Anyone use any the Android TV boxes from Amazon

There are a plethora of Android TV boxes on Amazon. I was thinking of getting on as opposed to using FireTV sticks for my clients. Has anyone had any luck with any of these?

If you are into Neftflix and Amazon Video they are not worth it. Nothing beats The FireTV 4K (FireTV Cube), AppleTV 4K or the Shield TV. Plus Operating System support for these Fake AndroidTV boxes is lacking.

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Backing up what Edwin_Perez said. It's basically a phone connected to a TV. They use mobile apps

Yeah, those boxes are not running Android TV. They're just running regular android. They even have the buttons at the bottom of the screen :joy:

Better to just stick to the devices that we fully support if you want to have a good experience.

gotcha thanks

There are units that run actual ATV OS.
I have seen some names/models floating around on other fourms and from a few tech folks I know on Discord that they use and recommend. Some are very good for modders or folks advanced in Android and software tweaking.
But, yea, they are mostly China rip off os of some sort
But i really like how most of them have dedicated Audio outputs, which is something i could have used.

I think there is some official Google ATV dev box unit out there....cant recall what it was called.

I got a Shield, as it was the only ATV box sold in physical store, and those same tech folks that have generic ATV boxes, all cource, that Shield is the top device for ATV....period. I had tried a Roku Ultra as well, but found it to limited and lacking in apps and features.

I am not much a fan of the Home Screen/Launcher on the Shield though.
But it is overkill for a stream box for sure. but does do games quite well.

For android TV, you basically have 3 choices, here they are ranked (I have all three, so this is accurate)

Nvidia shield > AirTV mini > Xiaomi Mi Box S

I was quite surprised by the performance of the airtv mini. People on ebay almost give them away because they have an annoying startup that goes right into Sling. You can change this to another app (theres a post on it on xda) and it works much better. Of course the app to change the start to will be Channels!

Other then the Nvidia Shield: Due to Amazon's ongoing spat with Google: No Amazon Prime Video on Android TV boxes.

We have a couple Xiaomi MiBox S'. I'm slowly phasing both those and the Fire TVs out for Apple TVs.

Channel master stream + is still available
Don't know if TiVo's has been released yet.

I have Android Prime Video on my Sony TV. :man_shrugging:t2: Are you only speaking about external boxes?

Yeah, there are a couple others, other than the Shield, I've read about having Amazon Prime Video. Theory is those manufacturers cut individual deals with Google for AP Video to be available. But for most Android TV devices you have to side-load it. Several times Google has taken measures to subsequently disable it after people have done that.

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