Google-branded 4k Android TV Dongle

[Icarus_BZ]

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/04/mysterious-google-branded-4k-android-tv-dongle-shows-up-at-the-fcc/
 

The Android TV has long been overlooked as a legitimate streaming option. I mean, I didn't even know it existed. This afternoon, it was revealed that a new Google branded 4k TV dongle (manufactured by Shenzhen SEI Robotics Co., Ltd) had passed through the FCC.

 

What do you think? Are we finally looking at a direct head-to-head competitor to the Amazon Fire Stick? As an Android user who is admittedly rather detached from the Google ecosystem, I am perfectly content with my Fire Stick. However, I'm always a fan of competition

Quote

The manual—which is full of terrible English and definitely needs an edit pass—describes an Android TV device with a quad-core Amlogic S905X SoC (four Cortex A53s at 1.5GHz or 2GHz), 2GB of RAM, and 8GB of storage. The device supports hardware-accelerated video decoding at 4K/60FPS from both H.265 and Google's own VP9 codec..

[Crunchy Dragon]

Please edit your post to match Tech News posting guidelines or it will be moved out of Tech News.

https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/11724-posting-guidelines-read-before-posting/

[Icarus_BZ]

@Crunchy Dragon I apologise, I'm new to the forum. Does this edit satisfy the Tech News posting guidelines?

[Crunchy Dragon]

1 minute ago, Icarus_BZ said:

@Crunchy Dragon I apologise, I'm new to the forum. Does this edit satisfy the Tech News posting guidelines?

No worries, you're fine.

 

Unfortunately no, it doesn't. I'll highlight what you still need to do in red:

Quote

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Welcome to the forums

[NTDaws]

Well finally, I always hated the Chromecast OS.

[Sniperfox47]

This will be a good device for developers. Hopefully we can see some more widespread support for Android TV.

 

That being said, I personally will stick with my Nvidia Shield. This seems like a good replacement for the Nexus Player, but doesn't seem like anything powerful enough for even basic games.

[Zodiark1593]

2 hours ago, Sniperfox47 said:

This will be a good device for developers. Hopefully we can see some more widespread support for Android TV.

 

That being said, I personally will stick with my Nvidia Shield. This seems like a good replacement for the Nexus Player, but doesn't seem like anything powerful enough for even basic games.

If cheap enough, this could be a more powerful device for emulation than the Raspberri Pi, and by that, I mean the gpu is powerful enough for more advanced shaders.

[Sniperfox47]

28 minutes ago, Zodiark1593 said:

If cheap enough, this could be a more powerful device for emulation than the Raspberri Pi, and by that, I mean the gpu is powerful enough for more advanced shaders.

The GPU is a little more than twice as powerful (Mali 450 vs VC4) with a traditional OpenGLES driver rather than a solution partially implimented in software on the CPU.

 

And the CPU has a higher clock (1.5Ghz vs 1.2)

[Zodiark1593]

40 minutes ago, Sniperfox47 said:

The GPU is a little more than twice as powerful (Mali 450 vs VC4) with a traditional OpenGLES driver rather than a solution partially implimented in software on the CPU.

 

And the CPU has a higher clock (1.5Ghz vs 1.2)

The Mali 450 would be limited to OpenGL ES 2.0, though for shader filters, I'm not certain if that is of any real concern. However, the gpu is apparently an MP3 part clocked at 750 MHz (doesn't change the "little more than twice as fast" bit), so I'm pretty hopeful that good quality CRT shaders can be implemented. 

 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnx-software.com/2016/01/12/amlogic-s905x-processor-specifications/amp/

[Curufinwe_wins]

I'm all about that chromecast life. Sorry. Not interested.

 

 

[LAwLz]

Android TV could use a bit more love.

I'm surprised it hasn't taken off yet, considering how good the core OS is. What lacking is third party app support, but I guess that's because most people don't use it for more than watching Netflix.

[divito]

7 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

Android TV could use a bit more love.

I'm surprised it hasn't taken off yet, considering how good the core OS is. What lacking is third party app support, but I guess that's because most people don't use it for more than watching Netflix.

This. While Android TV is great on something like a Mibox, the lack of apps is a bit of a downer. Granted, it has mostly everything I'd want, but several things that would be nice to have.

[Sfekke]

Sounds pretty good, I'll just keep using Netflix on my laptop & PC though.

Benefits of living in one room, no space to put a TV & 40% of what I'd like to put in it 

[mynameisjuan]

22 hours ago, Being Delirious said:

Well finally, I always hated the Chromecast OS.

Whats wrong with it? Its whole design was a one click cast to the device and works very well. 

[NTDaws]

2 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Whats wrong with it? Its whole design was a one click cast to the device and works very well. 

Because I hate having to use my phone for connecting to things. Reason being is there can be a loss of connection stopping a stream. I also prefer a interactive system with a remote. And in general the chromecast OS is inconvenient to be considering how I like to have complete network access to my media server. With chromecast I can't access my voice to access this specific IP at this address. Nor would I want to do that.

[mynameisjuan]

3 hours ago, Being Delirious said:

Because I hate having to use my phone for connecting to things. Reason being is there can be a loss of connection stopping a stream. I also prefer a interactive system with a remote. And in general the chromecast OS is inconvenient to be considering how I like to have complete network access to my media server. With chromecast I can't access my voice to access this specific IP at this address. Nor would I want to do that.

But chromecast was never designed to have an interface. You cant call it bad if your expectations were never intended to be the way you want it to. 

[Drak3]

4 hours ago, mynameisjuan said:

Whats wrong with it? Its whole design was a one click cast to the device and works very well. 

It requires a phone, tablet, laptop, or desktop to use.

 

Connection between the Chromecast device and the device acting as the remote fails frequently, and when the connection itself working correctly, there is a tremendous amount of lag and not all input goes through.

 

Performance on the SoCs in smart TVs with Chromecast is pathetic.

 

Chromecast was a flawed idea in theory. In the real world, it's a failure at everything it was supposed to do. Chromecast should have been killed off after the first generation of shitty dongles.

[mynameisjuan]

2 minutes ago, Drak3 said:

It requires a phone, tablet, laptop, or desktop to use.

 

Connection between the Chromecast device and the device acting as the remote fails frequently, and when the connection itself working correctly, there is a tremendous amount of lag and not all input goes through.

 

Performance on the SoCs in smart TVs with Chromecast is pathetic.

 

Chromecast was a flawed idea in theory. In the real world, it's a failure at everything it was supposed to do. Chromecast should have been killed off after the first generation of shitty dongles.

Ive been using almost every day since release and I have no issues with it nor has my brother, parents, girlfriend or any of my friends I recommended it to. 

 

Im sorry you need a phone or tablet....but thats the use it was intended for. I dont see how thats a complaint. 

 

If you obviously dont like it so much then dont buy it, but as of right now its still a popular item and works flawlessly. 

[Drak3]

Just now, mynameisjuan said:

If you obviously dont like it so much then dont buy it

Too late, I bought the original model. It was garbage. So is the Chromecast system built into my 4K TV/

 

1 minute ago, mynameisjuan said:

its still a popular item

It's not that popular. Certainly less so than any single Roku or Apple TV model. Perhaps more popular than the Nexus player, but only for the fact that Walmart sold the Chromecast dongles in store longer.

 

3 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

works flawlessly. 

I've never seen these pieces of shit work flawlessly. They barely work to begin with.

 

3 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

m sorry you need a phone or tablet....but thats the use it was intended for. I dont see how thats a complaint.

When that setup is as absolutely broken as it is, it becomes a huge issue.

 

4 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Ive been using almost every day since release and I have no issues with it nor has my brother, parents, girlfriend or any of my friends I recommended it to. 

I'm calling bullshit on that. Chromecast is hypersensitive to even minute connection interruptions and loses its shit most times your phone loses pairing.

[mynameisjuan]

8 hours ago, Drak3 said:

Too late, I bought the original model. It was garbage. So is the Chromecast system built into my 4K TV/

 

It's not that popular. Certainly less so than any single Roku or Apple TV model. Perhaps more popular than the Nexus player, but only for the fact that Walmart sold the Chromecast dongles in store longer.

 

I've never seen these pieces of shit work flawlessly. They barely work to begin with.

 

When that setup is as absolutely broken as it is, it becomes a huge issue.

 

I'm calling bullshit on that. Chromecast is hypersensitive to even minute connection interruptions and loses its shit most times your phone loses pairing.

Im sorry but everyone else and I have no problems with it. Not even sure what connectivity problems you are talking about because I can leave to the store with my phone, come back and its still playing. Its an independent device....there is no local pairing.  

[Drak3]

28 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Not even sure what connectivity problems you are talking about

In order to use the piece of shit, ypur phone has to be actively paired, through your home network. Break that at any point, and Chromecast has a tendency to either outright ignore input, or it freezes for a few minutes.

 

30 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Its an independent device

No, it's not. An independant device means it doesn't require another device that is sold separately. The only thing the Chromecast can do by itself is continue playing a video, woopie fucking do.

 

32 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

sorry but everyone else and I have no problems with it.

Again, I'm calling bullshit on that. Google's replacing it for a reason.

[mynameisjuan]

8 minutes ago, Drak3 said:

In order to use the piece of shit, ypur phone has to be actively paired, through your home network. Break that at any point, and Chromecast has a tendency to either outright ignore input, or it freezes for a few minutes.

Still dont know what the hell you are talking about. Like I said, I can leave my house come back 30mins later and its still working fine, still even have the options to pause and change the video while miles away. So this losing pair is not a thing. 

 

8 minutes ago, Drak3 said:

No, it's not. An independant device means it doesn't require another device that is sold separately. The only thing the Chromecast can do by itself is continue playing a video, woopie fucking do.

Said it was an independent device as it you push it to the screen and you can do what the fuck you want. there is no active connection between the two until you say stop casting. 

 

8 minutes ago, Drak3 said:

Again, I'm calling bullshit on that. Google's replacing it for a reason.

Its not being replaced, they are adding a step up to it. Just a mini shield. 

 

Again, I see you are super salty but I have yet to see any of the circumstances you mention. 

[Drak3]

3 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Still dont know what the hell you are talking about. Like I said, I can leave my house come back 30mins later and its still working fine, still even have the options to pause and change the video while miles away. So this losing pair is not a thing. 

 

Said it was an independent device as it you push it to the screen and you can do what the fuck you want. there is no active connection between the two until you say stop casting. 

 

Its not being replaced, they are adding a step up to it. Just a mini shield. 

 

Again, I see you are super salty but I have yet to see any of the circumstances you mention. 

Whatever. If you're happy with an inherently heavily flawed product, so be it.

[rdelacroix]

They should just rebrand the CCC Air Stick 

https://www.cccair.co.jp/airstick/

 

https://www.cnx-software.com/2018/01/19/ccc-air-stick-4k-tv-stick-runs-android-tv-supports-hdr10-aptx-hd-bluetooth-audio-japan/

 

Looks like a good device. UHD, HDR10, Bluetooth with aptX/aptX HD(a big deal for me at least).

[bobhays]

10 hours ago, Drak3 said:

Whatever. If you're happy with an inherently heavily flawed product, so be it.

this is the first time I've seen someone so disappointed in the chromecast. I have one and it works pretty well. I actually prefer it over a remote for things like YouTube because it's easier to search for videos and my phone and then cast it. I don't use it every day but at least a few times a week and the biggest problem I've had is finding out how to cast from different browsers. 

 

Edit : I just remembered the biggest problem I had with it is I couldn't cast local songs from my phone, I'd have to stream from a service or upload the files to Google play music but I think they added this, I'll try it again today.