Does it act as a dumb monitor? Can all smart TV features be permanently disabled?
this post was submitted on 05 Apr 2026
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You can prolly just not connect it to Wi-Fi but I seriously doubt any TVs these days don't have this bullshit.
Ah so close!
If it lacked any smart tv features and had displayport it would be my next tv.
I love that the author refers to Hisense as "it" rather than they. Corporations aren't people!
Sounds great! I'll gladly pay $200usd for it.
I skimmed the article and didn't see any mention of price, but I expect it to be 10x what I'm willing to spend on a display.
Also if it's a smart tv I'm no longer interested at all.
Allmost all tvs are smart tvs these days, just never connect it to wifi and use external devices like an HTPC.
This. I don't get why most commenters whinge about smart TV capabilities, when you don't have to actually use that feature.
Because it run on a computer that won't last as long as a normal tv. If the computer degrade, your experience suffer.
Tbf if its booting from ROM and doing the same job its not going to degrade.
Graphics cards from 20 years ago will still play 20 year old games just fine, its not like that computers job is gonna change anytime soon.
I expect it won't be long before they start including cellular modems.
I'll be sticking with my Sceptre then
Normally I’d say just leave it off your network, but I’ve read some awful stuff Hisense does to coerce users into connecting their TVs to their network.
Hisense UR9 RGB, but note that the port is on the left bezel of the panel. Hopefully saved you a click.
Tldr; This article reads like my own particular preferred brand of copium.
Nvidia Tried this with BFG (Big Format gaming Displays) but most of them never made it to market. I think Microcenter carried one model and it was expensive for what you were getting. Back in those days having the nvidia gsync sticker easily double the price of any monitor and making it a ~60" tv wasn't an exception.
I can't be the only person who wants display port but I fear this must have to do with the HDMI Forum being the current cable standard mafia and supporting anything other than HDMI is like giving up an inch of the total control they have over the TV industry. They (Sony, Phillips, Toshiba, Hitachi, etc) are effectively colluding against TV buyers and controlling the market and eliminating competition.
With that being said, the USB-C port on these TVs has been around and Ive seen other reviewers show that the high sense implementation is not the panacea (yet) that gamers desire. Its more for like, plugging in your Macbook to your TV.
Still, if this TV came out tomorrow and Wendell from Level1techs said "your Linux pc can get 4k, 120hz, HDR FreeSync out of this" and showed it working, $3500 dollars wouldn't stop me from buying it.
Still, if this TV came out tomorrow and Wendell from Level1techs said “your Linux pc can get 4k, 120hz, HDR FreeSync out of this” and showed it working, $3500 dollars wouldn’t stop me from buying it.
I wish I was this rich to impulse buy something that expensive because a man on the internet said something positive abouti t.
A lot of us skip several upgrade opportunities and just keep saving for something decent that works well with our OS.
Heck, I went over ten years on my last CPU and mobo because I was waiting for the predicted amdgpu nirvana that we have now.
My TV is no different. I've had the same, dumb, 1080p IPS since 2012. Just waiting for a tv that's worth it.
So yeah, if the ideal tv launches at 3k, I'll buy it without a doubt.
I have that money saved from when I didn't leap to 3d, when I didn't leap to OLED and when I didn't leap to 4k.
Well, you see, when you know and understand Linux well, your chances to become rich are increasingly higher.
- Most people are poor
- Most people use Windows
Coincidence?
Now gimme one without smart tv bullshit
I bought a 48" OLED "monitor" that has none.
The smart TV part is conceptually okay, but the bullshit is unspeakable. I actually like that TVs have apps for the streaming services and stuff, if they didn't have to be evil about how they implement it. But they're evil, so here we all are, wanting completely dumb TVs.
Every invention this century....
I don't really agree that is conceptually okay. TVs and computers have drastically different life cycles. That TV will still be kicking probably a decade after the internal Smart TV computer is uselessly underpowered. This same problem is arguably even worse with cars.
I don't agree. I don't need my TV to keep up with the latest software like I do my computer. I'd like it to load apps for the streaming services and search YouTube videos. If it can do that today, it can do that five years from now.
You could accomplish that with a streamer though. The new ones even have IR and can act as universal remotes. This negates the detriment to not having it built into the tv.
Then when it's out of date you replace a 100$ streamer and not a 1000$ tv.
I still have to have a separate device with cables going to it.
But if a codec change or such happens (like to AV1 or h.265), it might not, we have an older 4k smart tv (Sharp Aquos LC-60UE30U) that can't handle 4k streaming without dropping to single digit fps.
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Just don't connect it to the internet. Smart TV is now dumb TV. It really is that simple.
You're still paying for the components, so an out-of-box dumb TV would be cheaper (we saw this when smart TV's first launched, they were ~$30-40 more then the dumb versions). You still are at the mercy of whatever board/OS gets installed. And Microsoft is constantly trying to force users to make an online account to use the PC, it's only a matter of time before TV makers require WIFI to do initial setup. Plus there's ways to still get online, like if they partner with Xfinity who use customer routers (the ones that get rented) for others to use... stuff like that would eb all to easy to do. Or heck, partner with Amazon. They deliver everywhere, so the trucks are driving around, there's ways they could auto join you to a network.
The "just don't" doesn't send a message other than "we need to try harder because we need to steal that data". Stop buying TVs is the only message that might work.
Now it is a dumb tv with a 30 second boot up time and a clunky menu for changing inputs.
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It's not going to be cheap, though — in the US, the 65-inch model is officially priced at $3,499.
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