- mrvictory1@lemmy.worldEnglish19 minutes
Since there are a lot of comments here I want to ask this: we purchased a xiaomi tv stick (specs below) and a 15 year old intel pentium dual core w/ android runs circles around it with the exact same apps plus the PC has significantly more stable network connection. The stick’s OS is old however not bloated and it even blocks google banner ads OOB. Did we get a very bad unit or are all of TV sticks / boxes unusably slow unless you get a shield or an apple tv?
- 1 hour
It’s been like this for a while. Nvidia Shield is even worse but I put up with it because it’s so useful.
1 hourAt this point, I’m not even sickened any more. Anyone who buys these consumer goods and willingly uses them as intended DESERVES this shit. Fuck them. Before someone says “It’s all I could afford” or “What’s the alternative? We can’t seem to find “dumb” TVs anymore!”
Dead. Simple.
Buy that trash Roku TV. Take it home and set it up. NEVER, EVER allow it to connect to the internet. Set it to ALWAYS go to the “PC” hdmi input and put a tiny, cheap Linux PC on the end of it. If you need a remote, there are dirt cheap gyro mice “remotes” on Ebay.People love to hate Apple, and that’s fine (Tim Cook sucks ass), but the AppleTV is honestly the best streamer and you can’t change my mind.
Zero ads on the Home Screen, and even the first gen 4K box that came out 8 years ago is still fast as hell and getting updates.
I know this because I had one in my closet and just took it out the other day when setting up a TV in my bedroom. It downloaded updates and is now rocking and rolling again.
My family knows me as the anti-apple IT Guy. So, it shocked everyone when I brought home a Best Buy open box Apple TV 4K (saved me $20US).
Honestly, this is my first Apple purchase since my ipod and I have to admit: it’s good.
Roku has lost their way and my 3 Roku Ultra devices are all dying for reasons unknown (freezing, random reboots, spinning endlessly when trying to open an app). I’m just so done with them (and Nvidia) for my streaming hardware business.
I bought an AppleTV device and it is by far the best out of the box TV product I’ve purchased. It’s pricey but I highly recommend it if you don’t want to self host.
They are certainly more expensive, but it’s a “buy once cry once” type of thing. You pay a little more but the box works SO MUCH better and for longer than the cheap junk that’ll show you a bunch of ads.
I have two of them at this point and zero regrets.
- motruck@lemmy.zipEnglish1 hour
I’ll see you walled garden bullshit and raise your an nvidia shield. I think I Stoll got till September before I’m in the sane boat.
- Mearcfara@lemmy.mlEnglish3 hours
I wonder how much of the anti-apple stuff comes from the extremity of the person’s views. I have always preferred PC/windows due to familiarity with it, but I’ve used iphones for 12 or 13 years, and by extension, some of apple’s services (like icloud). They’ve been pretty great this whole time. And, as a normie, I’ve been happy with what I’ve heard and seen about their stability, general lack of ads, and security/protection of customer data. I doubt there’s many others on the Fediverse with similar views due to the nature of this place, but anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that it seems like some of the dissent toward apple is inherent to their position relative to the opinion holder.
I definitely think it’s “linux brain” that exists around here to a degree. You can see it on any given thread that talks about…well…anything technical. “Just download Linux!” they’ll say. And I say this as someone who LIKES Linux. I have it on two of my pcs (and I have a Mac and iPhone/iPad, etc. as well). It’s great. But there’s a zealotry around here around it.
That said, it’s not hard to dislike Apple right now. I’m pretty mad at them for cozying up to trump all the time. I’m glad Cook will not be leading Apple soon (though I wish he’d just leave outright. He’ll still be at the company). But it’s hard to deny the hardware is great and the software is generally good and generally works well.
But Lemmy is certainly a niche population of nerds. And that’s fine! It’s great! But a lot of those nerds seem to love the “console wars”-type mentality of “MY thing is the best and anything else is bad.”
- Mearcfara@lemmy.mlEnglish1 hour
I really appreciate your response and I agree completely. Linux seems awesome (I’ve played with Mint a little bit, and have heard a lot about Bazzite and Kinoite, and I do plan on moving over when I have the time/energy/motivation. It does seem significantly better than the commercial offerings once one gets past the (often exaggerated) learning curve.
Would you mind expanding on the Apple stuff? I haven’t looked into them as a company since they told the courts to fuck off during the Snowden trial or something like that. I’m realizing that I’m not an Apple fanboy, but I also don’t have the data pool to really form an opinion one way or another.
- kieron115@startrek.websiteEnglish3 hours
Roku has had a big ad on the side for a while now? I’ve been blocking it with DNS.
- gedaliyah@lemmy.worldEnglish5 hours
Roku is another prime example of enshitification.
Now I have all my “smart” TVs disconnected, and I hooked up some inexpensive Android TV boxes (with a couple minor modifications). No more ads!
- 3 hours
can you go into detail on the boxes and your mods? interested in getting some of my family off of Roku for this reason
- blargh513@sh.itjust.worksEnglish17 minutes
I would love to exit the Roku ecosystem. I don’t use any Apple products and I’m not interested in starting.
It’s amazing how there are really no open-source products in this category of devices.
- gedaliyah@lemmy.worldEnglish13 minutes
I got some cheap ONN boxes, Which seem like the best value for true Android TV devices. If you have the funds NVIDIA Shield TV is probably the way to go.
It’s possible to skip the Walmart account login at setup, but probably not possible to skip the Google account sign-in (let me know if you find a way!).
Setting up side-loading is trivial, although largely unnecessary. I loaded Stremio, Jellyfin, and a VPN for better streaming experience and control. I replaced the default home screen with Projectivy Launcher. You don’t need to go into ADB shell or anything like that. There are also other home screen launchers that fix the major problems with the default GoogleTV screen; Emotin UI (closed source), FLauncher (dormant), Leanback Launcher, ATV Launcher (closed-source).
There are lots of options for web browsing, File Explorer, on-device media, stores, etc. that are easily available.
- Briguy@lemmy.worldEnglish5 hours
The easiest way to avoid ads is use an android streamer (I use the Google tv streamer) and install projectivity launcher. You get the cleanest UI that’s fully customizable with only what you want to see. I also installed a button remapper app to change the netflix button on my remote to open Plex. It’s a very easy stress-free experience using my tv
People probably wouldn’t like it to have only one product without a single ad. They probably had bug reports about it “my roku doesn’t display ads on my smart TV, does that mean that it’s broken?”.
- 4 hours
You can update (and probably should to get things like security fixes), just make sure you then also install a custom launcher like FLauncher to replace the original one after updating.
Don’t need security fixes. Updates always makes things worse. So I’m very happy with current version and will keep it forever.
- Mearcfara@lemmy.mlEnglish3 hours
Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve always found smart TB UIs to be totally unnecessary and kind of an annoying feature. I’ve got a Sony smart TV and have never used the UI. I just use it as a monitor for my PC, and if I’m watching TV, it’s via the web or something. So personally, this doesn’t seem like that big of a deal, aside from the principle of it, which is absolutely a big deal and super shitty.
Maybe some of this is being terrified about the quiet spreading of the IoT and how that feels like a really fucking half baked idea that’s going to be a big problem later on.
- comradegodzilla@lemmy.mlEnglish7 hours
Are there any TVs nowadays that don’t advertise to you? I bought a Hisense about 6 years ago because it supposedly didn’t advertise. 2 years into getting the TV it advertises now. Any suggestions for a TV that just lets me watch?
- Zetta@mander.xyzEnglish6 hours
Every time somebody brings this up, there’s the same obvious answer. The only real option is to have an external streaming device and to disable or completely ignore the built-in operating system.
- VonReposti@feddit.dkEnglish6 hours
I got a Philips TV and just never connected it to the internet. Only ad I see is the ugly Netflix button on my remote, rest is handled by OSMC.
I think most TVs can do this. I’ve even discovered that Samsung that’s notorious for forcing you to go through a network setup wizard can be bypassed just by pressing the right arrow button instead of selecting a WiFi. At least all the Samsung TVs from my old workplace had this bypass.
- epicshepich@programming.devEnglish5 hours
Finally got sick of the FireTV so I plugged a mini PC into a dumb TV. It’s kinda sad to have to use a keyboard instead of a controller, but it was a minor tradeoff for a much better experience.
- Olgratin_Magmatoe@slrpnk.netEnglish6 hours
I know its possible to jail break a roku, but is there a follow up to remove ads after doing so?
Really sick of it. Though I need to get a pi-hole set up anyways
Great, I got rid of Amazon fire stick after they stuck ads in movies and got a Roku.
Now I’ll have to switch again or start pirating. Another loss for civilization
- fribbtastic@lemmy.worldEnglish7 hours
Used a fire TV stick for a long time but multiple factors made me finally switch to an Nvidia shield.
Worked great for a year and then an OS updated made the home screen 60% ads, especially those that started to play with sound when I was on them for like 2 milliseconds. Installed projectify on it and now I only see what I want to see.
It is always disturbing to me how much ads I see when I am using someone else’s system, because I banned everything at home.
- osanna@lemmy.vgEnglish13 hours
And they wknder why piracy is skyrocketing again. It’s not hard, dipshits. Fuck.
- DevoidWisdom@sh.itjust.worksEnglish15 hours
They updated my roku a few months ago with this and there was an opt out to revert, and I took it. It asked if I really wanted to change back to the old UI as it would be unable to swap back. I hope that stays true!
- commander@lemmy.worldEnglish15 hours
My understanding is that they pushed it to some people as a beta and eventually they would roll out the update to everyone even if they opted out of the beta. I opted out to go back to the not as bad homescreen and blocked it from the Internet in my router settings
- DevoidWisdom@sh.itjust.worksEnglish5 hours
That’s what I figured. I havent blocked the device completely, but I would like to block the update if possible. I just need to look and see if I can block just the update dns query. Was your fix a total block?
