R-T-B's house of Hisense Firmware

[R-T-B]

No pressure, no one wants to brick their new hardware. As fun as it all is, I'm here to help not hurt lol.

 

[DaleAlan]

No pressure, no one wants to brick their new hardware. As fun as it all is, I'm here to help not hurt lol.

I remember googling it when I first got it and everyone said it’s impossible but I’m sure it could be done as I can’t see them changing the internals for different OS’ but it’d be a risk as you’ve said. As long as it auto switches out of the restrictive PC mode I’m happy enough. Any refresh rate change knocks it straight out and stays out until it’s restarted (cheers framerate matching in Kodi haha) so allows full control of the picture settings. Weird firmware to say the least.

 

[R-T-B]

It all depends on the actual chipset used really. It can vary from not very much to a whole lot depending in what was available to these manufacturers that particular day, but you are right to assume many are probably made from similar parts. Still iffy to just crossflash though... always is.

 

[DaleAlan]

It all depends on the actual chipset used really. It can vary from not very much to a whole lot depending in what was available to these manufacturers that particular day, but you are right to assume many are probably made from similar parts. Still iffy to just crossflash though... always is.

Yeah debated it originally but the risk outweighs the benefits. The NAND could be specific to the Google system. Easiest way would be a board swap if the internals connections matched between comparable sets but that could be a job for when my warranty runs out. Won’t be anytime soon. Cheers Richer Sounds for the extended warranty

It’s got a couple of quirks but for what I paid it was an absolute bargain as they price matched a Costco deal so using it as a dumb tv is no biggie as it’s always connected to my laptop it’s more for proof of concept. It’d be fun to have the Google system. Vidaa just can’t compete.

For anyone in the EU there’s another site for the U8K with firmware downloads available here https://4pda.to/forum/index.php?showtopic=1079549 (hit translate to English if required) if you click Useful Resources it will bring up a list of links which also includes older firmware to download. There’s also a direct link to GoogleDrive for the same https://drive.google.com/drive/mobile/folders/1zBmOUaPeBAzTtOIegZpe9e0k8qpl1PLr (dunno why I’ve spent time Googling around I don’t even have a U8 but it’s kept me out of mischief if nothing else ) same instructions as usual but I’ve clanked on a pic just in case.

 

[R-T-B]

Yeah debated it originally but the risk outweighs the benefits. The NAND could be specific to the Google system. Easiest way would be a board swap if the internals connections matched between comparable sets but that could be a job for when my warranty runs out. Won’t be anytime soon. Cheers Richer Sounds for the extended warranty

It’s got a couple of quirks but for what I paid it was an absolute bargain as they price matched a Costco deal so using it as a dumb tv is no biggie as it’s always connected to my laptop it’s more for proof of concept. It’d be fun to have the Google system. Vidaa just can’t compete.

For anyone in the EU there’s another site for the U8K with firmware downloads available here https://4pda.to/forum/index.php?showtopic=1079549 (hit translate to English if required) if you click Useful Resources it will bring up a list of links which also includes older firmware to download. There’s also a direct link to GoogleDrive for the same https://drive.google.com/drive/mobile/folders/1zBmOUaPeBAzTtOIegZpe9e0k8qpl1PLr (dunno why I’ve spent time Googling around I don’t even have a U8 but it’s kept me out of mischief if nothing else ) same instructions as usual but I’ve clanked on a pic just in case.

Yeah, good find as well. I'm still cataloging your previous find. Its over 100GBs lol. Still should be done in a day or so.

 

[DaleAlan]

Yeah, good find ad well. I'm still cataloging your previous find. Its over 100GBs lol. Still should be done in a day or so.

View attachment 409151

Ooof you’ve taken on a huge job but not all heroes wear capes and you’ll get your reward in the next life if not this one Yeah that new site linked is really good too once you delve into it for us poor Vidaa peeps. *shakes fist at you Googley’s*

 

[Space Lynx]

@R-T-B my dad has a hisense 65" 4k roku os tv for many years, it updates all the time with no issues. we really like Hisense, my mom has one too and its really impressive considering the price tag.

i know this isn't really on topic, just wanted to share my experience, I think the trick with Hisense is to make sure it is a Roku OS on it, I find it very nice anyway

 

[R-T-B]

@R-T-B my dad has a hisense 65" 4k roku os tv for many years, it updates all the time with no issues. we really like Hisense, my mom has one too and its really impressive considering the price tag.

i know this isn't really on topic, just wanted to share my experience, I think the trick with Hisense is to make sure it is a Roku OS on it, I find it very nice anyway

It's ontopic, one bad firmware experience doesn't make them all bad. I just like to provide options. Thank you for your experience.

Google or Roku is certainly the better half of them than the VIDDAA stuff, but even it works fine as a dumb tv.

 

[Space Lynx]

It's ontopic, one bad firmware experience doesn't make them all bad. I just like to provide options. Thank you for your experience.

Google or Roku is certainly the better half of them than the VIDDAA stuff, but even it works fine as a dumb tv.

yeah my parents don't understand technology, so my mom upgraded her super old tv earlier this she wanted it to be like my dad's hisense roku in the living room, which we have had no issues at all with for several years now. well, she bought a hisense tv but it was one of the different OS ones, probably google os or something, she hated it and refunded it and i had to explain to them it had to be Roku OS Hisense

once they got that though they have been happy since, my mom has a 2025 model 58" hisense roku model i think, the picture quality on it is absolutely insane... it only cost $258 earlier this year... honestly the picture on it really impresses me, and I am an OLED fanboy. and it's not even Mini-LED... so yeah Hisense is really great quality imo they are prob harvesting our data like no ones business, but i don't think we give a damn anymore lmao

 

[R-T-B]

yeah my parents don't understand technology, so my mom upgraded her super old tv earlier this she wanted it to be like my dad's hisense roku in the living room, which we have had no issues at all with for several years now. well, she bought a hisense tv but it was one of the different OS ones, probably google os or something, she hated it and refunded it and i had to explain to them it had to be Roku OS Hisense

once they got that though they have been happy since, my mom has a 2025 model 58" hisense roku model i think, the picture quality on it is absolutely insane... it only cost $258 earlier this year... honestly the picture on it really impresses me, and I am an OLED fanboy. and it's not even Mini-LED... so yeah Hisense is really great quality imo they are prob harvesting our data like no ones business, but i don't think we give a damn anymore lmao

Mine is a miniled so I may be talking out of my ass, but I have to say, the brightness on quantum dot anything is actually really nice. But so is the deep blacks of OLED. Pros and cons.

 

[R-T-B]

Update on my rooting adventure: There is a bug in any firmware older than 55U8K's O0730 that allows you to keep your widevine key, and thus continue to stream 4K rooted. As you can imagine, I have switched to that style of firmware now, and am documenting this as we speak (look for a "rooting" subfolder in the models I own soon).

The other news is I have finished organizing that massive gdrive of firmware, and they will be up shortly, albeit more or less without documentation.