I recently bought a van with a DVD player and screen for the rear passengers. There is an HDMI in and I would like to find an AndroidTV device that I could always leave in the car. I want to put my movie library onto a thumb drive and use VLC (or something similar) to allow the kids to watch movies. I don’t plan to have it connected to the internet. There is an AC outlet and USB power.
I know nothing about AndroidTV hardware and would appreciate any help or advice. Thanks!
I would go with the mibox. It has its downfalls but experience no issues when playing local content in Kodi.
AndroidTV Device Comparison Table:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AndroidTV/comments/cguehm/androidtv_device_comparison_table/
If all you want is to play back files from a thumb drive, then a Raspberry Pi will work and be low powered compared to other Android TV devices.
A Pi2 or even the Zero would work. Just image LibreELEC onto a MicroSD, insert and it boots into Kodi.
I've used a Jetstream box in our van. Kodi with files on a USB drive works just fine.
Following
Buy the cheapest Amlogic based Android player you can find ($30?). They usually have Kodi preinstalled. It will do everything you wish. Will even come with a remote so you can control it all.