which adroid tv box should I choose. New on this market...

[epayson85 72]

Again, there are plenty of reasons to choose the Shield over the NP.  Let's also remember to get the NP at your $60 you have to be luckily.  I see none right now for that cheap.  Right now units are starting at $80 used.  More for brand new units.  And since none of them are from a Asus Reseller, you run into a warranty issue.   What happens when your cheap $60 player dies in 6 months?  Buy another?

 

Let's just call it what it is.  You want the cheapest player you can get.  Fine, it's the NP.  but if you think the experience on the NP is identical than the shield, you need to continue spending the money you are saving on the illicit drugs you are using that gives you that perception.   Have you noticed anyone else raving on the NP?

 

As for 4k video there is plenty of it out there.  Personally, I like it because it can play the 4k Videos I take with my 4k GoPro.   

Even $80 is less than half and they are refurbished from asus.  The guy selling them from 80 is who I got them from for $60 a couple weeks ago.  Supply and demand I guess lol but they are from asus repackaged and I could buy 3 and still be less than one shield with a remote haha.  

 

I don't want the cheapest player I can get... plenty of those you can buy online and they work like crap.  I want a quality player.  Which I have with the nexus and the AFTV.  You can see plenty of past posts from me screaming about the AFTV before its latest update telling people not to buy them.  If it doesn't work I don't want it.   What I don't want to do is over spend for items I don't need.  I don't need to play games and I don't need surround sound.  The rest of the experience is exactly the same.  I know slow.  I have used the firetv stick.  Even that isn't awful... once its playing its great but has to trasncode everything and the menu response / loading is slow.  If the menu moves a millisecond faster on the sheild... its not worth $200, I'm sorry its just not lol.

 

I have yet to see a single 4k video on sites that I will not name on here  lol I see plenty of 4k UHD blurays... but they aren't 4k.  They are 1080p from a 4k source.  As for retail stores I have seen some 4k discs like the revenant just released.  Would love to see it / see what the file sizes are like.  They also say 2 discs... I pray that doesn't mean they have to put the movie on two discs and they just have to put all the extras on the second disc due to how big the movie is.  

[MSattler 387]

Also I'm not a cheap ass... I'm just not a dumb ass that wastes my money on over priced products.  

 

That's debatable.

[MSattler 387]

 

I have yet to see a single 4k video on sites that I will not name on here  lol I see plenty of 4k UHD blurays... but they aren't 4k.  They are 1080p from a 4k source.  As for retail stores I have seen some 4k discs like the revenant just released.  Would love to see it / see what the file sizes are like.  They also say 2 discs... I pray that doesn't mean they have to put the movie on two discs and they just have to put all the extras on the second disc due to how big the movie is.  

 

Newsgroups have had 4k content for months.  Most of them are ripped via HDMI recorders.  Those are recorded on their way to a 4k display and it is 4k content.

 

While UHD Bluray's are not cracked yet, they will be, the same way BluRay's were, it is simply a matter of time.

 

Storage won't be as big of an issue as you thing since h265 offers storage savings as opposed to h264.   Even BluRay's initially used 2 discs for some movies, and still do in some cases like LOTR.  It's not a huge deal to rip both disks, and use mkvmerge to merge them into one file.

[MSattler 387]

  I have used the firetv stick.  Even that isn't awful... once its playing its great but has to trasncode everything and the menu response / loading is slow.  If the menu moves a millisecond faster on the sheild... its not worth $200, I'm sorry its just not lol.

 

Again, you are simplifying everything to playback with stereo audio.   Not everyone is as simplistic as you are that sense.  The FireTV Stick was dead slow, and has an even bigger issue with it's going to sleep while the Emby app is still running.  That is slowly getting better but it has been a huge issue since day one.

 

While the FTV2 is much better in performance, it also leaves you with 95% Amazon advertising, and one little icon for Emby.   That is the main reason I refuse to buy any additional FTV2's.  I have no issue dropping $200 for a Shield with a Remote and Controller as opposed to $100 for a FTV2 with just a remote.  If I want to run emulators with the FTV2, I have to buy a controller as well which adds to the cost.

 

I am running a media server with all of my content for a reason, why make my family navigate around Amazon's crap instead of just being able to load Emby.  Makes you wonder how many accidently movie purchases have been made by family members of Emby users, who thought they were getting the movie from the Emby server, and instead buy it from Amazon.

[epayson85 72]

You are a moron, my wifi is fine.  I gave my NP away for free, as have several others on here.

 

Dual SSD's because in case 1 fails I continue running, mirrored disks.

 

As far as the movies I have nearly all content is 30-40Mbps.  If you have 6 users active at a time, which is common for me, that is 180-240Mbps inbound alone, with the movie being read from the Storage Servers, to the Emby Server.  Add to that the outbound traffic which could be as much as 180-240Mbps.

 

While the movies are coming from seperate drives on seperate storage servers, the internal disk still does a ton of transcoding for users who are remote, which can a majority of my usage.   With the SSD's, and the 10GB of memory and 128GB ssd disk most of the transcoding is being cached, which means less writes to disk, and means the web interface isn't slowed by the constant writes to disk.

lol you are getting very defensive about your wifi.  You should really try to refrain from name calling.

 

Mirrored SSDs? raid 1?  Hows that working for you?  I have never bothered... Almost nothing is ever written to my OS drive so I expect the SSD to last longer than the computer does.  I do disc images every night to my back up server though just in case.

 

Still the cache would only be needed if they are all coming from one drive and if you have movies going at 30 to 40 Mbps those must be what 20 to 40 gig files...  If they are from one drive... even your cache would fill up if you had 6 streams going at once.

 

serious question though... how many SSD cache discs have you gone through?   Would love to see how long a drive like that lasts being written to over and over again.  Thats supposed to be the killer for SSD's so just wondering what you are getting for a life span on those puppies.

[epayson85 72]

Newsgroups have had 4k content for months.  Most of them are ripped via HDMI recorders.  Those are recorded on their way to a 4k display and it is 4k content.

 

While UHD Bluray's are not cracked yet, they will be, the same way BluRay's were, it is simply a matter of time.

 

Storage won't be as big of an issue as you thing since h265 offers storage savings as opposed to h264.   Even BluRay's initially used 2 discs for some movies, and still do in some cases like LOTR.  It's not a huge deal to rip both disks, and use mkvmerge to merge them into one file.

Not a big deal for us... I would hate to be a normal person having to get up and insert disc 2 LOL

[epayson85 72]

Again, you are simplifying everything to playback with stereo audio.   Not everyone is as simplistic as you are that sense.  The FireTV Stick was dead slow, and has an even bigger issue with it's going to sleep while the Emby app is still running.  That is slowly getting better but it has been a huge issue since day one.

 

While the FTV2 is much better in performance, it also leaves you with 95% Amazon advertising, and one little icon for Emby.   That is the main reason I refuse to buy any additional FTV2's.  I have no issue dropping $200 for a Shield with a Remote and Controller as opposed to $100 for a FTV2 with just a remote.  If I want to run emulators with the FTV2, I have to buy a controller as well which adds to the cost.

 

I am running a media server with all of my content for a reason, why make my family navigate around Amazon's crap instead of just being able to load Emby.  Makes you wonder how many accidently movie purchases have been made by family members of Emby users, who thought they were getting the movie from the Emby server, and instead buy it from Amazon.

You can put a custom launcher on there that makes that all go away just saying.  I also have amazon prime... rarely use it but thats why i like the option to be able to watch some of their content.

[MSattler 387]

lol you are getting very defensive about your wifi.  You should really try to refrain from name calling.

 

Mirrored SSDs? raid 1?  Hows that working for you?  I have never bothered... Almost nothing is ever written to my OS drive so I expect the SSD to last longer than the computer does.  I do disc images every night to my back up server though just in case.

 

Still the cache would only be needed if they are all coming from one drive and if you have movies going at 30 to 40 Mbps those must be what 20 to 40 gig files...  If they are from one drive... even your cache would fill up if you had 6 streams going at once.

 

serious question though... how many SSD cache discs have you gone through?   Would love to see how long a drive like that lasts being written to over and over again.  Thats supposed to be the killer for SSD's so just wondering what you are getting for a life span on those puppies.

 

I'm not getting defensive, I've stated time and time again that the issue was only with the NP not with any other wifi device.  You are the moron who keeps telling me to fix my wifi.  Stop being a moron, and I will stop calling you one.  It is pretty simple, but if need be I can pull out my kids crayons and color you a nice little picture?

 

The mirrored SSD's are running fine, and if I lose a disk, I will not be down.

 

I don't think you understand how a cache drive works.   Before any writes are made to disk, the writes are kept in the 10GB of memory and the 128GB SSD.  Think of a ram drive.  Whether cache fills up depends on the number of streams, regardless it's an overall faster system response than plain disk.

 

I have been running these SSD's for six months without issues, with daily use.  And when they go, they go, and I will replace them, potentially still under warranty.  Again.... you want the cheapest system out there, I want one that is as responsive for concurrent user 10 as it is for user 1.

[epayson85 72]

That's debatable.

My remote in my media room is $300 lol I'm not cheap

[MSattler 387]

My remote in my media room is $300 lol I'm not cheap

 

I as referring to you being a dumbass, not a cheapass =)

[Deathsquirrel 741]

The other devices are able to play high bitrate video without transcoding over wifi.  I play blu-ray rips just fine on mine.  The only thing mine transcodes are really old files that I have and its probably because the files are messed up lol but luckily the PC can read them and transcode them.  I bet they would transcode on the shield too.  Maybe you are playing straight up Blu-ray files that aren't encoded in anyway if the shield can play those without transcoding over wifi thats something else but my devices play just about everything I throw at it.  

 

I think unless you are hooking it up to surround sound or using it for gaming which is completely unrelated to EMBY then you can buy a cheaper option.

 

Well considering I specifically listed HD audio playback as a reason to get a shield, I would think it's relevant.  The nexus or ftv, which I have, are perfect for plugging straight in to a tv but they will require some teanscoding, depending on content.  The don't compete with a NUC or similar htpc for high dnd playback.  The shield does.

[epayson85 72]

I'm not getting defensive, I've stated time and time again that the issue was only with the NP not with any other wifi device.  You are the moron who keeps telling me to fix my wifi.  Stop being a moron, and I will stop calling you one.  It is pretty simple, but if need be I can pull out my kids crayons and color you a nice little picture?

 

The mirrored SSD's are running fine, and if I lose a disk, I will not be down.

 

I don't think you understand how a cache drive works.   Before any writes are made to disk, the writes are kept in the 10GB of memory and the 128GB SSD.  Think of a ram drive.  Whether cache fills up depends on the number of streams, regardless it's an overall faster system response than plain disk.

 

I have been running these SSD's for six months without issues, with daily use.  And when they go, they go, and I will replace them, potentially still under warranty.  Again.... you want the cheapest system out there, I want one that is as responsive for concurrent user 10 as it is for user 1.

No I understand how a cache works lol

 

Let me ask you. Where are your files stored? Mechanical drive right? Where is your transcode directory?

[MSattler 387]

No I understand how a cache works lol

 

Let me ask you. Where are your files stored? Mechanical drive right? Where is your transcode directory?

 

Movies are stored on a mechanical drive.

 

The Transcode directory is on a SSD drive.

 

Any writes that occur to the SSD drive are cached through PrimoCache.

 

Level 1 Cache 10GB of Memory

Level 2 Cache 128GB SSD Drive

Edited April 28, 2016 by MSattler

[MSattler 387]

Well considering I specifically listed HD audio playback as a reason to get a shield, I would think it's relevant.  The nexus or ftv, which I have, are perfect for plugging straight in to a tv but they will require some teanscoding, depending on content.  The don't compete with a NUC or similar htpc for high dnd playback.  The shield does.

 

No No no, you don't understand, he is right, and everyone else on the forum including you and me are wrong.  Lol.

[CBers 6766]

The last few pages were such an interesting read, not

 

This is way off-topic now, so perhaps we should lock this thread and move on.

[Heuer 76]

+1