OT: Mad Catz M.O.J.O.

[christoph86 12]

I am highly considering getting one of these.  Can see it here  http://store.madcatz.com/brands/mad-catz/Mad-Catz-MOJO-Micro-Console-for-Android.html?scid=madcatzsitestore

 

Basically it is an Android mini pc built primarily for gaming, but has full access to Play store.  You have to root it at this time (encouraged by Mad Catz) to get full access to everything.  Runs top of the line Tegra 4 processor  and is going to have Kit Kat soon (stock comes with Jelly Bean) and Ouya store access.  Price tag is a bit steep, just dropped it to $200 US, but looks like a high quality system with a nice game controller.

 

Was wondering if anyone has gotten this yet or any first hand usage?

[christoph86 12]

So I ended up buying this little unit for $199.  I have it connected to a 60 inch Vizio LED TV.  I have had it about a week and a half and would like to do a little review.  Overall, I'm extremely pleased with this unit.  It does very well with media playback and with the MediaBrowser3 Android app.  So far I've only used it wireless, but plays 1080 very well.  HBOgo, Netflix, MaxGo all work well.  Showtime Anytime app will download, but when you try and play a movie/show it says that HDMI output is not accepted from this device.  You have to root this item in order to full access to all the apps on the Play Store.  The good thing is, it's easily done and it's encouraged by Mad Catz to root it.  It doesn't negate your warranty.   I rooted it the first day.  It is a fanless device that makes zero noise.  When the 10 foot interface comes along with the MB3 android app it will be that much better.  The controller that comes with it is very much like an Xbox controller.  It has a little slider on it to change from three positions, game mode, mouse mode, and pc game mode.  Navigating with the mouse mode is very good on screen once you get used to it, except if you want to type a lot.  For typing a lot you can easily connect a Bluetooth keyboard or a fly mouse that has a keypad on it.  I have a Mele F10 coming soon.  PC game mode is for connecting the controller to your PC with the Bluetooth dongle you get with it.  Regular game mode is for playing Android games on the unit itself.  It only has a handful of games right now that natively accept the MOJO controller, but most games in the Tegra Zone store can be keymapped using Tincore keymapper app.  More games are coming, including all Ouya store games.  Currently I'm playing The Bard's Tale (awesome game, hilarious) and works natively and very good.

 

If you like emulators, this unit excels in this area.  So far I've used Mupen64 Nintendo 64 android app and Reicast, Sega Dreamcast android app and they work great.  For the dreamcast I've tried Grandia II and Sonic Adventure 2 and both work extremely well.  That app is only alpha and really have not had issues with it at all on those games.  Both of these apps have the MOJO controller as a preset, but you can change the buttons if you like.  NES, SNES, Sega and PSone emulators also work with this system, though I have not tested them yet. 

 

Audio:  I don't have it connected to any speakers or a AVR, but it can do Dolby digital and PCM for sure. I think it can do DTS, but this is all app dependent?  Not entirely sure, but have read that. 

 

Storage:  Unit comes with 16 gb memeory.  It has USB 2.0 and 3.0 and microSD slot up to 128 gb.  Currently you need the 3.0 slot filled with the Bluetooth dongle for the controller, but once Kit Kat arrives you won't need the dongle.  I use SD card slot for holding my Roms.  Natively storage is read only, need some additional apps to have NTFS write capabilities, have not tried writing to a storage device. 

 

Issues:  Unit does not have an off button, so this can be seen as an issue to some.  It does have different power states and all very low.  From the website:  running 3d game: 3.5-4.5 w, HD video 2.77 W, idle 2.5 W, Shallow sleep: 1.56 W and deep sleep: 0.26 W.  If you quit using the controller for a couple minutes it will turn your tv off. This is changeable within the settings.  It detects both 2.4 and 5 ghz wireless, initially connected to 5 ghz but seemed to lose connection.  Since switching to 2.4 ghz have not had any issues.  When your unit goes to sleep, waking it back up and continuing an android game, sometimes the app will crash and it requires pulling the power plug out to reboot.  Rebooting on this unit is very fast.  There is no optical output.  You have to root this item to have full functionality, though it's quite easy to do.  Last issue is that the soft keys (you know the keys at the bottom of a tablet that show the buttons for back, home and recent apps) don't disappear when launching movie apps such as MB3 and HBOGO.  You have to install a third party app to make them disappear.  This isn't an issue for emulators or games, but has been for media.  I don't know if there is a permanent fix for this coming.

 

Other thoughts:  I bought the MOJO a few days before the Amazon Fire tv was released.  Initially, the Amazon Fire TV is $100 cheaper, with gamepad it is $60 cheaper.  Amazon Fire is likely it's own ported Android?  I'm sure there is a root soon to be released for it, but it's not encouraged.   If using for pure media only, the Fire is probably the way to go.  If you like high end Android games with Tegra 4 support and emulator support, MOJO has it's place.  I really enjoy it and it has filled the need for me. Rumor is that Mad Catz has actually made the gamepad for the Fire TV, so this makes me think that whatever support is given to the Fire TV, the MOJO will get as well (my thoughts only).   

 

Updates:  Kit Kat, Ouya game support, and supposedly NVIDIA gamestream is coming so you can stream games from PC to your MOJO. 

Edited April 12, 2014 by christoph86