Show HN: Making a smart TV dumb and then smart

(github.com)

56 points | by animalhot 14 hours ago ago

23 comments

  • jelder 2 hours ago

    All I really want my TV to do is turn on, quickly and reliably, and display whatever is plugged into HDMI1. The market is flooded with “Smart” (actually Surveillance) TVs so not buying one isn’t really practical.

    • pwg 26 minutes ago

      I wonder if your comment suggests a re-framing of the TV's name. Start referring to them as "Surveillance TVs" in all contexts. Maybe the idea will spread?

    • f_allwein 9 minutes ago

      Not connecting the TV itself to any WiFi/ LAN networks used to help. Is that not the case anymore?

      • darrelld a few seconds ago

        My parents got one from Walmart and to use any of the software interface they needed to login to a Walmart account. Scary.

    • mchristen 43 minutes ago

      You can buy what are called digital signage displays which are mostly just that. A quick search shows a 65" Samsung model available in US retail for $1400.

      • thesuitonym 22 minutes ago

        Digital signage displays are not TVs though. They are much more expensive and frequently don't have features that dumb TVs had 40 years ago such as speakers, TV tuners, and multiple inputs.

  • a1o an hour ago

    Curious about Netflix, does it limit the resolution because it is not an “official” app or something like this?

    Also, it says you have to have system root of the tv, how does one get root access to the LG TV?

  • pcardoso 4 hours ago

    Found this a few days ago as well.

    https://github.com/Gathin23/cleanyourtv/tree/main

    • vanviegen an hour ago

      So they recommend that you debloat your TV by pasting a rather lengthy prompt into your coding agent, that'll take a long time to sort things out.

      And then, near the bottom of the page, they provide a 9 lines of shell script that according to them does "everything the agent does". Uhh.. okay? I guess the agent would be for trouble shooting, but I'm not really sold on this modern of delivering software yet.

      https://github.com/Gathin23/cleanyourtv/tree/main#doing-it-b...

    • jorisw 3 hours ago

      This is cool, but beware this takes a long time to complete even with an agent.

      And the result I didn't find particularly pretty to look at

  • gosub100 an hour ago

    This is a side topic, but relevant to those of us who care about UI/UX:

    I have a webos TV and notice that it comes with free Samsung IPTV channels. But they are unusable because of the delay in switching between channels! This relatively minor detail could be the difference between a killer app that could grow and monetize, vs something that users try and give up on.

    I'm sure there are ways to make it as fast as cable TV, even if it initially degraded the video or had other consequences.

  • Zookaz an hour ago

    Just get an exisiting tv box or make your own. dumb your tv down and keep it that way smart tvs are a joke

  • NoboruWataya 5 hours ago

    A dumb TV connected via HDMI to a Raspberry Pi running Kodi is smart enough for me.

    • everdrive an hour ago

      Can Kodi use widevine yet? I did this years ago, but it was a game of cat and mouse I kept losing. Right now we just plug a linux laptop into the TV via HDMI.

    • DarkCrusader2 2 hours ago

      Does DolbyVision or HDR10+ content work in this setup? My understanding is that they won't. I also got a lot of stuttering issue with 1080p x265 content last time I tried hooking up the Pi with my TV.

      I would love to get Kodi working with HDR10+ on my Samsung TV without buying those expensive android boxes (which are very expensive and difficult to obtain in my region anyway).

    • loloquwowndueo 2 hours ago

      Where do you even buy dumb tv at a decent price these days?

    • epihelix 4 hours ago

      This is the way.

    • globular-toast 3 hours ago

      [dead]

  • hahahoo 2 hours ago

    [flagged]