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A couple of days ago, nVidia presented their new portable gaming device alongside one particular feature. The ability to stream PC games via cloud and from a nVidia powered PC with GFE (equipped with at least kepler Ge Force GTX 650) to any device able to have their Grid client.
This is nothing more than the evolution of what Splashtop brought (with nVidia sponsorship) on CES 2012 (confirmed by nVidia Italy itself on Facebook).
Now during the conference it was stated that the client would have reached every android device (not only Tegra ones nor Project shield) and in the next days some hands-on with different "non-shield" devices were recorded.
Finally also the one recorded on Nexus 7 landed (cortesy of Droid-Life)
here it is:
I honestly think that if there will be the option to customize controls other than the only gamepad, the Nexus 7 could be even a better device that the shield itself for this kind of gaming (even if it lacks the Tegra 4 SoC). Furthermore it will surely be a great boost for android gaming in general (thanks to the direct support of nVidia and their money / partners- compared to the influence of Splashtop Inc.). The staff of the Tegra page on FB confirmed me that Grid (that I intend in its incarnation of both LAN (via GFE) / internet streaming (via third party partners)) will have a different timetable than Project Shield, so I think we'll have the opportunity to enjoy this feature sooner than the release of Shield (maybe at the same time with the announcement of the Nexus 7 successor @ Google I/O or even sooner with an open bea :laugh
SimoxTav said:
A couple of days ago, nVidia presented their new portable gaming device alongside one particular feature. The ability to stream PC games via cloud and from a nVidia powered PC with GFE (equipped with at least kepler Ge Force GTX 650) to any device able to have their Grid client.
This is nothing more than the evolution of what Splashtop brought (with nVidia sponsorship) on CES 2012 (confirmed by nVidia Italy itself on Facebook).
Now during the conference it was stated that the client would have reached every android device (not only Tegra ones nor Project shield) and in the next days some hands-on with different "non-shield" devices were recorded.
Finally also the one recorded on Nexus 7 landed (cortesy of Droid-Life)
here it is:
I honestly think that if there will be the option to customize controls other than the only gamepad, the Nexus 7 could be even a better device that the shield itself for this kind of gaming (even if it lacks the Tegra 4 SoC). Furthermore it will surely be a great boost for android gaming in general (thanks to the direct support of nVidia and their money / partners- compared to the influence of Splashtop Inc.). The staff of the Tegra page on FB confirmed me that Grid (that I intend in its incarnation of both LAN (via GFE) / internet streaming (via third party partners)) will have a different timetable than Project Shield, so I think we'll have the opportunity to enjoy this feature sooner than the release of Shield (maybe at the same time with the announcement of the Nexus 7 successor @ Google I/O or even sooner with an open bea :laugh
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I used splashtop thd and I was able to play any game even just cause 2 just from streaming from my gaming computer. It worked perfectly fine on my N7 I don't see any reason why I would buy a device like this when I already own a device that can do the same thing.
Sent from my LG-C729 using xda app-developers app
Splashtop?
What's that?
And is OnLive working with N7?
AFAinHD said:
I used splashtop thd and I was able to play any game even just cause 2 just from streaming from my gaming computer. It worked perfectly fine on my N7 I don't see any reason why I would buy a device like this when I already own a device that can do the same thing.
Sent from my LG-C729 using xda app-developers app
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Indeed, with the move from nVidia to make the technology available to all android devices, the only benefit compared to Splashtop THD is that the application will be directly supported from nVidia (that is not a startup nor currently involved with iOS).
It wasn't a topic about nVidia Shield but about nVidia Grid (that are 2 different projects with their own roadmap, simple shown together during the conference)
However Splashtop is lacking in the support of their app (several critical bugs are more than 1y old) (p.e. I had to tweak an XML profile via text editor to fix the mouse flickering issue in their app) and they have also to develop the iOS "traditional" version that it's surely more profitable for them than the THD one (in fact talking to their support center their confirmed that are short on resources to fix those bugs in short times).
Furthermore nVidia Grid will be probably free on LAN side (so potentially better than Splashtop), but it will be also available via 3G and 4G/LTE (but the service will be provided by third party owned Grid Server Farm). A feature that Splashtop simply doesn't have
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
Splashtop?
What's that?
And is OnLive working with N7?
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I will semplify:
Splashtop = Remote desktop gaming via LAN streaming YOUR OWN hardware (Google Play)
Onlive (as you know) is the same thing of splashtop on the "internet" and is offered as a service with THEIR hardware (is currently in bankrupt due the expensive architecture, a technical problem solved by nVidia Grid with virtualization).
nVidia Grid will be BOTH (for the LAN side supported directly via nVidia through their Geforce Experience Program and for the "Internet" side provided by third party like Playcast)
For OnLive for N7 the device isn't officially supported, but IMHO it should work
The question is - will Grid work on N7/N10/current top tablets?
Or is it going to be Tegra 4-exclusive?
To me...YES!
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
The question is - will Grid work on N7/N10/current top tablets?
Or is it going to be Tegra 4-exclusive?
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Grid (for its "internet/cloud" side) for sure, was declared during the conference ((link, look from 0:24:00) and was also shown there (even if in a limited environment having the rack next to the devices and not "on the internet"). To see other devices running it there is the video in the opening post and several other hands on showing it running on N7, HTC X and LG Smart TVs.
Grid (-or whatever it's called- for its "LAN" side, basically the evolution of Splashtop THD streamer) is currently promoted only on the Shield Project page but considering that is the same H.264 compressed stream that travel from a server to a client but in a local environment, if it can works on internet, why shouldn't work on local? If what Mr Huang said ("as long as you have a mobile processor able to manage h.264 you can run grid) is true, directly from nVidia or from someone that extract the APK, we'll easily have the client.
On the server side everything is needed is a GeForce GPU (at least GTX650) and the GeForce Experience Program, so no particular gimmicks.
Seeing Splashtop THD running smoothly on N7 is enough to state that the hardware is powerful enough to handle it (as long as we're speaking on internal screen (so 720p) and i'd say up to 1080p (even if Splashtop doesn't support on its THD version). Probably 4K screens and concurrent miracast streaming to both the devices will be an exclusive for the power of T4 (and with a very good wireless repeater i'd say), but without a video output option on the N7 is not our scenario at all
I don't see much point of using 4K HDTV's with a tablet to run a gaming streaming program. It's much easier to just play on a console or connect your gaming PC to a HDTV and use it as a monitor to utilize the power potential and play graphics-heavy things like Crysis in the resolution it was meant to be played
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
I don't see much point of using 4K HDTV's with a tablet to run a gaming streaming program. It's much easier to just play on a console or connect your gaming PC to a HDTV and use it as a monitor to utilize the power potential and play graphics-heavy things like Crysis in the resolution it was meant to be played
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I completely agree. Furthermore, talking about raw numbers, accordingly to this a streaming of an H.264 720p video (in high quality)@ 30fps, takes about 6Mbit/s that is currently a bandwidth available even on a good G router (and on several mobile providers). Considering the target of 60 fps we will need a surely at least a N router to avoid hiccups during the stream. However, rising the resolution to 4k the bandwidth needed for 60fps is about 70mbit/s that is simply insane to reach completely wireless if not sitting next to the PC and the router (as always seen in all the presentations) or having a real powerful dual band router...So to me the streaming makes sense only on portable devices up to 1080p. Above there are surely other solutions
SimoxTav said:
I completely agree. Furthermore, talking about raw numbers, accordingly to this a streaming of an H.264 720p video (in high quality)@ 30fps, takes about 6Mbit/s that is currently a bandwidth available even on a good G router (and on several mobile providers). Considering the target of 60 fps we will need a surely at least a N router to avoid hiccups during the stream. However, rising the resolution to 4k the bandwidth needed for 60fps is about 70mbit/s that is simply insane to reach completely wireless if not sitting next to the PC and the router (as always seen in all the presentations) or having a real powerful dual band router...So to me the streaming makes sense only on portable devices up to 1080p. Above there are surely other solutions
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So, as I understand, to use Grid you must not only have a more or less fast Wi-Fi connection (or mobile network if it allows it), but also have a device powerful enough to decode the picture being streamed from the server/your PC, right?
I've seen a couple of vids with the above-mentioned Splashtop GamePad THD - and it runs with noticeably less framerate than it does on the PC that the app was demonstated with
It's kinda strange though, because unlike Grid and Splashtop - the OnLive required to have only a fast enough internet connection which bandwith would allow to process the stream from the server, and the technology didn't require you to have a powerful hardware, meaning that you could even run things like Battlefiled 3 with maximum quality on a 5 year old PC
So why did NVidia decie to go the other way around?
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
So, as I understand, to use Grid you must not only have a more or less fast Wi-Fi connection (or mobile network if it allows it), but also have a device powerful enough to decode the picture being streamed from the server/your PC, right?
I've seen a couple of vids with the above-mentioned Splashtop GamePad THD - and it runs with noticeably less framerate than it does on the PC that the app was demonstated with
It's kinda strange though, because unlike Grid and Splashtop - the OnLive required to have only a fast enough internet connection which bandwith would allow to process the stream from the server, and the technology didn't require you to have a powerful hardware, meaning that you could even run things like Battlefiled 3 with maximum quality on a 5 year old PC
So why did NVidia decie to go the other way around?
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More or less every device today is able to manage (encode/decode) a H.264 stream so basically the "requirements" for the client device are not so strict (I'd say similar to OnLive indeed. Consider that having a compressed stream means less bandwidth used, on the other hand a decent CPU is needed to handle the task). The main difference is about that the THD version is specifically optimized to use one core of Tegra 3 just for the decoding process. Talking about the framerate of splashtop, I'll measure it somehow (I need the GF reflex but i'll try with a phone ), however I never noticed so much difference between the 2 devices (assuming that I have an intel core-i5 + GTX 670 and a DGND3700).
To be completely honest, however, I didn't even noticed a difference between the THD version and the "Splashtop 2 version on the nexus 7 (Splashtop 2 is free so is worth a try and compatible with a wide range of devices).
May I ask you to link the video you watched to see if the different framerate could be relevant to some particular environment?
SimoxTav said:
May I ask you to link the video you watched to see if the different framerate could be relevant to some particular environment?
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I watched this video, the official one from Splashtop YouTube channel:
You can easily notice that even streaming a movie lacks the framerate compared to the original shown on the PC
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
I watched this video, the official one from Splashtop YouTube channel:
...cut...
You can easily notice that even streaming a movie lacks the framerate compared to the original shown on the PC
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Yeah I'd say the difference is crystal clear. Probably for Grid/Project Shield they improved their codec to grant a smoother output (nVidia Italy said something related to it on Facebook (Link)
Quanto mostrato è una evoluzione di questa tecnologia, ancora a livello prototipale, quindi purtroppo non siamo in grado di risponderti con precisione, non essendo neppure noi a conoscenza dei dettagli
Translated:
As shown is an evolution of this technology (Note: Splashtop), still at prototype level, so unfortunately we are unable to answer precisely, since neither are we aware of the details
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I recorded on the fly a video for BF3, both server and client are connected via wifi (this isn't the optimal scenario but due the distance I can't move the desktop around the house). Talking about numbers there are no excuses and even on side by side comparison the difference is noticeable; however taken each one singly, the experience is IMHO enjoyable). Tomorrow I'll try with Splashtop 2 the same test (that one comes from a different developing branch, more recent than THD so maybe there will be improvements)
Video
FYI:
I used the render.drawfps call on BF3 (embedded in the engine) and FPS Meter on Android so was easy to see their framerates side by side. On PC the game is configured on Ultra with Vsync so no more than 60fps.
Does the in-game graphics setting have an influence on the framerate of the streamed picture?
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
Does the in-game graphics setting have an influence on the framerate of the streamed picture?
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For this i quote what Eurogamer stated during the faceoff between OnLive and Gaikai (that should be based on Grid servers) (Source)
Improved visual quality server-side also has ramifications for video compression. Hard edges with no anti-aliasing will be harder to encode than a richer, smoother picture derived from the game running on higher graphics settings - after all, these video compressors were designed with real life footage in mind, not raw game visuals.
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So better compression means lower bandwidth, however the framerate of both the stream and the server play a big role.
Basically, fewer unique frames (60FPS) means less work for the compressor to deal with when encoding the video stream. From another perspective, dropping down to 30FPS also provides double the amount of bandwidth for image quality and thus delivers overall clarity closer to the experience of gaming on local hardware.
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IMO 30FPS is mostly enough, though for fast paced racing and fighting games 60FPS is a must. Especially for fightings.
I believe that if we use a game with less graphics-heavy vicuals - then the stream should be pretty smooth, right?
Like, let's say, games like Diablo II, StarCraft, WarCraft III and Trackmania/Trackmania: Sunrise should work pretty nice
Fatal1ty_18_RUS said:
IMO 30FPS is mostly enough, though for fast paced racing and fighting games 60FPS is a must. Especially for fightings.
I believe that if we use a game with less graphics-heavy vicuals - then the stream should be pretty smooth, right?
Like, let's say, games like Diablo II, StarCraft, WarCraft III and Trackmania/Trackmania: Sunrise should work pretty nice
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Yeah, but more than graphics visuals details, their fast pace gameplay is the worst for this kind of technology.
However it seems that with grid the performance are clearly better
Did they specify if this was going to be a monthly subscription type deal or a pay for the games and what not like onlive?
ÜBER™ said:
Did they specify if this was going to be a monthly subscription type deal or a pay for the games and what not like onlive?
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I don't think that NVidia can afford to run a service like this (imagine how much resources they need to provide this streaming, especially in a perfect state)
Look at what happened to OnLive
So probably it's gonna be, like, 10-15$ a month or so, not too much (like if you'd rent a game from a shop like GameStop or such) and multiplied by the number of NVidia-powered devices (including phones, tablets and computers/notebooks/etc) - it's gonna bring some $$$ for the company
ÜBER™ said:
Did they specify if this was going to be a monthly subscription type deal or a pay for the games and what not like onlive?
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Their GRID architecture for cloud will be sold to third parties (Playcast, Ubitus, etc) and nVidia will not provide its own service directly. However talking on the LAN side of the application, it should be promoted and supported directly by nVidia (even if for now is shown as a "Shield only" feature) but I expect to see it at least on "all" Tegra devices (due the fact that if the service can work on the cloud, make it working on LAN is surely easier.
I want another player - for Kodi and occasional simple games.
I have the FTV and although I'm happy with the performance, I don't like the inability to root (inc. custom recovery etc) and to use external storage.
Any alternative suggestion at a nearby price? Or is FTV the only way to go at that price mark?
Id wait now, unless you're desperate.
There may be some android tv boxes coming out soon which may be better than the fire tv or amazon might have a sale.
Amazon might cut a tenner out of the price of FTV, but I really want to have the ability to root and not to be afraid that my box will one day be locked forever.
The minix X8 looks tempting
papars said:
Amazon might cut a tenner out of the price of FTV, but I really want to have the ability to root and not to be afraid that my box will one day be locked forever.
The minix X8 looks tempting
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do this. search on ebay for new sealed firetv's. ask the sellers to send you the serial number. Pick up a rooted one. Once rooted you are golden. I essentially got an extra rooted new one in my bunker for future use or I may hook it up in the bedroom in future. I'm glad I picked up an extra rooted one when I could.
The biggest thing you will loose when getting out of an architecture from amazon is the native apps like Netflix, bbc etc. I would stick with amazon ftv and find a rooted one. I'm sure if you look hard you will find yourself a rooted one If you disable the updates you should be fine.
Your suggestion is valid but I'm in europe and not really in need for netflix.
The price for sealed older FTVs seems somewhat high and by reading articles I see that even the SN wont warranty a rootable box.
In the meantime I will try to h/w root my box and see what comes out of this.
I recently shelfed my Fire Tv for the same reason. I have to many streaming boxes kind of a habit of mine (Fire Tv, Google Adt1, Ouya, Madcatz Mojo, Tronsmart Draco). Fire Tv still has the best commercial content but the hardware is getting outdated for games and the OS is way to restrictive. AndroidTV devices are still open to root and side loading but the commercial content is lacking has a great interface. On the opposite end is the Mojo and Draco with raw Android out of the box. They allow root without risk to warranty. I have gone with the Draco for now as it is very fast, Antutu test out at almost 60,000 with Power VR graphics. Madcatz has great quality and controller.
There are allot of consoles coming in the next few months, Razer Forge, Snail Games Obox, Nvidia Shied, Roku 4, Apple TV, others. You will be able to take your pick. My opinion for what its worth
Pure xbmc, get a rasp pi 2. Fast, cheap and simple with openelec And no amazon os to deal with. My living room fire tv has been relegated to the drawer since getting one.
I have raspberry pi first gen. It works ok and decoding is great but is sloooooow as death.
I've replaced it with AFT and I don't want to go back.
pi 2 could be faster but the cost of getting it operational (case, psu, remote etc) is near the cost of a commercial box. I will check out the options listed in above posts.
papars said:
I have raspberry pi first gen. It works ok and decoding is great but is sloooooow as death.
I've replaced it with AFT and I don't want to go back.
pi 2 could be faster but the cost of getting it operational (case, psu, remote etc) is near the cost of a commercial box. I will check out the options listed in above posts.
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i've moved my fire TV to a bedroom and have been running 2 s802 m8n china boxes and if you dont care about android and games.. openelec is flawless on it for me, full CEC control, refresh rate changing, etc etc.. best 75$ i've spent so far.. after using these for a while you really notice how much better openelec runs than kodi on android.
nhumber said:
i've moved my fire TV to a bedroom and have been running 2 s802 m8n china boxes and if you dont care about android and games.. openelec is flawless on it for me, full CEC control, refresh rate changing, etc etc.. best 75$ i've spent so far.. after using these for a while you really notice how much better openelec runs than kodi on android.
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Openelec is an operating system which runs the XBMC/Kodi program the same way that Android is an operating system that runs XBMC/Kodi. The only difference is that Openelec is a minimal operating system that uses just enough to run XBMC/Kodi, while Android is a full operating system able to run several programs. A couple years ago when XBMC came to Android it sucked and I quit using it after about a week, but it has came along way since and my Openelec system running Kodi cannot compare to my Fire TV running Kodi.
papars said:
I have raspberry pi first gen. It works ok and decoding is great but is sloooooow as death.
I've replaced it with AFT and I don't want to go back.
pi 2 could be faster but the cost of getting it operational (case, psu, remote etc) is near the cost of a commercial box. I will check out the options listed in above posts.
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I have to chime in here. With some smart shopping ill bet you could get all you need for 60 or less. My rpi is still the most consistent , reliable kodi device but like you, i thought it was too slow (even running off usb 3.0)
But ive heard good things about rpi 2 just running it on a class 4 sd card. My advice--dont use a case, its not needed unless theres reason to think itll get damaged. My tv remote works fine with it and this might not matter cuz if you have b+ you should have a lot of the stuff u want or need. I heard you might want to upgrade the power supply. I bought one for the b+ that worked great for 8 bucks on ebay. If i didnt care about netflix thatd be the way imight go. Of course that could change in the upcoming months.
porkenhimer said:
Openelec is an operating system which runs the XBMC/Kodi program the same way that Android is an operating system that runs XBMC/Kodi. The only difference is that Openelec is a minimal operating system that uses just enough to run XBMC/Kodi, while Android is a full operating system able to run several programs. A couple years ago when XBMC came to Android it sucked and I quit using it after about a week, but it has came along way since and my Openelec system running Kodi cannot compare to my Fire TV running Kodi.
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thanks, im aware of the setups, had a firetv since day one.. had fedora installed on it at one point even, what im saying is that Kodi for linux (openelec in my case) is much more stable than kodi for android or maybe its just linux stability vs android stability.. i dunno. but you dont get hangs or freezes like you can sometimes get with the android boxes, i also said the main things that are better with openelec than with kodi on the fireTV are fulling working CEC control, refresh rate changing since im kind of an videophile and watching any movie on the fireTV results in less than perfect playback, and HD audio support is also another nice feature you cant get on a fireTV.
porkenhimer said:
Openelec is an operating system which runs the XBMC/Kodi program the same way that Android is an operating system that runs XBMC/Kodi. The only difference is that Openelec is a minimal operating system that uses just enough to run XBMC/Kodi, while Android is a full operating system able to run several programs. A couple years ago when XBMC came to Android it sucked and I quit using it after about a week, but it has came along way since and my Openelec system running Kodi cannot compare to my Fire TV running Kodi.
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Depend on the hw that your OE is running on, got myself an Asus Chromebox that costs slightly more than the Fire TV when it was on sale last Black Friday, it runs like a dream.
As for running Kodi/XBMC on FireTV vs generic Android box vs OpenElec/Xbmcbuntu/Linux + XBMC I'd say it doesn't matter any longer. I've run all 3 ways, and it used to make a difference. A cheap booksize miniPC running OpenElec or Xbmcbuntu was much better than any Android based solution for a variety of reasons. That just isn't the case any longer. Of course if you have better hardware things like menus or the time it takes to start streaming a show will be a bit quicker, but otherwise you can get a solid stable Kodi/XBMC environment on any of these.
Back to the original question, personally I'd hold out until some of the Google Android TV boxes (not generic Android boxes) start shipping. Not because I think they will be better than GATV boxes, but because there should be a better selection of options and one might be a better fit than your two AFTV choices. Either way, it's hard to beat AFTV and I expect similar results from GATV boxes. Side-loading isn't as easy as just installing from the app store, but there are options that have all the plug-ins ready to go. Unlike other setups, you don't have to figure out which remote to use or how to get it configured (yes, I know some generic Android boxes come setup for XBMC and even have their own customized XBMC, I have one).
In short, I used to have a mix of generic Android boxes and mini HTPCs running OpenElec/XBMCbuntu. Now I have AFTV boxes in daily use and two Rokus that are almost never used. For the price point, ease of use, stability and extra functionality above and beyond Kodi the AFTV and presumably GATV boxes just make more sense.
One last thing I almost forgot - the space limitation on the AFTV is a huge drawback. Until (unless) Amazon releases an update to let us use USB drives for apps and data this could be a big issue. If for some reason you absolutely require plenty of disk space, perhaps you don't have network storage and need all your media on the device itself, then AFTV may not be an option.
GATV might have the same lock as amazon regarding custom updates / root.
I would like to escape the proprietary ecosystem opposed by amazon and google if possible to avoid possible lockouts in the near future.
I like the amazon box, is fast and easy to use with its remote. I use a NAS for my media but I would like to have root and extra storage option on it.
The mojo looks like a good option, I might go for this.
I've been using a Fire TV Stick for about a week now, after you sideload Kodi (and then use your Amazon account to install Kodi on another device, so you trick the FireTV into showing Kodi in your Recent apps on the home screen) I don't think you can beat the bang for the buck.
I'm about to order the Minix X8-H Plus. This thing seems a lot better than the AFTV! I have a 256gb SD card lying around, so I can't wait to throw it in this thing. It has 2gb RAM, 2.0ghz Quad-Core Processor, SD slot, three USB 2.0 ports, gigabit ethernet, 16gb eMMC, 4K2K UHD video playback, Octo-Core Mali-450 GPU, Dual-Band Wi-Fi 802.11ac and 4K H.265 / HEVC Hardware Decoding Support.
It looks like they're going for around $150-$160. Check it out:
http://www.minix.com.hk/Products/NEO-X8-H-Plus-Android-TV.html
papars said:
Your suggestion is valid but I'm in europe and not really in need for netflix.
The price for sealed older FTVs seems somewhat high and by reading articles I see that even the SN wont warranty a rootable box.
In the meantime I will try to h/w root my box and see what comes out of this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just got a firetv from ebay and its rootable. I've done about 28 mods and haven't seen one with series 305 which are the incorrect ones.
shutterslaps said:
I'm about to order the Minix X8-H Plus. This thing seems a lot better than the AFTV! I have a 256gb SD card lying around, so I can't wait to throw it in this thing. It has 2gb RAM, 2.0ghz Quad-Core Processor, SD slot, three USB 2.0 ports, gigabit ethernet, 16gb eMMC, 4K2K UHD video playback, Octo-Core Mali-450 GPU, Dual-Band Wi-Fi 802.11ac and 4K H.265 / HEVC Hardware Decoding Support.
It looks like they're going for around $150-$160. Check it out:
http://www.minix.com.hk/Products/NEO-X8-H-Plus-Android-TV.html
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Thats a sweet box for sure.. I am not too sure its a fair comparison though.. My AFTV cost me $80 and came with a remote. The $145 standalone box is more than twice as much if you get a controller. My Android MiniPC's (older) have been disappointing when trying to run Kodi etc.. which led me to the snappy performance of AFTV.. This box looks to have all the power you could need. Should be fun to have
This note on the webpage should be noted as well - The NEO X8-H Plus only supports standard definition Netflix. Netflix 1080p HD and 4K UHD resolution are not available on any MINIX NEO Series devices
I have been watching the Razer Forge TV box as well it looks to be a beast for $99
Ok, so I just ordered a Mi Max 128GB/4GB for Black Friday (from geekbuying) and was wondering if this device can actually support OpenGL ES 3.2, and I am asking if it can support it hardware-wise cause I know it won't work on android <7.0, so anyone know?
Adreno 5xx series GPU's have full support for EGL 3.2 with Android extension along with Vulkan support. So it's expected that they will be supported in Android 7~7.1.
Edit: & Android 7.0.1 is definitely coming (probably early next year in stable update):
http://en.miui.com/thread-420161-1-1.html
Zola III said:
Adreno 5xx series GPU's have full support for EGL 3.2 with Android extension along with Vulkan support. So it's expected that they will be supported in Android 7~7.1.
Edit: & Android 7.0.1 is definitely coming (probably early next year in stable update):
http://en.miui.com/thread-420161-1-1.html
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Click to collapse
Thank you, that's what I was expecting as well but even on Qualcomm's site the specs of the 510 are not clearly stated, also good to know we will in fact get 7.0.1 (although I plan to stay away from MIUI).
This should mean we might even be able to get at least somewhat decent Wii&GC emulation on this device in the future which is pretty exciting for me since there are still a lot of games I bought and never got around to finishing or even playing.
Ranomez said:
Thank you, that's what I was expecting as well but even on Qualcomm's site the specs of the 510 are not clearly stated, also good to know we will in fact get 7.0.1 (although I plan to stay away from MIUI).
This should mean we might even be able to get at least somewhat decent Wii&GC emulation on this device in the future which is pretty exciting for me since there are still a lot of games I bought and never got around to finishing or even playing.
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Click to collapse
Don't have to high hopes that Dolphine emulator will fly on Adreno 510, the driver's especially sheder compiler are far cry from anything good also hardware capabilities (EGLS 3.2, Testilation engine & Vulkan compatibility) don't count much without proper & good driver's support. On the current Android gaming scene A510 is wonderful but it won't shy with Dolphine (nothing will, best behaviour you will have with New Rogue series [Imagination Technology] but their is no any newer SoC for Android with it we will see how will MTK X30 behave 2Q next year).
Edit: By the way this whose a best deal for it when I searched wanting to buy a full prime one in the mean time I decided not to go with it & instead both a 3/32GB S650 version in land where I live. But search again me by you can find a better deal.
https://toponedigital.aliexpress.com/store/group/Xiaomi-MAX/342812_507286278.html
Best regards.
Zola III said:
Don't have to high hopes that Dolphine emulator will fly on Adreno 510, the driver's especially sheder compiler are far cry from anything good also hardware capabilities (EGLS 3.2, Testilation engine & Vulkan compatibility) don't count much without proper & good driver's support. On the current Android gaming scene A510 is wonderful but it won't shy with Dolphine (nothing will, best behaviour you will have with New Rogue series [Imagination Technology] but their is no any newer SoC for Android with it we will see how will MTK X30 behave 2Q next year).
Edit: By the way this whose a best deal for it when I searched wanting to buy a full prime one in the mean time I decided not to go with it & instead both a 3/32GB S650 version in land where I live. But search again me by you can find a better deal.
https://toponedigital.aliexpress.com/store/group/Xiaomi-MAX/342812_507286278.html
Best regards.
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Click to collapse
I did not say it would fly but it would have at least somewhat decent performance which for me means playable, especially since most of the games I want to play are for GC not Wii and are RPG games (except perhaps the Sonic Adventure games but I can play the DC version of those if the performance is too bad), the only few Wii games I would like to play would anyway not be practical (if possible at all) because they use the huge mess that the Wiimote is (mainly Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World).
Plus I have seen Snapdragon 808 with the 7.0 dev preview (OpenGL ES 3.2 supported) running Dolphin quite well and even with lower performance that would be enough for me.
Either way I would probably end up starting the games and not finishing them for a long time as I keep doing, start them while traveling and then too busy with College and stuff to finish them and then start an other game (like I did with 7th Dragon 3 on my 3DS, Tales of Eternia for PSP and countless others) but it would still be nice to know I at least have the possibility of playing those games on the go.
Well A518 can all A418 on S808 can & probably a little more in time when drivers support all capabilities along with games/emus. Then that is settled its enough for you & it is a pleasurable experience to play on such a large display.
Best regards.
Before anyone says game streaming I wanted to know if there was any other features that I should consider when deciding over a cheap android box and the shield. I owned a cheap android box for 2 years and it was really good but it was slow and never got updates but kodi worked perfectly until 17 update, but it's hard justifying a $300 price tag for the 16gb over $50 for the cheap one.
1. CPU performance, much faster then any s912, especially it have active cooling make it can keep in full speed, if you use any old amlogic box you will know you just can't decode any 1080 hi10p due to either the HW decoder not support or CPU not fast enough for SW decode. The shield can do it by CPU with 50-70%cpu usage max. Also although newer amlogic such as S912 support h265 but it is very buggy, the shield TV on the other hand is very stable.
2. For Android gaming I don't think you can find any android box in this size/price can better then it. Sure you can get a x86 box but that will much more expensive and larger.
3. Support 1080 ycbcr 422 12bit , I don't have 4K so dunno what is support, but as I remember there are no other cheap android box will support this output. (Sure you will need to take care the HDMI version mismatch problem if you got AVR)
If you will not use Plex and don't need IR then I suggest you just get the 16GB version, by the way I attach a 128GB USB stick to store my mame rom, much faster then hdd version.
Previous I use mi box and some other android box, but I can say shield TV is the most problem free and the fastest one for me.
$50 android boxes are junk, period. These things should be illegal to sell in USA. The manufactures are horrible at support & you never get updates. The only time a cheap android box is worth buying is if there are active private developers. Here's where the price difference matters, your $50 box lasted you 2 years. I've had my shield tv for almost 2 years & my guess is it'll still be alive & kicking in 10 years & still be my main media center. The shield tv was released as a future proof device, meaning it has a long life span while the $50 junk boxes have a very short limited life span hardware & software wise, you'll be replacing these types of boxes every 2 years.
Since when was the 16GB version $300?!
What feature(s)?!
In One Word... Widevine L(evel)1 support. (Ok tht was Two Words, whatever...)
Why is this a big deal? In Two Words this time. Amazon, and Netflix. In full UHD, let alone FHD. Your ~50$ 'Droid Box most likely will never have it. The only exception to that rule would be the Xaiomi Mi Box. Which like the Shield TV is a licenced AndroidTV Box. Which is based on the well known AmLogic S905 SoC. I have no ideas on how, or if Amazon will ever be ported to it. For now I gather it's a bit of a Shield exclusive. But, Netflix should be fine, along with the other usual suspects.
There is also the Gaming, and Emulation side of the Device, that puts it well ahead of the competition. With its small but exclusive Titles under the nVIDIA Lightspeed Studios. But, that may not be enough to convince a mass take up of it considering the initial cost.
If all you need is a cheap Kodi Box than by all means. You could pick one up, and gamble that you get a working one. Note I got burnt TWICE with an AmLogic S912 SoC Device. The first One cooked itself, while using Chrome, and the Second came with a defective WiFi Chip. So you take your chances with an unknown when buying One of these Devices.
When it comes to Updates, you'd be lucky to see a few Bug fixes before whoever's in charge gets bored, and moves on. nVIDIA have been supporting the Shield TV since it came out in 2015, and they will probably still be supporting it for a while yet with the 2017 version.
One last thing you might like to know about Kodi, and these Cheapo Boxes. Unless those Manufactures get off their butts, and code their CODECs to Android spec. Kodi will only ever function in Software mode only. Which will have a major impact on Video performance. Alas I don't know if the Mi Box also has that problem. Given its a specialized AmLogic build, perhaps not? But, a native Netflix App does not a Kodi make.
Of course there is One other thing that separates both the Shield TV, and the Mi Box. (Which I hinted at earlier.)
They are both Licenced AndroidTV units. And, in case that isn't quite clear to you. Then a word of caution to you. AndroidTV ≠ Android (e.g. Some generic 'Droid Box.), You should expect to see virtually nothing in the (AndroidTV), PlayStore. Certainly nothing like what most People probably imagine, after getting off the PlayStore on their Samsung Phablet. And, you can thank Google for that!
se1000 said:
Since when was the 16GB version $300?!
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Probably since nVIDIA weren't able to meet the demand for the Device which drove Scalpers to scalp it along with the Pro for Upwards of 600€'s, and no I wish I was making that up. The only time the Shield came down to reasonable levels, was just before they announced the Shield 2 (a.k.a. The Shield TV Slim), which was rightly rejected by those who already had a Shield. Seeing that I was able to get a used '15 Pro for 'round 200€ back in January. Good luck finding one now, for that price. If I wanted to spend nearly 300€ on a used One. I would rather just buy the new '17 Model for a fraction more. (i.e. 329€).
Ichijoe said:
What feature(s)?!
One last thing you might like to know about Kodi, and these Cheapo Boxes. Unless those Manufactures get off their butts, and code their CODECs to Android spec. Kodi will only ever function in Software mode only. Which will have a major impact on Video performance. Alas I don't know if the Mi Box also has that problem. Given its a specialized AmLogic build, perhaps not? But, a native Netflix App does not a Kodi make.
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You are correct on this, most cheap android box had broken mediacodec support, as KODI remove the amcodec support so either 1. switch to old version/spmc which have amcode, 2. SW decode, but the cpu not fast enough most of the time.
the google version of mi box's mediacodec are ok, but it still cannot hw decode hi10p (main reason I switch from mi box to shield tv)
DummyPLUG said:
You are correct on this, most cheap android box had broken mediacodec support, as KODI remove the amcodec support so either 1. switch to old version/spmc which have amcode, 2. SW decode, but the cpu not fast enough most of the time.
the google version of mi box's mediacodec are ok, but it still cannot hw decode hi10p (main reason I switch from mi box to shield tv)
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Outside of actively getting off my [REDACTED] to search for some hi10p Materials, back when I was still knee deep in Linux VDR (i.e. HTPC). The chances of actually encountering anything actually encoded at 10bits is extremely rare. And I do likes me some KissAnime. So I would chalk it down as a nice to have feature, and not the Killer One, that Widevine Level 1 is. As only the Select TVs running ATV, or the MiBox, and Shield TV are capable of such high end DRMs, for legaly being able to watch Netflix in either FHD, or UHD.
Since those other Boxes only have Widevine Level 3. You'd be lucky to watch Netflix in 480p MAX!
So for me that's a bigger deal going forward. Mores the pitty that the MiBox is virtually useless outside of North America though.
Not going into hard core comparison as far as audio support and video support but just general laymen comparison.
As reference current devices I own a A95x cheap android box, Fire TV Sticks, Nexus Players and 2nd Gen Fire TV, Roku2, Shield TV Gen 1
1. Performance - I didn't think the difference would be that huge since I mainly just use streaming services and apps like Netflix and Kodi to name a few but it's noticeable even in just those two areas. My FTV2 was snappy I thought compared to my other devices but the Shield just Launches apps quicker and goes through local and internet streams a lot smoother. Not a gamer but I have used them and let kids use them to try games and again just performance is amazing.
2. Ease of use my gripe with the a95x cheapo is It was IR remote and the interface just sucked. FTV2 and FTV sticks had their own interface over Lollipop and this too I am not a big fan of. Nexus Player and Shield TV are very straightforward and use the Leanback Launcher IMO easier to use and get google play store unlike Amazons offerings.
3. You get what you pay for. It's an investment that hopefully it will last. Performance wise I'm not worried about having to get a new box for a while now. Also the build and the remotes just are more appealing with the metal finish and all and they are rechargeable (yes the drawback is it's not replaceable batteries). It's running official Android TV yes the Playstore is limited for TV devices but for average user that doesn't want to side load and just works great out of the box it's perfect.
If cost is an issue like it was for me just wait for a deal or find one used if you're willing to take the chance. I just got my 1st gen Shield 2 weeks ago because I bought it used for $120 and had I tested it beforehand I never would have bought my a95x, fire tv sticks. I am happy with the Nexus Players I scored those for $40 but it's discontinued and my FTV2 but the Shield TV kicked those devices out of the family room and now those are in mine and kids bedrooms.
If performance isn't a huge deal then I wouldn't upgrade. If it is but cost still too high there are alternatives Fire TV (Just ew Amazon interface) and Nexus Player (Discontinued) or Mi box (Owned for a month and returned it performance wasn't as good as Nexus Player).
I have 2 fire sticks, a firetv box, and the new version of the shield TV. The shield is fast and responsive, but I don't think its performance justifies the price. If you not going for game steaming... I would just use a firetv box. Kodi performance is on par.
Here is my problem with the shield TV. Ram. For its price point I would expect 4gb of ram. This was a huge mistake I feel when they released the new version.
Don't get me wrong, I love my shield but if I didn't get mine for 175 with a deal, I would have not got it.
I couldn't disagree more with the majority of what's been said. It is true that the shield is an investment. It's worth it in the long run to get a shield. Talks of "4gb of ram" are comical at best. You want 4gb of ram buy a jetson tx1 for $500+ The point is, 4gb of ram isn't required when you have a constant power source. Take the Nintendo switch for example, yea sure it's basically a jetson tx1 (4gb ram) but clocked at a much lower speed to run on battery.
I would say it depends greatly upon how you want to come to the Shield TV. If your looking at it as just another in a long line of 'Droid Boxen, then that is how you will see it. If your like me, and your coming in from the huge running costs of an HTPC, with VDR Recording capabilities. Then the Shield becomes self-evident. As it can do those same jobs in a much tighter Footprint, and use just a microfraction of the Electricity to do it. Everything else is just a nice bonus. e.g. The Games, Emulations, Android itself.
So no Op is correct the Shield TV isn't the right answer for everyone. If for example Op wanted just the cheapest Box to do the most basic streaming (Amazon, Hulu, Netflix HBO Go, etc....), Then the Amazon Fire TV, would be right up his street. But IIRC, that only had 2GB of RAM, not that you would need it.
Also, if you want extra storage, you're better off getting the 16GB model and adding an external HDD. The way Nvidia set up the Pro model is kinda dumb - everything (including the system ROM) runs on the HDD, not flash, so it's really slow. It's also not user-replaceable without voiding the warranty and a lot of hassle. 4 TB portable drives are a bit over $100, so you can get a lot more storage for almost the same price.
Mogster2K said:
Also, if you want extra storage, you're better off getting the 16GB model and adding an external HDD. The way Nvidia set up the Pro model is kinda dumb - everything (including the system ROM) runs on the HDD, not flash, so it's really slow. It's also not user-replaceable without voiding the warranty and a lot of hassle. 4 TB portable drives are a bit over $100, so you can get a lot more storage for almost the same price.
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That might be true... But it's not like you couldn't just clone the contents of the Original SSHD, and then write that to the heavier, faster SSD. There are at least Two Threads on that subject, that I'm personally aware of. As to it being slower? That only applies when doing things like unlocking the Bootloader (a precursor to rooting), or factory resetting it where in both cases it'll take the best part of 2h to complete. Under day to day use However, I greatly doubt there is any major difference in the overall speed.
Also the newer Slim (and, light) Shield TV, also lack a few things, like the IR Port (for Harmony Remotes), and the OTG MicroUSB Port, and worse of all the MicroSD Slot.
Also one thing about Adopted Storage, e.g. adding external Storage. Just because you could add a 4TB SS/H/DD, doesn't give you licence to go 'round installing everything to your heart's content as not everything will be installed to External (Adopted), Storage and you will most likely be scratching your head about not having enough Space to install some Game even if you have the best part of 4+ GBs left inside in your External Storage. Just the way it is on my Phablet alas Adopted Storage is kind of a lie. As I see it.
If you replace the Pro HDD with an SSD, you're paying $100 just for the hard drive bay. (Edit: I did not realize the Pro hardware was basically unchanged.) Also, I would not recommend using an HDD as adopted storage anyway. Better to leave it as NTFS since Android network transfers are so slow.
Finally, it is possible to boot the Shield TV from an external SSD. You need a special boot image (MM only unfortunately) and an SSD in a USB enclosure. It's a bit tricky to set up but works pretty well. A Nougat version is in the works.
Ichijoe said:
That might be true... But it's not like you couldn't just clone the contents of the Original SSHD, and then write that to the heavier, faster SSD. There are at least Two Threads on that subject, that I'm personally aware of. As to it being slower? That only applies when doing things like unlocking the Bootloader (a precursor to rooting), or factory resetting it where in both cases it'll take the best part of 2h to complete. Under day to day use However, I greatly doubt there is any major difference in the overall speed.
Also the newer Slim (and, light) Shield TV, also lack a few things, like the IR Port (for Harmony Remotes), and the OTG MicroUSB Port, and worse of all the MicroSD Slot.
Also one thing about Adopted Storage, e.g. adding external Storage. Just because you could add a 4TB SS/H/DD, doesn't give you licence to go 'round installing everything to your heart's content as not everything will be installed to External (Adopted), Storage and you will most likely be scratching your head about not having enough Space to install some Game even if you have the best part of 4+ GBs left inside in your External Storage. Just the way it is on my Phablet alas Adopted Storage is kind of a lie. As I see it.
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Try enable force app install on external in developer options, I had no problem to save everything to my USB.
I'm surprised nobody is talking about this here. This is pretty big.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.en...05/nintendo-wii-gamecube-nvidia-shield-china/
none24 said:
I'm surprised nobody is talking about this here. This is pretty big.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.en...05/nintendo-wii-gamecube-nvidia-shield-china/
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Click to collapse
Yeah I've been checking on here to see if anyone had mentioned anything about it. I'm curious to see what the difference is between the Chinese version of the Shield and the current one.
I'm presuming there will be a TV version of the JD.com app but I'm wondering if there will be any different framework in the ROM so that this app and the Wii/GC games only work on that variant.
Andy4Shurr said:
Yeah I've been checking on here to see if anyone had mentioned anything about it. I'm curious to see what the difference is between the Chinese version of the Shield and the current one.
I'm presuming there will be a TV version of the JD.com app but I'm wondering if there will be any different framework in the ROM so that this app and the Wii/GC games only work on that variant.
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Click to collapse
according to sources, its gonna be HD remakes of the games and all upscaled to 1080p, and people are speculating that they'll be downloads so ppl might make APK mods and end up being free.
none24 said:
according to sources, its gonna be HD remakes of the games and all upscaled to 1080p, and people are speculating that they'll be downloads so ppl might make APK mods and end up being free.
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When I say ROM I specifically mean the Nvidia firmware. When Nvidia released shield exclusive games in the past they put certain checks in them and referenced Nvidia graphics libraries to play the games.
Hopefully we will have the same graphics libraries in the firmware but if we have different framework information then I'm guessing that would have to be bypassed in the APK or spoofed/installed on our Shield TV version.
It's too early to say if all this is possible I guess.
has not been talked about here because this is old news. Before the second gen shield tv was released, before the nintendo switch was released, it was stated that nintendo would be porting over a couple of games to the shield and they would not receive a North American release. Most likely part of the nvidia nintendo switch deal. Doubt nintendo does the actual porting though. Also shows how easily wii games could be ported to the switch. Goes to show, the shield tv isn't really meant to be much of a gaming system though, not in nvidias eyes. I say this because nvidia could have partnered with game developers to bring AAA ports and AAA exclusives. Look at all the game developer love the switch has gotten and continues to get, in theory all of those games should run on the shield. Afterall, the switch is a shield tv with an extra gb of ram, but the switch cpu gpu and ram are under clocked and under voltage to allow longer battery life.
techjunky90 said:
has not been talked about here because this is old news. Before the second gen shield tv was released, before the nintendo switch was released, it was stated that nintendo would be porting over a couple of games to the shield and they would not receive a North American release. Most likely part of the nvidia nintendo switch deal. Doubt nintendo does the actual porting though. Also shows how easily wii games could be ported to the switch. Goes to show, the shield tv isn't really meant to be much of a gaming system though, not in nvidias eyes. I say this because nvidia could have partnered with game developers to bring AAA ports and AAA exclusives. Look at all the game developer love the switch has gotten and continues to get, in theory all of those games should run on the shield. Afterall, the switch is a shield tv with an extra gb of ram, but the switch cpu gpu and ram are under clocked and under voltage to allow longer battery life.
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its old news that it was supposed to happen. now its actually happening tho id think ppl would at least discuss it was my point in my question. its still big news im sure someone will find a way to spoof the games to run on USA versions of the shield like the guy above mentioned, i agree with everything you said except the part about the AAA games, they already did that and have some thats what geforce now is for.
Andy4Shurr said:
When I say ROM I specifically mean the Nvidia firmware. When Nvidia released shield exclusive games in the past they put certain checks in them and referenced Nvidia graphics libraries to play the games.
Hopefully we will have the same graphics libraries in the firmware but if we have different framework information then I'm guessing that would have to be bypassed in the APK or spoofed/installed on our Shield TV version.
It's too early to say if all this is possible I guess.
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yeah ik what u meant, i was just making the point about modded apks and such since the games do seem to be something that can be downloaded.
but i agree its too early to say, lets keep hope alive tho
Except they haven't done that. How many AAA games run on the shield? Hardly any, couple out dated games got ported. GeForce now is a joke & doesn't count as AAA titles for the shield since they aren't running on the shield. Any android device can stream games.
It's probably all down to money. I'm guessing they make a lot more from their Geforce Now service than they would porting games.
Shield TV also isn't portable like the Nintendo Switch so doesn't have that niche selling point (it's up against Sony and Microsoft if it pitches itself as a gaming device and it's always going to lose that one) and Nintendo has a fairly big die hard following so game developers are more inclined to make games for the Switch... they will sell.
It's a shame that we probably won't see the Shield reach its potential as a gaming device but to be honest I use it more as an all round media device that can do a lot of things so I'm fairly happy.
Did anybody have any luck with finding the APK files for the Nintendo games? I want to see if the games work with GLTools like Half Life and Portal does.
Farfala said:
Did anybody have any luck with finding the APK files for the Nintendo games? I want to see if the games work with GLTools like Half Life and Portal does.
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Isn't it only the Tegra 4 (shield portable) compatible games that work with GL Tools?