Initially wanted to pick up a MI box but it was sold out at Walmart so got the fire stick instead. Now that it's back in Stock thinking of returning the stick and just getting the mibox. Primary use will be running Kodi and Google movies - hearing that fire stick workarounds are getting scarce as Amazon is clamping down.
Any thoughts?
Go with a Mi as Amazon already has the code in place to block whatever apps they desire. How long till they decided to block kodi/spmc? Besides, all amazon products are designed to direct you to their paid content and their gui is fucking horrible.
I've had both and the Mi box is way better. Although the Mi box and the android TV platform in general have flaws, it has many more apps, and is much more open. And of course the hardware is way faster.
Mi box all the way
I have both and the Mi Box is infinitely better in every way. Love it.
Amazon just put an ordering limit on fire sticks so im looking to switch.
I have both. I bought the MiBox on day 1, and have had no end to the problems. I appriceate that it runs essentially stock AndroidTV, and you can run basically any app. However, I have experienced constant crashing, apps not loading properly, ShowTime and HBO Go both freeze up at random or just play "static," Sling doesn't have a pause function (which it does on literally every other platform), and the remote drops out a lot, at least once a day (it eventually reconnects). Also, casting from your browser or phone is really hit or miss--so far I have not been able to make it work, although I never had a problem with my old Nexus player. And if you use Prime Video, forget about it because even if you manage to sideload the latest build, it's going to break quickly.
On the other hand, the Fire Stick is currently about $15 ($29 for black friday, and a Prime Now promo for $10 off plus $5 Amazon gift card after delivery). So I've been using the Fire Stick for about two days. Voice search is several orders of magnitude better than on the MiBox, if you're into that, and no app crashing yet (although the remote drops out occasionally). As others have mentioned Amazon totally locks down their devices, so don't expect Kodi to work for very long even if you get it running. But if you just use it as an environment for Amazon Video, YT, Netflix, and especially Prime Music, it's perfect.
So if you intend to run Amazon services, but also want to access your own media or plugins with Kodi, you need both. Hey, that's why there's more than one HDMI port, right?
fire stick
And it's out of stock again.
I've had zero issues with my mi box and I've had it since the day it was released. My vote is definitely for the mi box
Anyone know of any place other Walmart where the Mi Box can be picked up, (online only with shipping), Walmart is being real prick with respect to international cards being used to pay for an order, tried with a local US card as well, automatic order cancellation.
Have both, the mi is snappier and has volume control on remote