Nvidia Shield TV Refresh

TheMightyTen · 16 Jan 2017 at 09:27

Don't know if anybody noticed Nvidia's release at CES of the relaunched Shield TV. The relaunched 16Gb units are released today and have apparently been shipped from various retailers.

There have been no major changes to the hardware of either the 16GB or 500GB pro models, apart from the sdcard slot being dumped off the 16GB and the size of the 16GB unit reduced.

The biggest change comes in the form of a new design bluetooth linked controller and this time the remote bundled in the box as well. The biggest and main change that will also benefit existing Shield users as well is the rollout of Shield Experience 5.0 based on Android Nougat, which with the various advantages that Android 7 brings, Nvidia have now made a deal with Amazon so at last the Amazon Video streaming app is officially included with support for 4K HDR streaming as well. There are apparently improvements to Game Stream as well and also over time increasing integration with Google Home using "Always on" voice activation on the controllers and yet to be released dongles.

http://shield.nvidia.com/support/nvidia-android-tv/release-notes/2

The Shield Experience 5.0 should also start rolling out to original Shields today allegedly.

The shield already was one of the best media streamers available (or unavailable except for stupid money for the last couple of months

) but this is upping the game again and will become my default device again. I'm really looking forward to seeing what Koying can do with SPMC on the new API compared with Kodi 17 which will get a few tweaks as well.

TheMightyTen · 17 Jan 2017 at 08:32

Perhaps read my opening post, as it might contain that information in there

The new ones do as they are shipping with the new Shield Experience 5.0 (Android N) the rollout of Android N to the 2015 Shields has been delayed by at least a week but I successfully sideloaded the new Amazon apk to my 2015 and can confirm it works a treat with UHD and HDR all working perfectly and a damn site better than the appalling Sony Android TV Amazon App (that suffers from lipsync creep issues)

Metallifux said:
Nividia have apparently made a deal with Amazon and Prime Video is now available on the v.1.1 Shield and will be rolled out to v. 1.0 Shield's shortly.

Fixed for you

TheMightyTen · 17 Jan 2017 at 11:17

But Fire TV lacks HDMI 2.0a/b (Only 1.4 so no 4K60 and thus no native 4K interface), HDR, 1 Gb Ethernet port, passthrough of HD audio formats, no Framerate switching in Plex (Kodi and SPMC have to play games to do it)

As to UK on demand services aside from the available iPlayer, I just cast from my phone or tablet.

Don't get me wrong the Fire TV is a cracking little box (if somewhat problematic with Black crush on the gen 2s) and half the price of Shield but Amazon dropped a couple of catches on the selection of hardware for the gen 2.

TheMightyTen · 17 Jan 2017 at 14:09

Annoyingly it looks like nVIDIA have not implemented the new IEC61937 audio passthrough from Android Nougat and are still using the RAW method from Marshmallow, that may cause some problems down the line with Kodi as they very definitely do not like RAW.

**Edit: Also looks like Nvidia up to it's usual games telling porkys about "new" features which are in fact just exisiting features that have been around for a while, the Steam App being one which is just a link to Steam Big Picture which has existed in Game Stream for some time.

TheMightyTen · 18 Jan 2017 at 07:54

I have to say even with NVidia shennanigens (which lets face it we're used to now as they are one of the most dishonest companies on Earth) I couldn't do with without my 2015 Shield 16GB. It really is the goto "out of the box" Kodi/SPMC streamer, I've recently been reripping my whole library as HEVC with the HD soundtracks and it just works with no fuss

Add the game streaming (even in its current state), Netflix 4K & HDR and the sideloaded Amazon Video (now with 4K & HDR) and it just works the way I want (and even the Misses can use it with no bother

)

TheMightyTen · 19 Jan 2017 at 12:10

Well Manuel Guzman is claiming that the Experience 5.0 update for 2015 Shields was pulled on release day because of last minute discovered bug (pinch of salt??)

Incidently they have already patched Experience to 5.01 because of other isssues (some are claiming it has finally fixed refresh rate switching for people who have the chain Shield->Amp->TV where HDMI version go 2.0->2.0->1.4)

TheMightyTen · 19 Jan 2017 at 13:56

I agree, I'd love to load LibreELEC straight on to it and run it clean

TheMightyTen · 26 Jan 2017 at 16:35

Shield Experience 5.02 for the 2015 Shields has now been released. It's installed and running great for me. The framerate and colour space switching issues seem to have been fixed and everything just feels a little smoother.

Early days yet but all looks good, looking forward to seeing what Koying can do with SPMC (he's currently debugging resolution switching under SE5 to see if he can get material to play at native res and have TVs far superior upscalers do the work rather than the shield and Kodi code)

TheMightyTen · 29 Jan 2017 at 10:08

HDR on Netflix has been available since SE3 so is nothing new. The whole HDR tag Nvida are throwing around about Shield 2017 is more of their blather and nothing new as it's all just re-announcements of features that Shield 2015 already had. Really the only new things are colour spaces being fixed and the addition of an official Amazon app which incidentally may not be as "official" as Nvidia made out since Amazon UK are denying all knowledge of it and stating specifically that the Shield is not a supported device for Amazon Video.

TheMightyTen · 14 Sep 2017 at 12:45

It's about the best Plex client I've come across, direct plays all formats fine (including HDR and 4K) passes all known HD audio formats fine as well. The only caveat being that everything in the chain must be HDCP 2.2 as HDCP 1.4 can cause confusion after handshakes.

TheMightyTen · 21 Sep 2017 at 15:25

I found the spousal acceptance factor went up even further when I brought a harmony remote into the equation, the Shield plays nice with the Harmony hub

TheMightyTen · 21 Sep 2017 at 20:56

MonkeyMan said:
Does it work with the Amazon video app? I used to use a Fire TV remote (Nvidia one is ridiculously expensive) but it works in everything apart from Amazon video, apparently its a common issue with third-party remotes.

I've done a full reset on mine as it had become quite unresponsive, will have to try True HD through the Plex app again and see if it still cuts out every 20 mins or so.

It does

TheMightyTen · 22 Sep 2017 at 15:22

What do you mean by "What's the deal with HDR?"?

The new remote only version I think is conformation that they have accepted people are not buying it for gaming and mostly using it as a streamer. Really it's failed to deliver as a gaming device (not helped by Google's somewhat haphazard support of Android TV) and the home PC game streaming being limited to only users with GeForce cards has hampered them as well after they Fake Newsed a Steam App at the re-launch of the current version.

As a 4K streamer though it is still the best, the only thing they need to sort out is per app resolution switching to allow source to play native and have TVs with their superior upscaling hardware do that job.

TheMightyTen · 29 Sep 2017 at 08:13

Something I posted in the thread about the new Amazon Fire TV that I have just discovered on the shield thanks to a comment from Tinwarble on the NVidia Shield TV forums. SPMC users might find it useful

TheMightyTen said:
To confirm a comment I made above Koying has got resolution switching working on the Shield TV in SPMC , with the latest SPMC Alpha 17.4a10 if you set the resolution to 1920x1080 it changes the shield resolution regardless of if its set at 3840x2160 so 1080p/24 content plays at 1080p/24 and if you then choose 4K content (and HDR as well) it switches up to 3840x2160, the only caveat being if you choose the GUI at 1920x1080 you can only choose refresh rates of 23.97, 24, 29.97 and 30 (refresh rate switching still works for played content though)

Also just in case people haven't noticed Shield Experience 6.0 dropped yesteday which allegedly fixes the problems for people with a mixed HDCP 2.2 and 1.4 chain (It also adds Google Home but only for the yanks)

TheMightyTen · 29 Sep 2017 at 08:34

Paper release, not physical yet.

TheMightyTen · 29 Sep 2017 at 12:15

I'll check the keyboard tonight, haven't used it so haven't noticed (If it is the case won't take long for Manuel Guzman to communicate it back up the chain and have 6.01 rolled out), I also don't use the voice search as I control mine with a Harmony so I'm not being affected by the new Google voice search hijacking everything. I do like have all the colour spaces, refresh rates and resolutions my TV can do selectable now from an experimental point of view, also the sound sync on the Amazon Video app is noticeably better, Grand Tour is actually watchable

TheMightyTen · 29 Sep 2017 at 12:33

No that has been reported yet, it seems to be baked into the OS.

TheMightyTen · 29 Sep 2017 at 15:10

The whole voice search thing has been replaced with the new Google one (including the hijacking of the Nvidia button on the game controllers and the mic button on remotes). For everyone not set to English (US) the functionality is gimped. On the SPMC Github Issues Koying has already marked that the VocieRecognizer button needs to be assigned to a new key in keyboard.xml as the system now completely owns the old one.

TheMightyTen · 30 Sep 2017 at 17:59

I find the home PC game streaming to be relatively problem free within the limitations of it being nVidia only and what it can play.

TheMightyTen · 3 Nov 2017 at 14:40

ChrisD. said:
I've no interest in Kodi, ditched it over a year ago in favour of Plex.

Use SPMC/Kodi with the official Plex plugin, all the advantage of Plex library management with the far superior video and audio playback control and configuration of Kodi. You can set the Plex plugin to auto load with Kodi startup and the interface then just looks like Plex.