Why are amazon fire tv sticks still popular?

[dhruv_sharan]

isnt apple ecosystem the most lock down in this case ? only for side loading apps i have to connect my pc every 7 days to my iphone so that my moded apps does not expire. or is it different with apple tv os?

[napsterlabs]

@Syzygy

Any reason that you wouldn’t just choose to cast content from your phone instead? Unless, of course, it’s a non-smart TV, and you can’t do that.

Casting sucks, you have to have your phone on at all times, drains phone battery and can’t use the phone during that time. Not all apps supports casting either.

@dhruv_sharan

maybe if it is a smart tv why not just watch the content directly ig? login log out ?

Consider this:
Your wife wants to watch TMKOC, so you sign her in, into YT.
Wife goes to shower, you want to switch quickly to Ted Lasso, get one episode in. Apple TV isn’t installed. Until you install, sign in, and start watching, your wife is back already.
Get the point? It is just convenience. And you don’t have to log out at checkout, just unplug it and put it into backpack!

Also, Turns out most of the hotel TVs aren’t Sony or lag a lot. Fire TV 4K (not even the max) has been real solid for me, zero lags whatsoever. I have installed Prime Video, YT, Jellyfin, Xstream Play, JioHotstar, Apple TV, Netflix and there is plenty of storage space left.

[raksrules]

@Syzygy

Any reason that you wouldn’t just choose to cast content from your phone instead? Unless, of course, it’s a non-smart TV, and you can’t do that.

Recently I stayed at a hotel for 15 days and it has google tv based TV so I was able to sign in (dummy account) and download apps. But still casting from android tablet to TV was not possible as the TV would not show up in tablet even when both were connected to the same hotel wifi (exact same access point as the access point name was room number).

[Syzygy]

@dhruv_sharan

maybe if it is a smart tv why not just watch the content directly ig? login log out ?

@napsterlabs I think you meant to reply to this comment, and not mine.

I meant using your phone, which already has you signed into OTT apps, and then directly casting it to the hotel TV. So there’s no login/logout mess.

@raksrules

TV would not show up in tablet even when both were connected to the same hotel wifi

Oh, interesting. I’ve never faced this issue yet, but I’m not sure if it’s because I’ve only stayed at bnbs recently, and they had relatively modern TVs, where casting worked. The fire stick way does sound convenient, and can also work for non-smart TVs with HDMI input, so there’s that.

[anchberry]

There is a difference between modded and genuine apps.

Apple ecosystem is meant for convenience not tinkerers. No hardware software optimizations come close to it. I have had multiple configs of different OS, hardware etc but nothing beats this.

As for Apple TV. It is powerful in terms of hardware, secured, more locked down ( but there are ways around that) No lags in general. Decent library of apps. Fast and reliable. Set it and forget it

[napsterlabs]

@Syzygy

@napsterlabs I think you meant to reply to this comment, and not mine.

Fixed it, thanks

[raksrules]

Rightly said. People start comparing apple tv to android fire stick saying apple is locked now and what not. But the apple tv in terms of performance in legit apps is miles ahead. I have apple tv HD (max 1080p) with black SIRI remote which I bought used. The device is from 2015, 10 years old as of today and it works perfectly well and I have latest TvOS installed in it.

I daily use it for Jiohotstar and sony liv and works great and picture quality is great (only my 15 year old sony full hd tv). My kids play games on this which work using the accelerometer on the siri remote. It is basic games like real racing, tennis (wii like play feature) and minions.

I also have firestick connected to same tv.

[gourav]

I bought it initially because of Vu Android TV became really slow in less than 2 years of use. Later kept it because when I changed TVs, the new one came with Vidaa OS. I didn’t want to spend time trying to figure out if I could use Kodi and SmartTubeNext on Vidaa when I could just plug in my existing fire stick to the new TV.

I currently use Onn TV Stick which I asked a friend to bring from the US. I switched because I wanted a clean custom launcher, which Fire Stick was no longer allowing.

[Satyanveshi]

@gourav

currently use Onn TV Stick which I asked a friend to bring from the US. I switched because I wanted a clean custom launcher, which Fire Stick was no longer allowing.

I thought it had region issues. Is that no longer the case? (Or am I mistaken)

[codwapeace]

@raksrules

But still casting from android tablet to TV was not possible as the TV would not show up in tablet even when both were connected to the same hotel wifi (exact same access point as the access point name was room number).

Hotels have (or should have) client isolation so that one client cannot directly access another. The clients only have access to the internet.

@Syzygy

because I’ve only stayed at bnbs recently, a

Would be using consumer routers and there is no need (or knowledge) for them to setup client isolation.

[gourav]

It does. I had to use US VPN to activate it. But it’s been a year and there hasn’t been any issue since. It checked the region only during activation.

[JMak]

May be the quality of the products was much better before, hence they are still working dsspite being non smart. That’s why the fire sticks are still popular and the chromecast with gtv

I can second that atleast in my case.

[codwapeace]

@gourav

I currently use Onn TV Stick

@Satyanveshi

I thought it had region issues. Is that no longer the case? (Or am I mistaken)

Firestick 4k second gen supports all audio and video formats other than Dolby vision profile 7. It can be played back though by some conversion. Same can’t be said about Onn 4K (even the pro). It doesn’t support lossless audio codecs.