any point, return. It’s a TV, it shouldn’t need internet at any point.
I used to be a fan of LG TVs (we have 3 of them, last model is a 2021 Nanocell). Because of this alone LG will never see my money again. Thanks for the warning.
I have recent LG TVs. They did start showing ads, but if you dig around in the menus you can disable them.
To each his/her own. It’s not easy in some places to find TVs that aren’t smart, and in all honesty, I think LG has no competition when it comes to the panels. But out principle, I’m not giving money to companies like that. Why isn’t it opr-in instead of opt-out and on top of that you have to dig deep to opt-out?
I do understand your position, and respect it. I’m just not willing to be part of their revenue.
Didn’t really state a position other than ownership, which does have some implications. I am fine with smart TVs but not ok with data collection and ads.
Either would only be ok if I had opted in, especially be paying a lower price with that tradeoff, but I and everyone else are paying full price, so I am adamantly opposed to it.
You took it a step further than me, and I applaud your efforts. I hope they are noted by the manufacturers.
Bad advice.
Why? That’s exactly what I did with my tv. It never saw the internet and works just fine. I literally don’t care what Samsung does or pushes out for updates because it doesn’t matter.
I can still do everything I want from Netflix to streaming from my NAS etc.
/shrug
Because some TVs will scan and connect to an access point, such as one your neighbor temporary enables. Then it uploads years of data that it collected on you in less than a minute.
How can it connect to access points without a password? Every wifi/hotspot has passwords on by default.
damn, your neighbor must have stupidly fast wifi if it’s uploading that much so fast
Yeah, but is that an option realistically, if the parents want Netflix and Iplayer or whatever?
I think just with electric cars all the options are a complete privacy nightmare …
*all new cars
Ya, because it’s a TV. You connect those things to the inputs and drive the content from other things (game console, firetv, htpc, etc.
I’m baffled by people negatively reacting to my post. It’s how tvs have worked for 50+ years. Just because they recently got the ability to execute programs, doesn’t mean you have to use it. Just air gap it and the issue is 100% solved as far as the tv is concerned.
how do you remote control HTPC?
wireless keyboard and mouse is not a real solution. all other such devices that you mentioned used a handheld remote controller
My TCL Roku TV kept flashing its indicator light in a very annoying fashion after disconnecting it from my network. Guess which TV does not have an indicator light anymore…
I heard that https://libreelec.tv is pretty good
Its good if everything you need can run from Kodi. It uses its own Linux distribution in the background, so you won’t really be able to install anything else unless you build it.
Absolutely this. Depending on how you use it though, make sure you have a VPN and private DNS setup on your router
Why do you need private dns for?
To control what can be accessed.
Having your own DNS enables you to block ads on every device in your network.
PiHole makes my smart TV more responsive, because it can’t get crap to load into the home screen.
If Kodi is used to watch movies and TV shows for free then you’d want to protect your internet traffic from unwanted eyes
Isn’t a dns included in most vpns?
My advice is never use a smart tv of any kind.
Use a third party device like an apple tv or roku, hell even a bluray player with apps on it.
Then get what ever TV you like and never let it see the internet.
I personally like Visio, but any mid grade display is fine.
My partner and I were gratefully surprised when we bought a cheap Hisense for their cozy space (to isolate when overstimulated and just play some games) that in the setup it offers the option for a ‘dumb TV’ mode with no requirement for internet. In addition you can reject the user agreements and still use the TV. It boots straight to HDMI, no pop up ads, and is snappy.
Isnt Roku just as bad as the web TV systems? Amazon fire is bad too.
Yes and no. This is for parents, so ease of use is a huge factor.
The processors in smart TVs are often crap, plus who know what updates and monitoring they are pushing on you.
With a dedicated media device you only have one company to deal with. Personally, I use my playstation for everything, but for my mom a Sony bluray with the apps works fine.
At the end of the day, they’ll want netflix, amazon, youtube, hbo max, etc, and you get a way better experience with a media player vs smart tv. Sony is a known evil as it were, their hardware is good, and they generally don’t fuck up firmware updates.
It is getting harder and harder to find a dumb TV though.
They didn’t say that…they just said not to hook whatever smart TV they get to the internet.
I mean, they say both things.
My advice is never use a smart tv of any kind.
If you want a true dumb TV, buy a commercial grade display made for digital signage. Bit more expensive, but designed for 24/7 operation and has none of the smart tv fat.
I have considered looking into this. Building one’s own TV might be the move.
Have you done it, and if so, any tips?
No, I work in corporate AV, so I’m buying higher end digital signage for most applications at work.
NEC and Philip’s I’ve been using lately, but they are just the cost effective ones now. LG, Samsung, Sony, all make good displays.
Digital sign usually dont have any smart apps, and if they do you can fully disable them.
They also have all the advanced features you could want. Serial and TCP api, multiple ports of various formats, auto on with sync detect, etc.
For personal use, my last three have been Visio from Costco, and while it has the apps, I just never connect to the internet.
I have seen guides online to open up a display and disable the smart elements, but that seems overkill to me.
One thing to watch for, I’ve heard but haven’t witnessed that many displays are getting way more aggressive about auto connecting to wifi for sharing data and updates. If someone has unsecured wifi near by etc.
I would be against Roku streamers since that defeats the purpose of not using a smart tv. Roku collects, sells and profits from your personal data.
I got a cheapest Android smart TV and never connected it to the internet. On HDMI1 there is Amazon Firestick for the occasional Netflix use. On HDMI2 there is Kodi for every day watching. Because of how modern TVs work, both these extra boxes can be steered with the TV remote.
Depends entirely what they are doing with it. If they are using services with DRM, e.g. Netflix or Disney+ I bet you will be out of luck because that pulls out an entire ecosystem, driven by Google, which is based on selling ads.
“not realistic to propose rpi and more complex systems”
If they have to install it, probably not. If they have to plug it on the HDMI port, power and optionally Ethernet honestly things like LibreElec or Kodi are pretty well done. Heck even a very young kid (talking not even 5y/o) can manage that (I’ve seen it, repetitively) or even start VLC to connect to DLNA server as long as it’s properly setup.
I would avoid anything built into the TV.
- Its starting to be used for spying on you
- The chip they come with are usually not that good unless it’s a high end TV.
- They are building ads right into the TV themselves.
I would not connect the TV to the internet and use a external media player. Either a Nvidia shield or an Apple TV is your best bet.
You can also try building a media player yourself using a small computer.
Note - The self made media player will be more limited in terms of apps available, unfortunately, as well as streaming quality from some of the streaming services.
We need this info added to an FAQ. This question comes up frequently.
Rooted android TV with a good router firewall
None. Don’t connect it to the internet. Get a PC and use the TV as a glorified monitor.
If I’m not mistaken, many smart TVs tend to take multiple screenshots per second and send it back to base with other methods if wifi or ethernet aren’t available, although I gotta research a little more on that.
So even then, don’t connect it to a PC, you’re just waiving your privacy rights
If they aren’t connected to wifi…they can’t send anything back.
They do thru other means, ex. Using your computer as the WiFi tether
LG is currently even worse than Android - it autoinstalls (gambling!) Apps(yes,we made sure there was no hack/malware), tries really hard to get into the network, etc. But I might be biased as I am very unhappy with their support as well - their display showed a faulty line exactly 10d after the guarantee/warranty ran out, they quoted more than the current retail value for the repair and 80% of the original retail value. For a problem that is very likely not even the display itself but a faulty cable. Fuck them.
Personally, if a Pi is out of the scope (which I totally understand) I would go with a Android box and any TV you like displaywise- while Android is as bad privacy wise as any other TV OS nowadays, it is usually far easier to lock it down at least partially so at least the worst problems can be avoided/most of them can be rooted or get linage OS installed. Just make sure the box you use can do that.
Because in the end it’s also an usability problem - your parents will call you if Netflix, Disney+ or something like that refuses to play because they now require widevine in a newer version than LibreELEC offers,etc. If you want to support that, go for a Pi. If you don’t, find a middle ground.
Real world, it’s a royal pain in the butt trying to get a not-smart TV. There’s a couple of companies that sell them at consumer-accessible prices and they aren’t as frequently on the kinds of deep discounts bigger brands go for. You might just have to steer your parents towards using an Apple TV (the only ads are for Apple’s own services plus nice integration with iPhones if your parents happen to be iPhone users) then set it up to boot straight to the Apple TV so they never see the Smart TV OS, and of course never connect the Smart TV to the Internet so whatever data harvesting it does do is useless
LG WebOS doesn’t have good support for things like Jellyfin. If you want to ever build a library of media and let them have easy access to it, then WebOS is gonna suck, so will Samsung’s Tizen. But all the Android TVs have access.
Don’t know if you’re interested in that kind of thing, but figured I’d share it in case it was a factor.
The only other alternative is a commercial display.
This is untrue. You can use Jellyfin or Kodi natively on LG WebOS on the TV and stream whatever you want locally. You have to grab it from the homebrew channel or sideload it. It’s a little bit of a process though. Nothing crazy. But it works!
Edit: you can also get YouTube without ads off Homebrew.
Yeah, sideloading it requires getting a development code from the company, jailbreaking your machine, then installing a full development environment…
Not what I’d call user friendly.
Meanwhile, on something like the FireTV stick, if someone gives me the URL to an APK, I can install it.
Rooting (assume you meant this by jailbreak8ng) is not required for this process. Only some apps reauire root. Kodi and the youtube adfree apps don’t require root.
I have a WebOS tv and the answer is: just don’t. It’s open source in a similar way Android is, spy’s on you, has way less apps available and can’t/is really bad at basic shit
Everything is really bad. But sadly it is nearly impossible to buy a normal TV these days. Just buy any SmartTV, and get yourself a MiniPC with the Linux Distro of your liking.
