this post was submitted on 17 Jun 2026
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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:
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.
I want to know what I can do with an existing Roku Ultra box I have. I've been using it in my office lounge ever since I was gifted it by a recruiter, but only have experience hacking Fire TV devices.