Currently I use firetv stick but I hate the ads. I only use it to launch arte, jellyfin and smarttube so it’s OK. But if I would have children it would be very bad because it’s filled with shiny trash everywhere. I wouldn’t want my kids (or anyone) to see that stuff.
I am looking forward to plasma bigscreen in june but I can’t add more value to it right now than donating to kde. Is there something else? I’ve got a Samsung TV which is on the same level of badness as firetv. It could be worse but it’s far from good as well
I use nVidia shield TV with a dumb video projector. I haven’t bothered with a custom launcher.
I have disconected my tv as it has some strage VIDAA system that idk what it is and idk if i can change it, I have an nvidia shield with lineageOS and I install there anything I want
Arch w/KDE Plasma desktop, of course.
“Smart” TVs should be kept off the internet and only used as video output for actual computers.
IMHO, Android still has the best ecosystem of TV remote navigateable apps. The problem is just Google.
I have a ‘Google TV’ android based TV.
It started out terrible, but after removing or disabling almost all apps and installing couple replacements, it’s great now.
Most importantly:
- FLauncher replaces the Google launcher and thereby removes almost all ads and ‘recommendations’
- TV Bro is a FOSS webbrowser for TVs that has build-in add-blocking
- SmartTube is a Foss YouTube client that just works great and brings Add- and Sponsor block
- Stremio with Debrid Media Manager and Torrentio (both using a Debrid service!) for streaming in general
- Jellyfin if you have a home server
All of that is FOSS and would work completely without Googles involvement, if you find a way to flash a custom ROM onto a TV or TV box.
Alternatively: Anything with an ‘air mouse’.
An alternative to Android, I have used before, was just Linux with oversized app icons and then a G20s (Pro) remote. These cheap chinese G20s remotes work great as a mouse, similar to a Wii mote. Especially with the G20s Pro you can even set numerical passwords for everything and then just type it on the remote. They also have microphone that only works when you press the button. So if you have some tts service on you device, this is also a solution. I haven’t found a solution for it yet, but I believe, using T9 typing as a text input would also be a great solution when using these remotes.
There are also air mouse with a full keyboard built in, like the W1, W3, Q40… But I think, they are all a bit too heavy and too big, feel clumsy at the slight benefit of having a keyboard.
And then there are devices like the A8, which are just small keyboards with a touchpad, that also work as an air mouse, but fail as a remote IMHO. But that entirely depends, on how much typing you want to do on your TV.
This is exactly my setup. Tell me a little about Stremio if you don’t mind. I feel thick, but I dont quite get what it is.
Stremio is basically just a foss streaming app that doesn’t do much and relies on customization through extensions. There are extensions that add streaming services and extensions that grab recommendations/popular series & movies from different sources. The basic idea is, that you should connect all your streaming services to it (through extensions) and than add stuff like rottentomatoes and IMDB to it, to get recommendations. Then you select or search for whatever you want to watch and Stremio shows you, which of your connected services has that particular stream available. Technically completely legal and fine.
However, it’s often (ab)used for streaming directly or indirectly from filesharing protocols. So, instead of adding Amazon Prime or Netflix extensions to it, which discriminate against FOSS clients by only delivering low-quality streams, you could add something like Torrentio. Torrentio is an extensions that can use various torrent trackers (both free, insecure ones, like 1337x or Piratebay, as well as private trackers) to look for available torrents for the thing you want to watch and then it acts as a torrent client and streams the video file directly from that torrent.
Torrentio can also be set up, to use a Debrid service. A Debrid service, is a cloud service that acts a bit like a cloud storage that can download files from torrents or filesharing sites (often through a premium subscription at that service, that you don’t have to buy yourself) and then allows you to download these files from the cloud storage. Most importantly, it decouples you from the torrent, acting a bit like a proxy or VPN, and keeps your IP safe by doing that (e.g. to avoid law enforcement). It also allows you to start a torrent download that has few seeders and then let it run possibly for weeks and get notified, once your Debrid has completed the download. And lastly: a good Debrid service basically ‘seeds’ the files other people have downloaded on that service to all other people on the service, that request the same file. (We call that ‘cached’) Through that, you can get most popular torrents in a matter of seconds, which effectively allows you to stream them fast and reliably, like from any streaming platform.
Again, Torrentio can use a Debrid service like that, which makes it secure, reliable and convenient. A really good Debrid service should cost around 3€/month and will have basically all films and shows from all big streaming platforms (Netflix, HBO, Prime, Disney,…) already cached in 4K HDR+ Dolby whatever. This basically offers you a much better service than any other streaming platform, doesn’t serve you ads, preserves your privacy and does all of that for the small cost of 32€/year and living in a legally dark grey area.
Torrentio has a small flaw, when used with a Debrid: Torrentio uses torrent trackers (1337x, NYAA, EZTVx…) to find a fitting torrent and then requests that from your debrid service. If you are lucky, your service has that torrent cached and you immediately start streaming. Otherwise, your debrid has to start downloading the torrent and will only serve it to you a while later.
An alternative extension for Stremio is Debrid Media Manager (DMM). It basically tracks, which files are cached on your debrid already and then allows you to specifically request those already cached files, making it start the stream more reliably. However, most debrid services don’t really like having their cached files tracked, for legal reasons, and sometimes close or obfuscate the API, which makes DMM a bit less reliable on some debrids. Then again, the Torrentio service that downloads tracker information also likes to fail sometimes.
I have both installed (using the same debrid) and default to DMM and only check Torrentio when DMM fails. Other people have it the other way around.
Thank you for the informative and detailed explanation!! I very much appreciate it. I think I might dive in and play with it.
Great writeup, I’ve been using Torrentio with a debrid service for about a year now and wondered if there was a backup method when Torrentio fails to load. I’m definitely going to check out DMM thanks to you!
I prefer no OS, just use it for HDMI ports like any other display
Samesies, dumb tvs forever.
For proprietary streaming apps where I want to be able to see what’s going on because I’m allowed a higher resolution than a 720p blurry mess? Apple’s TVos seems pretty great. Zero ads, smooth, devices are overpowered for watching just TV. It does have apps for Jellyfin and Plex though I’d have to suggest infuse instead which is a $12 annual subscription for 4k or any proprietary audio codecs but it does work pretty well.
For everything else some version of libelec or corelec depending on the device in question it’s being installed on. There are also external launchers that keep Android but remove most of the problems.
If you want plug and it works then AppleTV. If you’re interested in putting in some work maybe a custom launcher on an android install. Beyond that libelec, coreleck, and Kodi.
Kodi maintains a big csv list of hardware (and software) with capabilities and suggestions here: https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=376035
I use Projectivity Launcher on Onn Android box that I got from Walmart for $20. It even has an option to be the default
Projectivy is incredible. I took a while to try it because I didn’t have any real problems with Google’s launcher besides the ads, but the jellyfin and smarttube integration make it so much better than I realized.
I’m just using fedora with gnome at the moment. And I control it with antimicro x. Though the gnome extension I liked best for typing on screen with the mouse isn’t available on the latest version of gnome. A Bluetooth keyboard would be nice.
(Technically right now I more often just use it as a second display for my laptop with an HDMI cable running across the living room and don’t bother with the controller, using the trackpad and keyboard. But it was working nice also when I left my laptop plugged in sitting below the TV :)
Ubuntu on a Linux machine and a g60s Bluetooth remote. Done.
Apple’s TVOS has zero ads and is very simple, but it’s also Apple.
My other choice would be a good Android TV box on an NVIDIA Shield or something since you can use third party youtube launchers and third party apps. I haven’t personally used it though so YMMV.
Apple TV with Infuse is almost the perfect experience. Nvidia Shield Pro with Kodi is my alternative but it’s so clunky I never use it.
Definitely not WebOS. I have an Nvidia Shield that runs Android TV, which is nice because there’s a wide selection of apps and you can install custom launchers, Tailscale, Jellyfin, SmartTube. The downside, as I recently learned, is that your parents probably will have a harder time switching between the TV’s native OS and the Shield.
So I recently got a Google TV, which is (just?) Android TV, and that allows me to install Tailscale and Jellyfin, but since it’s 1 system, it’s easier for some folks to use. I also installed Projectivy Launcher for my parents to get rid of the default ad-ridden launcher. I haven’t yet had time to try to install SmartTube, but I think I read it’s possible…
Curious to learn more about https://plasma-bigscreen.org/ I didn’t know about that. Thanks!
libreelec on an external device
I’ve been running kodi on a raspberry pi for years as my media center and It’s great. There’s an official jellyfin app for kodi too.
Seconded for Kodi! It’s just a fantastic TV interface.
Are you also using the jellyfin app with your kodi. I find the app very slow on my RPi3 running with kodi.
Thanks for pointing out that Plasma Bigscreen is getting an official release! I tried the AndroidTV for Raspi but encountered too many bugs, specifically CEC isn’t yet working.
Sad to say but my current recommended TV OS is… Tizen. I have TizenTube for YouTube and Plex/Jellyfin apps for everything else.
We are planning to join the Plasma release schedule starting with Plasma 6.7 (in June), which will make it possible for distributions to ship it in their repositories.
Yeah, didn’t realize this myself. Android TV is just something I’ve been tolerating. I also have a Linux living room gaming PC running Pegasus Frontend and it’s annoying that I often have to break out a mouse and keyboard. Linux HTPCs and couch gaming PCs haven’t really been a great UX so far, so I’m excited to see Bigscreen finally release.
I did previously try Steam gaming mode, but it doesn’t work with a USB remote from my tests. It also treats non-Steam games as 2nd class citizens that can’t be cleanly organized and categorized. Another huge downside is it’s proprietary and collects data.
Bazzite has been a fantastic living room gaming PC for me. Even when I have to switch to desktop mode I can still control the mouse and type using the on screen keyboard. I can count on one hand the times I’ve used a mouse and keyboard in the past year and most of those times it was just because it was more convenient for what I was doing.
That said I’m still excited about Plasma Bigscreen for an always on media watching device that allows me to unplug my TV from the network.
Yeah, Bazzite is great for anyone already using Steam. My main personal reason for not using Bazzite is the fact that Steam can’t be easily uninstalled.
I just use a full fletched DE on a Mini PC. Works best for me - for navigation I use a keyboard/trackpad combination thingy.
Would something like that work for you?
