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Old 01-07-2019, 12:52 PM   #212
Hemi-Cuda
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Join Date: Feb 2006
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Quote:
Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay View Post
What are you liking about it?

Doing some Plex research and it seems to be the best client for it but I'm sure there are other things I could use it for?
I've posted a few times on what I use mine for, but I'll expand a bit

Streaming - I sold my Xbox One as all I was using it for was a Netflix and Plex player. That paid for the Shield and gave me better clients for both (4K capable Netflix, Shield is able to natively play almost anything so no transcoding for Plex). Plus it's the only Android box that supports Prime Video

Gaming - Naturally after selling my Xbox One, a game I actually want to play (Forza Horizon 4) comes out. Not an issue though since I have a gaming PC, so installing it there allows me to stream it to the Shield to play on the big TV. And if you don't have a gaming PC, you can use GeForce Now, Nvidia's online game service. There's a handful of games that come included with the service (right now there's no charge as it's still in beta), and it also allows you play any supported game that's in your Steam library. I tested it with Street Fighter 4 just to see how responsive it was, and I couldn't detect any lag

Emulation - Still falls under gaming, but specifically you can install Retroarch and other emulators to play classic games all the way up to Gamecube and even some Wii games work. So if you have a Retropie hooked up, this can replace that too

Chromecast - The Shield has native Chromecast support. I've really enjoyed having that as part of my main set top box and never having to switch TV inputs

VPN - You can install a VPN directly on the Shield and have it only apply to specific apps. So for instance I exclude Netflix and Prime but route the NHL Gamecenter app through it so I can watch Flames games

Sideloading - Some apps are restricted by country, or are only officially supported on the Fire TV stick. But with the Shield you can download official .apk installers from www.apkmirror.com and install them anyway (or find a Fire TV .apk rip, https://www.reddit.com/r/AndroidTV/c..._tv_3_for_you/). So I'm able to install Hulu, route it through the VPN and login with my cousin's account

Basically out-of-the-box the Shield is the best TV box as is, but once you start playing around a bit you can really see the power of it and nothing else comes close
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