For just monitoring status CEC might work, not tried it, but with a Pi I think you can get the CEC data from the HDMI port.
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CEC 
I donât think I have had a single good experience with CEC
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Yeah, thatâs why Iâm saying, the not-so-reliable route⌠But, for just checking status it could very well be 100%.
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I just found this for Sony TVâs but it is unclear if this is only for their âProfessionalâ line of BRAVIA TVâs or if it also applicable for their consumer models as well.
I am quickly finding out that this is a very deep rabbit hole 
. I am getting the impression that professional system integrator companies are going out of their way to make this complicated as a sort of job security.
Do you know which brands and model lines support either of these methods, preferably an IP interface?
Update: So I found these existing integrations, primarily with NR but also found a Hisense MQTT integration which sounds interesting especially if you can subscribe to power events. I am honestly leaning towards Hisense because they had the sense of using an existing IoT protocol and also has AndroidTV as their smart tv provider so push comes to shove I could mess with the ADB of that.
Also looking at Home Assistant, the best any of their TV integrations do are local polling, which is where my current Vizio integration is at. I have never messed with MQTT but if I understand it correctly, that would be the best chance for local pushing via subscriptions right?
Update 2: I think I am slowly coming to the conclusion that a better way to handle this is to handle it via the remote, or at least a combination of both. These smart TVâs are far too inconsistent YoY and the effort you put in now to get it working might be washed away with a single product release. Whereas a remote control setup would span multiple TVâs should it come to that. Does anyone know how much would a setup from RTI would be?
Can you be more specific on âstatusâ. What status are you looking for? To control or even get status a TV must have power. TVâs that allow control use a âsleepâ mode where the screen is off but the TV still has power. This is necessary to actually get status from the TV and to control it.
TCL Roku TVâs all have status and control through the Roku ECP IP interface. This can provide a lot of status of the TV, what channel (aka app) is running/playing and control of launching those channels and volume and TV functions. What you canât do is control the App directly as those are their own thing.
No âweâ donât make this difficult, nor is it difficult when you use the right hardware to interface. A common DIY method is to use Global Cache devices to interface with the TV and whatever control system youâre using. Most TV makers all have a lineup of âcommercialâ or âproâ series of TVâs that include serial or IP interfaces. All of the major brands to and the interfaces are well documented.
This is the WHY every single professional control system offers remote controls. RTI, URC, Control4, Savant, Crestron⌠they all have remote controls to work in tandem with the control system for A/V device control. The system processor has a driver for the make/model for IP control or they will interface with serial or IR for devices without IP control.
Yes. However RTI is not a DIY system. Youâre not going to buy it from someone and then be able to configure and manage it completely by yourself.
To start with, all I was hoping for was on/off status. Ideally I would also want play/pause status, but that would force me to use their smart TV stuff which introduces a whole other issue I rather not get into right now.
I hear what you are saying, but to me that sounds a lot like âItâs not difficult if you know the right people, have the right hardware, and know how to do itâ which kinda makes it sound like it is difficult. And maybe the issue isnât with the system integrators, maybe it is an unavoidable truth when you try to corral the multitude of disjoint and non-standardized brands and provide a nice interface on top. It seems logical that they would do everything in their power to make sure that the effort they put in isnât just copied for free, hence the perceived barricades and hoops a consumer has to jump through.
I think this speaks to my point. There is absolutely no reason every system canât be DIY if the buyer chooses to, they paid for it after all, at least that is my perspective. The fact that some systems like these intentionally create these barriers just feels extremely âgatekeepyâ to me.
My original intent with this thread was simply to find the best TV brands out there for smart home control and monitoring. Maybe I should have been more specific on the DIY front so that is my bad. But at the same time if we canât have conversations like this in a community such as this, I am not really sure where else they would take place. That is what I love about this community so much, it is a crossroads of so many types of people.
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In a way it is very âgatekeepyâ. The rational of it is that these companies such as RTI, URC, Control4, Savant, Crestron have been around for a long time (20+ years) for most of them and they have a reputation (brand image) to maintain. In todayâs world of internet forums and reddit and places a brand name can get torn apart very quickly by only a handful of people spreading negative information. None of these systems are âeasyâ to deploy correctly. I will say they are not âhardâ but they do require understanding and training to understand them.
In the past a couple of these companies did sell to DIY and it was a disaster for them. Not only in brand tarnishing from users but also in support costs. People really donât consider the true cost of providing quality support and when trying to provide support to un-trained and often non-technical end-users that gets VERY expensive very quickly.
Lutron is the only âdealer systemâ that is still offering any form of DIY still. They were smart and made training mandatory for the consumer to get the programming software.
I read discussions and info from the pro systems on occasion where there are itâs discussed about providing DIY offerings or access and Control4 has moved in this direction with allowing consumers to program 90% of the system on their own. The main limitation is the inability to add new devices/drivers. However this DIY capability comes with a cost to the consumer in a subscription which pays for the support. Many people are complaining about this subscription but they want the ability to break the system. I say let them break the system and then charge double for the support call but thatâs just me.
I do remote management and installs for RTI systems. As the dealer I work with the users and DIY installs. However if you break the system and call me for support you better believe Iâm charging a lot more for the time to fix it again.
Long and probably just a rant.
Back to the TV. If you want status and control and not have to introduce a lot of other things into the mix I like Roku TVâs. The IP interface is nice because it works with any control processor and provides the TV status and âplayingâ status of the channels (roku app). You can also control most of the functions. With the interface being IP the control processor stays aware of any âmanualâ changes so if someone users the normal remote to do something thatâs reflected in the Roku system and gets reflected to the control processor. Unlike with a Harmony remote if the TV or AV subsystem gets out of sync then Harmony is now broken. There are some âandroidâ TVâs that work this way but they do require a driver integration using the âadbâ interface and it really is a hack.
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Rant or not, I found it very insightful. I donât know anyone in that field really so hearing the history and back and forth this industry has gone through was interesting. I do tend to agree with you however, consumers should be given all the rope they need should they request it, even if it will result in negative consequences. The moment that doesnât happen, suddenly the conversation isnât about the tech and is now more about the âmoral obligationâ of the company to âprotectâ the consumer, and in my eyes they suddenly take on the role a parent might to a child, which to me is just not healthy in this context. I also agree with you on giving the consumer the freedom to break their own devices, but at the exact same time, consumers shouldnât get mad or expect free repairs if they do break it. Actions have consequences and all of that.
BTW, this is all under the assumption that there is not malice on the side of the company, e.g. intentionally creating traps for consumers to fall into to promote their official non-DIY setup.
This is exactly what I am looking for. Two-way syncing, especially if it is push and not poll, was really my one non-negotiable if it exists at all. That is what drew me to the MQTT of Hisense. I have reservations about Roku as I have never really liked their interface or how they try to be the cheap Apple TV, but if the display quality is good, price is good, and integration is good, I can always add my own sources like a Nvidia Shield TV or Xbox.
In regards to the TCL IP interface, how stable do you think it is, i.e. how long has it been around, has it seen many breaking revisions, is it documented well, etc?
I agree with this. Which is a reason why I work mostly with RTI and not with Control4 or others. Control4 is very strict in all regards of who has control. RTI is a little more open as they are the manufacturer and we are the dealers/installers and we are free to choose how we interact with our customers and what levels of access we provide to customers. Which is great for both parties involved.
Itâs the same boat with integrations/plugins/apps/whatever if they are given free Iâve found the users are far more demanding about updates/fixes than those users who pay for integrations. The paid users tend to understand things take time and you canât just hack out a fix for their single issue that may have unintended consequences and break things for others. Itâs all a balancing act.
Itâs not a TCL interface. Itâs the Roku ECP. TCL is just one of the large TV makers for âRoku TVâsâ. The interface is purely a Roku thing that is fully integrated to the TVâs.
The Roku ECP is a poll not a push.
The Roku interface has gotten a lot better. If you slap a Shield or Xbox or something else onto the TV then you lose a part of the functionality of knowing âwhat is playingâ if you wanted to integrate that into a dashboard or interface. If the intention is to do this itâs much better to find a good TV with serial or direct IP interface for basic TV functions and then use a android integration or xbox integration to build up the multimedia status and controls.
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Yeah this is my ideal setup. I hate smart-tvâs with a passion, but I rather not get into that right now. 
Any recommendations on that front? I wasnât even aware those still existed.
Oh, that makes the decision more complicated. I have reservations about constant polling, especially if it is over a non-dedicated network, so that leaves me either having to find another way to intelligently poll or be fine with a latency of constant polling that is serviceable for the network.
I have found the same, but it always confounds me because if anything it should be the opposite no? 
I also think this speaks to a much larger âsocietalâ problem that is well out of the scope of this forum.
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Most of the major brands still have dumb TVâs. They are marketed as part of their âcommercialâ line up and often used for signage displays.
I understand. I donât particularly like polling but sometimes itâs appropriate. I have a TCL Roku TV setup and itâs polled quite frequently and itâs nothing to my network. Works just fine via Wifi or Wired connection.
I think that topic would require itâs own forum and babysitters 
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I appreciate the heads up, but that effectively brings me back to square one and back to the start of this thread, minus your suggestion of Roku based TVâs, but even then, at least for my use case, is only as good as my current Vizio TV.
It seems that outside of Hisense and their MQTT communication, every other brand is more or less the same when it comes to DIY control/monitoring, for their commercial lines anyway. The differentiator then becomes the display quality and/or the OOB calibration of the TV. But that is something that is not covered very often for these âcommercialâ displays, at least based on my initial research. So if anyone has any resources or recommendations of where to start I would appreciate it.
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Going back to the beginning of your question. I think itâs the wrong question. You are trying to find a TV that has âgood smart home integrationsâ. Define this? What controller are you actually using or wanting to use.
Problem is that NONE of the typical DIY home controllers have âgoodâ integrations with most home TVâs or A/V systems. This is because most of the DIY systems are based around âhubsâ or software only and donât provide the physical capabilities to integrate with lots of devices that they could or they donât have proper integrations with 3rd party controllers to achieve this through drivers (plugins/integrations/whatever).
Most TVâs out there arenât going to support âpushâ as itâs not the job of the TV to control your smart home but itâs the home controllers job to control and manage the TV. Now you mentioned the Hisense with MQTT and thatâs pretty cool. If you could share a link Iâd like to look into that more. The TCL series of Roku TVâs and any other brand of Roku TV is the closest youâre going to find that is DIY friendly with an open API for integration through Node-RED or other software integrations. As mentioned before many, nearly all major brands offer serial connections to control the TVâs from controllers or Global Cache controllers. The problem here is that not many of the DIY âhubsâ actually have good drivers if any for Global Cache and this tends to be a 1-way configuration anyways using serial. Hence why the controller is in charge of controlling the TV. Now this is a problem as if the TV is changed outside of the controller then you donât get any update of this change back to the controller⌠Youâve likely experienced this if you use Harmony remotes and someone changes the TV with the OEM remote or manually. Same thing.
Pro systems provide remote controls that interface with the controller which is then controlling the TV.
Now the Roku TV integration is a polling interface. However I have my controlling polling the TVâs every 5 seconds and thereâs zero impact on my network. This is a tiny tiny amount of data that is polled. Polling is not a huge issue on the network until you start polling internet end-points and that introduces latency. However the amount of data is still tiny. The Roku polling is all internal traffic local to your network and in modern wired or wireless networks itâs nothing. Do not fear the polling⌠
A Roku TV along with a driver for your control processor would be a very good option. Now the question/problem is what processor are you using, if any and whether it integrates.
Now if you wanted to do a full blown DIY hack-o-thon you could use a Global Cache unit with a serial or IR block to your TV. Then use an IR reciever like a Flirc or something and from a driver/integration use the remote + IR + Flirc to the control the Global Cache to then control the TV. Since your driver/integration would be controlling the TV (even with your remote as itâs now using the hacked Flirc receiver) then your âautomation systemâ would know the status of the TV and such. However you still have the same problem of the âhome automationâ being out of sync IF the TV is changed not using the hacked together integration solution. Hence where having a Roku TV being polled to pickup any outside changes becomes a really nice thing.
Another option in DIY space would be a android based TV that could be hacked and use the ADB controls to get TV information. This has been done with FireTV systems but is kinda a hit or miss and breaks when Amazon decides they want to change things and update the TV as they donât intend for the TV to be used this way.
Just some ideas and some more rants
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Honestly I was hoping to use a Core, but that is another topic entirely. Most likely I will be using Hubitat with Node-RED for rules and automations, so if the TV can directly integrate into NR that would be acceptable. Hell, something that works with Alexa or Google Home and has fast pushing of the status, unlikely due to cloud interface, would work.
Reference my above post, also notice that I found those other manufacturerâs 3rd party integrations and I would be curious on your take compared to Roku TVâs integrations. Also regarding Hisense the repo is more of a guide than it is software or a traditional integration. It seems that their mobile app uses MQTT for its protocol and he is just giving the steps of how to connect via that without your phone, which as an aside seems to be how most of these âintegrationsâ are. They seem to just be emulating a phoneâs connection to the TV.
This will probably be my second option behind Hisense if that doesnât pan out. With Amazon and the FireTV yeah I could see that as an issue, but I dont forsee that happening with the likes of a Nvidia Shield or even a Google/Android TV smart TV. Amazonâs stuff is based on Android yes, but they put a layer of their stuff on top which is where the issues are introduced generally.
A few things:
- Another route may be to monitor your AV receiver. My Denon receivers provide instant power and input status. The Denon API is pretty well documented and the Hubitat drivers (I use the community one) works well.
- I like my Rokus, but Roku is a big data monitoring device (but so are the TV makers). So I run a pi-hole to minimize the traffic
- I know results may be a way off, but I believe that Amazon is forcing all the AV companies to start to use Matter. Hopefully that will provide better routes to automate AV equipment.
How do they have the power to do this?
Access to Alexa
I mean if that means actually good Alexa integration then I am all for it. Yeah these companies have skills but boy are a lot of them garbage. At least my Yamaha one is. Why is it so difficult for them to just show each zone as a speaker so I can make that they default music output of my group.
I think thatâs the point.
Late to the game. I use a community integration for my lg television. It is quite functional, and utilizes a websocket for push updates I believe. i have been happy with it, not that I actually use it a lotâŚ
Can control a large amount of the built in functions as well as monitor power stateâŚ
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