• noodlejetski@lemm.ee
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    6 months ago

    I honestly do not understand why anyone would want to watch TV on their fridge.

    • lemmylommy@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Lots of people have a TV blaring all day in the kitchen. I don’t get that either, but that must be their target.

    • BertramDitore@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      The reporter’s use case actually makes a lot of sense to me. I would never buy one of these, but I wouldn’t be opposed to using something like this if I ever ended up with one.

      It’s not like I stand in front of it and watch a whole movie in my kitchen. But I like to have the T2 Tennis Channel on while I scramble eggs or pop on a news show while cooking dinner. Plus, it’s nice to have a kitchen screen that doesn’t take up counter space.

    • tal@lemmy.today
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      6 months ago

      The aspect ratio of the screen doesn’t seem like it’d be all that ideal.

      • Imgonnatrythis
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        6 months ago

        Since it now the norm for everyone to film everything with a smartphone and in the vertical position (I’m old enough that this still hurts my soul), Ive hypothesized that it won’t be long before we start seeing a lot of tvs in this format.

    • Blackmist@feddit.uk
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      6 months ago

      I honestly do not understand why anyone would want to watch TV on their fridge.

      I was sat in the optician’s waiting room the other day, and there was some cheap gameshow on the TV, where people would win like £20.

      I couldn’t believe that people would even film it, let alone broadcast it.

      Watching broadcast TV is the equivalent of going to a restaurant, not wanting to choose and just asking the waiter to pour any old slop down your gob.

  • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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    6 months ago

    Smart fridges are such a stupid idea. Fridges last like 30 years, why would you integrate a computer that is going to reach end-of-life in less than 5 years?

    Just get a fucking tablet and use it in the kitchen.

      • Regna@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Samsung who won’t even provide price estimates/quotes for reparation of utensils WITHIN WARRANTY without being paid $25 before hand. Their products suck that much.

      • Nommer
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        6 months ago

        Samsung isn’t what they used to be. 5-10 years ago they were fine but they’ve really gone downhill with customer support and quality. I’ll be looking at another manufacturer next time I need an SSD.

    • sugar_in_your_tea
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      6 months ago

      No, fridges last 10-ish years, 15 if you’re lucky, especially if you buy Samsung or LG. My LG compressor went out twice in 10 years, and the second time the tech said it would cost way more to fix than it’s worth, even if the part is under warranty (I fixed other stuff myself as well).

      I just got a new fridge, and looking through reviews, even the “best” fridges (unless you go industrial) last 10-15 years on average. I got Whirlpool this time, because they were near the top of recommendations (Maytag was #1), so hopefully those 10-15 years will be relatively trouble-free.

    • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      6 months ago

      So I don’t need all the features of a smart fridge and shit because I habe a phone and a tablet hub for that sort of thing, but a feature I’ve only seen on LG smart fridges is something I’m frequently annoyed more don’t have these days with how cheap the tech is: remote fridge monitoring

      Slap a few cheap cameras in there so I can see 2 angles on every shelf and monitor the current fridge levels from my phone.

      "Are we low on ketchup or am I stupid?” know for certain!

      Saw a feature close to this but not quite as good on an LG smart fridge years ago and have been vehemently disappointed by every fridge ive looked at since not having that.

      And I’m in the market for a new fridge goddamnit. I don’t want to have to install my own cams but I’m close to doing it at this point

    • RedWeasel@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      30y seems a bit optimistic. I have already replaced the control board on our fridge once and I think I need to again and it probably is less than 15yo.

      • laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        6 months ago

        Not so much “optimistic” as “the way it used to be”

        I’ve got a fridge that’s nearly 30 years old that we’ve never had to fix anything on (other than the ice maker). I thought it died about a week ago, turns out I just accidentally turned it off (issue with the coldness dial) and it’s colder than ever right now.

        I’ve also got a 6 or 8 year old fridge that I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if it needs replacing before the old one.

    • AA5B@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      I’d be happy if my fridge had some sort of optional rack for an arbitrary tablet, with power supply or even a traditional paper calendar . Even happier if it had cheap simple Zigbee/z-wave/Thread sensors - let me choose to do or not do anything with them

      • Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        If these things all used Raspberry Pi compute modules, they could be reflashed with custom roms. Just loading stock Kodi would do most of what you might want put of a kitchen computer.

        • AA5B@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          There’s no reason they need so much processing, something that expensive. All you need is very cheap sensors - it really needs to be from the manufacturer for power and to get a signal through the metal skin.

          Minimal software, no required online services or planned obsolescence, no privacy violations or data collection, no confusion for anyone who chooses not to use it, very minimal price increase. Since I can track power consumption externally if I want, I’m not sure what you’d even want beyond temperature monitoring and alerts

          • conciselyverbose
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            6 months ago

            It’s not worth all the compromises.

            But having a camera inside the fridge so you can check if you need something when you’re at the store has definite utility.

            • AA5B@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              While that sounds like a good idea, I can’t see that working. You’d need many cameras and even then some stuff would be hidden behind others

              • conciselyverbose
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                6 months ago

                It’s not my idea. They have them.

                Obviously there’s a level of stuffing your fridge where you could be wrong, but that’s also bad for the actual refrigeration performance.

          • Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            I’m not sure what you’d even want beyond temperature monitoring and alerts

            Yes. Knowing if the fridge door was left open would be good. It’s terrible to come home and realize you’ve burnt out the motor and all the food is bad.

    • sugar_in_your_tea
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      6 months ago

      Unfortunately, they’re kinda hard to find. We recently got a new fridge, and most of the French door fridges (fridge on top, freezer on bottom) were smart or didn’t have a water dispenser.

      We ended up with a Whirlpool without smart features, other than the “smart” water dispenser (touch screen to auto-fill cup to X liters), and it still has “dumb” buttons for that as well. I haven’t taken it apart, but hopefully the dumb buttons act as a fallback when the smart buttons inevitably fail.

      • Alborlin@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        I was sleeping for fridge about a year ago, i didn’t find a single “smart” at all. Max tech was door ice and managed 🌡️ with digital dials

        • sugar_in_your_tea
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          6 months ago

          Really? I’m in the US and went to Home Depot, Lowes, Costco, and Best Buy. Our requirements:

          • ice dispenser in the freezer section - ice dispenser’s in the fridge have a high failure rate
          • external water dispenser
          • preference for french door fridge (freezer below fridge)
          • strong preference for no smart stuff
          • not LG or Samsung; strong preference for Maytag or Whirlpool

          So, here’s what we found:

          • about half of the french door refrigerators had “smart” stuff
          • about half of the remainder of french door fridges had a water dispenser in the door, the rest either had none or it was inside the fridge
          • only one french door refrigerator had an ice machine in the freezer, the rest either had none or it was in the fridge; water dispenser was inside the fridge

          So we bought a side-by-side fridge from Whirlpool, which met all of our requirements except the french door design.

    • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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      6 months ago

      There are two (fairly lackluster) uses for it.

      The first is that it has a camera with a large fisheye that can show you the inside (though this is more useful when away from the fridge rather than using the screen). The issue is the camera is only at one point. The fisheye helps see more, but it can never see all the fridge.

      The second is as a home assistant in the kitchen. This is actually useful. It can display recipes and whatever in it whole you cook. You can also use a phone, tablet, or other home assistant device for this though, but if you want to throw away money this does seem convenient.

      • sugar_in_your_tea
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        6 months ago

        They also can show arbitrary stuff, so it’s great for todos, family reminders, etc. We bought a chalkboard-like thing (wet chalk?), but a thin whiteboard would work too.

        My wife prefers using a tablet to cook since she can move it around (from the prep counter to next to the stove). I use my phone.

        We bought a new fridge recently, and while the smart features looked cool, I don’t trust them to get security updates, nor am I willing to pay a premium for cool features on a fridge that’s likely to have problems (Samsung and LG have the coolest features and the worst repair track records).

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    6 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    Yesterday morning, I woke up to a notice on my fridge alerting me that one of my favorite features was going away.

    And while that turned out not to be the case — the confusion highlights how precarious smart appliance features can be.

    “The notification was sent in error, and a correction will be released.” I also asked Langlois if he could explain why this happened and how many fridges sent out this message.

    It offers hundreds of live TV channels with news, sports, and plenty of classic TV (there’s an entire channel dedicated to Baywatch reruns and another to Degrassi Junior High), alongside movies on demand.

    I’m still waiting for that pop-up telling me all is good, but I’m definitely relieved I’m not losing the option to watch TV Plus on my fridge.

    But I like to have the T2 Tennis Channel on while I scramble eggs or pop on a news show while cooking dinner.


    The original article contains 470 words, the summary contains 156 words. Saved 67%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

  • devilish666@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Sometimes I wonder why people buying smart fridge in first place, it’s just fridge with touchscreen panel on it, what makes it’s so special compared to other fridges that has better cooling technology or bigger capacity or better electricity consumption