Ask Slashdot: Best Non-Smart TV Sets? (slashdot.org)

williamyf writes: I have always been of the idea that my TV shall be non-smart, leaving the smarts to connected equipment (in my case my Synology NAS running Plex and a combination of Chromecasts and laptops do the trick). I think that most of my Slashdot brethren are of a similar persuasion. But, over the years finding decent non-smart TVs is becoming harder and harder, unless your are prepared to pay much higher prices for industrial/signage equipment, or are prepared to deal with slightly inferior specs and quality, or get an old (possibly second hand) set, or are prepared to do long, hard internet searches for that needle in the haystack (all slashdot readers can google, but here at least we can hear firsthand experiences from technically-minded people, and not fake-ish reviews).

In view of the recent story about Samsung TVs being bricked by a firmware update, I ask the Slashdot crowd to amass our collective knowledge and see: What TV makers make decent non-smart TV sets? Which are these sets?

Requirements: non-smart, no apps on the TV, no app on the smartphone, no nothing -- the dumber the better. OTA tuner optional. 1080p50/60 or higher (1333x768 was barely adequate in 2008, but KRAP in 2017). 16:9 or 21:9. From 35 inches (for the master bedroom) to 70 inches (for the middle class living room in an apartment complex). Real remote (not app in a phone) with at least volume up/down, input change and sleep function, plus all needed to configure the set. Lots of HDMI 2.0 (or higher) ports. A decent assortment of legacy ports (including component, composite, S-Video). HDR capable. Good build quality. Good price (Ideally slightly lower than similar smart TVs, since we are forgoing the hardware needed for the smart part, as well as the ongoing support cost for firmware updates). Good image quality. Decent warranties. Reputable manufacturers. Reputable sellers.

Comments

Any TV you want

[FictionPimp]

Buy any TV, do not connect it to your network and do not use any of the smart functionality. Boom instant regular old tv!

Re:Any TV you want

[thegarbz]

But if it takes longer than 8 seconds to turn on from unplugged to ready it's no better than any CRT set you can find in the trash.

Sure. If you buy a small crap one with poor picture quality 4:3 ratio, crap brightness, low resolution, and in ability to plug in anything to it then yeah it would be no better than a CRT.

if it takes too long

You're watching TV, not trying to land a fighter plane. If you can't spare the 10 seconds for it to start then maybe the problem is you.

PC Monitor

[DrYak]

At that point, specially for the smaller TV screen sizes, you should also consider getting a huge PC Monitor.
Which can give you a very high quality display at a decent size (but might be a bit over priced).
But only llimited connectivity (usually 2 or 3 out of the list of usual suspects : Display Port, HDMI, DVI either pure digital or with combined analog and eventually legacy analog VGA)

Then you can separately tack on everything you need.
- multiple HDMI can be obtained by connecting a separate HDMI switch box. Some even have remote controls
- OTA receiver (DVB-T or whatever it is called elsewhere out of europe) can be found as separate stand alone boxes.
- tiny flat speakers built in the monitor (available usually as an extra option on most PC -monitors) will never beat the quality of a mid-to-high range PC multispeaker set, specially those which feature a decoding box (analog + SPDIF + Optical inputs)

Then you can use either an IR-blaster on your favorite box (NAS, Chromecast, whatever) or even if your smartphone (or some old repurposed PDA) happens to have one with an appropriate app. Or get a complex programmable universal remote. So you can centralize the control of all these dozen of gadgets. Thus :
- the remote is the only complex device.
- if the remote is fried, you can still use all the other non-firmware-brickable devices by pushing their buttons (or trying to find where you put the dozen of specific remotes and find corresponding battery cells).
- absolutely non of the above relies on any cloud stupidity. (nobody is going to hack you "over the air").

The only drawback is the absolutely huge mess of cables of connecting all this disparate devices, and trying to fit everything nicely in cabinet.

For bigger surfaces than largest PC monitors, consider projectors in your choice, with a similar "dump display + separate accessories" approach (so avoid the "professional" projectors geared toward meeting rooms, which tend to have wifi support and even an embed android able to display presentation directly from an USB stick. Just go for the dumb consumer projectors that only have DVI/HDMI).

But the draw back is that projector currently don't support resolutions as high as monitors.

The best long term advantage :
when some function breaks or you want to upgrade, you only have 1 single accessory to upgrade (e.g.: by a new HDMI switch with even more ports) rather than changing the whole smarttv

Re:You need SmartTVs

[PhYrE2k2]

The need is simple:

1. The display panel and its HDMI ports will be the de-facto standard for the next 10+ years, much the same way televisions still have composite/component/s-video inputs despite no component built in the last 15 years using them

2. The 'smart' feature will quickly become outdated and will lack long term support. A smart component based on the AndroidOS, for example, is unlikely to have security support or functionality many years down the road on the useful life of the television

3. While once can replace/upgrade a $50 component connected to a HDMI port, few will seek to upgrade their television.

4. Once such security support is gone, this network-connected television will see the real possibility of what's been going on (enabling cameras and microphones, privacy issues, etc)

5. Not connecting the television to the network often sees the 'smart' feature interfere with normal operation including messages about not being able to check for updates, it being in the list of inputs, etc.

6. As features evolve, you will now have two 'smart' devices (one in the TV and one that does what you want, such as adding H.264 decoders, etc) and this is unnecessary for (a) power consumption, (b) security, (c) user confusion, (d) user experience.

In general, the 'smart' feature should always have been a module that, while it comes with the television and could be proprietary, should be upgradable and replaceable.

Re:Stop looking for a TV

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah why didn't he just go buy a 70" monitor? What a dummy...

Smart TVs will never go away

[Pentomino]

Making TVs smarter has other drawbacks, that won't be alleviated by simply unplugging from the network.

For one, when you turn them on, they have to "boot up", and this takes longer than whatever warm-up period is required. And once they've started, they're in a multitasking OS, so they have better things to do than respond immediately to your remote control presses. This is especially frustrating when you switch inputs; you can't just tap "input" three times. You have to tap "input", and wait for the box to move before pressing "input" again. If it takes too long to move, you might try pressing "input" an extra time, but this time it gets buffered and you end up going too far.

Unfortunately, I expect smart TVs are here to stay, because the presence of those "Netflix" and "Amazon Prime" buttons on your remote are subsidizing the low cost of the TV. And there aren't enough of us nerds that would pay more for a TV that does less.