Most "smart" TVs work perfectly fine as a dumb panel if you just don't give them internet access. And because they're sold expecting to get a bit of money back on ads, it's generally cheaper than a truly dumb panel of the same quality. I've got a Samsung QN90B and it has never once complained about not having internet access, and the UI is plenty responsive.

I have a QN90A that operates as a "dumb" panel via a HDMI-CEC through a combination of receiver and Apple TV 4K. Rarely/never need the TV remote and there's zero point to giving the TV internet access. The receiver has internet access so it can play Tidal.

I love my TCL tv. It’s not “dumb” since it’s actually a “google tv” , but if you don’t connect it to the internet, you don’t have to deal with that. It only shows a notification when turned saying it has no internet, but it goes away on its own after a few seconds.

When I turn it on, it will automatically select the previous input, so I don’t have to interact with the “smart welcome screen” or whatever it’s called. It can even be turned on and off by my set top box which actually handles the media playback. I only need to reach for its remote to change the brightness. I think it’s supposed to have some kind of adaptive thing, but it doesn’t work since I’ve disabled everything that sounded like “camera” or “mic”.

It has 4 HDMI ports, dvb-t, dvb-s and can play things from usb. It also has optical audio out and can output audio to Bluetooth headphones.

Image quality and brightness are great for my needs. Audio is surprisingly good, so I can use a low volume without issue.

The model is 65c845 and cost me less than 1000€ new. My understanding from reviews is that the panel is pretty good, but that they skimped on the “smart” side, which was the right choice if you ask me.

$218 for 43 inch TCL S4 television, (with Google TV built in) https://www.walmart.com/ip/TCL-43-Class-S-Class-4K-UHD-HDR-L...

$99 for Google Streamer.

This "streamer" is overpriced for the market.

Damn it’s kinda crazy a 43 inch tv can cost 218 dollars

Funny... My TCL TV (75C745K) has been nothing but headaches. Extremely buggy and often needs to be rebooted.

Great panel but the software stinks.

Are you using it as a "smart" tv?

In my case, I did connect it once to the internet, to see what's up, and since it had prime video which is pretty much the only thing I watch, it could have allowed me to not have a different box and cables laying around.

And, indeed, it started showing ads on the homepage and the UI was pretty laggy, even compared to my several-year-old firetv. Fortunately, I was able to do a full factory reset and it forgot everything.

Now I only use the software to switch to an HDMI input which doesn't handle the control bits, like a PC, and to increase the brightness in case I'm watching at noon and don't want to close the blinds. 90% of the time, though, I don't even know it exists, since I only use my set top box' remote to do everything I need (change channels and volume, turn on and off). The other 10% it works well enough that I can't really complain.

Bought an LG “C” series OLED a month or so ago. Never gave it a WiFi password. Everything (Apple TV, XBox, Switch) uses HDMI CEC, so I just turn on the desired device, inputs are switched and devices powered on. I never see the TV’s Home Screen, and it doesn’t complain about lack of network. The LG acts as “dumb” as the truly dumb TV it replaced.

I had my brother stay over a few months ago and he gave it the wifi password. Luckily it didn't update to a firmware version with ads (as their cheaper/older devices apparently do), but that's the risk with this approach.

We looked into this when moving house a few years ago in the UK. There didn't seem to be any viable options, so we bought a secondhand TV. I've heard that there are ways to get hold of shop display monitors but didn't figure out how to do this.

If you don't connect your TV to the internet, ever, not even once, it will function as a dumb panel.

Call me paranoid, but I just don't trust it not to look for nearby unsecured wifi networks. Ontop of which I feel dirty and complicit by paying for functionality that I will never use and believe is detrimental to society.

Find the Wi-Fi antenna and remove it if you are so worried. Unfounded fears without action is merely handwringing, while unactionable fears aren't worth worrying about.

Fair point, but that only covers half of my objection. Also I would not agree with "no action". My action was to decide on a different product.

Yeah, this is the frustrating part. I've worked with retailers on in-store displays, so I know that you can get high-quality, cheap panels that are "dumb" in that they don't have apps, but they do have full local-only operating systems that can access wifi networks and list files. Some of them can even boot into a chrome-based kiosk mode, indicating a full html rendering stack.

But if you check for anything DIY, they're either sourcing panels directly from manufacturers in China, or ripping apart smart TVs (or just "not using" parts of them). There's a happy middle ground and I know, from experience, that's it's not an expensive one, even though I also know from experience that it's often times an extremely pricey one. By which I mean, the panels themselves are cheap for an outlet to get and use, while actually trying to buy a panel from those outlets is reserved for B2B applications and is priced for enterprise work.

What I was hoping for is that someone who knows about those kinds of panels and that kind of work would be able to say "Ah, yeah, here's a great panel that we use for our displays which is a good deal". But, so far, I've never had any takers on that. It's a small industry (or, at least it was when I was involved), so that's not unexpected. But I keep hoping that some dogged youtuber or some experimental blogger will figure out how to source all the bits for the TV that so many of us want, but that there's is strong business disincentives to create.

That's what's most galling, I think. Samsung/LG/Sony could make this and sell it, but they refuse to because it would provide an alternative to the market they really want which is ad capture/data harvesting. And I'm just so tired of that being the only option for that specific reason. Because now I'm stuck here hoping that someone out there makes the least-complex, cheapest, and fastest thing for a TV manufacturer to make, which seems like the dumbest thing to have to hope for.

This is gonna be me if or when my quite functional dumb LG from 2012 ever gives up the ghost. I just don't see the appeal of smart TVs when that functionality can be outsourced to a cheaper modular device.

I'll echo what other people are saying, that you should just not connect the smart tv to your wifi, but I am nervous about smart TVs that ship with cell chips to connect to the manufacturer's servers when people don't hook the device up to wifi.

I'm not sure how to determine which models do or don't ship with cell chips.

That's not a thing. Do you seriously believe OEMs would ship a 4G/5G modem and bundle an unlimited data plan with low margin consumer electronics, just to earn a few dollars per year from ads?

And man, oh man, wouldn’t we all just love a device with a free cell modem and a data plan ripe for the hacking?

IOW, if it has been done, hackaday, et al., would have already shown us how to bypass the weak obfuscation and get free data. Or at least an article on “my new Samsung TV has a cell modem that they don’t advertise. ‘da fuq?”

If it gave them enough extra data to sell, yes?

I don't think Sony or Samsung would be paying consumer prices for cheap low-end cell chips or bulk low-bandwidth data plans.

I agree, since 90%+ of people connect to WiFi, it's not economically sane. With cars it's a different story though.

Getting an Amazon Firestick and putting Kodi on it is a great way to watch stuff locally if you have a NAS full of media

Otherwise, look at getting an Intel Compute Stick. They are full PCs that plug into an HDMI port. Running VLC on these is a pretty good solution

That seems like old advice. Why are we still hacking on Amazon Firesticks?

And the last Intel Compute Stick was released in 2021 -- the Compute Stick is just another consumer product that Intel has killed (along with their NUCs and their reliable/inexpensive desktop motherboards).

I mean, Kodi is wonderful, but the platforms to use it with seem to have moved on.

As an example: For years now, a Raspberry Pi 4 with LibreELEC is a fine way to watch local media on even convoluted AV rigs with its dual HDMI outputs. A Pi 5 also works. (And both can use CEC, so navigation can happen with the normal TV remote without additional fuckery.)

The old advice works which is why I suggested it. I've been using this setup for years and it has been excellent for watching everything

Only Firestick has crap software and slow as hell.

The latest Firestick 4K Max is slow, full of ads, and locked down to where some of the more fun side-loading features don't work anymore like remote button remapping. I ditched it and got an Apple TV that doesn't force you to watch ads for Ford pickup trucks.

But Kodi is available for the fire stick while you have to jump some hoops with third party signing services to keep it on Apple TV.

It’s certainly better in other ways but this thread doesn’t follow

Kodi is the only application I run on my Firesticks

I use it to run the Jellyfin client, but it's still painful to use because you can't bypass the Firestick home screen, which is bloated with ads and takes seconds to load. I find this unacceptable in a commercial product.

Any normal TV, just don't connect it to the internet. Use an external box like an Nvidia Shield or Apple TV, its remote will control on/off/volume on the TV via HDMI-CEC.

Now your cheap replaceable external box is the internet-connected computer and your expensive wall-mounted TV is an appliance.

Make sure you get one that won't nag you, a friend's Hisense will regularly overlay an annoying splash screen if it can't reach the internet.

I've got an Iiyama 42" monitor running as a TV for AppleTV and an Xbox. Panel quality is a bit meh, I think it's some sort of weird 2k/4k thing done for dynamic range. It's a signage one, rather than a strict monitor, so there's a little bit of firmware, and I could put rotating pics on it using a usb key, but I'm using the apple-tv for it. No RF (which is good, means I don't have to pay for a tv license that I woudln't used), and 2 hdmi inputs.