alt Hacker News>Is it the OMG BEST? no. But I Disabled wifi, and even the channel display.
Why not just get a (presumably subsidized) smart TV instead, and skipping the premium? It'd also be not disconnected from the internet, and despite vague HN/reddit speculation that TVs have cell modems in them, that has yet to be confirmed.
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If you do this, connect it to the internet at least once, because most smart TVs ship with missing features that aren't activated until you do a firmware update.
Some instead assert TVs might connect to the first open network available, like if a neighbor briefly opened a hotspot, which sounds more believable.
I use HDMI on my Smart TV and just disabled wifi because I realized it was downloading more than half my bandwidth (a small amount, in fact). It could have been doing an update but I found no reason to leave it on. Occasionally I'll use YT or Prime since it doesn't have to be tethered to a PC, but overall it's nicer as a monitor than a streaming app.
I have a TCL Roku TV that I use disconnected and with an Apple TV. It still has annoyances here and there, like pausing for three seconds or so on every startup before it switches inputs. I’d pay a mild premium to not have that.
These days a lot of them will nag you if you don't connect them to the internet and only use them as a dumb display.
I don't think you can use the ones at wal-mart without an internet connection of some kind
I wanted more control and no UI. The commercial ones do that -- I think this was like $150 more than the "samsung smart ui" one... Never seeing a smart TV interface was worth that for me. YMMV.