the best 2018 media streaming device

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#1999392 19-Apr-2018 15:54

Kinda on this topic,

im looking for a media box that can play from a USB HDD, as well as from a network, and that can be controlled from a standard infrared remote. needs to be simple to operate.

i have a WDTV live here but it wont read the bigger HDD's these days and its getting pretty long in the tooth.

currently using a PS4 but it refuses to play about 1/2 the content we have.

JimmyH

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#1999455 19-Apr-2018 18:54

What's your budget?

Either:

importing an nVidia Shield TV (circa $180 US + shipping),
or an i3-based NUC with a USB dongle for the infrared remote, or
A Raspberry Pi with Kodi.

Should easily do what you want.

Personally, I replaced my WDTV with a NAS (to hold the content, running Plex) and a Raspberry Pi (running Rasplex, to play the content). Content goes on the NAS rather than the drive being plugged into the Pi, but it works really well. And, more importantly, it has High Wife Acceptance Factor.

Jase2985

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#1999503 19-Apr-2018 20:22

@JimmyH budget is low and a sheild would be overkill as would a NUC.

i like the interface of a proper media player as its just easier to use with a remote which probably rules out a NUC along with the cost.

how is a raspberry pi with playing and or transcoding a 1080p 4GB movie?

jnimmo

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#1999505 19-Apr-2018 20:26

Apple TV 3 is fantastic if you could move on the USB hard drive requirement and just play off the network instead

Jase2985

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#1999511 19-Apr-2018 20:38

jnimmo:

Apple TV 3 is fantastic if you could move on the USB hard drive requirement and just play off the network instead

cant move on the hard drives as thats the primary method of viewing and that wont be changing

+ apple TV = yuck :P

cokeman2

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#1999603 19-Apr-2018 22:10

Just a update Mi box is working good

Streaming from my pc in 4k wirelessly on kodi

Pass through Dolby atoms and HDR enabled by

Default settings... only had one issue on

planet earth 4k umm might be a courrpt file

All the rest are ok at the moment

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JimmyH

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#1999962 20-Apr-2018 18:33

Jase2985:

how is a raspberry pi with playing and or transcoding a 1080p 4GB movie?

It mostly plays 1080P content fine. However, it doesn't transcode them. I play them through Plex, and the transcoding is done by the server and not the client.

Jase2985

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#1999979 20-Apr-2018 19:27

as mentioned i would mainly be playing media straight of a HDD so i take it, it had no issues with that through Kodi?

timmmay

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#1999987 20-Apr-2018 19:58

R.Pi2 works well for everything I regularly use it for. I don't watch high bitrate 1080p very often, it can choke a bit sometimes on the really high stuff, but it's rare. R.Pi3 should be fine.

Roku stick from Amazon works great for Netflix.

PANiCnz

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#2000276 21-Apr-2018 12:42

If you want to run Kodi get a Odroid C2 over a Raspberry Pi. Has native support for LibreELEC and will do 4k with an HDMI 2.0 port.

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#2008770 6-May-2018 16:20

kobiak:

+1 mibox. no issues. super easy to use.

I'm looking to get one of these for Netflix, etc. but do they support ExpressVPN? Googling hasn't proved that fruitful.

Ideally I'd like to use dns4me, but that doesn't look like it supports Netflix in Japan, which is really all we need here. Hence the need to spend extra on a VPN...

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#2008817 6-May-2018 17:35

I got my Odroid C2 last week an spent a few days setting up. seems to be all good and do what i want from it.

Took me a few hours to get a remote setup with it as its range of out of the box supported remotes is limited and i wanted to use my universal one. Required a bit of command line work and some basic coding but works great now.

cokeman2

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#2009006 7-May-2018 09:32

its been couple of weeks with mi box had a few problems

1. i am getting washed out colors on HDR iam streaming from pc playing via KOdi , even thou tv says its in hdr mode

could be ,HDMI cable unlikely thou , it goes through the amp which is hdr 4k compatible.... might be a kodi issue?

2. audio drop outs on 1080p and 4k to point it just starts to starter then basically if restart a movie very annoying, media streamer

happens maybe once threw a movie, Netflix etc is all fine

is there any other media streamer software like kodi or plex i could try

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cokeman2

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#2009802 8-May-2018 11:02

unfortunately I've given up on the mi box for 4k streaming from my pc i don't think it just not powerful enough ....reading from forums there seems to be problems everywhere regarding audio dropouts ...happened last night again working fine all the way through the movie then it just started to stutter /lag to the point i had to restart it again :(

thinking nvida shield tv costly but i ve learned from my mistake, i sell the mi box .....

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#2009815 8-May-2018 11:20

I purchased a Roku stick from Amazon recently (Ships to NZ) and am very happy with it. Plugs into an HDMI port of the TV. The channel range is limited as it's not a US version but we watch Netflix 90% of the time and a bit of YouTube and both work very well. For $70 I'm very happy.

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