I heard several brands like Tanix, Beelink, Mecool etcCan you guys give brand recommendations for budget TV box, with good FW support.
Budget $200 max, Nvidia Shield is around $300 on my country
I heard several brands like Tanix, Beelink, Mecool etcCan you guys give brand recommendations for budget TV box, with good FW support.
Budget $200 max, Nvidia Shield is around $300 on my country
You're in the wrong sub. This sub is for boxes running official AndroidTV for the OS. Most of those TV boxes run Android for touchscreen with a custom launcher tacked on, and come with an air mouse. Rule of thumb: if it requires an AirMouse, it's not AndroidTV, it's Android for the TV.
MeCool makes a relatively cheap pair of boxes running actual AndroidTV, the M8S Pro L and M8S Pro W. I'd recommend looking at the M8S Pro L, it's the more capable of the two. I actually ordered one myself to mess with, but it hasn't arrived yet, so I don't have any direct experience with it just yet.
Speaking of budget, what’s your limit. Not everyone has the same limit.
The only true android tv box you have on your list is mecool if you have a budget of up to $200 the only choice is the Nvidia Shield tv
Are you sure that the Nvidia Shield is $300 in your country? There is a 16 GB variant and a 500 GB variant and the larger one cost around $300.
There are only specific non licensed Android Boxes that run the Android TV OS out of box. These ones generally have Widevine L1 and HDCP 1.x for 1080p Netflix like specific models of MECOOL's:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMeIqU_gbWQ
I believe the most recent model of the MECOOL M8S Pro L with the Voice remote also has Microsoft's Playready needed for Amazon Video.
None of these unlicensed devices will do Chromecasting. You need a NVIDIA Shield or Mi Box for that.
The Mi Box is a great device for streaming video (Netflix, Kodi, etc) and is $70 US. They just released a stable (as in non-beta) Oreo update to beta pool, and shipping devices with Oreo preinstalled now (not yet on shelves here though).
If you want official AndroidTV, a good price and just want to stream video than Mi Box will work great. If you need an Ethernet port, you can get a compatible adapter.
Can buy direct from Xiaomi website, but make sure it is the international version and right model number (stated above).
Of course Amazon and Roku are also fairly inexpensive. I prefer AndroidTV personally, but if available than it wouldn't hurt to check them out too. That's if you haven't already.
Those boxes most likely don't run AndroidTV, but rather a version of Android. This is sub-optimal on televisions, since it means that the apps won't be optimized for that 10-foot interface (An interface that you can read from a large distance from the screen, and interact with with a remote).
The most budget option I can recommend for an AndroidTV device, is the Xiaomi Mi Box 3 (watch out. they also sell boxes running regular Android). That would cost you around 60$.
To my knowledge that is the cheapest AndroidTV device on the market.
Edit: I see your budget is 200$ max. In that case I'd recommend the Nvidia Shield