Ask HN: Which TV do you recommend for privacy?

I have a Sony Bravia that I've never connected to the internet, only to an Apple TV and a Steam Deck. It makes a noise when you turn it on or off, and sometimes it makes that noise all by itself while turned off. Makes me feel like it turns itself on to try and collect audio data periodically. But! I think since the TV itself is never going to have direct internet access, I'm not that worried about it sending my data.

Connect any TV to a laptop/desktop computer... running Linux, of course.

Paul Graham in his keynote speech at PyCon[1] bolted an iMac to the wall as TV.

I use a Mac Mini M4 and a huge 300 euro 4K screen as my TV. much better than an Apple TV and no spying or ads at all.

Best TV in my life, a user friendly computer.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9ITLdmfdLI

Some good answers here already. Step 1 is always not to connect the TV to the Internet. You can go further and remove the WiFi daughterboard and/or desolder the chip.

Step 2 is to connect a TV box, but if you replace Samsumg, LG, or Google by Apple or Amazon, you have made no progress at all towards privacy.

Having researched this topic extensively, there are two main options for real user control and privacy. First, you can run an ordinary Linux distro on a mini PC, with a "launcher" such as Plasma Bigscreen. It's fine with an airmouse, but you will be mostly running upscaled desktop apps that aren't remote or controller friendly.

The best solution is actually to keep the mini PC and compile Lineage OS (Android TV 17) for a generic x86 target. This is a true degoogled Android TV distro that can, with some more hacking, run any ARM TV app from F-Droid, Aurora or other source. It is by far the best solution in that it is a true 10-foot UX and is compatible with almost all TV apk apps out there. The downside is that this not exist off-the-shelf. I spent a couple of days putting this together with Claude and it takes several hours to compile. I also found several upstream bugs in the process and will be submitting patches to the AOSP and Lineage.

Get a big monitor with all the specs you want and connect it to an old laptop. You can watch whatever you want on there. You can even play video games on your Playstation or XBox if it has an HDMI port.

Personally I opt for projectors; but similar problems arise with the built-in apps. They're just rubbish. My personal preference is to use no abuiltin apps, just use a laptop to access Jellyfin with a Logitech K400 (keyboard with inbuilt trackpad) sitting on my lap.

The next step for me will be setting up a Raspberry PI with Plasma Bigscreen.

I’m sticking with my 2010 Toshiba REGZA until it dies. 1080p is fine for me.

I don't know how true it still is, but dumb TVs have traditionally been marketed as "commercial displays". You'll pay more and have to bring your own media, of course.

Just don't connect it to wifi

Unsolicited advice, with a different approach, from personal preference / experience:

Sitting screens considered harmful.

Treat them as a liability and "trash"-adjacent, no matter the actual display technology or whether you can remove the spyware.

That goes double for TVs, so don't buy one.

Re-invest the time and attention you save in a good projector and a generally "invisible" screen / room setup.

I'm a happy owner of a $1000 DLP LED projector and a similarly priced motorized 150" screen. Do look into laser projection, which has been getting steadily more affordable for a while now.

Disclaimer: I've never subscribed to the "maximum screen size" formulas. As long as my own nose isn't in the way when I look to either end, it's fine, and inching towards that range is exactly what I'm deliberately going for. So yes, I'm one of those people who sits in the front rows at the movies.

I keep filler-free shows (TNG, anyone? :') movies and game time strictly out of band. So to me that's even more enjoyable in an immersive and optimally shareable setup whenever I do purposefully take the time.

More reading, as well as a nudge towards doing stuff, is probably the main side effect I'm after here, as you can tell.

Am i wrong if I say: get a simple PC screen, or a beamer without android ?

- Buy any TV you want

- Don't connect it to the network

Buy any TV you like, never connect it to the internet.

Get a cheap open source media box and attach it to the TV.

The answer is really simple and this gets asked a lot.

Buy any TV, don't connect it to the Internet. Then connect the HDMI or DP to Apple TV and you're good to go.

I have an LG OLED. It's gorgeous, but

- It's MAC address is blocked from the network

- It's never had WIFI credentials

- It's ONLY ever used with an Apple TV or PlayStation

An interesting question is why aren't there companies in the same vein as AMG was for Mercedes, that buy the product, modify and resell them? In this case, buy the factory LG and using expertise, lobotomize it and resell it people here? If this post shows the demand the where is the supply?

It doesn't seem that it's a DCMA limitation, yet at least. Would it fall under "right to repair"?

Huge fan of "never give it wifi, hook it up to a little linux box, remote control it via input leap" myself

Roku TVs are really easy to turn into dumb TVs. Don’t connect the WiFi, and set it to always turn onto the HMDI input your PC/device is connected to. No tracking, ads, or extra steps.

Aside from getting a "dumb" tv, your best bet right now is to get a tv running google/androidtv and run a script like https://github.com/Gathin23/cleanyourtv against it to remove all of the tracking etc. from it.

I just dont connect mine to the internet, hook up an Apple TV to it.

Got a Bravia TV for cheap back in 2014 that happened to be pre-Android TV (and pre-Google TV) so Android TV was just released and those something-else-os were "outdated".

Sony stopped releasing security patches a while back and there are no longer apps whatsoever and they all were crap - the youtube one was pure torture because of how slow it was and the web browser was just as miserable as ie6.

But besides that I can send it commands to it via its IP and control it, consume stuff via a DLNA daemon, do screen mirroring, and all the usual tv stuff. The image quality and sound are still great after 10+ years though I can't care less about oled 4k 120Hz and all that stuff. So it's no longer a "smart" tv but it's not also so "dumb" for a now dumb tv.

One that can be purchased and shipped from the EU.

They have the strongest consumer protections and guarantees.

I'd go for a Sony.

There are retail displays that don't have the ad/nag/crap-ware of home TVs.

It's not hard to find options if you stop looking in stupid places with bad search terms. "TV" on Amazon is literally the innermost circle of consumer hell.

> I don’t mind paying a premium

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1916990-REG/lg_65ep5q...

A Benq gaming monitor with an android box, chromecast tv, nvidia shield, etc, with a soundbar.

Best setup is buying whatever tv, never connecting it to internet, and connecting to an external device running whatever os flavor you prefer. I have setup using bazzite with a steam controller and an old laptop, and added non-steam games for YouTube and jellyfin, works great for my needs and I play a few small steam games on the tv aswell

Few years back, I bought two TVs: 65" LG latest at the time TV ($2k) and a 55" Sceptre tv from Walmart for $200. The TV from Walmart is a dumb TV with terrible speakers. So, in addition to tv I got a $150 soundbar and an Apple TV. I almost don't watch the LG one and daily watch the Walmart tv. It’s good enough in this setup.

I was able to root my Samsung TV easily with Codex, disable updates and spyware, MITM everything with the eMudhra certs. The problem is no one really knows what these TVs do, they're all liars with 100 page privacy policies that will legally allow anything, and encrypted HTTPS communications that we can't even ordinarily monitor what they're sending. They can be updated at any time to start sending more or less data without your knowledge. So I feel the only realistic option is find a TV that can be rooted and do that. If you root a TV, you can fully disable network access and then use an Apple TV, or use the TV's software with MITM and deeper analysis with AI to disable snooping.

I ran into issues with only the smart TV apps being able to provide certain formats like Dolby Vision, Dolby Atmos, etc.

My three Sony Bravias from 2010 are still going well - LCD 1080p, no screen wear at all (a later Sony I bought ~2017 has already worn to buggery)

Not sure if there’s even a used market for older TVs, though

Use any screen or projector connected to a linux box or AppleTV for streaming. Personally I use an old laptop running Kodi.

What sort of screen? Well, whatever you can tolerate. I use a very old commercial display I got through an e-waste reseller. It’s not great, but it was cheap ans has worked fine for years. If you insist on a “TV” screen or any monitor/projector with connectivity, pick one you can root. As other users have pointed out, simply “don’t connect to the Internet” unfortunately isn’t enough to guarantee your data stays private.

Panelook.com

I buy the best tv that satisfies my needs. I will not handicap my viewing pleasure reading chicken little stories of the paranoid Internet.

LG Ultragear 48GQ900-B

Ok I'm cheating, it's a monitor. Only it's the size of a TV and there's a remote.

But no tuner and no ARC.

But I don't care.

Zero smarts, boots in a millisecond, auto-wakes on device power-up, input switching just works, no half-baked HDMI-CEC hell. No wifi. No network. Nothing to spy on me because it's a FUCKING MONITOR and THAT'S IT.

https://www.lg.com/us/monitors/lg-48gq900-b-gaming-monitor

Does anyone make TVs with Opera/Vewd (rythmes with lewd) anymore? That's what mine is running, and it supports Netflix and whatnot, but doesn't show ads or spy.

Also, Android TV boxes sometimes have shenanigans installed by the manufacturer, but they are easy to customize to only run what you want, and they run fine without a Google account.

As far as I can tell, there's no way to use an Apple TV box without linking it to an Apple account and letting them spy on you.

I was going to write buy Apple TV and never ever connect the actual TV to the internet, but:

- I am unsure whether modern TVs utilize ethernet over HDMI to connect to internet through Apple TV (I have no idea why Apple TV should allow this, but I don't trust Apple to not accidentally enable this)?

- I can only imagine nefarious five eyes reasons for why Apple released Apple TV that plays 4k60 exactly like the previous models, but now has 8 GB RAM, powerful machine learning CPU, and built-in microphones that are impossible to disable

So, apart from getting used prev gen Apple TV (and still having to trust company whose leader has to accept Trumps's lunch invite), I have no good advice.

Is this really more complicated than just never connecting it to wifi and then using a dedicated device like AppleTV only?

I shop for elite televisions at the “reuse” center, my latest score was a 2013 Panasonic plasma which is a perfectly good dumb TV hooked up to an XBOX ONE and a home theatre. Downstairs I have a big curved Samsung 4K attached to my big PC. Someday I’ll see the high end OLED that I crave.

If you have the room and price is no object you definitely want at least 5.1 theatre, both movies and TV programs sound great in 5.1. The next step up is a second subwoofer, even for music subwoofers take a load off your other speakers and reduce distortion.

As everyone is saying: just don't let it on the network. It's a little annoying because you can't have smart home stuff like "turn off the TV when I leave the house" working, but that's it.

My thing is, don't use an Apple TV. For the last 15 years or so I've just used a Mac Mini plugged into a big TV, and it's perfect. Get a wireless keyboard and trackpad and one of the many available trays that will hold them together. I'm literally typing this right now on this exact setup.

Personally, I used to be very privacy-conscious, but have given up on enforcing it everywhere over the years. I still care, more than most people I know in real life, but when it comes to stuff like TV's I just get whatever has the best panel for the lowest price. Last time I bought a TV, that was an LG TV running WebOS, which is not exactly the best from a privacy standpoint. Initially I used it with an Apple TV, but now I just use the native apps and try to disable the telemetry that I can in the settings panel.

I get that they’re not equivalent, price wise, but have you tried searching for “55 inch computer monitor”? They sell large ones for use in video conferencing rooms for example.

Out of curiosity, do these “smart” TV features even matter if you’re just switching to one of the HDMI inputs? I’ve used an external device to drive my TV for years, and I honestly have no idea what is installed on the TV itself.

A RPI 5/4 with a basic TV works really good !

Disconnect the TV from internet and use a solution like Apple TV for apps you would like in TV. Even better is a Mini PC connected to the TV if you are savvy enough.

A lot of people are saying to not connect an ethernet cable to the TV, but what about if I want to connect the TV to LAN for my Jellyfin server?

I bought a Hisense TV three years ago. I do not connect it to the Internet. I use an Apple TV for streaming. I went with Hisense because it was well reviewed. I think you'll be fine with whatever TV you buy as long as you follow this strategy.

Any AndroidTV and then run CleanYourTV [1] on it, gets completely rid of all Google ads and additional bloatware by the manufacturer. Maybe run Claude against the repo first to check for malware but going by the number of stars it seems to be solid.

[1] https://github.com/Gathin23/cleanyourtv

Gamers Nexus has a good discovery video on how extensive smart TVs are snooping on people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IFVTcM28KA

Samsung is the worst by far. Samsung (TizenOS) does not respect even privacy opt outs. It seems like LG, Google TV OS (Sony) and Fire TV OS (Amazon) and VidaaOS at least do that.

https://allaboutcookies.org/smart-tv-tracking-privacy-opt-ou...

Never connect to internet is the best option.