Android box recommendation

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jammy420

jammy420

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I have not done much research into Android box...

My requirement is simple. It should do voice based search and switching between applications. this is the primary requirement . everything else is an add on. Main usage will be youtube. read somewhere amazon fire tv stick doesnt support youtube search.

I do have a JIO STB box came along with my fiber connection. but the voice search is not that great.
 
I have fire tv stick (6 moths old) & mi box 3s (3 to 4 years old). Both are good option. I somewhat prefer Fire TV Stick due to timely updates and smaller package (I carry it during trip with family so i can use it with LED TV rather than relying on cable). Mi Box is not bad, lil bulky, updates are little slow but never slowed down in 4 years. Hope this helps
 
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FireStick and Mi Box both are good options, and may be only two credible options.

Mi Box is 3199 on FK right now. If you need to buy something else too and could take cart value >5K, further 500 can be saved.
 
I would vote for Fire Stick purely because I have never used anything else before. Firestick does voice search on youtube. It even actually does on my firestick which has smarttubenext app with some sort of addon which enables youtube search in this app.
 
One can also install google playstore on firestick but unsure how much storage does firestick has and can it be extended.
Mi box wil be the best long time hassle choice. Plug it to any tv, no slowness no dependency on tv resources.
I'm using an android tv which sometimes becomes slow due to internet sync and all. But I hardly watch anything on tv so its pretty manageable!
 
nRiTeCh said:
One can also install google playstore on firestick but unsure how much storage does firestick has and can it be extended.
Mi box wil be the best long time hassle choice. Plug it to any tv, no slowness no dependency on tv resources.
I'm using an android tv which sometimes becomes slow due to internet sync and all. But I hardly watch anything on tv so its pretty manageable!
Click to expand...
Yes storage is a struggle with Fire Stick as most come with 8GB only. Not sure if the 4K versions come with 16GB but from what I know, their RAM is more but not the storage. I don't have lots of apps so it is manageable but if someone wants lots and lots of apps, it will be cumbersome.
If anyone buying Firestick then I recommend 4K because of extra RAM, even if you don't have 4K TV.

I guess using some dongle, there is a way to connect MicroSD to Firestick and then move app data or apps (not sure) to MicroSD / USB but never tried.

Also in my Onida Fire tv which has 1gb ram, i have installed a one click RAM cleaning tool as 1GB RAM means sometimes UI struggles. There is no issue once video plays but UI navigation is something pain. Good thing is we use 2-3 apps always which are always in front of queue.
 
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Currently using MiBox 4k and firestick 4k. I bought mi box again because I realised without doubt, that I needed the usb 2.0 port for my rips.

But, If streaming is your only purpose, then go for firestick 4k. At 2,999 it Is an absolute steal for the price. It's faster, snappier and Alexa is overall better voice assistant for movies imo. You can also control your tv power/audio using firestick remote which is not possible using MiBox. Firestick also has much more stable wifi reception at a distance if it matters to you. Picture quality is also a slight improvement over MiBox.
raksrules said:
Yes storage is a struggle with Fire Stick as most come with 8GB only. Not sure if the 4K versions come with 16GB but from what I know, their RAM is more but not the storage. I don't have lots of apps so it is manageable but if someone wants lots and lots of apps, it will be cumbersome.
If anyone buying Firestick then I recommend 4K because of extra RAM, even if you don't have 4K TV.

I guess using some dongle, there is a way to connect MicroSD to Firestick and then move app data or apps (not sure) to MicroSD / USB but never tried.

Also in my Onida Fire tv which has 1gb ram, i have installed a one click RAM cleaning tool as 1GB RAM means sometimes UI struggles. There is no issue once video plays but UI navigation is something pain. Good thing is we use 2-3 apps always which are always in front of queue.
Click to expand...
Actually all the currently available firesticks except the new 4k max come with 1.5gb of ram. The old 1gb ram firesticks are a pain to use nowadays. Even the latest max released this year comes with 8gb storage.

Edit: Lol. I did almost 3 hrs of side by side comparison between mi box and firestick after I bought the 4k for around 2850 after all offers a few weeks back.

After checking once more, YouTube is performing slightly better in firestick 4k. I am getting slight more delays in MiBox, while loading up youtube and transitioning between advertisement and video.
 
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ibose said:
Do they work ? I always took them to be snake oil
Click to expand...

May be it is placebo, not sure. It does show what was the RAM previously and what was after the tool ran. The app doesn't even open, it is just an overlay over fire stick screen telling the before and after RAM and what all apps it closed.
 
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ibose said:
Do they work ? I always took them to be snake oil
Click to expand...

Check screenshot..

IMG_2886.jpg
 
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Umm .. some of those terminated processes seem critical like FireTV Remote, Android settings etc. Does your remote work after that cleanup ?
Anyways if it leads to noticeable performance improvement then that is good. It's just that I found that such RAM optimizers made little difference on systems and mobile phones.
 
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ibose said:
Umm .. some of those terminated processes seem critical like FireTV Remote, Android settings etc. Does your remote work after that cleanup ?
Anyways if it leads to noticeable performance improvement then that is good. It's just that I found that such RAM optimizers made little difference on systems and mobile phones.
Click to expand...

Yes everything works and I do notice UI being more responsive.
 
Kmkaks said:
Currently using MiBox 4k and firestick 4k. I bought mi box again because I realised without doubt, that I needed the usb 2.0 port for my rips.

But, If streaming is your only purpose, then go for firestick 4k. At 2,999 it Is an absolute steal for the price. It's faster, snappier and Alexa is overall better voice assistant for movies imo. You can also control your tv power/audio using firestick remote which is not possible using MiBox. Firestick also has much more stable wifi reception at a distance if it matters to you. Picture quality is also a slight improvement over MiBox.

Actually all the currently available firesticks except the new 4k max come with 1.5gb of ram. The old 1gb ram firesticks are a pain to use nowadays. Even the latest max released this year comes with 8gb storage.

Edit: Lol. I did almost 3 hrs of side by side comparison between mi box and firestick after I bought the 4k for around 2850 after all offers a few weeks back.

After checking once more, YouTube is performing slightly better in firestick 4k. I am getting slight more delays in MiBox, while loading up youtube and transitioning between advertisement and video.
Click to expand...

Have you tried to install youtube vanced or jiotv app, airtel stream app in mibox 4k...? I want to know if it works the same way as phone or if it will be different.
 
Firestick or a google chromecast with google tv(if someone returning from US can carry it for you).

You get updates and thats the best part.
 
I have the Fire TV 3 which I use as a secondary device. Amazon has all but killed the device with the new interface update earlier in the year. Also, Amazon never updates the actual Android version, so in my case, since it is stuck on Nougat, a lot of the sideloaded apps are slowly becoming incompatible.

I picked up a Motorola DVM4KA01, simply because I wanted the Android TV interface and Play Store and it was available for less than 3k after bank offers earlier this year. It is still stuck on Oct 2020 security update, so like all Android boxes it will suffer but at least it has less compatibility issues and Chromecast still works well with most apps compared to Amazon's pointless mirroring.
 
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