A warning about the dangers of digital


 
Steve Hoch said:
I dragged an older Vizio flat screen TV I had in the basement upstairs thinking I would put it in the garage to watch while screwing around out there. It still works fine but I realized that it was literally just a TV, no apps, no WiFi. I would have to hook it up to cable and that wasn't the plan so it's useless to me. It's just funny how quickly you get spoiled by technology.
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Just stick a cheap FireTV, Appletv, Roku, or Chromecast in it and you have a smart tv with no cable needed.
 
My gilling and smoking results are so much better since I have gone digital! Without a instant read thermometer it was just guess work and nothing came out the way it should. I could not even think about smoking without a remoted temp sensor for the grill / meat. Just no way to know what is happening.
 
Joe Anshien said:
Just stick a cheap FireTV, Appletv, Roku, or Chromecast in it and you have a smart tv with no cable needed.
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You're right Joe, that's probably what I will do since the TV still works fine. I guess my point was that it surprised me when I fired it up that it didn't have that stuff built in like all my other TV's and it shouldn't have. I still remember when we didn't have WiFi built into everything but now I just kind of expect it to because it's just such a big part of everybody's life now.
 
DanHoo said:
I have a first or second gen fire stick with a remote if you want it Steve.
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Thanks Dan, but I wouldn't even think of putting you through the trouble. I have a TV in the kitchen hooked up to an over the air antenna that I think has WiFi. I might be able to swap that with this extra TV, I'll look at it tomorrow. Besides I'm used to watching TV on my phone while I'm out in the garage anyway. This only came up because my daughter came home from college and said her TV wouldn't connect to the WiFi anymore and I got it to work again. She must think I don't know anything about this stuff because she waited about three months to mention it after she and her engineering grad boyfriend couldn't figure it out.
 
If do you have either over the air antenna or cable you can get it to your tv using an HDHOMERUN. I have used both and they work great. You can even watch TV on your phone or tablet, though you will still need some kind of stick in your TV. The FireTV is nice that you can also mirror your phone. I use Samsung DEX to get a complete desktop on the TV from my S22. It all depends on if you are in the Apple or Android ecosystem.
 
Joe Anshien said:
If do you have either over the air antenna or cable you can get it to your tv using an HDHOMERUN. I have used both and they work great. You can even watch TV on your phone or tablet, though you will still need some kind of stick in your TV. The FireTV is nice that you can also mirror your phone. I use Samsung DEX to get a complete desktop on the TV from my S22. It all depends on if you are in the Apple or Android ecosystem.
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Thanks Joe, I will look into it. Out of the five people in my family, I'm the only one that thinks having an android phone is ok. I will figure something out on the cheap because although I do have cable, there's no way I'm going to pay more to have it in my garage too.
 
I also have a Firestick. Hate the thing. Yours if you want it. I am a ROKU guy. I even use a ROKU on my 55 in Samsung QHD TV because I hate the Samsung OS so much and it's so slllllllooooooooowwwwww. Put a ROKU Ultra on it for my FUBO, Tablo, etc. We cut the Xfinity cable back in March or April and been streaming everything and using Table with my big roof antenna to stream recorded antenna shows ever since
 
LMichaels said:
I also have a Firestick. Hate the thing. Yours if you want it. I am a ROKU guy. I even use a ROKU on my 55 in Samsung QHD TV because I hate the Samsung OS so much and it's so slllllllooooooooowwwwww. Put a ROKU Ultra on it for my FUBO, Tablo, etc. We cut the Xfinity cable back in March or April and been streaming everything and using Table with my big roof antenna to stream recorded antenna shows ever since
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I have had both and liked them both but, until one of them has a video feed for what’s currently cooing on my grill, I only use them for movies.
But, as to digitally enhanced grilling, I feel like less is more. Was chastised by my brother about being a “meddler” since I do not have a pellet smoker (like he does) which he can control from his phone, blah, blah, blah. I could not make him understand that there is very little I need to fool with once things settle in, he could not grasp the fact that I get it dialed in and GO TO BED! How much less bother can that be?
I hate my phone, texting when we are on vacation of at a place where line of sight is not possible with granddaughter is fine but, I really don’t feel like having “My Life is on my phone!” as many seem to. I’m old enough to remember rotary phones and not being in constant contact with some damned annoying appliance!
end rant , sorry.
 
LMichaels said:
I also have a Firestick. Hate the thing. Yours if you want it. I am a ROKU guy. I even use a ROKU on my 55 in Samsung QHD TV because I hate the Samsung OS so much and it's so slllllllooooooooowwwwww. Put a ROKU Ultra on it for my FUBO, Tablo, etc. We cut the Xfinity cable back in March or April and been streaming everything and using Table with my big roof antenna to stream recorded antenna shows ever since
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Me too. 5 TVs in 2 homes...all Roku. Cut the XFinity cable in the beach house in March or so and went with Fubo...Fubo isn't super cheap, what about $73/month if you but it in quarterly chunks? But it has more streaming content than you can watch in a lifetime PLUS...all Philly live sports...Eagles at the beach house in the Fall is just awesome!!
Pay for the full Xfinity cable package in our main home so still get Max, Netflix and some others at the beach house too. Max is very good.
If I find a series that has run it's course and is not available except for a pay per episode/season, I'll buy the DVD box set. My daughter convinced me to try Mad Men...bought the first season and went for the box set. It's entertaining. Got The Office box set, Justified, Sopranos...although that's always available on Max.
Today's television....so much content...so little time!
 
I only went with FUBO because it was the only one that gave me Sports+Chicago, and Marquee. Also one of the only ones as well not requiring you to have an actual "earth based" ISP connection. Most of the others will not work on an OTA based ISP i.e. T-Mobile. I think TM did some upgrading to my towers as well. As I now have ping times very similar to what I saw with Xfinity, more stable download speeds (not blazing fast still around 150Mb down) but upload has doubled and become way more stable. to between 30-40 up.
 
LMichaels said:
I only went with FUBO because it was the only one that gave me Sports+Chicago, and Marquee. Also one of the only ones as well not requiring you to have an actual "earth based" ISP connection. Most of the others will not work on an OTA based ISP i.e. T-Mobile. I think TM did some upgrading to my towers as well. As I now have ping times very similar to what I saw with Xfinity, more stable download speeds (not blazing fast still around 150Mb down) but upload has doubled and become way more stable. to between 30-40 up.
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That is a huge drawback for the 5g internet. I considered it for our beach house...the price is very attractive...I pay $80/month for Xfinity 800mbps
and bought a Motorola modem and Archer A7 router. It's been a rock solid setup thus far although the 800mbps might be overkill. We run 1 TV, 1 wifi camera, 1 wifi thermostat, a tablet or 3, 2-5 phones...not a huge bandwidth household.
 
Jay D in Jersey said:
That is a huge drawback for the 5g internet. I considered it for our beach house...the price is very attractive...I pay $80/month for Xfinity 800mbps
and bought a Motorola modem and Archer A7 router. It's been a rock solid setup thus far although the 800mbps might be overkill. We run 1 TV, 1 wifi camera, 1 wifi thermostat, a tablet or 3, 2-5 phones...not a huge bandwidth household.
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If I could have gotten XFinity here for that price I would not have cut the cord. But the cheapest tier of theirs here was gonna run me $120 for internet alone. I guess their pricing is regional and adjusted to fit what ever competition they might have
 
LMichaels said:
If I could have gotten XFinity here for that price I would not have cut the cord. But the cheapest tier of theirs here was gonna run me $120 for internet alone. I guess their pricing is regional and adjusted to fit what ever competition they might have
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Mine is $107/month minus $20 for auto pay. They have slower for less obviously but I was giddy it wasn't $285/month anymore,
 
I use the Smoke X4 and the Billows blower, Works perfect for me as my Kettle is always Mobil. Simple as Pie No app's required and when on sale, An affordable great unit.
 
I’m not saying they are not, to a certain degree(sorry for that pun), labor savers only that I don’t use them. For those that do and enjoy them, fine have at it, I’m just not going down the “Deeper Gizmosis” well. I’ve got too much stuff now!
 
So, when my daughter left for college I bought her a TV to take with her and it had Roku built into it. That's what she wanted and I didn't think anything of it. She graduated this year and came home with it, she told me she couldn't get it to hook up to the WiFi and I looked at it and got it to work. I was scrolling through the menu and noticed that it had the Xfinity stream app built in and that's our cable provider. I set up the app and took her cable box out, ten bucks a month saved. I'm not going to get rid of all the cable boxes but I have one more I'm going to put on the Roku instead of a cable box at least. I'm probably also going to get one for the TV I'm going to put in the garage now that I see how handy and simple it is to use.
 
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