Amazon Fire TV

K@rl said:
I'm tempted with one of these for Kodi to replace my Lenovo Q190 HTPC - I would prefer the Nexus player for full Play Store account though.
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The Nexus Player has half the power, half the RAM, no Ethernet and will cost more, so is a non starter really.

A Fire TV style box running proper vanilla Android TV would be brilliant.
 
got a Fire TV for Christmas and just thought I'd check in with a good review. Fantastic hardware device and Kodi performs so well on it. It's the fastest machine I've used Kodi on and it's well worth £64.

I quite like playing the Minion Rush game from the Amazon app store on it too :D
 
Dimple said:
Questions

1) How quick after turning on can you get at XBMC?
2) If I sideload Play Store can I then install from Play Store?
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It takes around 10 seconds to open XBMC/Kodi, settings>applications>manage installed apps and open from there.

You can install from the play store, but you'll need to root first, side loading the play store without a root won't work.
 
You can easily assign the application using llama to an icon on the screen like "Watch Art" - no need to faff around through settings menu to launch XBMC and this is without root.
 
So this can play all my media via XBMC that is stored on my PC?

Really really tempted now. Would be very handy.
 
james.miller said:
they also dont support rgb limited output, so you get black crush on your tv unless your tv happens to support full range RGB (like a monitor). Hense why i asked if the fireTV suffers the same problem (as basically every other android media player out there does) but nobody has answered yet.
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Interested in this please, how can I tell? Will it show in the options somewhere?

Copy/paste from AV forums in case anyone is wondering what this is about (as I had to Google it myself to understand).

Whether you should use RGB Full or RGB Limited is not decided by the media you are playing (games, DVD, Blu-ray) but is instead related to the HDMI input on your display (and how it is calibrated).

RGB Full has black at 0 and peak white at 255. (This is sometimes known as PC levels)

RGB Limited has black 16 and peak white at 235. (This is sometimes known as video levels - and is the broadcast and production video standard used in both SD and HD video standard 601 and 709)

If you replay a Blu-ray or DVD (which will be encoded 16-235) in RGB Full, then your PS3 will remap the 16-235 video to 0-255, which has the side effect of clipping any <16 or >235 content that may be present on the Blu-ray or DVD (sometimes known as Blacker than Black - BTB - and WTW - Whiter than White) (*)

If your display is a regular HDMI TV, then it is almost certainly delivered configured and calibrated for RGB Limited - as this is what an HDMI DVD player, HD satellite receiver etc. will usually output by default if using RGB output. (As 16-235 is the video standard used for DVD, Blu-ray and TV broadcasts).

If you are feeding your device to a PC monitor - configured for 0-255 levels (which is what most DVI PC monitors are set-up for) then RGB Full would be the best choice.

If you feed a 0-255 signal (RGB Full) into a display configured for 16-235 (RGB Limited) then you will get crushed blacks and clipped whites (as the content below 16 and above 235 will not appear any different to content at 16 or 235) - and the image will also appear to be artificially more saturated (richer colours)

If you feed a 16-235 signal (RGB Limited) into a display configured for 0-255(RGB Full) then you will get grey-ish/milky blacks, dull whites - and the image will look washed out and de-saturated (less colourful) (As the 16 black level in the source will be displayed as grey as it is above the 0 black level of the display, and the 235 peak white of the source will not reach the 255 peak white of the display)

(*) BTB and WTW in 16-235 video shouldn't contain picture content on properly mastered material - but they should ideally be preserved to allow overshoot and undershoot on sharp transitions (particularly in analogue sourced content) to be preserved without clipping to avoid ringing.
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Key bit highlighted.
 
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Begbie said:
So this can play all my media via XBMC that is stored on my PC?

Really really tempted now. Would be very handy.
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Yeah, though if it's streaming media from your PC, then you'll have to leave it on while you stream.

I would invest in a NAS drive and store your media on there. :)
 
S2KIP said:
Copy/paste from AV forums in case anyone is wondering what this is about
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Ah, so in short the FTV spits out graphics/PC levels? I was wondering why when my girlfriend was watching Mad Men it looked so crushed, but I wasn't really paying attention :p Good job my GT60 can be set to graphics levels for each input :cool:
 
Which TV exactly? I have the P50GT60 and I've just been looking through the options but can't find it.

However all my inputs come via the amp over a single HMDI connector, so not sure what I could do apart from connect the FTV to the TV and allow the TV to pass audio to the amp (which I'm assuming would be 2.0) so not ideal.
 
I have the P42GT60. If you go to:

Picture Settings > Option Settings (second from bottom) > HDMI RGB Range > Full (or Auto seems to work for me too).

Looks much better! I have my Xbox360 spitting out graphics levels too :)
 
S2KIP said:
Interested in this please, how can I tell? Will it show in the options somewhere?
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Scam said:
Ah, so in short the FTV spits out graphics/PC levels? I was wondering why when my girlfriend was watching Mad Men it looked so crushed, but I wasn't really paying attention :p
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^^^ That, basically. As is the case with my neo x7. I dont get why it isnt a bigger complaint - it totally ruins the picture in darker scenes.

Some newer tvs do support full OR limited per input but as mentioned, RGB full causes issues when you have other RGB limited devices (set top boxes, pvrs etc.) and you are using an av amp, for example - the av amp presents one output for the tv and you cant calibrate the tv for both limited and full at the same time on the same input.

Looks much better! I have my Xbox360 spitting out graphics levels too
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It shouldnt look any different if the tv is correctly calibrated.
 
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No you can't tell the difference but technically you are working with more range from the source. Its worth using graphics levels if you know what you're doing and don't get confused :p

I'm also surprised its not a big complaint. Totally ruins the picture!
 
Anyone have any issues with rewind & fast forward on xbmc/kodi using a harmony remote? Rewind just jumps back to the beginning of a show and fast forward jumps 15 minutes forward, works on the original remote (x2, x4 etc) but can't seem to get it sorted on the harmony ultimate, any ideas?
 
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Clov!s said:
Yeah, though if it's streaming media from your PC, then you'll have to leave it on while you stream.

I would invest in a NAS drive and store your media on there. :)
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Nice, PC is left on anyway.

Does it force TV to 24HZ on XBMC like a bluray player etc would..?
 
Begbie said:
Nice, PC is left on anyway.

Does it force TV to 24HZ on XBMC like a bluray player etc would..?
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As far as i'm aware you have the choice of 50Hz or 60Hz in the options on the AFT, if that changes once the content is played, then I've no idea sorry.
 
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