Hi all. I friend of mine here in Thailand gave me what he calls an 'Android box' (photos of device), which, when properly configured should be able to stream various movies, TV shows, to my TV from the internet. Would this fall into the 'Android TV Box' category? My assumption is 'yes,' but I just wanted to confirm.

I have some questions about setup and configuration, and I want to know the best sub to ask.

Thanks in advance.

edit: Thanks to /u/danielwray, I found the answer. What I have is this model (or some kind of reasonable facsimile).

• http://www.theandroidportal.com/remove-device-google-account

So if anyone else is in a situation where your Android TV device is lost/stolen/damaged, you can use this to remove your Google account's access from the device.

Edit 2: As a side note, my failing backlights on my X850C were due to me having the brightness turned up nearly all the way up for a prolonged period of time. According to a few of the repair folks I've spoken with, turning the brightness / backlight above 70% of it's max will burn out the backlight, backlight inverter, or power supply board much quicker because of the amount of power that is drawn. They all recommended not going above 50% of the max backlight brightness and never to go above 70%. With this in mind, I'm now able to use my X850C again. After keeping the power off for a couple hours, I plugged it in and powered it up. I was able to get it to the homescreen and immediately turned the brightness down to about 10 in all of the various profiles (App, App Video, HDMI, etc.) I've been using this Bravia as a bedroom TV for a few nights now with no issues.

So if you're having an issue with a newer 4K smart TV like I did (6 blinking red lights), try unplugging for an hour or so, then plugging it in and turning the brightness down, then test the device again. Per my repair guy: If it still fails, try to wipe it. If you can't wipe it, and it can't be fixed, destroy the main board before discarding the TV or selling it for parts.

Here is the video of it running Shield TV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HE_Eg25kjNI the response time is much better. I still have crashes once in a while but I think it has to do with Android trying to close it, when that happens i do a force close and just restart it.

OP: I had seen one post in this subreddit about syncing hue lights to your Android TV and after much trial and error I have finally found a way to do it and figured I'd share. I will give two methods as some may be able to get he native app to work or it may get updated. For me it crashed every time.

Easy Sideload Method: Go to https://github.com/BradyBrenot/huestacean/releases and download the latest Android release and side loading it on Android TV.

Another app I have heard mentioned is Hue Ambilight which is available in the play store. You can install this from a browser on the Shield TV. I also did not have success with this app, it seemed to fully close and not continue running in the background.

Workaround Method: If neither of these apps worked then this is the best way I found to work around it, you must have a PC available to do this.

Download the Windows app of your choice to capture your PC screen, the link above to huestacean is the fastest to me, I also purchased HueDynamics and have tried Screenbloom. HueDynamics is a good all around app for hue but I am currently using huestacean as my screen capture method when gaming.

Download the Vysor App https://www.vysor.io/# for your computer and sideload the app on your Shield TV from here: https://www.apkmirror.com/apk/clockworkmod/vysor-android-control-on-pc/vysor-android-control-on-pc-1-0-0-0-release/

On your Shield make sure Network Debugging is enabled in Developer Options Open the Vysor App on Shield it will take you through some screens. Open Vysor on the PC you will see a link to install ADB drivers toward the bottom, install those as instructed. Restart Vysor, Input the IP address of your Shield by clicking the little button above the word "Settings" (this can be found in network settings on the Shield) Once you input this you will get a popup on your Shield to allow the connection, You will see it show as a device.

Now you need to go to the Windows app that you chose and pair it to your bridge and choose the monitor which you will be having Vysor open on, set Vysor to full screen and you will now have an ambilight alternative. This is very low latency for me as Huestacean uses the Hue Entertainment API plus I am on a gigabit wired network. YMMV

Here is a quick demo of this working on my setup. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLF1QXZqWZI

Edit: *One thing I forgot to mention, many paid apps such as Netflix, HBO and others do not allow any screen capturing, to get around this you would need root and Xposed, I have not attempted this yet but will update the post when I do.

I've looked at the spec sheet for this device and it doesn't mention which SoC is used but only that it's a "quad core ARM processor." Would any owners of this Android TV device be able to install AIDA64 from Google Play and provide more specific details such as those from the system, CPU & Android menus of that app? If it's too much to type, screenshots are also fine. CPU-Z also provides technical specs but that app requires sideloading on Android TV. I've seen people commenting about the lack of Netflix support but for that to change, the hardware needs to support Google Widevine L1 DRM for high definition playback. An app called DRM Info can be installed to determine if it supports that or not.

I am used to streaming from various r/sportstreams subreddits and am finding it a little tedious on ATV.

Am I correct in understanding that there actually isn't a proper web browser for ATV? Firefox and Chrome are both quirky.

Chrome doesn't seem to have a working long press menu which means you can't open in new tab or copy text, and Firefox which does, doesn't seem to playback video as smoothly. Chrome's quirks also seem to apply to any browser that leverages Webview.

I use Naked Browser on my phone but that appears to be completely unusable as I can't seem to scroll.

I have an "airmouse" but being able to use the simple remote that came with the Mecool M8S Pro L would be a huge plus.

Are there any ATV reddit apps that make it painless to click on one of many links within a comment to either open it in a browser (for web streaming) or to copy a string of text (for acestream)

This interface? Also is this redesign Android TV exclusive for now?