[mythtv-users] Smart TVs that can run Mythtv-Leanfront?

[John Pilkington]

On 11/11/2022 17:47, James Abernathy wrote:
> My old UHD 4k tv is losing some of its backlight and I'm going to 
> replace it during the Black Friday sales. So I'm thinking about whether 
> any of the Smart TVs can already run some of the MythTV Android apps. 
> Leanfront would be the key one.
> 
> The Sony X90CK says its Smart Platform is Google TV.
> 
> Has anyone tested Leanfront on a Sony TV with Google TV built-in??
> 
> Jim A

I haven't, but perhaps I can take up the 'replacing a TV' theme, with 
some relevance to leanfront.

I had two old smart TVs 'brick' last year.  The reason wasn't clear.

Since then my watching has been on monitors, with stereo hi-fi sound 
from the PC line output. One of the monitors has digital video input but 
is missing HDMI sound.

Before the bricking I could get sound from the Firestick 4K via the TV 
headphone socket, but these now seem to be almost extinct, replaced by 
Bluetooth.  So I have bought a DAB-radio with Bluetooth, to see how it goes.

I do get BT audio, which sounds reasonable, but with quirks.  'Ticks' 
from a testcard are heard as 'shushes'.  Some googling suggests that the 
audio codecs in both the Firestick and the Bluetooth receiver are not 
the best for high-quality audio, and I don't think that either can be 
changed.  Kodi on the Firestick shows the effect too.

So what, going forward, is the best way to get good stereo (or other) 
audio from Firestick-like systems?  I guess that if I really feel the 
need I should look for HDMI audio extractors.

John P