[Mi Box] First-timer Questions

by alex_harris

Hi good day. I just got my Mi Box delivered today. Unfortunately my cable internet is acting up so I haven't finished setting it up yet. I plan to update all the apps and remove unwanted apps (e.g. NetFlix, Spotify, etc.)

I will mainly be using it to play 1080p BluRay off an external hard drive (2.5" 500GB). This will be offline. I will be using this in my room (in a separate bldg without internet/WiFi).

  1. What's the best player for this? Balance of performance and UI. I tried playing an anime BluRay rip on VLC and it was pixelating and shit. Not sure if it's a problem with the drive or the box itself. Note: this is out-of-the-box. I haven't updd ated stuff yet.
  2. This box will be offline, so I guess I'll be uninstalling most of the pre-installed apps to cleanup the homescreen.. Can I get them back from the play store later on?
  3. exFAT or NTFS for the external HDD? Other than exFAT being accessible to a Mac (which I do not have, Windows FTW), I'm not sure about their pros/cons when it comes to Android or in this case AndroidTV.
  4. Any further suggestions/recommendations to enhance my experience in using this?
LiterallyCaligula

Re #1: I've tried all the players and the only one that has 100% reliably played everything I've ever thrown at it without issue is Kodi.

Bodycount9

You want to firmware patch it up to the latest before you install any apps because after the last firmware you will want to do a full reset to get it back to default settings.

LooseSealLooseSeal

Perhaps completely unrelated, but my exFat 2 TB drive is often acting up after being connected for more than 24 hours to my SHIELD. A restart usually fixes the issue until the next time. I suspect this might be related to the power supply, but my 16 GB FAT-formatted flash drive works just fine. As far as the player goes, VLC or Kodi seems to be your best bet.

a60wattfish

Kodi or SPMC. SPMC may be slightly smoother, but I'd have both. I think they should both independently remember what you have watched off your hard drive.

VLC on android is horrible and doesn't have any of the advantages that the desktop version has.

BiggussDikkuss

The MX Player App is a basic no nonsense HDD plug in media player that pretty much handles everything if you don't want to go down the whole Kodi route.

You have bought the wrong box expecting Hi10P aka 10 bit H264 Anime to work. It's an out of spec (release group) video compression method that will not hardware decode on 99% of media players on the market.

Hardware decoding of 10bit H265 (HEVC) yes. 10bit H264 NO.

You need a decent Spec Intel machine to Software decode 10 Bit H264 Anime in 1080p, especially Bluray Hi10P Rips.