"modern" does not imply "better" anymore, for at least a decade now.

Think of SmartTV, microwaves, or every kind of consumer electronics in general.

I do think you should open your mind a bit. Smart TVs are pretty terrific, I can just cast whatever I want across the room and bam, it's on the TV. Friends can come over and share the input. I can lay in bed with nothing but a remote and browse my plex library.

I used to go along this line of thinking, and had a "dumb" TV for a long time. I would spend hundreds of hours trying to get a PC/xbmc/kodi setup with a remote control to be comfortable, but always required a keyboard and mouse next to the TV. In the end it was a waste of time and I wasn't enjoying my TV as an entertainment device.

When I finish work, I want to sit down and just have everything work. I don't want to have to keep getting up and pressing buttons and messing around to get a myriad of supplemental devices of varying quality to work. I just want one single device, on the wall, with a remote.

What you didn't include: the data gathering and the ads. tons of ads. I interacted with smart TVs before, but when i pay for it and it displays me ads in the UI, its an instant return. I'll have none of that shit.

And don't get me started on weird bugs that i can't even fix myself. Stuff like my dad's TV randomly outputting 1-2 seconds of audio of the last selected sender /while being turned off/. Audio only, with the screen turned off. Just a few moments. Nightmare fuel when its dark and you are sleeping in the same room.

I don't experience ads with my TV. I don't understand why this is an often repeated point. I've had three so far (due to moving countries), and never experienced this "tons and tons of ads" thing I see people complain about. It's always just been a UI and some apps.

Regarding data collection, who cares? Just get a pi hole if you really care about that.

Also you are describing a fault that can occur with a dumb tv.

EDIT: okay. I found this https://external-preview.redd.it/DcKcaASCdFkfM-eK5pOiu6DIOZb...

I have a samsung TV and I do not see this. Perhaps this is a region thing. I've lived in The Netherlands and the UK and not experienced this.

Dumb TV + Streaming stick is the way to go. Bundling your TV (hardware) with your smart TV (software) is a recipe for disappointment and frustration 2-3 years down the road when the tech evolved and your TV manufacturer has lost interest in supporting your model (looking at you LG)

I don't completely disagree. VGA should have been removed from monitors 10 years ago. Some companies still buy new monitors and hook them up via VGA. That should be prohibited by labour laws. The image quality wasn't good enough to be used for an entire work day in 2010 and it certainly isn't acceptable today.

Tens years ago I argued with a previous boss that it didn't matter how cheap the monitor was, he shouldn't force anyone to use a VGA monitor and hurt their eyes when DVI was available and only slight more expensive.

That being said, if you need a VGA monitor, perhaps for some retro computing or a system that only supports VGA for some reason, it's better and cheaper to just fix it, if possible.

I think with VGA, being analog, the image quality depends on the specific hardware. I've used monitors on 1080p 60Hz using VGA cable and it's been fine. On the other hand, I've also had poor image quality (ghosting) at the same resolution with a different cable and monitor. So it is possible to have decent quality on VGA, but not guaranteed.

I think these days that you don't really pay extra to have an HDMI port on a monitor. As HDMI is signal compatible with DVI, you can just use a passive adapter if your computer only has a DVI output.

I have considered digital inputs (DVI, HDMI or DP) mandatory for any monitor I have purchased for myself since 2010 and when people ask me for advice on monitors I advise the same.

> or a system that only supports VGA for some reason

AFAIK, nearly all modern servers only have VGA, serial, network, and a couple of USB ports, so it's much more common than you think. Of course, most of the time you'll be configuring them through the dedicated management network interface, so the VGA and serial outputs are mostly a fallback.

Just like 3.5mm headphone jack. No.

Well, people complain about Bitcoin to kill our climate but on the other hand have no problems to buy new monitors when it's not necessary ...