[Question] Full stream ahead!

strawman

strawman

A discussion about the chrome stream stick leads me to wonder what people are using for their streaming?

We have

* amazon firetv sticks (first gen)
* iOS devices with a lightning to hdmi converter
* roku (4th gen)

And those pretty much cover the bases for us right now. We've used old roku devices (until the kids lost the remotes), we've connected computers, I have an older apple tv that just frustrated me to no end.

I'm finding I prefer roku over amazon, but amazon is ok. We use the iOS devices because they've got unlimited cellular data and our DSL can't keep up with all our usage, so it's a nice way to get a decent stream when the kids are otherwise using the internet.

What do you use? What have you used and why are you now using your current solution? What do you like/dislike about those you have experience with?
 
fade

fade

Staff member
Until a couple months ago, I used the PS4. The kids were familiar with it, and it was already attached. The UIs for Netflix and Hulu are really well done on the PS4, too. Now, though, I bought a Samsung TV with Tizen on it (an offshoot of Android created by Samsung), so I just use the smart TV apps. They work fine, and support 4K with no additional setup. The only issue there is that Hulu keeps losing its auth token, and you have to completely restart it every time the TV goes off.
 
Denbrought

Denbrought

Chromecast 1st Gen and Steam Link for the living room TV, Chromecast 2nd Gen for the bedroom TV. This combination does everything we've needed.

Chromecasts handle anything done with a cellphone (Netflix, Youtube, Twitch), while the Steam Link turns either of our computers into media PCs (Kodi and videogames) from across the house w/o wires. Before the Link, streaming from our PCs via the Chromecast was chancy at best. The Link also forwards USB devices plugged into it to the main machine, which is great (wireless keyboard and controller at the moment).
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
I have:

Western Digital WDTV Live
Google Chromecast
A cheap shuttle barebones media PC.

WDTV Live -
Advantages? Decent UI for remote control, works reasonably well for what it DOES work on, works on both wifi and ethernet cable
Disadvantages? Old, now extremely dated, doesn't support all newer codecs (though it does handle more than you might think, for example it CAN play MKVs, which puts it ahead of the fucking chromecast, lol), runs kind of slow, no app support (no netflix/hulu/etc)

Chromecast -
Adv: Good versatility, controllable both via PC and smartphone apps, good app support from things like Netflix, $$$cheap as hell$$$
Dis: Requires internet connection over wifi (any playback software is redownloaded from the net every time it is used), prone to overheating, needs to be power cycled every so often, bad audio codec support (Transcoding software such as VideoStream often required to play videos), your ability to play videos is ENTIRELY reliant on 3rd party app developers to not screw something up, and they frequently screw something up.

Media PC -
Adv: By far the most versatile, anything you can play on a PC you can play on your TV.
Dis: Also by far the most expensive, albeit only $200. Chromecast was $35. Even the WDTV was $100. Controls can be an issue, though I use a Rii I8 wireless kb/touchpad remote combo and it works pretty well, but still that's another $20 to tack on.
 
Gared

Gared

We have the Chromecast and one of the generations of the FireTV Stick from Amazon (whichever one was on sale Prime Day 2016). Personally, even with all of the recent problems I've had with the Chromecast, I still prefer it over the FireTV stick.

FireTV: My experience has been that even if I reboot the device daily (power cycling it), after two or three hours of viewing consecutive viewing time, the video quality first switches back to standard def from high def, and then starts shuddering and skipping parts of the stream. The other thing that annoys me is the UI itself. I hate that they didn't think to make it possible to loop back to the beginning of any given list by advancing past the endpoint - i.e. If you've just scrolled 100 movies into the comedy section, and decide you want to watch the 13th movie, you either scroll all the way back one at a time, or you exit the category and go back in. It's such an obvious convenience feature I cannot fathom how it was left out. That being said, since I use the Chromecast with the VideoStream app to play DVDs and other offline movies, Amazon fixing those two issues still wouldn't win me over.

Chromecast: I paid the $25 for the lifetime subscription of the pro version of VideoStream, and the playlist option is too useful for binge-watching TV series (and the only actual way to play a DVD smoothly, since you can load each video file in succession) to go back to anything else. And while I'm on the topic of playing DVDs, when the bloody hell did Microsoft take DVD capabilities out of Windows Media Player and start charging $10 for a DVD player app? How did I miss that?! I could really use a smoother integration option for VLC to either casting device though, since that's what I play DVDs with now; and the device itself is starting to glitch out a lot, but it may be due to the ambient temp going up. It was awfully hot when I unplugged it a while ago, so I let it sit and cool down, and now it works again. I may need to set up a small fan to vent heat out from behind the TV.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Oh yeah, that's the other thing that pisses me off about chromecast - Videostream keeps acting like it's got a shit connection and buffering like crazy. That shouldn't happen when I can speedtest on my laptop in the same room for 80+ mbit.
 
fade

fade

Staff member
I don't get the appeal of the Chromecast. I don't want to have to bring my phone into my tv watching experience. It seems like an unnecessary complication. I bought one and tried it for about a week before returning it. Never used it once.

Ditto on media PC. I had one set up, but there was never anything I needed to do that required the extra oomph of a whole PC. That, and the power consumption of a PC running all the time made me itchy. I ended up donating it to goodwill.
 
Dei

Dei

GasBandit said:
Oh yeah, that's the other thing that pisses me off about chromecast - Videostream keeps acting like it's got a shit connection and buffering like crazy. That shouldn't happen when I can speedtest on my laptop in the same room for 80+ mbit.
Click to expand...
We bought a wired adapter for our Chromecast specifically because our Wi-Fi is shit.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Dei said:
We bought a wired adapter for our Chromecast specifically because our Wi-Fi is shit.
Click to expand...
I know my wifi isn't shit, though. I suspect it's part of the all-encompassing thermal issues the chromecasts all seem to have. I have it on their little cable dongle to get it away from the TV and have room to breathe, but it is still irritating.
 
fade

fade

Staff member
Well actually, that's not really fair. I replaced the few things I couldn't do with anything but the media PC with a $30 Raspberry Pi. It runs Kodi just fine, and I can control it using Kore from my phone. Plus I can swap out the MicroSD and reboot into RetroPi for emulation, not using any roms whatsoever no siree bob.
 
DarkAudit

DarkAudit

Thanks to Best Buy only having a DisplayPort to HDMI adapter, this hackintosh is hooked up to the living room TV and the stereo for sound. I spent all of last week watching the BBC feed of Wimbledon in HD thanks to VPN. Far cheaper than adding TV back onto the cable bill. :D[DOUBLEPOST=1500571010,1500570418][/DOUBLEPOST]
fade said:
Ditto on media PC. I had one set up, but there was never anything I needed to do that required the extra oomph of a whole PC.
Click to expand...
See above. With a VPN there's all sorts of stuff available to stream that would otherwise be region blocked. I was still able to watch Wimbledon and the British Grand Prix both in HD in spite of not having access to the ESPN or NBCSN streams.
That, and the power consumption of a PC running all the time made me itchy. I ended up donating it to goodwill.
Click to expand...
What are you doing that drains that much power? Are running a rendering farm on the side? :p
 
figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
My solution was a 15 foot HDMI cable, cost me $5, but my computer in my bedroom is very close to my TV in my living room.
 
phil

phil

Two first gen Chrome cast for the living room and bedroom. I also use my PS3 to cover the gaps like Amazon prime.
 
PatrThom

PatrThom

We have a 4th gen Apple TV in the living room connected to a dumb TV, and that gets the most use by far. We never used any of the earlier versions. Previous to that, we would directly connect an iPod/computer/whatever directly to the television when what we wanted to watch wasn't on traditional hard media, which was inconvenient enough that we didn't do it often.
Cranky has a smart TV in his room, and he has his older computer hooked to it as a monitor, so if he wants to stream something it's either through an app on the TV itself, piped in from the computer, or cast directly from his phone.
Things nobody in the household owns: Chromecast, Roku, PS4, Wii, FireTV, or any other sort of dedicated media PC. I have an older 2007 Mac Mini that was purchased with the intent to be a media machine (because it supports analog S-Video for the 27in tube TV we had at the time), but we upgraded to an HDMI-capable television before that was implemented. The cable company, Amazon, and others all keep trying to shove their preferred player down my throat, but I have not discovered any need for them, and now that Prime video is finally coming to Apple TV, our options are just going to expand.

--Patrick
 
MindDetective

MindDetective

Roku 3 (I think) and a Roku driven smart TV. I like the agnosticism of Roku, but there are some features of Chromecast that I would really love to have too.
 
Gared

Gared

fade said:
I don't get the appeal of the Chromecast. I don't want to have to bring my phone into my tv watching experience. It seems like an unnecessary complication. I bought one and tried it for about a week before returning it. Never used it once.
Click to expand...
fade said:
Well actually, that's not really fair. I replaced the few things I couldn't do with anything but the media PC with a $30 Raspberry Pi. It runs Kodi just fine, and I can control it using Kore from my phone. Plus I can swap out the MicroSD and reboot into RetroPi for emulation, not using any roms whatsoever no siree bob.
Click to expand...
?
 
strawman

strawman

DarkAudit said:
I plugged the hackintosh configuration into this site
Click to expand...
Per the site: "The results do not include PSU power losses", and most cheap power supplies are 60% efficient at idle loads. If you pay extra for the "80 plus" rated supplies you might get something that is above 80% efficient at low loads.

So your PC is likely to be pulling 65W or more when idle. If your electricity costs around $0.15/kwh, that's a cost of $85 per year.

Measurements online for the Amazon Fire stick say 1.5W at the outlet when idle ($2/year) and 2.5W at the outlet when streaming ($3/year).

The Raspberry pi when idle isn't much more, and even at full tilt with a lot of USB peripherals pulling power it's only costing $17/year.

Further, that 65W doesn't just disappear - it goes into your house as heat, so during the winter it's beneficial (though probably more expensive than gas heat) but in the summer you're paying again to remove it from the house.

Not to knock your choice of streaming device, I'm sure it gives you benefits worth the cost for you, but Fade's power savings argument is very sound.
 
Bubble181

Bubble181

I....ehhh...don't use anything to stream content to my tv. I watch YouTube or whatever on my pc or phone, and tv or dvds on my tv.
I'm a caveman .
 
strawman

strawman

fade said:
Yeah, I was waiting for that. Using my phone as a remote isn't the same (to me) as being the device that's actually doing the downloading and computing work.
Click to expand...
When the chrome device was introduced they touted one of its biggest features - when you sent content from a computer or phone, it would attempt to hand off the stream itself, rather than getting the data from the computer or pone, so your phone wouldn't actually process the youtube stream the chromecast was playing, it would just act as a glorified remote. At least for those streams it could perform the handoff for.

Has that changed?
 
Denbrought

Denbrought

stienman said:
When the chrome device was introduced they touted one of its biggest features - when you sent content from a computer or phone, it would attempt to hand off the stream itself, rather than getting the data from the computer or pone, so your phone wouldn't actually process the youtube stream the chromecast was playing, it would just act as a glorified remote. At least for those streams it could perform the handoff for.

Has that changed?
Click to expand...
It has not. The only time your phone is doing work is when establishing a connection with the Chromecast itself, or when you're using tab/screen mirroring (in which case your device has to re-encode the stream). At all other times, your phone is a glorified remote.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
stienman said:
When the chrome device was introduced they touted one of its biggest features - when you sent content from a computer or phone, it would attempt to hand off the stream itself, rather than getting the data from the computer or pone, so your phone wouldn't actually process the youtube stream the chromecast was playing, it would just act as a glorified remote. At least for those streams it could perform the handoff for.

Has that changed?
Click to expand...
That is both the strength and the weakness of the Chromecast. The streams are "handed off" to it, but more than once that's led to situations where Netflix worked on my phone but not on my chromecast, or vice versa. Furthermore, as I made mention, the Chromecast has a very strict list of what codecs and formats it will play natively - mostly MP4/AAC, I think... I know if a video contains MP3 audio, the chromecast won't play it. This is where apps like videostream and BubbleUPNP come in, which you install on chrome on your PC, and then it transcodes and streams your video files to your chromecast in real time... and it also has a smartphone control app, but all the calculations for the transcoding are done on your PC.

It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, especially given that google has had ample time to patch in the missing codecs/formats but has chosen not to do so. Even the ancient WDTV Live has better update support than the chromecast has had.

VLC has been teasing that it is working on chromecast support for the last 6 or 8 months or so, but I've tried it and it is still VERY alpha. Doesn't always work, and when it does, it rarely supports seeking/pausing without screwing up and requiring starting over.
 
fade

fade

Staff member
stienman said:
When the chrome device was introduced they touted one of its biggest features - when you sent content from a computer or phone, it would attempt to hand off the stream itself, rather than getting the data from the computer or pone, so your phone wouldn't actually process the youtube stream the chromecast was playing, it would just act as a glorified remote. At least for those streams it could perform the handoff for.

Has that changed?
Click to expand...
Well. In that case, I retract my statement. I'd still rather not use my phone at all, though. I'd rather not even use it for Kore, but it's better than attaching a mouse just to watch a movie.
 
jwhouk

jwhouk

Dumb question: what exactly do you need to use Chromecast? What does it all involve - actual movies/TV, or just Youtube-like stuff? What about sports and "live" events?

I've been considering getting something like this for myself, but I'm not sure if I want to dump cable completely.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
jwhouk said:
Dumb question: what exactly do you need to use Chromecast? What does it all involve - actual movies/TV, or just Youtube-like stuff? What about sports and "live" events?

I've been considering getting something like this for myself, but I'm not sure if I want to dump cable completely.
Click to expand...
At the bare minimum you need some sort of mobile device with the free Chromecast app installed. That will let you configure and control your Chromecast. Once you do that, Google Chrome can stream anything in a tab to the Chromecast, and there are a number of apps like Netflix and Hulu that support Chromecast on their own. If you've got video files that it can't play natively (pirated TV/movies), you'll need something like videostream for Chromecast, which is free.
 
klew

klew

Was never tempted with a separate streaming device other than a game console. My 2005 HDTV only has 2 HDMI ports which are taken up by the cable box and PS4. The cable box is an Xfinity X1, so there is a good amount of on demand stuff, plus the PS4 can stream Amazon (no Netflix or Hulu for me) and HBO Now (free 30 day trial, pay for one month, get all of Game of Thrones S7). Finally got a new desktop PC (first since 2003) with my first non-CRT monitor, which has 2 HDMI ports, so it takes whatever is on the PC and hooked up the old PS3.
 
jwhouk

jwhouk

...eeeyeahno. I can just hook up an HDMI to my PC and stream stuff off of there. Hell, did that for a lot of NHL games a few years back using NBC Sports' website.
 
PatrThom

PatrThom

Just as an aside, here's something you can use as a yardstick to compare other media centers against.

https://airtop-pc.com/product/airtop-g/

You can get it with a Broadwell i7, 32GB RAM, a GeForce 1060, up to 4 internal drives, scores 7.8 on the Steam VRMeter, and best of all it supports up to 7 simultaneous 4k displays, all in a box about 4 x 10 x 12in (10 x 30 x 26cm).

Also it is completely fanless, so it makes zero noise.

Also it's a little over $2000.

--Patrick
 
David

David

My main work/gaming PC is connected to a bigscreen TV on the wall by a displayport cable and set as the third extended display. When my girlfriend and I want to watch something I turn the TV on, drag a video window over to Display 3 and set the LCD TV as the sound source. Not the most elegant of solutions but it works for now.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
David said:
My main work/gaming PC is connected to a bigscreen TV on the wall by a displayport cable and set as the third extended display. When my girlfriend and I want to watch something I turn the TV on, drag a video window over to Display 3 and set the LCD TV as the sound source. Not the most elegant of solutions but it works for now.
Click to expand...
Elegance is overrated sometimes. What you have is probably the most powerful and versatile solution, and would be my ideal solution if my main PC was close enough to my living room TV to be a convenient way to control it.
 
ncts_dodge_man

ncts_dodge_man

I've got an older i3 desktop with 6 GB of RAM and a mild video card hooked up to my main house TV - it works rather well and is very versatile since it can stream (Netflix and Amazon Prime), watch my DVDs (via Kodi), or be "big screen mode" and stream my games from my i7 gaming laptop.

I used to have an Acer Revo small form factor for the PC, but it died.

I eventually want to build a new desktop HTPC with that smaller form factor again so it fits into my TV stand rather than stick out like a sore thumb, but that'll be a little bit yet.
 
Denbrought

Denbrought

David said:
My main work/gaming PC is connected to a bigscreen TV on the wall by a displayport cable and set as the third extended display. When my girlfriend and I want to watch something I turn the TV on, drag a video window over to Display 3 and set the LCD TV as the sound source. Not the most elegant of solutions but it works for now.
Click to expand...
This was our setup before we moved.
 
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