A while ago I hacked root on my LG tv, but eventually I gave up on the war against spying/ads and just unchecked all the agreements, unplugged the network from it, and hooked up a $20 Onn 4k tv box instead.
Now it does everything I want. It has an unlockable bootloader, root, can run custom roms, all the good things.
I gotta admit, it's pretty LoTek of him to strap a partially dismantled Lenovo laptop to the back of this thing, but... couldn't he have just used a mini PC that's designed to be mounted to the VESA mounts present on many flat-panel TVs?
Because he had a partially dismantled Lenovo sitting around.
I've done the same thing with some random HP laptop from 2006 whose screen died, used it for youtube on a TV until it finished crapping out. I had windows xp on it though.
I used an Apple TV for the longest time, but as more of my content shifted from pure consumption to more interactive live streams or YouTube videos that often serve as a jumping off point for research, the artificial limitations of the platform came to bear.
A Windows PC is the easiest thing for this, so I built one. LTSC with all of the annoying crap turned off, Firefox with extensions, fast, upgradable hardware. Full keyboard and trackpad, plus smaller pointer and keyboard devices scattered around.
The costs of doing so are the cost of buying a cheap used SFF PC from eBay or a new miniPC and a few hours of setup. An N100 box can be had for less than $200 USD with enough horsepower to due basically any HTPC task you want, including ones the STB makers wouldn't allow you to do like emulate old consoles or install whatever software you want.
LTSC is a Windows 10 servicing channel that offers 10 years of support for a static feature set. It is designed for devices and use cases where functionality and features don't change over time, such as medical systems, industrial controllers, and air traffic control devices.
It seems to be a supported annoyance-free windows.
TV has a fixed IP, which is not allowed to leave the local network.
I stream my entertainment from an Nvidia Shield and when I am done both are powered off on the power strip. Problem solved.
The "function" that instantly drops you out of your app into an advertising funnel if you press the wrong button (the obvious one to press, naturally) while the screensaver is on is a real scumbag move.
Just takes one dark pattern to make me assume everything you do is a money grab.
And I use MythTV[0] myself. I've gotten a lot of hate from other HNers about that ("why aren't you using $MEDIAPLATFORM instead?" "That's so old, you should use Kodi, instead" -- when Kodi is older than MythTV.).
No, it's not the slickest interface. And no, it's not the most full-featured. But it doesn't spy on me (like Kodi, Emby and/or others) and it doesn't try to show me ads either.
I don't run it off a broken laptop (a fanless minipc for the front end and a VM for the back end), like in TFA, but it works nicely and does what I need of it -- and most of all, it doesn't spy on me or try to show me ads. That's a win!
It is weird how FOSS is constantly reinventing this wheel. All the user wants is the ability to play media over the network and via USB. Think VLC on a HDMI stick. Simple and elegant. What we always end up with is a media server for the network, with torrents, RSS feeds, email alerts, weather, and a semi broken media player, almost as an afterthought. We want a hammer but end up with a hammer factory distribution center, warehouse, and a crane specifically designed to move around pallets of hammers.
If it's anything at all like what KDE Desktop is, then I have very high hopes for it. Kubuntu is one of the best pieces of software that I've ever used. It actually has real UI design thought behind it (unlike GNOME), and is performant (also unlike GNOME).
Kodi became it's own deeply complex thing; far from a WM/DE?
I suppose I mean something that Linux people would recognize is a DE. A slightly easier and TV-ish interface, but still ships with e.g. apt or pacman or whatnot, etc.
No personal knowledge/experience with it but it always sounded like a true DIY project.
There should be an open Chromecast. Pocket-sized SoC with HDMI port where one can install whatever Linux kernel and userland. No need for "custom ROMs" from third parties. Once purchaser pays for the computer, they should be able to wipe the pre-installed crapware, if they so choose, e.g., maybe when it gets old, without making the thing useless.
WTF can someone do with an old Chromecast. Toss in the garbage?
Use it? Older Chromecasts still work, they're not like Android phones stuck on an old version of Android and can't install newer apps. It's a target device for audio/video. It's fairly limited but that also means old ones are fine.
They won't do 4k, but I'm sure there's someone you know that has a TV that isn't 4k and doesn't have a Chromecast that could use it.
Such a device would necessarily only play pirated content (well, and YouTube) or SD content. All the streamers don't allow desktop Linux browsers to play HD content. (Well, there's a hack for Netflix. Don't tell em.)
I would really love the convenience of something like an Amazon fire stick, but as all open source and ad and spyware free.
This SD-only thing is one of the more annoying things about using Linux on the desktop. Some of the big streaming services don't officially support watching on Linux devices at all right now (except for special cases like Chromebooks maybe).
It's pretty hypocritical that big organisations run servers on Linux and often have developers using Linux and yet don't give the same consideration to the Linux community as customers/users.
Somehow I suspect this comes down to media industry executives insisting on this or that flavour of DRM - as if that's going to stop anyone who runs a Linux desktop if they really want to find "alternative" sources of the material anyway. There must be enough users running Linux these days who would be willing to pay to support the shows they enjoy and just want the same service as their Windows or Mac using counterparts if they're paying the same money for it?
Readit News
Now it does everything I want. It has an unlockable bootloader, root, can run custom roms, all the good things.
What are you able to do?
(I have an LG tv, never hooked to ethernet/wifi, only used as a display for 4k bluray)
Dead Comment
I've done the same thing with some random HP laptop from 2006 whose screen died, used it for youtube on a TV until it finished crapping out. I had windows xp on it though.
A Windows PC is the easiest thing for this, so I built one. LTSC with all of the annoying crap turned off, Firefox with extensions, fast, upgradable hardware. Full keyboard and trackpad, plus smaller pointer and keyboard devices scattered around.
The costs of doing so are the cost of buying a cheap used SFF PC from eBay or a new miniPC and a few hours of setup. An N100 box can be had for less than $200 USD with enough horsepower to due basically any HTPC task you want, including ones the STB makers wouldn't allow you to do like emulate old consoles or install whatever software you want.
LTSC is a Windows 10 servicing channel that offers 10 years of support for a static feature set. It is designed for devices and use cases where functionality and features don't change over time, such as medical systems, industrial controllers, and air traffic control devices.
It seems to be a supported annoyance-free windows.
Download links and explanation here: https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links
You couldn't pay me to own a TV with Roku as the OS.
Just takes one dark pattern to make me assume everything you do is a money grab.
No, it's not the slickest interface. And no, it's not the most full-featured. But it doesn't spy on me (like Kodi, Emby and/or others) and it doesn't try to show me ads either.
I don't run it off a broken laptop (a fanless minipc for the front end and a VM for the back end), like in TFA, but it works nicely and does what I need of it -- and most of all, it doesn't spy on me or try to show me ads. That's a win!
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MythTV
Edit: Added missing link.
And I meant Plex, not Kodi. Kodi doesn't (AFAIK) spy on their users, but Plex does. My apologies.
It just seems weird that this doesn't seem to exist. Like, you get something close to it and then it becomes Kodi or something.
VLC can stream on the local network directly to a chromecast. And surprisingly it actually works.
Haven't heard any news about it for a while, but it looks a bit like "Android TV except not Android".
To the tune of https://xkcd.com/918/ - Well, I guess that's all I really wanted.
I suppose I mean something that Linux people would recognize is a DE. A slightly easier and TV-ish interface, but still ships with e.g. apt or pacman or whatnot, etc.
No personal knowledge/experience with it but it always sounded like a true DIY project.
There should be an open Chromecast. Pocket-sized SoC with HDMI port where one can install whatever Linux kernel and userland. No need for "custom ROMs" from third parties. Once purchaser pays for the computer, they should be able to wipe the pre-installed crapware, if they so choose, e.g., maybe when it gets old, without making the thing useless.
WTF can someone do with an old Chromecast. Toss in the garbage?
They won't do 4k, but I'm sure there's someone you know that has a TV that isn't 4k and doesn't have a Chromecast that could use it.
It's pretty hypocritical that big organisations run servers on Linux and often have developers using Linux and yet don't give the same consideration to the Linux community as customers/users.
Somehow I suspect this comes down to media industry executives insisting on this or that flavour of DRM - as if that's going to stop anyone who runs a Linux desktop if they really want to find "alternative" sources of the material anyway. There must be enough users running Linux these days who would be willing to pay to support the shows they enjoy and just want the same service as their Windows or Mac using counterparts if they're paying the same money for it?