We purchased a 55" Vizio TV when we moved in 2018. It is a "smart" TV and I absolutely hate it. It forces you to see Vizio ad content on startup and is now fairly laggy five years on.

I've dealt with it for five years, but now that my little kids are starting to watch things on it more some of the ad content is quite scary/evil looking in its imagery and I'm pretty much done with the stupid thing.

We almost only watch BluRay/DVD's and streaming that we select (Amazon Prime and Disney+). I figured I would buy a dumb TV and just attach an Apple TV or Firestick to it to get the functionality we want.

I went shopping for a 55" non-smart TV and they don't seem to exist. There seems to be one "commercial" Samsung which is "sort of dumb," but I'm not sure how good an option that is.

My parents have an old Samsung 55" Plasma that's in good shape (from when 1080P was cutting edge) that they aren't using. Would it be a mistake to try to use it?

What are the Sigforum thoughts?

This is the new Samsung:
https://www.amazon.com/Samsung...97-eb60747b8daf&th=1

...the old plasma would be free. It hasn't been plugged in for a year and a half, but was working well when they "upgraded" to a bigger smart TV when my dad decided he couldn't see the 55" anymore.

FREE Samsung 55" Plasma...Sure, I like Free! What have you got to lose, especially if you're primarily watching movies & streaming! Plasma TVs are ideal for that usage, and display truer Blacks than a lot of LCD TVs. If it powers up, I'd set it up!

A network-wide ad blocker may be a way better solution.

My Sony's settings menu provides the ability to easily turn off the tv's wifi capability. This effectively makes it a dumb tv which connects to the internet via my Apple streaming device.

Is the option to disconnect from the internet not available in the Vizio's settings menu?

Best buddy went to stay with his kids in S.D.

They get five different feeds and 409 channels .
Had three controllers.
The
Ten year old had to stay home with him to watch TV while the parents went away for the day.

On day four he could get what he wanted to play.

Came home that night

quote:

Originally posted by KevH:
and is now fairly laggy five years on.

Make sure you have updated the firmware. Our Vizio was giving us trouble, updated the firmware, works like a charm now.

quote:

My parents have an old Samsung 55" Plasma that's in good shape (from when 1080P was cutting edge) that they aren't using. Would it be a mistake to try to use it?

I'd jump on the plasma, depending on the model, just be aware they are not very efficient and use a lot more power than your typical flat screen.

I have a Samsung non smart TV from around 2011 and it's all I've needed since then. It is just a 1080P model though. I've sometimes thought about upgrading to a 4K TV but I've only ever found them as Smart TVs. You're post made me do a search again and I found this blog that actually lists some dumb TV's that are 4K. I don't know how good these models actually are but here's the link if you want it.

8 Best Dumb (Non-Smart) TVs in 2023

Well, my parents' old Samsung is a 50" (not 55") from 2008. It's a PN50A650 (if that means anything to anyone). It's 1080P and it's heavy (probably about 90lbs). It is free though...

I don't know if anybody makes "dumb" TVs anymore. The last "dumb" TV I bought was the little 22 in. Samsung in the computer room. That was maybe 7-8 years ago?

The solution for de-fanging smart TVs is simply don't connect them to the network. Neither the LG in our family room nor the little Vizio in our living room are network-connected.

I do occasionally connect them to check for firmware updates, then they're disco'd again.

Or connect them, but, block their IP address at the Internet router. (Though then there'd be little point to connecting them, unless you had local network content, such as from a DLNA server, you wanted to access with them.)

Don’t let it connect to the internet and it will be a dumb tv.

It's not just the ability to connect to the internet and the features that are inherent to smart TV'a that I dislike. It is the interface that comes with it. I'm sure there are better interfaces available now but when I first saw a Smart TV I was turned off by the minimalist remote and having to scroll around an onscreen display to just switch inputs. It was so much easier to just have a button on the remote to do it.

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:
Don’t let it connect to the internet and it will be a dumb tv.

This is what I do. I have Sony TVs from Costco and I don’t ever plug them into the network. They sure try to convince you to do it when you set them up, but we use an AppleTV and a computer for stuff, not the TV.

quote:

Originally posted by Paten:
It's not just the ability to connect to the internet and the features that are inherent to smart TV'a that I dislike. It is the interface that comes with it. I'm sure there are better interfaces available now but when I first saw a Smart TV I was turned off by the minimalist remote and having to scroll around an onscreen display to just switch inputs. It was so much easier to just have a button on the remote to do it.

Get a programmable remote. Plenty of buttons. Make them whatever you want.

-Rob

quote:

Get a programmable remote. Plenty of buttons. Make them whatever you want.

Not a solution from my point of view. Why should I have to spend extra money to use a TV?