Is it viable to emulate Windows 10 on an Android Box just so I could keep using MPC-HC to watch my movies and TV shows while I'm out of a laptop?

by StrongAndPowerful

Long story short: My preferred and perfect method to watch anything, is through Media Player Classic, specially since it offers such great subtitle/audio tracks customization and it's the perfect player with the most responsive and simplest commands/UI in my humble opinion, plus it's already configured to work perfectly with my audio/TV setup.

That said, I've been out of a laptop to call my own for a long time, and I've recently moved houses, not being able to bring the laptop I was using with me. Thanks to the moving and the endless list of expenses and things I need to buy for the new house, I'm far away from being able to buy my laptop, while I have a perfectly good TV that I can't use for other than PS4 games and PS4's crappy media player, which by the way, has a terribly low audio that I can't amp up no matter what device I'm using, be it headphones or earphones.

That leaves me with the cheapest option that I didn't even knew existed, the miracle that are Android Boxes, for my TV. One would make a good replacement for a laptop as a media player for the time being, but I'm afraid I might be wasting my money if it can't do what I need it to do.

A quick Google search showed me that, despite not having Media Player Classic - Home Cinema, as it's a Windows-only application, one can still emulate Windows itself on an Android Box.

So, here's my questions:

  • Can an Android Box reliably emulate Windows 10 and run MKV/MP4 1080p files on MPC-HC while emulating?

  • Does it have an audio jack to connect headphones with?

  • If emulating Windows and running DS4Windows, does it support a connected PS4/Dualshock 4 controller connected via USB cable, so I can just plug my controller with my 3 meter USB cable and plug my headphones into the controller so I can control Windows and listen to the headphone audio via the controller like I do in an actual laptop? Would the audio quality be accurate to an actual windows experience?

shadywhere

No to all three points. Media Player Classic Home Cinema is a good media player (I use it as well) but it's simply not available for *nix or Android. VLC, MX Player Pro, or even Kodi are going to be your friend.

Some of them do have audio jacks, but they're designed to be connected to a TV via HDMI, so the ones with audio jacks are unusual and generally have very poor specs / software.

If you want a gamepad with an audio jack, get a Shield TV and controller.

randolf_carter

Emulating windows on an android box seems like a recipe for disaster, even if its possible. You can use Kodi, VLC, and probably hundreds of other media player programs on android. If the particular box you get doesn't have a 3.5mm headphone jack, a cheap USB sound adapter should work.

You might also consider a Raspberry Pi w/ LibreElec as a very cheap option, but unless its the newest RPi w/ a bootloader, you may need a PC to download an OS a prep an SD card.

Daveid

Just use Kodi, it's the MPC equivalent on Android. It's pretty much codec agnostic, with Lossless hardware decoding and bitstreaming support, with Match Frame Rate and Resolution Switching, 10bit, HDR, H265, AV1, etc, etc. I'm a snob when it comes to quality and I have nothing but good things to say about Kodi. Blows away what MX Player, VLC, or Plex's native player can do.

pawdog

It can't emulate Windows but it doesn't really need to. All the things you are used to doing with Windows, media playback wise is done natively with Android TV? Probably even easier and better. A $20 ONN UHD Android TV device, with a usb hub to attach a drive with media on it for example, can play any media you may throw at it with ease and of course you can go up in price from there. Kodi, VLC, Nova Media Player. IMO Android has long ago bypassed Windows for video media playback. There are of course in your case a couple of maybe non starters. Your chosen audio method I think would be problematic as the devices are much better suited to HDMI audio. A laptop being a totally self contained device is going do handle that kind of stuff much better. So if you need headphone audio you may have a to buy some inexpensive Bluetooth earbuds to keep expenses down if the TV speakers aren't sufficient for you.

SRGilbert1

I don’t know what price range of Android boxes you had in mind but why not just get a used PC like a small form factor Dell Optiplex? You should be able to get one for $100 or less.

K900_

No.

Yahiroz

MPC lover here too but it's going to run badly on emulated Windows.

MC Player Pro comes close, it does have decent subtitle options as well as other settings to really customise the player to your liking, but it costs a fair bit and the free version has been ruined when it was sold off.

VLC I found is the next best thing but like the desktop version doesn't feel as customisable as MPC.

Ice-Cream-Poop

Get a Xiaomi Mi TV box. Install Kodi and you'll be sorted. I've tried to use cheaper android TV boxes but they are just too shitty for all content and x265 stuff.