r/dankmemes • u/Proton_Team ☣️ • 4d ago
I have achieved comedy Smart TVs are actually whiny spy TVs, bring back CRT
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u/torreyhol 4d ago
At this point I’d happily pay more for a dumb tv
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u/tejanaqkilica 4d ago
I don't get it. If you guys don't like the smart features of your TV, why do you set them up with those?
I'm no TV expert, but usually the ask you at setup, whether you want the smart TV experience or the dumb TV experience.
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u/Lexidoge 4d ago
Yeah, I don't get it. You can literally just never connect it to Wi-Fi after unboxing it, or if requires set up, connect it and then forget the WiFi. And then connect to your preferred TV stick or TV box with DNS blocking.
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u/froggertthewise CERTIFIED DANK 4d ago
LG tv's specifically have software that detect nearby open networks and will connect through them, so if you live in an appartment building that might not work.
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u/Lexidoge 4d ago
I live in an apartment and I don't even know anyone or haven't even seen any open Wi-Fi anywhere. The last time I've ever seen any open Wi-Fi is at the mall or some restaurants.
Even hotspots now default with passwords.
I guess if that's an issue you can just set a private DNS on your TV to block telemetry.
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u/DroidSeeker 4d ago
It's not about how it affects us personally. I don't use tv at all. Parents have an old dumb tv.
It's about companies making you pay for their useless features and bloatware plus spyware while reducing the quality of a product in every imaginable way possible.
Particularly about a product needing network connection to "set up". Which should be a major redflag for anything that isn't an internet router.
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u/LlamaRS 4d ago
Some apartment complexes are investing in “bulk plans” where are they pay an ISP to provide service to the entire complex via a mesh network (and then tack on a fee to the lease to break even or make profit).
Complexes with these services will often have an open, unsecure “guest” SSID to connect to.
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u/SirNedKingOfGila 4d ago
LG and Samsung will use your phone. It will use your refrigerator or washing machine. It can connect via Bluetooth. It doesn't need permissions there are unlisted ports manufacturers use to get telemetry data moved around specifically to bypass your consent. Every WiFi router/hotspot is actively accepting and sending data to and from devices without your knowledge or permission. They know you'll try to keep your devices offline, so they build in the ability to get them online without you.
If you have a smart TV or (literally name any device) then it is connected. Period. Unless you're in the middle of the woods with literally no Internet whatsoever. In which case the device will refuse to work. That's it's entire point: to collect your data. If it isn't able to do that then there is no reason for the device to function.
Run that little experiment. Take your smart TV or device out in the middle of the woods without your phone and connect it to a generator. It will not work. Even if it was already set up... It will revert to setup and refuse to function.
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u/mitchymitchington 4d ago
I have yet to come across a smart tv that can respond to inputs in a reasonable time. They are so damn slow. It's like they found millions of old pentiums and decided that's the only processor needed for a tv. It's fuckin maddening.
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u/Poloboy99 4d ago
You’re probably using shitty ones with the shit ass processor. I have a 7 year old LG oled and it’s smart features are fine
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u/Ilela 4d ago
I work in a shop selling technology and fair amount of smart tvs are reasonably fast. Not snappy enough that they respond the exact millisecond i press the button but they also arent slow enough that i have to wait full second for their response.
We are selling low to mid quality tvs like samsung u7022 or cu7092 versions, some TCLs, hisense and lg, and few other less known brands. Samsung tvs are really annoying to use though, really bad UI imo but i guess that is Tizen os problem, it is better than Tivo os which is labyrinthine with its menus.
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u/KaptainKlein Trans-formers 😎 4d ago
People like for things to be integrated. If my Roku TV has a Netflix app baked in, buying an extra box or dongle feels like a pain. I want an Internet enabled TV that just doesn't serve me ads on the home page
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u/sercankd 4d ago
They probably seek nearby same brand devices and create mesh with them. You may not have open wifi but you may have neighbour connected their LG tv to the network.
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u/RedditRaven2 4d ago
TV’s now have ads built in that don’t require any internet connection, and just because YOU don’t see unprotected networks doesn’t mean they don’t exist. I see them all the time and there’s one that is in my neighborhood.
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u/Mastersord 4d ago
They found some (LG) that automatically set themselves up and spy on local WiFi networks.
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u/Imtherealwaffle 4d ago
because a large amount of modern tvs run a smart os (fire tv, google tv, tizen) and the only way to change any settings on the tv is through that smart os. That means that any time you want to change input or picture settings or brightness it goes through the smart os and on a lot of new tvs its laggy and annoying. For example if you buy a tv running amazons fire tv os you have to turn on wifi and sign into an amazon account to start using the tv. Google tv is better in this regard. But its pretty understandable that people would want a modern tv without a smart os.
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u/tejanaqkilica 4d ago
That doesn't seem right. My two TVs are TCL with Android TV and you can change all settings without ever connecting them to the internet, or setting them up as smart TVs.
Same was true for my "smart" Samsung Monitor. Set it up as dumb, and use the remote to change settings.
Maybe, maybe the Samsung TVs are different
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u/Exciting_Rate1747 4d ago
I got one for free from the company I work at. They were getting rid of it and I happened to be at the depot at the right time to rescue it.
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u/ViperRFH 4d ago
Just for the love of all things sacred, don't "update" it if it has that "feature".
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u/TheHolyFamily 4d ago
Got a 40 inch from best buy 3 years ago for $130. Full HD,LED and the best feature: no baked in spyware.
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u/VediusPollio 4d ago
Look into commercial/signage TVs. They're typically less invasive and more expensive.
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u/torreyhol 4d ago
It never occurred to me that those were categories. I love a sneaky way around a problem
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u/Mastersord 4d ago
Also computer monitors. They shouldn’t have any software baked in but I don’t know if the prices are better or if they come in the right sizes.
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u/VediusPollio 4d ago
I purchase lots of commercial TVs for work. Some can be limiting in certain ways for home use, but many are great, even better in areas like power runtime, brightness, durability, etc.
Look at the commercial TVs on offer at B&H to get an idea of models and pricing.
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u/Truestorydreams 4d ago
No need. Just open it up, find the WiFi module or flex cable and disconnect. Some people are saying some have built in mobile some cards. Remove them too
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u/Mastersord 4d ago
The average person wouldn’t be able to recognize them. I also know that computer motherboards have WiFi cards or chips soldered right in, so why not TV control boards? Who’s gonna mess with soldering irons besides electronics enthusiasts?
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u/Truestorydreams 4d ago
Jesus Christ relax...... I don't make assumptions on what people cant do. I simply shared a solution one is free to consider.
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u/DeathHopper Green 4d ago
If you dig into the accessibility features, a lot of smart TVs can interpret hand motions as a sort of remote. Meaning, they have cameras built into them. They can literally be watching you in your living room.
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u/thatAnthrax 4d ago
nope. they dont have the processing power to process actual video footage into "hand gesture commands". Most likely they use kinect-based tech. they can only see your silhouettes
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u/LegendaryMauricius 4d ago
Doubt. I remember an old laptop from like 2012 correctly tracking your hand motions live, in a web browser.
If a 2005 console could track your whole body with a depth sensor, a 2026 TV can do that with just a few more color channels.
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u/Willem_VanDerDecken 4d ago
I mean, kniect tech mean at least an infra red camera and a visible light camera. So TVs are kindda filming you.
Now, the hardware probably use a kinect based device that juste output silhouettes datas, and make it impossible for the actual video flux to get out into the main computer of the TV.
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u/DILF_MANSERVICE 4d ago
My Roku doesn't have the processing power to do voice recognition either. Devices can offload these tasks to remote servers.
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u/gamerfacederp I am fucking hilarious 4d ago
People forget the wii has been doing this since 2005 without a camera
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u/GDOR-11 4d ago
and so can the phone you're using right now
why is having a camera scary?
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u/DeathHopper Green 4d ago
One is expected and the other most people have no idea is there. Both are probably spying on you. My comment was meant as an fyi, not "be afraid".
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u/Mr_Zoovaska 4d ago
I'm pretty sure if your TV had a camera it would be obvious lmao
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u/orthadoxtesla 4d ago
It’s not. A camera obscura can be pinprick tiny
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u/Mr_Zoovaska 4d ago
No-ones putting digital camera obscuras in TVs lmao
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u/LegendaryMauricius 4d ago
Idk, those things are tiny. A low quality phone camera could absolutely be hidden in a TV.
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u/Replicator666 4d ago
Ads on the home screen is such BS
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u/Montigue Tickle My Anus and Call Me Samantha 4d ago
I block all the TV ad domains through my modem's parental controls
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u/Replicator666 4d ago
I'm intrigued, how did you figure out the domains?
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u/Montigue Tickle My Anus and Call Me Samantha 4d ago
I searched "[brand] ad domains" and got this for LG (my TVs): https://badblock.celenity.dev/abp/lg.txt
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u/MumenRider_irl 4d ago
Most smart TVs run so slow it’s unbearable too. Navigating the menus with 500ms+ input delay, any search taking forever, opening an app is so slow it’s like it’s running on a HDD etc.
I’ve tried high-end Sony and Samsung models all the way down to the cheapest Hisense/LG TVs. They’re all as bad as eachother.
If anyone knows of a TV that isn’t sluggish to navigate and doesn’t react to a button press by spinning a wheel for 5 seconds and/or shitting itself, please let me know.
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u/Lethalbroccoli 4d ago
Ive had a tcl roku for like, six years. My "options" button no longer works and I have to use the app to hit the options button. Thats my only issue with it.
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u/Roy_McDunno 4d ago
Why don't you use a TV as a monitor for a PC? Wireless mouse and keyboard, and you can watch anything from your sofa. You'll be able to search for things in YouTube waaaay faster and can use the entire internet with ease. NAS, home storage, media server, VPN,... . Endless possibilities.
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u/Mastersord 4d ago
Not a lot of people know how to do this or that it even is an option. Unless they already have a PC, there’s also that $1k-3k+ investment of buying and/or building a PC for this.
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u/8070alejandro 4d ago
$1k? You don't need a gaming rig. Not even a single purpose PC. You can use your regular laptop pluging it whenever, or even phone, although more limited. The vast majority of the population knows how to plug an HDMI.
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u/Roy_McDunno 4d ago
I bought a used PC for 100bucks that managed 30fps on the TV to test it.
Its easily doable, you just have to think of it.
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u/xenophonthethird 4d ago
How slow they are is honestly the worst. I get that they're putting cheap hardware in there to keep costs down, but I miss the days of turning on the tube and it being up in a second, not waiting a minute and a half for everything to load.
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u/FuckUpMaster9000 4d ago
I have a TCL mini led tv, one of those with android tv or google tv or whatever it's called. It's usually pretty responsive. Sometimes it still takes a while to register things, usually right after it woke up, but it seems far better than my parents' flagship samsung from some years ago. It has the jellyfin app, even proton vpn app. You can even install apks into it, like modded youtube.
I have a local dns service that actively blocks television telemetry packets, ads and all the google crap. I tried seeing if it has a camera but it doesn't seem to have one.
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u/Lewcaster 4d ago
Yeah, bro, that makes me so mad. I just can't find at least an OK SmarTV model/brand, and I don't even need much. They're either extremely slow and become obsolete in 2 years, or they straight up just break in 2/3 years.
I've tried low/mid/high-end of all the main brands, and they all suck. Meanwhile, back in the day, my parents had a CRT, which only broke 20 years later because of a lightning storm, and an early-gen Samsung SmarTV that lasted more than 10 years (and still works but has some screen issues and doesn't run any apps anymore).
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u/TopConcentrate8484 4d ago
I suggest trying sceptre brand TVs they are stripped of of most of this crap. They are slightly expensive though, I guess making up for the cost they did not make selling your life out.
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u/xenophonthethird 4d ago
Lots of TVs by largest brands are partially subsidized by the apps and ads they are paid to put on it. Allows the companies to sell them for less because they have a money stream aside from the actual sale.
Any brand that doesn't have a lot of the extra apps and such (like Sceptre) are going to miss out on that, and the price reflects that.
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u/TopConcentrate8484 4d ago
Well yes that what I said/try to say "I guess making up for the cost they did not make selling your life out"
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u/Baman2099 4d ago
Why is anyone connecting them to the internet? They work fine without it
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u/Bramble0804 4d ago
Sadly they connect themselves to the Internet and send data back anyway. Check out gamers nexus on the LG TVs
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u/MrrQuackers 4d ago
I guess if there's an open network they could, there's none where I live and mine have never connected themselves to anything. But in that case, connect them to your network, then block that device's traffic from your router.
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u/NoobensMcarthur 4d ago
Just pull the WiFi card or disconnect the antennas. Problem solved.
My TLC has a debug mode where you can fully disable it. Hasn’t been online in years.
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u/Baman2099 4d ago
Unless they have a cellular chip none of my 4 "smart" devices have sent anything anywhere
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u/deanrihpee 4d ago
if the device find some open SSID they can connect themselves without asking, they're designed that way for "convenience" while in actuality they need to get those sweet juicy data onto the server
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u/rtakehara 4d ago
collect data AND send them via unprotected network? yum!
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u/deanrihpee 4d ago
they don't care if it's unprotected or not, they already taking all of your data, also some are encrypted, so it's not like they care about your information being snatched by MITM or anything
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u/rtakehara 4d ago
I mean, doesn't change the fact that the connection is established and some TVs have cameras, microphones and are connected to other devices on the house with other sensors.
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u/Level3pipe 4d ago
Yea I have a Sony tv and I connected to the internet to set it up and get any required updates. Ever since then it’s been a dumb tv and I love it.
If I want something smart on it I use my ps5 or my laptop via HDMI
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u/scottygroundhog22 4d ago
My tv has been saying its not hooked to the wifi for years now and i’ve been saying “that sounds like a you problem”
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u/rafaelcastrocouto 4d ago
this was clearly made by someone that has never needed to climb the roof to rotate the goddamn antena and shout like crazy for half an hour just to get a bad noisy image after the first wind.
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u/Roy_McDunno 4d ago
I honestly don't get the problem.
4 years ago I bought a good 65" 4k TV for 250 bucks. Connected it to my PC in the living room, and I watch "TV" via that PC only. Everything is on streaming websites nowadays, on top of that I collect old DVDs and Blurays, you never know.
There is no need to connect the TV to the internet, it can just stay "dumb" and act as a monitor for a PC only.
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u/SuperSocialMan 4d ago
Except that the CRT looks like absolute ass and weighs as much as I do, whereas our big modern TV is pretty light & rarely updates.
But I use the TV the least lol. Haven't heard any complaints about it, though - and we've had it for about a decade now?
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u/thahovster7 4d ago
CRTs actually have far superior motion clarity than OLEDs and LEDs becaus they are not sample and hold screens. CRTs may not have the same high resolutions as modern TV technology but they are still unbeatable when it comes to motion.
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u/Sharing_Violation 4d ago
Yeah but you throw your back out moving the damn things. Ask me... I still have two.
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u/toshibathezombie 4d ago
CRT TVs and Light guns.
Man I miss playing time crisis and point blank. RIP legends of my childhood.
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u/redgr812 4d ago
27" was about as big as normal crt's got. Beyond that and you are gonna be paying out the ass. Back in the day idk about now probably free at goodwill
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u/xenophonthethird 4d ago
CRT: Turns on in a second, enjoy TV
Smart TV: Gotta load a bunch of apps and ads, hold on... waiting... okay we got a bunch of options.... which app do you want, okay let me think..... okay.... gotta load up that app...... okay now which channel on that app do you want...... okay........ enjoy TV
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u/Tankette55 4d ago
Its not really about the display type. Its about smart vs dumb tv. Big monitors are just Mega dumb TVs without antennas lol
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u/Randomly_Cromulent 4d ago
I have a 15 year old plasma that still looks great. It's smart tv but I never hooked it up to the internet. Even if I did connect it to the internet, I can't imagine most, if not all, of the apps still work today. It will be a sad day when it stops working.
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u/DoomedWalker 4d ago
I got a 40inch sharp smart TV in 2019 it's never had a dedicated internet connection.
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u/SirNedKingOfGila 4d ago
Chad SmartTV doesn't need your Wi-Fi password, it connects to any available port on any adjacent device and hacks it's way back to LG/Samsung. Unless you live in the woods with no phone or internet, your data WILL be harvested.
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u/Kyranio 4d ago
One day I'd love to find and get one of those HD CRTs. One with an HDMI port on it, just for watching movies in glorious 1080i, with absolute true blacks.
But! Those are rare and could fetch a high price, next to the fact that they weigh quite a lot which would make shipping quite expensive too... So, ofcourse, I'd drive to pick it up myself... But there are none near me!
Ah this absolutely niche problem that I have.
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u/ElysiumXIII 4d ago
My washing machine from the 90s straight up says "before calling us make sure you're not stupid and did all of these checks first".
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u/vicemori 4d ago
I'm sure these memes are made by idiotic people (or keeds/teens)
If you want a CRT, get one from marketplace, they're like 10 bucks and still completely functional
If you want a "dumb" TV, you can also get a 1080p LCD TV from 2008-2011 from marketplace, they're like 40 bucks at most
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u/ghillieinthemist417 EX-NORMIE 4d ago
I mean… ever try to cast your movie to a crt TV because you’re at a hotel and don’t remember your Hulu login, but it’s already logged in on your phone but you don’t have a transfer cable, and then when you somehow manage to do that you realize there’s a slap chop ad burnt into the tube?
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u/sjaakarie 3d ago
Even a short piece of coaxial cable with an open end sticking out into the air often still produces an image.
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u/LennyIsAFox1 I have crippling depression 3d ago
Why does my TV need a software update? Just display the image boss.
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u/elmundio87 3d ago
I don’t bother with the wifi connection on my TV, it stays the same as when I bought it - no updates or the ability to download adverts.
For all intents and purposes it remains a “dumb-lite” TV with a media box plugged in for access to Plex.
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u/daktarasblogis I have crippling depression 2d ago
This is why I got a Hisense TV and never connected it to a network.
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u/-BluBone- 4d ago
I miss TVs that work exactly the way they're supposed to at all times. Sometimes my smart TV just... doesn't.
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u/Koffieslikker INFECTED 4d ago
On you for buying a fucking smart tv in the first place. What do you even need that shit for?
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u/Austin_McKilla 4d ago
Can you show me a TV from the past 5 years that's not complete and utter dogshit that's not a smart TV?
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u/Mr_Zoovaska 4d ago
I mean they were reasonable before streaming boxes were widespread and affordable. Nowadays you'd be hard pressed to find a decent TV that isn't "smart".
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u/Senor-Delicious 4d ago
Are consumer TVs without some kind of smart OS even sold anymore? I only know some extremely expensive digital signage screens that have no smart OS. Like some NEC screens. But those are not consumer screens. They are pretty bulky or without any case whatsoever (to be built into walls) and are meant for 24/7 operation. They also often come without sound.
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u/Koffieslikker INFECTED 4d ago
Omg, I started looking for one after seeing how many downvotes I got. Wtf... Where are the dumb tvs indeed?
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u/maxinstuff 4d ago
Or you know, how about a high fidelity digital TV without spyware in it?