6 ms·

I remember seeing on HN a year or two ago? About Samsung smart fridges calendar app not being updated when Google phased out the API it was using. Also Blu-ray

• mrbill 10y ago
  That's what I do. I bought the "dumbest" TV I could find; I just want a display with speakers and HDMI inputs. Give me something I can plug the latest smart streaming box into and change that box as needed.
  • sankalp_sans 10y ago
    That's where we have a huge gap in device ecosystem. If you want one of the best displays on a TV, it comes "bundled in" with "smart" features. It's a shame that appliances industry doesn't let us customize exactly what we want (that lasts longer and hence would be comforting to pay a good price for).
    • rsync 10y ago
      "If you want one of the best displays on a TV, it comes "bundled in" with "smart" features. " Not true. If you buy a commercial display (you know, those panels you see in airports) not only will it be a far higher quality display than any consumer model, but it will also be the dumbest display you can imagine. They're not that much more expensive - which makes sense, since end users are sometimes building video walls out of 10 or 12 or 16 of them ...
      • gozur88 10y ago
        What I worry about with televisions is they'll come out with new standards that will render my keep-it-for-30-years TV obsolete in three or four years.
        • ptaipale 10y ago
          HDMI won't be going away any time soon. You can replace the receiver, and keep the good display. Yes, TV broadcast standards will change. Over here, we lost analog TV a few years ago, and in about three years we'll lose DVB-T on only have DVB-T2.
        • someonenice 10y ago
          Some one will come up with an external adapter that will do the conversion. Generally saw this with the PS/2 <-> usb mouse. usb <-> ethernet etc.
      • manmal 10y ago
        Interesting, can you please tell us how to google those?
        • Natanael_L 10y ago
          Keywords frequently include terms like "digital signage", and sometimes "industrial", "commercial", etc... You might like the one NEC makes with a slot for a Raspberry Pi: https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/compute-module-nec-display-near-you/ https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/compute-module-nec-display-... https://www.nec-display-solutions.com/p/hq/en/Launch.xhtml?id=PandVSeries https://www.nec-display-solutions.com/p/hq/en/Launch.xhtml?i...
      • baddox 10y ago
        Will they really be higher quality displays for viewing television, movies, and video games? I would expect commercial displays to perhaps be brighter, but I would be surprised if they focused on things that matter more for home viewing, like color accuracy, refresh rate, and contrast ratio.
  • wickawic 10y ago
    I just ripped the "smart" buttons off my remote and never gave the TV my Wi-Fi password. Wish I could have found a TV that was the same quality without the "smartness" but as another commenter stated, it is basically impossible.
    • ce4 10y ago
      Have a look at NECs 24/7 display series [1] (think pro devices for hotel lobbies etc). They even offer cool stuff like raspberry pi integration [2]. [1] https://www.nec-display-solutions.com/p/uhd/en/portfolio.xhtml https://www.nec-display-solutions.com/p/uhd/en/portfolio.xht... [2] https://www.nec-display-solutions.com/p/uk/en/press/pressreleases/dp/Products/Shared/News/2016/PressReleases/Company/RaspberryPi/RaspberryPi_uk.xhtml https://www.nec-display-solutions.com/p/uk/en/press/pressrel...
  • mherrmann 10y ago
    I think it should be that way with cars. Just include a screen and some buttons, then let people connect their smart phones.
    • phillc73 10y ago
      Which is a fine idea, until you drive to a different country and the data connection starts costing a fortune. I have a 2016 Hyundai Tucson. To obtain the traffic camera alerts, I need to tether my phone to the car. The car then uses my phone's data connection to obtain the latest traffic updates. However, whenever I drive out of my home country, which is quite often as I live in Central Europe, I turn off my phone's data connection. Otherwise, I'm slugged with a big bill for data roaming. If I had to use the phone's data connection for, as an example, the entire navigation system, it would seriously degrade the experience once I'd left the borders of my home country. As it is now, I already lose the convenience of traffic camera alerts. I appreciate there are options - OsmAnd with local maps, a better data roaming package or simply rely on paper maps. Nonetheless, I don't believe relying entirely on the phone for in-car functionality is viable until data roaming has been addressed.
      • mherrmann 10y ago
        I live in Austria, so can relate. But "just a screen and buttons" does not mean "permanent internet access". It could/should work without inet as well. But really, who wants car nav systems, when Google Maps on my phone is so much better?
      • tonyedgecombe 10y ago
        First world problems :)
      • tracker1 10y ago
        So, use an app with offline data and maps for the areas you are roaming into...
        • phillc73 10y ago
  • tracker1 10y ago
    I don't even care about the speakers or too many HDMI inputs... I have an AVR for all of that.
  • thedice 10y ago
    This is what I also try to tell people when they ask me for advice on a TV. I got a sharp TV about 6 years ago and it still works perfectly and has more HDMI ports than most TVs coming out now, with none of the "smart" features.
• nateguchi 10y ago
  NEC makes some commercial displays designed like this [1] - they have a Raspberry Pi compute module slot where you can install the latest version of the compute module. Not sure about the longevity of that standard though... (also another thing to note about commercial displays is that as they are usually on constantly, they frequently suffer heavy burn-in after a few years,so not sure if replaceable parts is such a big sell) [1] https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/compute-module-nec-display-near-you/ https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/compute-module-nec-display-...
• danmaz74 10y ago
  I bought a sony Android tv and are pretty happy with it so far - it's not bug free, but having a standard OS means the apps get updates. YMMV
• nkrisc 10y ago
  I had to go out of my way to find a dumb TV. But when I found it, it was a few hundred cheaper than smart TVs of the same size. I saved money and headache!
  • mrbill 10y ago
    When my mother bought a new 55" TV a couple of years ago, she didn't even know it was a smart TV (Android 4.4-based) until I came to visit and pointed it out. She just ignores and never uses any of the smart features.
  • TheGrassyKnoll 10y ago
    Brand ? Link ?? (Thx)
    • nkrisc 10y ago
      I'll have to double check the model later but it's an RCA 55" LED display. I don't remember exactly how much I paid at the time, it was a few years ago.
• nommm-nommm 10y ago
  Why would your fridge need a calendar app?
  • Chaebixi 10y ago
    Probably so that you can show off cool new tech as a trade show. IIRC, people have been trying to stick computers in refrigerators since the first dot-com boom. It made little sense then (and even less sense now), but it has a superficial appeal if you don't think about it too much: everyone in the family interacts with the fridge on a regular daily basis and many people use it as the household noticeboard. However, when you think about ergonomics, efficiency, and maintenance; the whole idea falls apart quickly.
    • Arizhel 10y ago
      It would make sense if 1) the fridge could somehow detect how much of various things you had left (milk, butter, etc.), 2) order these things for you automatically, and 3) there was an economical way of getting these perishable things shipped to you cheaply. It's sorta like Amazon with their buttons (I forget the exact name now), where you can press a little button in your laundry room and they'll immediately ship you some more detergent. The problems here are 1) there's no easy way to automatically detect the levels/amounts of foods in your fridge with current tech, 2) shipping a single milk or stick of butter is horrifically uneconomical, and 3) shipping cold, perishable items is even more uneconomical. I guess you could configure the computer on the fridge with your favorite items inside, and then just press buttons on the screen when something runs low (so it's not fully automatic), but that doesn't help with #2 and #3.
• hx87 10y ago
  I have similar preferences with kitchen appliances. I cook a lot, so I expect a lot out of my stove, but I hardly bake, so I don't care about having a fancy/enormous oven. In fact, I'd rather not have and oven, only a cooktop plus a portable convection oven, but in large parts of the USA a residence is not considered habitable without a built-in oven. Therefore instead of buying a range, I buy a $1500 gas cooktop with a 22,000 BTU/hr burner and the cheapest built-in wall oven I can find.