Three things. None of them are new.

A TV you already own, a browser that came with it, and a free dotBlast account. With those three, you can have your menu board running on the wall above the counter in about ten minutes. No installer. No IT ticket. No vendor coming out to “scope the project.”

If you’ve been putting this off because you assume digital menu boards are complicated, expensive, or require a contractor — this post is for you. It’s the practical, no-fluff version of what every café, restaurant, and small shop owner actually needs to know.

This is the post the complete digital menu board guide keeps pointing at. That one covers what to put on the screen. This one covers the actual setup — the five steps that get you from a blank TV to a live, updatable menu in ten minutes.

What You Need Before You Start

The honest list:

  • A TV or monitor. Any screen with an HDMI input works. Most cafés use a 32–43” screen behind the counter or on a back wall, but a 24” works fine for a small bar. If the TV was made after 2018, it almost certainly has a built-in browser — Samsung, LG, Sony, and most Android TV sets all ship with one. No extra hardware needed.
  • A Wi-Fi or wired network connection. The TV needs internet to receive menu updates. If your Wi-Fi reaches the kitchen or counter, you’re set. If it doesn’t, a €10–€15 Ethernet cable along the skirting board is the boring fix.
  • A dotBlast account. The free tier covers one dashboard on one device — exactly what you need to start. No credit card. Ten seconds to sign up at dotblast.app.

That’s the entire kit. There is no fourth item. The thing people worry about — a media player, a special cable, a proprietary screen — is not on the list. If your TV is from 2018 or later, the browser is already there. If it’s older, a €30–€40 streaming stick (Fire TV Stick, Chromecast with Google TV, or an Android TV box) plugs into HDMI and gives you a browser.

Step 1: Build Your Menu in dotBlast

Open dotblast.app in your laptop browser and create a new dashboard. dotBlast uses a grid-based layout — drag in the widgets you need, resize them, and arrange them.

For a menu board, you usually want:

  • A clock — shows the time and adds visual rhythm to the screen
  • One or more text / image widgets — these carry your menu items, prices, daily specials, and the photos that printed menus can’t carry
  • An iframe widget — for pulling in live data: your Instagram feed, today’s weather, a Google Calendar of events, or a metric from your POS

Most menus are three to six widgets arranged in a clean grid. The layout snaps to a 12-column grid, so everything aligns without fiddling.

Tip: Set the theme to match your brand before you start dropping in content. Go to dashboard settings → Theme and pick from built-in presets or create a custom colour scheme. Picking the colours once and reusing them across widgets is what makes a board look intentional instead of thrown together.

When the layout looks right, click Save. You’ll need the dashboard ID in the next step.

Step 2: Get the Dashboard URL

Open your dashboard in dotBlast and click Share → Quick Link. A short link like dotblast.app/go/K7RM4Q appears — valid for up to 60 minutes, and far easier to type on a TV remote than a full dashboard URL.

You’ll paste this short link into the TV browser in the next step. If you prefer, the dashboard also has a permanent View URL — same destination, longer to type.

Step 3: Load It on the TV

Two paths, depending on whether this TV will be permanent or temporary.

Option A — Quick Link (easiest, for first-time setup)

  1. On the TV, open the built-in browser from the home screen.
  2. Type the short link from Step 2 into the address bar.
  3. dotBlast loads the dashboard full-screen and auto-registers the device.

Done. The TV is now showing your menu.

Option B — PIN linking (for a permanent installation)

If the TV is going to stay there — behind the counter, in the window, in the waiting area — use the PIN flow. It binds the device to your account so it reconnects automatically after a power cut or reboot.

  1. Open dotblast.app in the TV browser — you’ll see a 6-digit PIN on screen.
  2. In your dotBlast account on the laptop, go to Devices → Link device.
  3. Enter the PIN shown on the TV.
  4. Choose which dashboard to display.
  5. The TV updates immediately — no refresh needed.

Once linked, the device shows the dashboard full-screen. Updates you make in dotBlast appear on the TV in real time over a WebSocket connection — change a price on your laptop at 4 PM and the screen reflects it within seconds.

Step 4: Stop the Screen From Going to Sleep

This is the single most common reason a freshly set up menu board “stops working” overnight. The TV’s energy-saving settings put the screen to sleep after 10–30 minutes of no input, and an unattended browser counts as no input.

You fix it once on the TV, and the browser stays awake:

Fire TV Stick / Android TV: Settings → Display → Sleep → Never

Samsung / LG / Sony smart TV: Settings → General → System Manager → Time → Sleep Timer → Off (and disable any auto-power-off in the Eco Solution menu)

Chromecast with Google TV: Settings → System → Display → Sleep → Never

Raspberry Pi: Edit /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf and set:

xserver-command=X -s 0 -dpms

dotBlast also asks the browser to stay awake on its end using the W3C Wake Lock API, which prevents the browser tab from being throttled when the screen is technically on but unused. Belt and braces — the TV setting is what actually keeps the panel lit.

Step 5: The Next-Morning Check

Walk in the next morning and look at the screen. Three things should be true:

  1. The screen is on — no screensaver, no sleep mode, no “no signal” message.
  2. The menu is current — whatever you saved in dotBlast is what’s showing.
  3. The clock is moving — a frozen clock is the fastest tell that the browser has crashed and needs a refresh.

If any of those three are wrong, the most likely culprit is sleep mode (Step 4 wasn’t applied to the right menu). The second most likely is the network — a router reboot overnight can sometimes leave the TV disconnected. Unplug the TV from power for ten seconds, plug it back in, and reload the dashboard URL.

That’s it. You’re done. Total time: ten minutes. Total ongoing work: updating the menu in dotBlast whenever your specials change.

The Same Ten Minutes Works for Office, Clinic, and Waiting-Room Screens

The five steps above aren’t menu-specific. The same setup gets a team dashboard on an office TV, a patient information display in a clinic waiting room, or a front-of-house screen for any small business running on the wall in the same ten minutes. The only thing that changes is what you build in Step 1 — KPIs for the office, health tips for the waiting room, today’s menu for the café.

If you want a more strategic view of what to put on the screen before you build it, the complete digital menu board guide covers content ideas in depth — daily specials, brand story, photo strategy, scheduled promotions.

Ready to Try It?

If you’ve got a TV on the wall and an afternoon free, you can have a working menu board before your next service. The free tier covers exactly this use case, no card required.

Start free with dotBlast →

If it doesn’t work in your café, we’d rather hear why than have you churn silently.

This is Foundation Post #5 in our practical guide series for restaurant operators. The previous post covers what to put on your digital menu board — read it before or after the setup, depending on whether you’d rather plan first or build first.