need a firestick

[richhead]

need a new firestick, had and old one, and used it alot, what is the goto one now, have an old, but vgood, 1080p tv, and its good enough for me, back when i got it it was top of the range sony brava , also have a suround system linked to it.
So not looking for the best, but the firestick i have is very basic, volume on the remote would be good, is it worth getting a 4k one, or will i not notice, thanks in advance from a tech ludite

[Lucid_AV]

Get the 4K one. That's the one that'll give you the TV controls. You can set it to output at 1080p. When the time comes to change the TV you'll be able to set the stick to4K nd get the benefit of HDR including Dolby Vision.

For sound, the 4K job will do Dolby Atmos if you're piping it through an amp or AV receiver that supports it. When plugged into your 1080p TV, and then the audio passed out via optical or HDMI ARC, you'll get DD5.1 and PCM stereo. This is because it's unlikely that your V will pass DD+

The 4K Max (Gen1) is marginally quicker, supports WiFi 6 (if your router has that) and there are some shortcut buttons for the main streaming apps if you're the sort of person who has trouble navigating some menus.

There are Gen 2 versions of both the 4K and the 4K Max coming out at the end of September. Both are faster but more money. They're available on preorder right now. The Gen2 4K also gets WiFi6. The Gen2 4K Max gets a screen show feature called Ambient Experience. When the stick isn't being used for streaming it can display artwork, photos, the/a weather channel etc.

The 1080p Fire TV stick is the cheapest but doesn't have TV controls and misses out on the speed and the HDR & Atmos features.

[jonsp]

Same issue as the chap above. Got a smart tv in the living room which works great. Girlfriend just moved in with me and contributed a fairly old non smart 40" which I've set up in the bedroom. Not a great TV watcher so this should do fine once I get internet functionality in to it. Am I best getting a fire stick or something like this?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Android-Quad-Core-Support...

We use YouTube and Prime Video, anything beyond that would be a bonus. We've got gigabit fibre and could connect via wifi or ethernet.

[Lucid_AV]

jonsp said:

Same issue as the chap above. Got a smart tv in the living room which works great. Girlfriend just moved in with me and contributed a fairly old non smart 40" which I've set up in the bedroom. Not a great TV watcher so this should do fine once I get internet functionality in to it. Am I best getting a fire stick or something like this?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Android-Quad-Core-Support...

We use YouTube and Prime Video, anything beyond that would be a bonus. We've got gigabit fibre and could connect via wifi or ethernet.

Same advice as to the first guy, but if £20-£30 price difference is a big deal for you then get the Android box.

I ran an Android box for 3-4 years before switching to a 4K Fire TV stick about 3 years ago. Before all that I dabbled with a home theatre PC system for several years. That was like owning a classic sports car. When it worked it was great, but you do spend a lot of time tinkering under the hood.

At the time I had loads of DVDs ripped to the HTPC hard drives. Swapping to a NAS and adding the Android box made things quieter and less cluttered. Kodi ran as the media player interface and it all worked really well for content at home. Streaming was okay until I wanted to do the 4K thing.

I'll fully accept that things may have changed in the 3 years or so since I looked at it, but the issue I ran into with the Android boxes was the licencing to play HDR content.

When a box is made, shipped all the way from China, warehoused, advertised, sold, warrantied, and everyone at each step (including HMRC) makes a profit from a £40 retail price, then it shouldn't come as a surprise that there's very little money in the production budget to spend on additional licencing. It's one of the reasons why an nVidia Shield - which is an Android box on steroids - costs over £200. When it came time to change, a 4K Fire TV on a Black Friday deal cost £39. I don't game, so the Shield doesn't offer me a lot that the Fire stick doesn't do.

Amazon is a big firm with their own content library. They're interested in selling subscriptions and add-on services, so of course they've got all this licencing malarkey sorted. Whether they make any money or sell the Fire TV sticks at a loss, I don't care. It just works. It's well supported and runs all the major apps including Apple TV if you want. I run Kodi on mine too, so it does the HTPC thing for my own content.

Everyone should make their own choices. However, I can't see me choosing to go back to an Android box after this.

[jonsp]

OK, that makes sense. Ordered the 4k Amazon stick - did wonder about the Android box as the reviews seemed to be mixed.

Appreciate your advice.

[richhead]

Lucid_AV said:

Get the 4K one. That's the one that'll give you the TV controls. You can set it to output at 1080p. When the time comes to change the TV you'll be able to set the stick to4K nd get the benefit of HDR including Dolby Vision.

For sound, the 4K job will do Dolby Atmos if you're piping it through an amp or AV receiver that supports it. When plugged into your 1080p TV, and then the audio passed out via optical or HDMI ARC, you'll get DD5.1 and PCM stereo. This is because it's unlikely that your V will pass DD+

The 4K Max (Gen1) is marginally quicker, supports WiFi 6 (if your router has that) and there are some shortcut buttons for the main streaming apps if you're the sort of person who has trouble navigating some menus.

There are Gen 2 versions of both the 4K and the 4K Max coming out at the end of September. Both are faster but more money. They're available on preorder right now. The Gen2 4K also gets WiFi6. The Gen2 4K Max gets a screen show feature called Ambient Experience. When the stick isn't being used for streaming it can display artwork, photos, the/a weather channel etc.

The 1080p Fire TV stick is the cheapest but doesn't have TV controls and misses out on the speed and the HDR & Atmos features.

Thank you for the good advice, i was looking at the 4k stick already, and you have made up my mind, Also if i ever upgrade the tv, hopefully it can be reused, i have no plans to unless it goes wrong tho, the picture is good enough for me.

[richhead]

and typical of me, i buy one a few weeks before they are half price