How standardized a lcd panels? Could I replace the controller in a smart TV with one of these HDMI to LCD controllers?
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No, yes, maybe, but probably not.
Also, only do this if it’s a passion project for learning, because the odds that it works out the gate, and doesn’t require multiple repurchases, are very slim.
The odds that you never quite get it to work right, or at all, very high.
If you’re sure you want to do this, start by reading the technical documentation to get a grasp of which parts might, or should, work together, and how. Do this before making any purchases.
If that doesn’t sound appealing, then buy an “digital signage” or “enterprise/business class” TV, or find a dumb consumer TV, new or used.
I bought a commercial TV, you might see them sold as “sigital signage.” it is my last “television”.
I’ve always wondered this, figure this is the thread to ask it.
I’ve been using the same dumb TV since 2013 it’s great, but eventually it’s gonna die an I’m scared of what pieces of shit smart TV’s are.
Could I not just use a computer and run it through the smart TV and bypass all the smart bullshit by using it as a monitor?
I’ve got a crappy Samsung knockoff with its own shit version of android that constantly switches inputs on its own and tries to load the home screen all the time. When the Xbox or PS5 is plugged in it will do that, when it’s HDMI into the laptop it doesn’t so YMMV but you should be ok.
Apropos of your first sentence, I have an odd question for anyone. The tv updated itself and now will try to turn off every hour or so due to some android power save, while I’m playing a game. I have to use the actual tv remote instead of the receiver which runs the inputs and volume. Can’t figure out how to turn that off, help!
Also, fuckin fantastic name Mr President. You and my cousin should hang out
I’m assuming you’ve checked but I’ll still ask, there’s no setting to turn off the battery saver mode.
The 2 hour screen saver is the longest option, there is no never. That is the extent of the power options on this Skyworth
Damn wtf, that’s truly unfortunate bud. Thanks for letting us know though, it’ll help us steer clear of that brand. I’m also looking for a new dumb TV to use as a monitor for streaming in my living room. I’m just gonna hook up a mini pc to it and call it a day. Wireless mouse and mini keyboard is all I’ll need.
I have a Hisense and a LG and I never connected them to WiFi. I have not had any issues
No.
Smart TV’s run automatic content detection on all their inputs. You will also be nagged to put the device online relentlessly, and some models will not let you skip internet connectivity.
Which manufacturers specifically will do this? Other comments seem to think LG is ok. Genuinely curious if anyone has experience.
Someone should make a wall of shame for the worst offenders.
Some smart TVs require you to connect them to the Internet before you can even use them with HDMI. It’s a changing world. This post has a lot of interesting comments.
I would immediately return that crap to the store.
Where I first caught wind of this was in the return line at Walmart where a guy was returning a smart TV because he wanted to hook up to his Dish receiver and couldn’t without creating an account.
Provide the citation please because the last one you mentioned to me was about a return that you heard about while standing in line at Wal-Mart about a rok/tcl tv, which btw which you don’t need to do any of that to use it.
https://support.tcl.com/ca-gtv-setup-configuration/how-to-bypass-tcl-account-creation
oh and
This makes me want to look at TCL TVs more closely. Thanks.
I wouldn’t recommend any TCL older than 5 years. No idea about new ones but I used to sell and install them and they all just sucked. The video quality was mid and they had a weird input delay that made them annoying to use. These were tvs that were new out of the box.
I own a 2017 TCL and can confirm, horrible picture, rolling bars, bad lighting, the worst HDR ever, makes horrible cap noises when it is on
Every one I have encountered only requires that for use of the smart TV features. And if you have one that requires Internet just to use HDMI to connect to a device, your TV is 100% spying on you and you should return it.
Just don’t connect it to your wifi. Any TV that has cell service antenna, like most cars now, just don’t buy those.
My experience with LG/WebOS has been fine if I don’t try to get online. It doesn’t pester me to do so.
I have a WebOS TV and I absolutely hate how slow it is. Turning on takes a long time. Selecting apps takes a long time. Flipping channels takes a long time. Did we forget how fast TVs from the 90s were??
To be fair, TVs from the 90s didn’t have apps, and I don’t actually use the apps on my LG, so it seems fine.
For older LG webos TVs, the delay between button push and action in the settings app can get as bad as 4 seconds.
The reason I bought it:
- Samsung pushed ads agressively on their TVs
- I had an HP tablet with webOS before and wondered what LG did with it after taking over the development. I was horrified.
The hardware is not much better. There’s constantly something wrong. But the LCD panel is pretty decent, so I just patch it up every time, rather than throwing it out.
In Spanish “WebOS” sounds exactly as if you were saying “huebos” which is slang for testicles.
Just a tidbit for your day to go just that much faster.
BestBuy brand Insignia offers non-smart TVs.
its doable with tablet and laptop screens but you need to know the exact model of the display-panel (not just the tv), i will get a large monitor if my current non smart TV from 2015 dies.
There are some amazing projectors available these days and they don’t seem to be crippled by smartification. There are some cool homebuilt projectors that are made of bright light sources and old cell phone screens to, if you want to learn.
Alternatively, you could also get a 40+” monitor. Avoid Samsung, because nowadays they are really pushing their spyware everywhere, including displays. Some other brands should be fine though.
so far i’ve been between simply buying a projector, im assuming those havent been smartified yet.
Or buying a big format display, i think those still exist, i hope they do at least.
Presumably you could probably mutilate a smart tv to properly disable it’s functionality, but im not electrical engineer so don’t ask me.
Possibly dumb question but can you use a Projector during the day these days?
My TV is in my living room. Right next to 2 big windows. With 2 sliding glass doors across the room
if it’s dark, or you like black looking like not black. Yes.
You should probably find a way to cover those windows so that it’s dark in that room, if you were to use a projector, which thankfully, isn’t very hard.
This is one of the downsides of having a projector, the darkest black that you can get, is based on the darkness of the environment you’re in. Which can lead to contrast issues sometimes, but if you good light regulation, it’s fine.
Probably not but you can buy digital signage. You will pay upwards of $4k potentially based on your needs.
Remember when you didn’t need this shit to just watch a movie?
I 'member
Seriously. Go back to the 90s, do this about anything, and Kevin mitnick will vanish from everybody’s radar just about instantly.
Now we need to do this shit to fucking watch TV. I need complex filtering software, anonymization tools, and a signal bounced off three continents to watch a video of a cat climbing into a box. A video that was recorded five feet away from me.
If I want to do it on a TV, I need to start soldering.
and a signal bounced off three continents to watch a video of a cat climbing into a box. A video that was recorded five feet away from me.
are you talking about some proprietary camera that only syncs to the cloud?
Jeff Geerling did a whole video about you can just use a professional display. It has the option to install a raspberry pi because it’s meant to be a display for a store window. This would be a good alternative but $$$.
https://www.sharpnecdisplays.us/products/displays/m551
Note: the reason TVs are cheap now is because they collect data about you. Your data is subsidizing the cost. So if that’s the case how much money do they make off you that getting a non smart display costs 4k?
Less than 4k; I remember my last dumb TV cost like 700$.
If there’s a TV repair / electronics repair shop in your area – someone who works with contemporary flatscreens – I wonder if you could reach out and make the ask? They probably have a sense of which generic controllers they would use.
I don’t think anyone repairs these things anymore. I found two dumped in the desert, one with its controller and power supply boards removed and one that was complete.
I got interested in this when the previous poster asked the question. Going down the rabbit hole I think I have my answers. Avnet has some good info on the mipi interface for consumer devices. It’s been very interesting and I do see it as a path to building good, cheap, large displays.
huh i wonder, if the answer is “yes” or “somewhat yes” is it a valid alternative to replacing the power supply in my tv?
i got one for free with a busted psu, but the power supply board is extremely rare (i only ever saw two listings of it, one on AliExpress and one on ebay, both just one piece left and for higher price than a new used tv; similar boards are like 5 times cheaper)
basically, unless i could find an alternative solution like that, I’m throwing it awayI think you will need a power supply for your panel in addition to a driver board like this. This only provides the signals needed to switch the pixels but not the power to drive them. Some of these include backlight drivers but even then I think you would probably need more current for a TV than these provide.
Why not disassemble it and sell all the working parts, if they are rare and expensive?
This comment reminds me of an episode of Pawn Stars when the son bought a very rare and expensive bike to fix up. The dad gave him hell saying if the bike is so rare and expensive, where are they going to get parts!?
LCDs do tend to speak somewhat standardised languages, but there is a lot more to a modern TV than just an LCD controller.
Color and white balance calibration, image/motion processing, HDR Processing, backlight control/dimming zones, input management, audio decoding/encoding/passthrough, digitizing analogue sources, HDMI licencing, Dolby licencing, etc.
If you want a better smart TV the best thing to do is to get a hackable TV like most android based models, replace the launcher, strip out system apps and telemetry with ADB and start fresh, then either leave it offline or use filtering to only allow access to the services you approve.
@Faceman2K23
Do you know a list of hackable tv’s or at least brands?
I’m very interested in preparing for the moment my current tv break.
@HaywardTOh my god this is the most depressing shit. Remember just watching TV?
Not sure if there’s a list, but most Android based TVs can be cleaned and modded to some degree via ADB. If you can access the dev settings in android, chances are you can do a lot to make it better, strip out some google or branded packages, replace the launcher to block OS level ads etc. Projectivy usually works well since it supports input switching on many devices, but it’s still better to do all of this to a separate box and then plug it into a TV that is firewalled/filtered/offline. more control and less to fuck up.
Rooting and unlocking bootloaders is more complex as these android devices dont have normal recovery systems and require a lot of custom drivers to make the video and audio processing work, so it’s not worth going that far.
I wonder if anyone has made a custom rom for TVs, sort like Lineage or Graphene. These panels run Android, so why not?
I have seen some talk over on XDA forums, but since there is more to an android TV than just the basic android OS, it’s a bit trickier without risking losing licences/compatibility/DRM/features.
Some older LG webOS tvs can be rooted and custom apps installed too such as ad free youtube players etc.
Just found some LG business TVs/displays/signage that actually run Tizen. Remember that cool Linux distro that was supposed to take over the mobile world nearly 15 years ago? Well, turns out, it didn’t, but it didn’t it die completely either.
Hopefully those panels are a bit more hackable or more privacy oriented.
Gets even weirder when you see LGs webOS kinda started out as PalmOS
Gawd, not Tizen. Their documentation is horrendous, there’s no wonder it never took over if developers were mentally punished for thinking of creating apps for it.
Well you could not connect it to the internet…
Not anymore with sidewalk and other similar corporate networks bypassing any requirement for the consumer to connect the TV to wifi
Do these show up as networks on devices, or are they kind of hidden? I’ve looked before and never seen any open wifi around my house, but I am near a mall and lots of shopping.
They do not use wifi. They use BLE over short range, or LoRa or FSK on 900mhz over long distances. If you wanted to see them you’d probably need a scanner built specifically to find them but idk if anyone has made one.
https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/devices/everything-you-need-to-know-about-amazon-sidewalk
“How much of my internet bandwidth does Amazon Sidewalk require?”
“Very little. Sidewalk’s connectivity is distinct from your home Wi-Fi. If you choose, however, to enable Sidewalk on your eligible Bridge devices, those devices would use a small amount of internet bandwidth.”
This sounds like it still needs your internet to work unless I’m missing something.
The connection isn’t for you. It’s so the TV can fingerprint the content you watch, and then send that utilization data back to the company.
You don’t need much bandwidth to do this.
So with no wifi connection, and a blueray player, if you play Star Wars, they can fingerprint a few frames, send them back to Roku or whoever over sidewalk via your neighbors ring doorbell, and know you played star wars… Even with your completely offline setup
Ah i see, so because its connected to other devices in the sidewalk network, if my neighbor has it hooked up to wifi and mine isnt, it still can connect to the internet.
Yea that sucks. I hate that. I have “smart” TV that i never connected to my wifi cause i use a pc for streaming.
Next thing yknow theres gonna be lte modems in these things that they pay to keep on just to spy on us ffs man.
Jacking off with a monkey paw while you dream of a mesh network. Thanks amazon.
If you don’t have a sidewalk bridge but your neighbour half a mile away has one, your device will connect to your neighbour’s bridge and send data to Amazon without you knowing
Uhhh. No.
im sorry how is this legal?
Corpo exception.
Also, maybe it isnt; state isnt gonna stop em either way.
correct me if im wrong, but a device trying to connect to the network in order to analytics. Which can’t, which then defaults to a SECONDARY BACKUP mechanism, just to transmit ANALYTICS. Is basically just spying, and you cannot convince me otherwise.
I… Well I might try but only if it were funny. I agree. But its not effectively (and I don’t think technically) illegal.
Maybe you’d disable it on the settings, but it remains enabled anyways. Then it would detect an open wifi and connect autimatically.
Or maybe the software that comes with it is buggy as hell your HDMI framerate and resolution became affected.
Ok, well personally, I’ve never seen an open network near my house, so if I cared that much, it would work for mine.
A wifi antenna should be easy to find.
If you cut it, could it lead to an error, or just weaken the signal?
If you wrap the TV in tinfoil, it’ll be a faraday cage and block all WiFi
If you wrap the TV in tinfoil, it’ll be a faraday cage and block all WiFi
I just keep my TV embedded in a block of lead.
CRT TV with extra steps
I mean I wouldn’t, but it’s an idea!
You really shouldn’t run an open wifi at your home. Or do you carry your TV to Starbuck’s or something?
Do you live in a farm your whole life or something?
Just in a country where open wifi without landing pages don’t exist. Apologies, didn’t think about actual open, public wifi.
Most people are more aware of these things nowadays, so you may not see it as much…
Am I missing something here? Why in the hell would I try to jam this into a TV, something that’s not trivial btw and more than likely not compatible vs just not connecting the blasted thing to the network? Do they come with cellular data you can’t turn off or something?
Because some people don’t like the bloated ‘smart’ operating systems on their tvs or how they operate. I.e. input lag when pushing buttons, showing ads or other stupid bullshit. Tbh I’d rather have a large stupid lcd panel that just turns on and shows whatever I plug into it via hdmi.
The only alternative to replacing the board are commercial displays, but those are very expensive.
I think it depends on what level the smart aspect is implemented and how integrated it is. Screen technology has been getting more and more locked down by corporate privateers/thieves.
I mostly tried hacking on small displays, and finally gave up as it was over my head. There is a whole lot going on in various layers and protocols. My rule would be to only buy a product like this if I can find a functional example of someone using my exact hardware with this exact hack in question.
In my experience, prototyping or hacking around with displays is a loosing game because they are not constructed for handling like this. You must go to extremes to avoid placing strain on the flex ribbon connections and must be very careful about taking the thing apart to test with it disassembled. It only takes a tiny mistake to damage something that can not be repaired. They are usually sensitive to small nonsense too. These are fast parallel circuits. I stay away from them, but maybe I’m just being soft.
Why go through all of that when you can just block network access, or not even connect it at all? Hell, just get a Blocklist that includes the bad URLs for your TV you don’t want it using, and run it on AdGuard or Pihole. Lots of easier ways to work around this.
Unfortunately some TVs pester you when they can’t get internet access, or will even attempt to connect to any open WiFi networks in range.
Some have offline ads or can’t boot straight to an input, too.
Then there’s Amazon trialing having Amazon-powered TVs automatically connecting to any Alexa devices and using them to gain internet access.
I’m not saying OPs suggestion is the best one, for most TVs, what you suggest works very well. But it’s good to have more options, particularly as the market continues to get more and more locked-down.
We gotta get in there and disconnect the antennas
But I’ve heard of a few models that don’t function at all until connected… yikes
Just not feasible though. Smart TVs have everything in an integrated line, from the screen controller, down to the external ports. It’s like saying “Hey, I just want to take the North Bridge out of my motherboard because I don’t use the features”. Not gonna happen.
Now, in an alternate universe, if somebody went down this route and made replacement parts to remove all the cruft, you’d essentially be buying an entire new TV. There is no cost savings there. Buy a monitor, and hook up whatever smart shit you want at that point.
Why go through all of that when you can just connect the board to the panel.
Why go through all that when you can just build a time machine and go back in time to be in the boardroom when someone presents the concept for a smart TV and then hide under the podium and tickle their genitals to distract them during the presentation and then spend the next 20 years in prison for sexual assault where none of the televisions have smart features?
I’d watch that movie
Then once you get out you can just buy a “commercial display” and not have to go through all that because there’s no smort features to begin with.
I would be interested in trying this but could I just lock everything except Netflix & Disney? Or have it one way and Keep my streaming but not have anything go from my tv back out?
The sensible approach is to get an Android TV device that you have more control over. You basically have the same freedom with it as with an Android phone or tablet. Plug it into the TV and use the TV only as a monitor/speaker.
Warning: Do not buy cheap Chinese off-brand Android TVs from drop-shipping hellholes like Amazon. These commonly come with malware from the factory. Invest in a quality device with the features that you need.
If you’re on a budget, it’s possible to make do with a Fire TV Stick, which are often on sale for next to nothing - just don’t expect blistering performance or a good UI. They are still Android underneath that awful UI though. You have to fight Amazon’s attempts at funneling you towards their own content, but it’s doable.
If you want a device that you can easily use for a long time without having to worry about it getting obsolete, get an Nvidia Shield TV or Shield TV Pro. Pricey, but - in my eyes - worth it. At first glance, these may look like every other streaming box, but they justify their relatively high asking prices. For starters, the support for these devices is astonishing, with even the first generation from 2015 still receiving updates. While the current hardware generation is from 2019, it has features you can’t get anywhere else, like for example real-time AI upscaling of low-res content in certain apps and (on the Pro model) the ability to serve as a media server instead of just a client:
Hook a storage device up to it (or mount your NAS), add media to them (digitize your home media collection or acquire media from other sources), and use the Plex server application to turn this tiny thing into your own private Netflix that never sees anything delisted. It has enough power to allow you to watch video locally and, at the same time, transcode (=turn media into a format the other device can handle in real-time) up to two more videos (depending on the video files) for other devices in and outside of your home network. This means you could watch something on your TV and at least one other person could watch content you have curated (they don’t need a Shield TV - Plex clients are on a wide variety of devices). Given that this is a device that fits into the palm of your hand and needs less than 10W, that’s quite astonishing.
Yeah, if you want to get fancy with your routing, you absolutely can.
I’m considering doing just that, having my TV and whatnot connect to a wireless SSID that only allows DNS to lookup certain streaming services. I’m not sure how difficult it’ll be, but I’ll probably play with it later this month.
Care to bring along a simple fool with you through your journey, maybe share how it goes?
I’ll probably make a post somewhere about it here. But I’m lazy, so I don’t want to get your hopes up. :)
Yeah, I am definitely going to open up my $400 tv and replace the LCD controller with this sketchy piece of hardware instead of, checks notes, just not activating any of the smart features and not connecting the TV to the internet at all.
Until you get a Roku where you literally can’t use the TV without accepting an arbitration clause.
Here’s an idea for you, don’t buy a Roku TV. Visio is pretty much the exact same price and you can just not use the smart features and just connect HDMI.
Yeah but what if you already had one. Or bought one without knowing it’d pull a fast one on you.
“Here’s an idea for you; how about being aware of every single company you might interact with and all the shitty ways they try to screw you over.”
That’s a little crass, but I hope you understand my sentiment.
Also how can such arbitration clauses be both legal and binding, I don’t understand it.
Did you know: you can look up a review of any piece of hardware out there that you wish to buy and gather info on it before making a purchase.
I love looking up reviews for every little thing I purchase, and even when I do ads nor microtransactions ever get patched in at a later date! Same goes for those service agreements which aren’t ever updated!
Oh, wait, no. That’s exactly what happens.
Nor do I want people who aren’t as tech savvy/in the know to get preyed upon/swindled.If you are incapable of sussing out the mindless morons who write reviews from the people who actually know what they’re doing that’s more of a you problem than anything else.
And buying a TV is not a little purchase unless you’re incredibly rich in which case why would you even fucking care. But hey, if you like rolling the dice on your hard-earned money to buy something that’s not going to work the way you want it to and then break it trying to “fix” it with some sketchy hardware from some rando online who thinks they’re “in the know” be…my…guest.
This is such a stupid argument. Not everyone is tech-literate. Ideally people wouldn’t have to look out for this because the practice wouldn’t exist. “Just don’t get robbed/swindled lol, you should’ve known better”.
And no, I’m not trying to advocate for whatever sketchy device is linked above. What I am saying is that I understand the sentiment, because that manufacturers are increasingly encroaching on our ability to own what we buy with parts pairing and always online requirements.
You are an Eloi not a Morlock.
