693
"The refrigerator is dead": Samsung's AI fridges shut down after update, causes outrage
(www.notebookcheck.net)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 23 Sep 2026
693 points (99.1% liked)
Not The Onion
22527 readers
1659 users here now
Welcome
We're not The Onion! Not affiliated with them in any way! Not operated by them in any way! All the news here is real!
The Rules
Posts must be:
- Links to news stories from...
- ...credible sources, with...
- ...their original headlines, that...
- ...would make people who see the headline think, “That has got to be a story from The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.”
Please also avoid duplicates.
Comments and post content must abide by the server rules for Lemmy.world and generally abstain from trollish, bigoted, ableist, or otherwise disruptive behavior that makes this community less fun for everyone.
And that’s basically it!
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
A refrigerator should never need an update. Smart appliances are the stupidest shit I ever heard of. A refrigerator should not need anything but an outlet and maybe a water connection.
look, i wouldn't mind a dashboad where i could see when the dishwasher was run, that the rinse fluid is low, the temperature in the fridge ans freezer over time, how many times the ice machine refilled, when the AC on....
smart devices could have been cool.
what we got was the ability for the power company to turn of my fridge, requiring a broken app to run cycles on a dishwasher, and spying for no benefit in every device.
The idea has promise and i hold a small glimmer of hope for home assistant. But, like so many things companies did not give anyone what they wanted.
One of the reasons techies are burning out is because they are tired of seeing the promise of a new tech and watching it be used to enable surveillance.
For a fridge the functionality as an appliance shouldn’t be linked to the functionality as a device with a web browser. Ice bucket low? Sensor sends signal to app, fine. But the fridge doesn’t need to know that; it can keep using the float switch or whatever it used to before “smart”. Temperature tracking same thing - bolt a sensor and hook it to the app, but don’t use that app and sensor to control the fridge.
But to build an ecosystem like that you'd need a developer, you can't just slop together an app, have you thought about the cost? And the shareholders!!
A lot of people using Home Assistant make some of those things happen.
I do too. But most commercial appliance integrations are hacks, and having missing featurea or dont really work most of the time. Many times I suspect skirting very close to violating TOS too.
HA is great if you have matter or zigbee or zwave. Probably even some of the proprietary in building protocols too. But these one off cloud commercial systems honestly suck in my experience.
I’ve run a household for 20 years and never needed anything like this
Need != could be useful
What would be really cool is if a fridge kept track of how fresh everything was, and alerted users when food spoiled, or was about to spoil, or on track to spoil given how seldom it was consumed.
I can't tell you how many times yogurt or sour cream has gone bad in my fridge because everyone forgets it's in there.
Also, detecting ice buildup and consequently adjusting humidity or water flow to the ice maker etc
i doubt it can tell that things are spoiling or moldy, decomposition, spoiling is a complex process, and may look normal ont eh surface but actually went bad if you "smell taste it.
More likely would be a system that uses cameras to see what you put in, alongside a program to identify what type of item it is, and a record of its estimated time of spoiling. Say you put in a pack of bagels, and the fridge deduces it is a new pack because you haven't recently taken bagels out. The fridge estimates they will probably last 1-2 weeks. Then depending on how much they are removed and put back in, it might throw a reminder on the screen "bagels still good?" etc
In the UK barcodes are getting replaced with qr codes that include everything from best by to ingredients and allergens. A system could easily use that and you just scan the qr code when you put it in the fridge
Give me a washer, dryer and dishwasher that send my phone an alerr when they finish please.
With home assistant we usually monitor a smart plug: instant power goes above x value -> cycle has started, power goes (close) to zero for x time -> cycle has ended, send notification. In my case I raise a flag value that reminds me periodically to unload the machine until I confirm that I've done it
I just set a timer
Doesn’t work for washers and dryers that use sensors to tell when the clothes are clean/dry.
Thankfully, my set is “connected” in that you can connect to it to see status updates and adjust notification volume, but everything else is manual.
My fridge also has monitoring, and tells you if the inside temperature goes outside range. It also lets you toggle the ice maker, notify you when it’s full and adjust temperature of the three compartments. I can see that last one triggering something similar to Samsung’s gaffe if a firmware update hard locked the temperatures to negative values or something.
I didn't know they made those without timers. Mine have those sensors too. I use the time setting.
Those sensors don't work anyway. Just do it by time.
Mine does... Both my washer and dryer will take longer or shorter of the alloted timer based on how actually "done" the wash is.
A 20 minute cycle on my dryer might end up finishing after 12 minutes. So it turns off.
And then you have to run it again because that sensor has a very different definition of what "extra dry" means than the rest of the world.
I've owned this dryer for 5 years and had to run a second dry cycle once because a massive sleeping bag was in with some clothes and it was still slightly damp.
But please, continue. I'd love for some dipshit on the Internet to tell me how my own appliances work.
Congratulations, I've used several and none have been worth a shit.
I recently had to buy all new kitchen appliances. They are machines, as simple as is available. I do admit the fridge does have digital controls, and they're kinda nice.
Agreed. The idea of reminders that I bought something in particular and should eat it before it goes bad is an appealing one. This seems like the opposite of that, though.
Honestly, this is not outside of possibility. My 3d printer does more complicated metrics. I'd be willing to bet we'd be able to do aftermarket mods for that if anyone was willing to DIY these days.
not as bad as those people buying a SMART MATRESS.
Oh hell no
That's nothing. We had to install a firmware update on a chef's knife! 🤣
Why the fuck do you even own that?
I know right? Yet people buy them.
Like SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world