currently looking at using older laptop motherboards to build a Linux based streamer box. be it native Linux or ASOP, I'm getting the fuck out of this bullshit.
this post was submitted on 17 Jun 2026
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I haven't watched network or cable TV in years, so Stremio (properly "Arrr-ified") is all I need. Works on Android, Win, Apple...
Music? Any media player, though Bluetooth, to my Bluetooth receiver connected to my awesome 80's Kenwood receiver, and I'm set. Music through the TV is a non starter for me. Discrete components, and good speakers. I don't want my music processed 4 times before I hear it.
I went with a HTPC and haven't looked back.
That time was long ago. The writing was on the wall as soon as they put a giant perpetual ad on the home screen.
Here's the worst part, there are no parental controls on the home screen, so if I'm trying to get my kid to Disney+, while it loads we're staring at some ad for a horror flick. Great job Roku...
Honestly, the parental controls on the Roku are non-existent and it's definitely on purpose, really pisses me off.
I like Roku. Their products have so far had the best functionality.
If they go through with their current plans to turn half the home page into an ad, I'm probably gonna try and sell mine (better to drive down the overall market with more supply).
I pay for a number of streaming services, and I pay extra so I don't have my time wasted with ads. I don't want ads in my home. If the device I purchased to bring me ad-free TV is going to itself show me ads, then as far as my needs go it's no longer fit for purpose.
Plasma Bigscreen will be here soon keep an eye.
So excited for Bigscreen. Might just finally replace my Kodi setup.
The Fox acquisition was the last straw for me too. I've watched Roku go from a user-friendly streaming device to a front end for an advertising company. A couple of years ago it became so irritating it finally pushed me to implement an Adguard Home DNS sinkhole after years of thinking it wasn't worth the trouble. Roku has also made it difficult to block ads, big gaps are shown in the UI when you do, and some apps can't be updated without disabling Adguard and downloading a bunch of Roku's ads too.
Yesterday I bought an Onn streaming box (Android TV) and it's like going from a abacus to a computer. After a couple of hours configuring, loading a new launcher, and using ADB to debloat I've got an ad-free, clean interface with much of Google's tracking disabled (at least as much as possible). Even better, some things (like the remote's volume control) work that never worked with Roku.
It was such a breath of fresh air I just ordered a couple more ($15 for the 2k model right now) and will have completely dumped Roku by the end of the week.
It's been a long time coming.
If they make you do all that work to scrape the shit out of their asses, why do you still dwell there, rather than sailing the high seas?
Not seeing anywhere close to $15 for any of their models
They've upped the price I see to $19.88 in the last hour. The nearby stores are now out too. What prices are you seeing?
Goddamnit. I got my Boomer parents to ditch cable and get a Roku, in part, to keep them away from Fox News.
Move them to a cheap Onn Android TV device. You can configure it with a completely clean interface with no ads at all, and no asshole company's changing the menus constantly once you install an alternate launcher. You can also debloat it like any other Android device and shut off most of the tracking (as much as is possible with Google involved anyway).
I bought my first one yesterday. After configuring it and seeing what a massive improvement it is over Roku I bought a couple more today. 2K ones are on sale for $15 right now.
Or a cheap used Apple TV
I have a couple of them that I bought shortly after the LTT video on the topic with the intention of rooting. After figuring out that I'd unfortunately got the newer hardware revision that can't be rooted, I had them just sitting in a box.
If "debloating" them without rooting and installing Lineage or whatever is "good enough," maybe I should take another look. Do you know of a good guide to follow? Is there anything special that needs to be done, such as preventing it from updating or connecting to the Internet before the factory malware is removed?
The one I bought can be rooted and I had planned to do so, but found it wasn't needed.
You can use ADB by itself, but this tool makes debloating a breeze. Deleted packages can be easily restored if you make a mistake. ADB needs to be running for it to connect. Be aware the remote is a Bluetooth device so don't make my mistake and turn BT off.
Remember when you could plug a keyboard into a smart TV and use it as a remote. I remember.
Wait, the $15 2K model you bought yesterday can be rooted? I figured anything made in the last few years would've been patched.
Can you tell me the exact model (the code on the box, like this, as explained in this XDA thread about the model I got where I experienced disappointment), and where you found the information about rooting it?
I appreciate that you're happy with yours even without rooting, but I don't think I'd be able to trust it not to enshittify in the long run on the stock firmware.
Instead of a Roku Stick, you could use the Google TV Streamer or Apple TV 4K…..…..Amazon's Fire devices are also an option, but I figure anyone with moral qualms against Fox may have similar issues with anything tied to Jeff Bezos.
I got a kick out of the article recommending Google and Apple like they’re the ethical option against Amazon here. Any sane person with moral qualms against Bezos will have plenty about Google and Apple too, so let’s not pretend that any of them are anything less than evil.
What suggestions do you have for simple media players that techy people could recommend to their families? It seems like for the most part we're limited to Android-based devices or the Apple TV.
I have no idea what anyone in the following comments is talking about and I'm otherwise "techy". I couldn't imagine a non techy person dealing with any of these recommendations. They just want something to work out of the box without lots of obscure configurations and zero support. As soon as they have a problem they are stuck. They aren't going to search through tech websites and special interest groups. I think a lot of folks don't understand how alien any of this is for the vast majority of people.
It's not there yet. But I'm hoping KDE plasma big screen continues to receive love. If it gets into mainstream distributions. It will likely be big. It's a much more smart TV like shell for the KDE desktop. All the familiarity of your Google TV, Apple tv, fire stick, Roku etc. But none of the advertisements or lockdown. With waydroid it should even be able to run most of your Android applications as well as all the native Linux and KDE applications. But again this is something to watch for. Not quite ready for deployment yet.
I'm just running Linux with an always on top Kodi on an N100 mini-PC.
Works fine with a wireless remote for the purpose of being a TV Box that I just have on my living room and use in the same way as I would a commercial TV box.
Granted, I also use that as a homeserver (its seriously overpowered to just be a TV Box) but that side of things I manage remotely via SSH.
You don't really need access to the full desktop to run Linux apps if you just want a TV Box.
This would be awesome!
It absolutely would be. I'm watching it with great interest. The thought of having a Raspberry Pi and old E-Waste business PC or a cheap n100 or 150 system at the television. Running Games movies everything. It's very attractive.
I was going to say, an old 1L ThinkCentre Tiny, Optiplex Micro, or HP Mini would fit the bill nicely. I already have one set up for retro gaming. It would be nice to get it set up as kore of an overall media center, with a remote-friendly interface. I know I can do that with Libre elec and Kodi but I’m not a fan. KDE is my desktop of choice so I’d love to see what they come up with. Plasma Mobile is solid so I would imagine it could be similar.
Build a media stick out of something like a pi seems like the only option? I wouldn't want to deal with that though and I'm not aware of anyone selling a plug-n-play ready options like that unfortunately.
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I was just looking into this recently and CoreELEC came up. That or LibreELEC that run kodi. The hardware that was recommended would be a ugoos x4q
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I mean, the Apple TV is doing significantly less sketchy shit, selling your data, and spying on you.
It also doesn’t have Home Screen ads and ads stuffed everywhere.
Of the options, regardless of how you feel about Apple, it’s the only viable commercial tv box.
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Roku has been one of the worst from a privacy standpoint, alongside Amazon devices. Google isn’t much better but for privacy, there is no off the shelf option better than AppleTV. Heck, even the beloved Nvidia Shield gets poor marks for privacy.
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Until the browsers I use axe ad-blocking, it's as simple as a HDMI cable and watching through PC tunneled to TV.
I've given stream sticks an honest try, but they're all abysmal. It feels like I'm caged in an advertisement ecosystem.
It feels like I’m caged in an advertisement ecosystem.
It is a caged advertisement ecosystem
Pretty soon I think I'm going to try using a Raspberry Pi as a streaming box. As long as it can play 4K content from Jellyfin and Youtube then it'll work great
For real, a long HDMI cord from my PC to my TV with a wireless keyboard & mouse is the peak couch setup. I love it.
Way ahead of you.
What do we do with existing TVs that have the Roku OS? I imagine alternative FW isn't an easy option since so many different HW brands use Roku
You can reset the tv and set it up without internet. It still works as a “dumb” tv.
As reddig33 mentioned, reset the TV and don't connect it to the internet. Buy a Google TV or Apple TV device of some kind, set the TV to that HDMI channel and use it instead of what's built-in.
Some recommended options for Google TV devices:
- Best:
- Nvidia Shield TV Pro
- Google/Android Ecosystem
- Although released in 2019, this is still the king and top option to get
- Nvidia Shield TV Pro
- Better:
- Google TV Streamer (4K)
- Google/Android Ecosystem
- Walmart onn 4K Pro Streaming Device, Google TV with Gemini (NEW 2026 Model)
- Google/Android Ecosystem
- Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Plus (newest model)
- Amazon Fire Ecosystem
- Apple TV 4K
- Apple Ecosystem
- Google TV Streamer (4K)
- Good:
- Walmart onn 4K Streaming Device, Google TV with Gemini (NEW 2026 Model)
- Google/Android Ecosystem
- Walmart onn 4K Streaming Device, Google TV with Gemini (NEW 2026 Model)
- Bare Minimum:
- Amazon Fire TV Stick HD (newest model)
- Amazon Fire Ecosystem
- onn 4K Streaming Device
- Google/Android Ecosystem
- Amazon Fire TV Stick HD (newest model)
Hope this helps.
I can vouch for the quality of the Shield TV Pro, except they did put some ads on the home screen in the past couple years when they had their first big update in a long time if not ever. It does come with a steeper price tag, but for me it was worth it.
Projectivvy Launcher is your new best friend.
I'll have to give this a try. Honestly, I watch 90% of my media on my computer these days, but I do get to the TV occasionally, and my wife uses it. This looks nice and clean.
I just block my Roku’s telemetry and ad servers at the DNS level with my pi-hole, and it works fine for streaming from my Plex/Jellyfin server. If you really wanted to be sure, you could just reset the firmware and refuse to connect it to the WiFi afterwards. It’ll still work just fine as a regular TV. Then you can hook up something like an Nvidia Shield Pro or an Apple TV 4K to it, and use that to stream instead.
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