I also have the impression that "everyone" buys an apple tv/Chromecast/etc anyways because of limitations in the smart tv or just ease of use. It makes a lot of sense to have these things separated except for TV manufacturers that want you to buy a TV more frequently.

Can we produce substantially inexpensive black-boxed hardware that they desperately want in order to cut costs, but interferes in dissatisfying but barely tolerable ways with the quality of life too? Can we occasionally make it send messages in-store to their customers that the execs wouldn't want or approve of but find themselves putting up with because it's relatively benign compared to a worse bottom line?

Using a computer monitor or specialist/signage TV is both expensive and offers a worse experience.

My Samsung TV has never been connected to the internet - we use a Roku box to feed streaming content to it - but it's still laggy and unresponsive by default, getting worse over the course of a few months until we decide to factory reset it again.

At one point it was so bad that I pressed the "change source" button a couple times, noticed it wasn't working, pressed the volume buttons, then the menu button, assumed the remote was dead, went to find some batteries in a drawer, took the remote batteries out, and then the TV rapidly switched sources, changed volume and opened the menu over the course of half a second.

But I expect that of my car infotainment, my computer monitor, and a recently purchased signage screen as well. Finding a device (any device) that didn't behave like this would me more shocking. I tend to think that the best thing to do is buy the most popular product, from a known brand. Because at least then there are millions of people having the same experience, increasing the chance of a fix.

We get amazing hardware in many cases these days. The quality of the screens in TV's these days is completely unbelievable. And you can get a decent one for a few hundred. I too wish there was a brand that would spend a little more on better UX (both hardware and software). But the harsh reality is that it doesn't sell. Rumor doesn't spread that BrandX has snappy intuitive menus, fewer bugs or less ads. The commercial says that UsualBrand has new magical colors and ultra high def thingamajigs, and that sells TVs.

The ARM chip in the AppleTV is anything but slow and the only thing I had to do to prevent ads on the Home Screen is to remove Apple’s apps from the top bar and replace them with my most used apps.

And often by that point they’re looking for an excuse to buy the new shiny anyway.

Problem with Smart TVs is they become obsolete super fast software wise. And basically, unsafe to connect to the internet in a few years.

Most TVs have CI+ ports. I can easily imagine an upgradable "smart module". Just buy a new compatible one (which, effectively could just connect for power and HDMI) and get the brand new stuff.

There is no bubble, smart TVs are a consumerist trap and it will require government intervention to fix because nobody has any incentives otherwise.

Having a switchable "compute" module that the user can upgrade without replacing the whole TV would be great but the truth is that is what a streaming box is doing just not integrated into the TV but connected via HDMI.

I treat my smart TVs like a dumb TV. It doesn't have internet access as I have explained elsewhere. I just use the TV OS to switch inputs and change picture settings but never use any of the built in apps.

Having said that my parents do use the apps and haven't reported any issues with them on their LG C8 from 2018. I have tried to get them to use a streaming box but they didn't see the point in complicating things to use the same streaming services. Maybe if the apps get slow or crappy they will change their mind rather than replace the TV.

Sure, if they worked, but they don't. Sadly it's pretty hard to get any real numbers on this. I do know people who use the smart bit of their smart tv, and to be fair, their use case might be exactly what the designers had in mind. The apps on the TV is a supplement to live TV. So mom and dad will watch just regular cable TV, maybe stream a movie once or twice a month, while the kids will use the YouTube app.

For people who are basically done with cable or over the air broadcasts, smart TVs just aren't good enough (for the most part). I think you can get high-end TVs now that are fast enough and where the software is reasonable. However, if you buy your TV in the supermarket, or just pick the cheapest one in the right size or color, when you can safely add something like a ChromeCast or even an AppleTV and it will still be cheaper.

You're right that a "normal person" simply do not want a home theater PC with a keyboard and mouse. They also don't care about Dolby, Atmos or soundbars. They just want a TV and if the speakers are built in, then perfect, less to worry about... In fact I'm kinda normal in that sense, my TV is a screen, it has speakers and inputs, it's fine. What's not fine is the shitty apps and the fact that I can reboot my AppleTV twice in the time it takes to open the Netflix on the TV. The AppleTV is my current baseline, you have to be at least as good or better.

Then there's the apps, you can be certain that whatever streaming subscription you want will have an AppleTV app or it works with ChromeCast. Does it work on a random Philips TV.... Will it ever get updated on your Samsung TV from 2016? Most likely not.

The concept of smart TVs are very convenient, but the TV manufactures lost this one. Either they stuff some Android stuff into the TV and upgrade the hardware or at least add in a small shelf in the back of the TV for me to put the AppleTV into, like B&O did at one point.

Are you aware of Google TV? It basically is android on the tv, and it's on lots of low to high end tvs across a bunch of manufacturers (Hisense, Tcl and Sony last I looked).

It's more than good enough for people who are done with cable and broadcast (I'm one of them). There are apps for all the streaming services, both my country's tv channels and the big players like netflix, apple, disney etc, and they perform great.

That must be... an extremely niche device. With some considerable knowledge of the space, I cannot think of an Android TV device that supports Apple TV but not Netflix ever.

And you know what? If they do abandon it, I'm still free to buy an add-on of some sort, so I haven't lost anything compared to people who have this weird obsession with dumb-tvs.

Of course not everyone cares about that but if you're going to spend good money on a nice 4K HDR TV I suspect you want to actually be able to watch HDR content.

But, even for that, I personally would not let my TV connect to the Internet and ruin my teaching experiences with ads.

Like most things in engineer's life, tradeoffs and people choose to trade different things.....

For me, convenience is having my dumb TV connected to my PC. It's not impossible to get a remote for a PC too you know.

They were arguing it's uncommon and requires above average competency.

The LG built-in system is actually pretty nice (and the reason why I buy LG TVs). Netflix and Prime Video are a click away. If I have downloaded something, I just plug a USB stick or use the built-in software (SmartShare) to stream from my computer by WiFi. If I want to play some games in the Steam Deck, I plug it with an HDMI cable and it just works. If I want to show my kid a Youtube video, it's a little more inconvenient with the on-screen keyboard but not a big deal. By the way, I have a Sonos Amp connected through HDMI Arc, feeding two wired front speakers and two wireless back speakers, and it works with many versions of Dolby surround sound - I haven't bothered to check if this is easy on PC, but I suspect it might not.

Maybe it's just that I don't watch a lot of TV so I'm not fussy, but I haven't found any particular feature I would like to have that isn't reasonably easy with my smart TV, while I do find significant drawbacks in the PC setup (basically more stuff in the living room, why would I need a keyboard or mouse there?).

So yes. I'm a nerd, and I like my smart TV. Go figure.

I love my LG OLED TV, everything I need is on the remote.

Back in the 00s I had a nice setup with a networked media player (connected via SCART back then) that could play my DivX/XviD DVD rips from a network share.

These days I have a NAS running Plex with an Apple TV 4K (2nd gen) and use Infuse for playback that happily plays back 150GB 4K HDR Bluray REMUXES over the network instantly. Also it is accessible anywhere I have internet so I can access my whole media library on a phone, tablet or laptop while away as easily as I can Netflix.

I use my LG "smart" TV like a dumb TV. I don't let it have internet access as it doesn't need it for how I use it although it is connected to the network but it has its own blackhole VLAN just to stop the "connect your TV to complete setup" message it always shows.

* Dolby Atmos decoded direct to speakers with no delay.

* Correctly demuxes and sends Dolby Vision HDR content at 4k 120 Hz to the display with a calibrated consistent lag with no frame drops.

* Correctly handles atmos surround system speaker calibration.

* Can play any Blu-Ray available on the market, sending the content without quality loss.

But it's also not unreasonable to want a smart TV that doesn't plaster the UI with ads.

Pretty much everyone believes their own specialist skills should be part of general education curriculum. If you ask a lawyer if law should be taught in schools, or an accountant about accounting, or a translator about languages, or a mechanic, or a nurse, or literally any person in any job they all think their own skills are appropriate to be taught to everyone. Obviously that isn't going to work.

Given that even farmers have to spend more time behind the computer than anybody is willing to admit, a little bit of understanding ans ability to automate the boring things is just a basic skill that should be thought. Not to solve any specific problem, but to learn how to find your own solutions and be clever about work processes.

Any society that teaches this will massively outperform one where specialists put up walls because they are afraid of sharing the magic incantations. Or we could continue living in a society where clerks print out a form just so the other clerk can type it into another program, because they haven't even discovered the concept of copy and paste.

The fact you believe everyone should learn some basic coding just shows you work in tech. It doesn't make it true. For a start, very few people actually apply the skills they learn at school until at least a decade afterwards (learning at around 10 - 12 years old, getting a first proper job where skills matter in their early 20s). Do you really think basic coding taught today is going to apply to a farming job in 2032 in the light of Github Copilot, visual programming, the death of filesystems and the rise of iOS/Android file pickers etc? Of course not.

If their career won't see any benefits by improving their computer skills, they have no reason to care about inefficiency.

I don't have any data but I feel like most people (technical or not) are thinking the same as me.

But a normal person doesn't want a smart tv either. It sucks. And that is when it is working, and it will stop working. And it does spy on you.

I get that people want to like smart TVs. Unfortunately, you can't.

I assume you mean normal people don't like crappy smart TV experiences with slow and crappy apps but if they were smooth and fast and easy to use they would like them more? If so that is true of pretty much everything technology related :) Nobody likes using a slow, crappy computer that takes 5 minutes to load a webpage do they.

I think normal people love smart TVs they just wish they were better especially as they age a bit.

What would be fantastic is a modular smart TV where the screen has a standardised connection for a compute unit that you can replace for a much smaller cost than replacing the whole TV itself. If you're happy with your screen it is frustrating you need to buy a whole new TV just because the shitty SoC can't handle all the new stuff Netflix, Disney, etc. add to their apps over time.

Erm, yeah, they do. They want a tv that's got the netflix and stuff all built in. A 'normal' person doesn't want to deal with an extra device that may or may not have a separate remote control. They want simplicity. Smart tvs give them that.

I'm perfectly happy to have a smart tv, it does what I need without extra wires or remotes. I have zero desire to have a separate box. If I'm still using my tv when it stops getting updates and being able to stream, then I'll investigate and add-on for it, not now, because in 5 years that would likely be out of date too.

I don't get this weird obsession with dumb screens. Device convergence is excellent. The fewer boxes and wires and the more capable the devices, the better.

My Apple TV is from the previous generation. Little by little it's losing software support. Should I replace the whole TV, which is still pretty good, when I finally upgrade the device?

The TV turns on when there is an active HDMI signal. The two volume buttons are the only thing I use every time I need it. If the Apple TV remote had volume buttons (like the new ones) I wouldn't need the TV remote at all.

It's not an "obsession". It's rational use of resources. Why does my TV need to be a full computer? If it is, what should I do when Netflix drops support for the application it's running?

Netflix still works on the first gen Roku devices from 2011 - at least it did a couple of years ago.

You can play back HDR and Dolby Vision 4K content just fine with Plex and it is all decoded on the TV (or streaming box) so no need to mess around with Windows video settings to get HDR looking not-shit.

They use Netflix, BBC iPlayer, YouTube and the Disney+ apps daily. No complaints other than when the wifi sometimes goes out but that isn't a fault of the TV.

No shit, the reason you jailbreak a tv is to put apps on it that were not built in (or remove apps that are intrusive.) This is just like saying that people who are happy with things aren't unhappy with things.

The parent commenter claimed that “almost nobody uses” the built in smart TV features. This is false outside of whatever tiny bubble they are in.

It probably depends on the kind of crowd you sample.

Roku by itself comes pre-installed on almost 40% of new TVs

https://www.fiercevideo.com/video/roku-claims-38-all-smart-t...

Manufacturers have just started installing FireTV software.

https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/devices/amazon-vp-shares-ho...

And Google has been in the game for awhile with preinstalled Android.

A few observations:

1. I can’t stand watching TVs in many hotels because of settings, you get the “soap opera effect”. My wife isn’t bothered by it.

2. Most cable boxes had channels with both the standard definition feeds and HD feeds. How many times have you seen people watching the SD feeds on large TVs and it didn’t bother them?

3. On another note: how many people do you see walking around with cracked phone screens who you know could afford to get it fixed. But it doesn’t bother them? I couldn’t even deal with a scratch on my screen. Related : bad displays because of a screen protector on their phones and it doesn’t bother them.

You incredulously ask: Are you going to X?

I say: yes, I am going to X.

I’m not sure what your anecdotes are purporting to say. Clearly neither of us has done the research, I made an observation, you made another. Get over it.

Anecdotally, that's not true of people I know (and even less so for people not in tech), but anecdotes are not particularly useful.