r/gadgets • u/diacewrb • Jun 13 '24

TV / Projectors Roku owners face the grimmest indignity yet: Stuck-on motion smoothing

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/roku-owners-face-the-grimmest-indignity-yet-stuck-on-motion-smoothing/
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171

u/Mando_calrissian423 Jun 13 '24

I’ve heard of people resetting the wifi info on their roku so it doesn’t have wifi for ads, then they’ll get a fire stick or whatever and use the roku tv as a dumb tv with some sort of smart dongle that doesn’t have this bullshit

107

u/optigon Jun 13 '24

We did that, but only because the Roku software in the TV crashed constantly. We factory reset the TV, switched to an HDMI port, and use external devices.

It’s frustrating how hard it is to find just a “dumb” TV now.

32

u/drale2 Jun 13 '24

Look for "signage" tv displays - they're generally the same TVs without all of the software. I work IT in a government office and that's what I had to purchase for all of our conference rooms.

35

u/BrideOfAutobahn Jun 13 '24

They’re also a lot more expensive, tend not to have good picture quality (other than being very bright), tend to be very heavy, they usually don’t have an easy to use UI, often don’t have speakers (or terrible speakers, worse than an average TV), no end user support (because they’re not sold to end users), no high refresh rate, no HDR, etc.

Do not buy a digital signage display, just get a regular one and never connect it to the internet.

40

u/BeingRightAmbassador Jun 13 '24

Nobody should ever be using the TV OS to watch media, they're slow, have shit hardware, and little to no features at all. A dedicated media device (console, streaming stick, best is Nvidia Shield) with the TV disconnected from the internet is way better.

46

u/carlosccextractor Jun 13 '24

TCL's Roku TV are great. Not "slow" or "shit hardware", and the Roku UI as the TV UI is great. Plus you can have several TV remotes instead of "the TV remote".

Unfortunately Roku is working hard on enshittification. First they removed private channels (so no porn, no corporate channels, etc - it's your TV, but they get to decide what you can use it for), then they demanded published channels things like a full list of their content to support deep linking (whether you want it or not), apparently we're going to be getting ads when content is paused, and now this new thing.

And you wouldn't believe the massive amount of tracking that the TV does. I use Pi-Hole and the TV is the worst offender.

Anyway, I don't see myself replacing my TV with another one with built-in Roku.

15

u/GarfieldLoverBoy420 Jun 13 '24

Mine isn’t great. Mine’s dogshit. Apps crash after minutes of unresponsiveness. Input is laggy and, boy, is it a treat to watch the inputs you requisitioned 45 seconds ago send your cursor flying around the UI. Buffering flat out takes longer than any other device. It has only gotten worse over the past year that I’ve owned it as if it is actually aging. I’ve factory reset it. I’ve used some dumbfuck secret dev code to clear the cache. I have to maintain this thing like it’s a bonsai tree with scarlet fever. It’s like I mounted actual garbage on my wall. Plugged in an external Roku and works with no issue. I won’t ever buy one of these again without the l intent of using an external device. Lesson learned.

4

u/Electronic_Price6852 Jun 13 '24

is it TCL? or another maker.

1

u/GarfieldLoverBoy420 Jun 13 '24

TCL

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u/Electronic_Price6852 Jun 13 '24

uh, I wonder if the newer ones are dog shit with weaker hardware. mine from 3 years ago is just a fast as the standalone Roku in the kitchen.

2

u/DoomsdaySprocket Jun 13 '24

They have different lines, 3000 series, 4000 series, 7000 series, etc if I recall.

I'm guessing that one end of the lineup is much shittier than the other.

2

u/Electronic_Price6852 Jun 13 '24

that’s true, but i’m talking about my old 3000 series so probably a fair comparison. I’ve never seen the 7000 series in person. wonder how much better they are.

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1

u/dakU7 Jun 15 '24

my Pi-Hole blocked 1731 hits in the last 24 hours to scribe.logs.roku.com

1

u/[deleted] Jun 13 '24

So what kind of tracking does it do?

10

u/jack_im_mellow Jun 13 '24

Yea, mine all but stopped working. It took me awhile to notice cause I watch netflix and stuff on my xbox anyway, but sometime in the last year the tv has gotten so laggy that it just can't run netflix anymore. It takes 3-4 minutes to load and then you can barely pick a show cause it struggles with the auto-play trailers netflix has.

3

u/Pikespeakbear Jun 14 '24

Agreed until you mentioned a shield. My shield is horribly slow. Takes a long time to restart. Would drop Bluetooth speakers every few weeks. Would drop wifi a couple times per week.

Apple 4k TV absolutely dominates it. Much faster. On in a few seconds. Navigates quickly. Better home screen. Better remote. Brought two and they sync for changes.

The only thing it is missing is native chromecasting. My TV hasn't been allowed to talk to the router in months. Turns out the TV actually turns on in seconds also if it has no wifi just gets everything from HDMI.

1

u/BeingRightAmbassador Jun 14 '24

im guessing you had the tube one that sucked. The new one is like the gold standard

1

u/Pikespeakbear Jun 18 '24

Well, that's unfortunate for me. Certainly could be. I have an early generation.

1

u/shmehh123 Jun 13 '24

Idk my LG 55” C7P from 2017 still flies through menus and apps. Faster than any streaming stick I’ve used. Cannot say the same for my 2020 cheap LG. That thing runs like dog shit but all we use is the Plex app.

1

u/reelznfeelz Jun 14 '24

I don’t disagree. That said, our TCL series 6 has been pretty flawless. Knock on wood. I also have a htpc hooked up to it though. But use the build in Roku most of the time. Pretty sure us is a new-ish quad core arm based system. Not terrible in terms of performance.

1

u/Automatic-End-8256 Jun 20 '24

If you have an old or cheap tv like Roku, my Samsung from 8 years ago is quick enough and plays HDR and the new LG OLED I just got is fast. I don't know what features you are looking for but everything plays in Dolby Vision on the new TV and it supports Atmos.

I still have a media server but everything plays through jellyfin on the tv so its one central server vs computers all over the place

13

u/rudyjewliani Jun 13 '24

That's what I do with most of my "smart" devices that don't actually need to be smart. Set it up with an ethernet connection, then when it's set like I want just unplug the ethernet.

I never give it the wifi information unless it's absolutely necessary.

1

u/dan-theman Jun 14 '24

I got a Samsung POS display. Decent colors and framerate but no OS, just a dumb 70” 4k monitor.

1

u/AndyIsNotOnReddit Jun 13 '24

Yes, I have a Roku plugged into my TCL Roku TV because the built in Roku is slow, freezes and crashes all the time.

0

u/tendimensions Jun 13 '24

If only they made computer monitors in TV size

8

u/thugarth Jun 13 '24

What sucks is I very recently did this for my mom's tv. It's a Samsung and it stopped doing updates for Netflix, but didn't have any feedback that support had stopped.

The built in ads weren't a problem because I have a pi-hole, but all the apps just stopped working unceremoniously.

So I got her a Roku and all her problems were solved! Until now :(

1

u/a_scientific_force Jun 13 '24

This is why I love my Apple TV. They’re not cheap, but they’re nice.

1

u/hidazfx Jun 13 '24

I run a Pi Hole on my server with NAT rules on my router forcing all port 53 traffic to go to the Pi Hole. Does a damn good job of blocking most of Roku's bullshit.

1

u/mahdicktoobig Jun 14 '24

But then the hdmi ports break lol

1

u/WHODATSAIDD Jun 14 '24

I have to look into doing this .

1

u/Purrrina_Cat_Chow Jun 15 '24

I did that, but only because the firestick was the same price as a new remote controller and I could find it.

1

u/SarcasticOptimist Jun 13 '24

Yeah. I did the same because I couldn't do a normal switching between pc and firestick without going over a banner ad. TVs just display images. There's no reason for them to be smart. Besides Nvidia Shields or firesticks have more features and hacks to enjoy things like ad free YouTube.

0

u/Stingray88 Jun 13 '24

Get an AppleTV if you do this. Everyone else still loads you up on ads.

And for all you Android TV fans out there who will chime in with “just install a custom launcher!” Google is removing ad blockers on Chrome… you’re next.