I’m considering buying a new TV. There’s plenty of posts about trying to find dumb TVs, comments like ‘just don’t connect it to the internet/network’.
What surprises me is that there isn’t a good overview of (popular) TVs or brands with basic information, answering for each TV:
- Can you use it as a basic TV by choosing not to enable smart features during setup?
- Can you opt out by just not accepting a bunch of agreements?
- Does it have a camera and/or microphone? Where in the device are these? Is there a physical disable switch for microphone?
- Does it nag when not connected to any network?
- Does it have higher than normal power usage when not able to phone home?
- Has it been discovered to connect to public WiFi networks? Does it have the (theoretical) ability to connect to 5G mobile networks?
And similar.
There are extensive lists with a lot of detail about VPN services but nothing like that for TVs. Am I ignorant of a good source, or does this just not exist (yet)?
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monitors are generally made to be viewed up close - if video quality is no issue, then a commercial display /digital signage is also okay.
however, a good detailed list of tv aspects would help with even that choice.
not shooting any option down - just wondering about available resources/information.
That’s not a solution since smartness is already in monitors as well.
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Do they make 55" OLED monitors? Only stuff I’ve seen is LED, and I’m pretty sure the picture/color quality is inferior to proper tv panel
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A big monitor with 100% AdobeRGB is going to be very very expensive. And if you want it to be 65", you just can’t find them…
And it is a monitor, meant to be watched from a close distance. It will not be such a great experience for movies and such.
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unhelpful troll
From trying to get people to do that (with no success), it’s because it seems too much like work. Folks want something they can plug in and go… but plugging in one extra thing is just a bridge too far these days. It’s frustrating as shit.
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You missed the point.
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I hear you, but I’m not an example of this. I have a Pi-hole set up, firewalled my phone, happily use LibreWolf, etc.
Besides that, I also want to do the research on what screen to get. If a worse screen (small one, monitor or digital signage) is the only acceptable solution, then that’s what I’ll pick – but having some idea of what it would mean to pick a typical smart TV and try to limit the consequences is also something I want to consider. The only frustrating thing to me is that it’s hard to find out details about this (and that includes details about digital signage screen quality, for instance, since businesses don’t seem to care all that much).
That’s great, I didn’t say you were. I was speaking specifically about people who, on the one hand lamented the risks of smart TVs, but on the other hand didn’t realize that they would just be plugging their existing digital cable STB’s HDMI cable into what amounts to a very large flat panel display.
Buy a store display meant to show logos and menus. Something like these:
https://www.amazon.com/s?rh=n%3A18746933011&language=en_US&brr=1&ie=UTF8&rd=1
I haven’t evaluated any of them; I just know people talk about them being the only tv screens without smarts.
I recently found myself in the market for one of these when my father in law decided to connect my Vizio TV to the internet. All the updates since 2019 installed and it became unusable with all the crap they installed/changed. No way to downgrade firmware.
I bought a 55” Samsung display and it works great as a dumb tv. I can connect via HDMI and my antenna just like a regular tv. The interface is a little clunky at times but that’s because it’s set up for a display board. I can even plug my flash drive into it for videos/pictures. It will never connect to the internet although it has that capability (and apparently an app for if it’s used as a display).
Get a dumb video projector.
Shockingly, those are also getting rarer.
Indeed. That being said I have a (sigh) Android video projector (Nebula Mars II Pro, by Anker) and even though it does comes with its bloatware (namely “trying” to force installation, without actually doing it, of e.g. YouTube or NetFlix apps) attempts one can ignore that, install F-Droid, install VLC and Launch on Boot from there then boot straight to VLC without have to interact with the stock launcher. Also remote adb works by default so one can tinker quite a bit without even having to active a kind of developer mode.
the answer is basically all TVs are subsidized to some degree. A list is somewhat pointless because they all do some sketchy shit and as lg has recently shown they reserve the right to change the terms years after the fact with firmware updates, even if you buy a flagship model that cost 3-5k
Basically you need to use it intelligently. Either don’t connect it to the internet at all, only connect it to an intranet/isolated vlan, or (least effective) block every suspicious outgoing request with your router or a dns thing like adguard/pihole.
The alternatives are to buy a non consumer display (eg something for signage or for like a meeting room in an office) which are usually more durable but also often far more expensive (no ad subsidies), the panel quality is generally noticeably worse (unless you’re buying a mediocre tv), and you lose out on enthusiast features (earc, vrr, etc). Or you can get a solid projector; the cheap projectors are usually kind of junk but nice ones are quite nice and often (but not always, they’re increasingly “smart”) have barebones ui/os. This can be pretty impractical for your living situation though
I get what you’re saying. What I’m running into is that there is little information on what happens if you ‘dont connect it to the internet at all’. I would happily do that, but as another comment notes, some devices keep whining until you do connect them, while others don’t. I can also easily set up a separate ‘fake’ network to black-hole all the communication attempts of the TV, but I have no idea whether that would stop the nagging – or the attempts for it to connect to public WiFi access points.
It would be really cool if people experimenting with this kind of thing could pool their findings, that’s all.
Interesting discussion, but many of the questions have pretty lame default answers. I have a Sony bravia from 2015 for reference.
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The TVs that come with an OS instead of just firmware are smart-TVs in all aspects. Your cable TV or hdmi input is an app just like Netflix is, and is subject to a launcher. You can’t make it dumb by disabling stuff.
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You can mostly reject targeted ads and disable personalized data collection. But smart TVs are priced with ads included, so completely turning off everything will require unsupported modding.
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cameras are only found in telepresence hardware, unless you want to be paranoid. Check the feature list. Microphones can be in the remotes of some TVs, but this will usually be advertised as a smart assistent if present.
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I haven’t seen any TV actively complain about missing wifi (except for during setup for updates)
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unless you are tricking the TV into thinking it’s online, any connection attempts/power usage would be a bug. Do note that smart-TV will by default have a standby-draw influenced by WoL or similar.
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This is pure tinfoil-territory. No hotspot/carrier carries data without being payed for it. It’s also not economical when telemetry can be sent over the customers home-wifi in 99% of cases. There is no gain in hiding sim-cards in every TV. Unless you are a person of interest and are sent a modified TV in that case.
Hope this helps.
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Just set up a TCL and it has a “basic” option which makes it work without anything. I’m still trying to decide if I should buy a Nvidia shield to pair with it so I enabled it “fully” for now, will probably switch it back. It’s basically android so many of these behaviours are just like on android phones
Personally, I got a large dumb flat TV and use a small PC attached to it with Linux with all the privacy trimmings, VPN, etc. Use a browser, like Librewolf or FF with ArkenFox, along with Freetube on it which we control with KDEConnect from our phones. Once you setup the proper commands on it, it is fly and forget. You can pick a stripped, privacy focused distro, too. Most of my PCs/phones are on WiFi but for that box I plug it to the router via cable, directly, for faster display speeds. You can download other media software and run it through, if you wish.
Power usage is minimal or at least I do not see my power bill go up substantially, or noticeably. Have had this type of setup for over 15 years. Never had to worry about microphones or cameras as there are none to worry about. No terms to agree to that will get changed on a moment’s notice, either. No spying or dialing home. Sometimes, the best way to win is just to not play their games. Have 0 complains.
I currently have a similar setup, but with a very old TV (that served me well for 16 years). Not easy to find good dumb TVs these days though.
Fx* with ArkenFox
No one makes a 65+" oled monitor so before anyone suggests “just buy a monitor” you can’t, I have looked.
Up until last year, I would have said get a good quality projector but even projectors have started getting infiltrated with smart “features” now.
Digital signage was also an option but oled options are basically non-existent and they often have matte screens that make the colors kind of mushy.
From what I have read online, the Sony tv offerings seem to be pretty unintrusive and don’t really care if you hook them up to the internet. The smart software is android tv based and can potentially be modded/stripped of google services. I have to do some more research though so don’t quote me on the above.
Our current TCL/Roku tv is dying and has turned out to be really bad smart/privacy wise and has gotten consistently worse performance wise over time. I’m currently evaluating options for its replacement and the Sony 65" oled is looking like the best one so far.
Sceptre make a 75” 4K dumb display that Walmart sells for a little under $600.
For best privacy, get a monitor and a tv box (like nvidia shield, or roll your own software a single board computer like a raspberry pi). That might be the only way to trust a tv: dont use it at all.
Roku TVs have version locked features, so I update them once then reset network settings, which wipes the connection. Then there’s the indicator light which you need to remove. But after that connect an apple tv and use it!
Personally, I say F smart tv’s. The smart bit is going to be old and useless in three years. The panel will last me over a decade.
Yes, you can ignore all the nagging and smart stuff and just set it to an hdmi input or something.
Then hooking up a 3rd party smart box is what I recommend.
F smart TVs*
Fuck*
Pretty sure it was
fsck, but I could be wrong
And grammar nazis
you’re right tho
So I just bought a brand new “dumb” TV for $150 off of Amazon (43" 1080 Sceptre). It isn’t high end in the slightest, but it IS brand new and not some weird old stock and the picture and sound don’t feel too far off from my significantly more expensive higher end LCD TVs. I wanted one that I could put on a rolling stand and move between a few rooms and saw no benefit to 4k at that screen size. Other than that, there are some decent “digital signage” TVs that were decently priced available as well from Samsung and a few other brands. I didn’t see anything that was OLED, but I was burned hard (quite literally with burn-in) on earlier OLED gear, so I am avoiding it until the prices get low enough that I can be fine with the chance that it will be crap after 4-5 years of use.
Can you tell us some of the things to search for so we can find those?
Try “lcd tv non-smart”, “lcd tv hospitality”, or “lcd business tv” or any variations thereof.
Thank you - I’ve added them to my list.
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Samsung is known to be one of the more cancerous of ad-ridden “smart” TVs
I haven’t had any issues with my Sony TV but I bought it several years ago and don’t really use it (I generally consume content on my PC with 3 monitors). It is not connected to any network.
I have a sony as well, and you can use it as dumb TV, by not agreeing to their privacy policy. If you want to connect it to wifi afterwards, it points you to the privacy policy again, so it seems like the TV follows that. But I’ve also purchased it 4 years ago, so not sure what the status is now.
So far, I’ve seen no ads. I mostly use it mostly via HDMI and sometimes for watching freely available TV via antenna.
I can’t answer all your questions, but this issue with my TCL Android TV is frustrating.
I’ve had it for 4 years, and due to constant Wi-Fi issues, I keep it deactivated, yet still get occasional notifications.
More concerning, I don’t trust the microphone is off, as the LED sometimes stays on, and Bluetooth visibility often resets.
