I'm not sure this is the best place to post this. I'm happy to move it to Bravia or ShieldAndroidTV if that makes more sense.
Current setup:
Sony XBR-75X940D TV
Onkyo TX-NR636 Reciever
I have the TV connected to ethernet and the just use the HDMI return for audio from the TV for everything attached to it to drive my 5.1 surround. It's not the fanciest of setups but it works really well for house, the TV still looks great, and the Onkyo does fine for surround. This is all controlled by a Harmony Hub setup.
What I'm trying to figure out is if it's worth it to upgrade to an Android TV box, likely the new Shield TV Pro. I have an XBOX One X and PS4 Pro connected directly to the TV but neither are ideal for streaming for what my household uses (Kodi, Netflix, Prime Video, Youtube TV, and now Disney + of course). The rest of the TV's in the house are running newer versions of Android TV which my family has gotten used to using and likes. The issue with this setup is that the old version of Android TV on the Sony is pretty slow and has issues that require rebooting the TV 1 or 2 times a week like losing internet, Kodi freezing, etc. BUT everything looks and sounds great when it's working. I have a media server on the home network with a bunch of old DVD rips as well as several newer 4k HDR files. The one issue I had was with larger 2160p HDR files I would get a lot of stuttering in Kodi which I "fixed" by attaching a USB hard drive directly to the TV with those files. Kind of a pain but like I said it works.
I assume the Shield TV Pro would be an upgrade in Android TV performance and I hope stability but I've read through these forums and the Kodi forums about some of the downsides around some audio and video formats. So my questions are:
- Do y'all think it's worth the upgrade?
- Would the '19 Nvidia upscaling be better than the Sony TV upscaling?
- Is there another solution that would work better?
Eventually I'll get a receiver that can handle HDR for all my various sources but I'd like to hold off on that for a bit longer if possible. Given that I assume I'd have to connect the Shield TV directly to the TV like my Xbox and PS4 and use the return channel for audio.
TLDR - Android TV in my "old" Sony TV is starting to suck, should I get a Shield TV Pro?
Thanks in advance for your help!!
As per the answer before yes get a Shield TV Pro or 2019 Fire TV hardware if you want to stick with Android. You need to be prepared to roll up you sleeves with some DIY however, because the 2019 Shield still has various bugs out of the box.
If you want a mature product that has even less hassles, and “just works’ then get an Apple TV 4K. It’s the only one that gives you access to an ever growing, affordable library of 4K HDR DolbyVision Atmos - rental iTunes and streaming ATV+ video content.
All those devices have properly implemented Dolby Audio licenses so your Sony TV can very likely passthru 5.1 DD (and probably 5.1 DTS) back out via HDMI ARC to the AVR - when they are direct connected to the TV.