NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV Pro Streaming Media Player; 4K HDR movies, live sports, Dolby Vision-Atmos, AI-enhanced upscaling, GeForce NOW cloud gaming, Google Assistant Built-In, Works with Alexa

. First, write this down and save it for when you need it, how to reset the remote when it locks up and new batteries don’t help: “Remove one of the batteries, press the home+dpad center button & slide in the battery. Continue to hold the buttons down till you hear a audible beep.” That happens about 6-9 months apart and knowing how to fix it makes this a flawless system. Can’t say that about upgrading my win 10 box to win 11 but the Android TV box that Shield TV is works well.I have it on wired Ethernet because the house has that. As does Marantz receiver, Samsung QLED TV, BluRay player (UHD streaming is not as good as disks, I’m on fast fiber, Amazon prime custom content and new Paramount+ Star Trek stuff being exceptions). They all work together and I have an Amazon 4k fire stick that does well but can’t Chromecast. I cast things that aren’t available in streaming form, a typical example is MLB have highlights, available on phone app. Clunky if you try them via browser (exception is watching on the computer directly). Generally I stream a lot including a lot of ad free YouTube. News, science and IT training videos (how to software stuff). The shield works well, up scales okay but the fact is that this is not the same as real 4k content, which the Shield does flawlessly. The remote is easy to use, unlike the horrible QLED remote. If only Harmony would recognize the Shield.I may shelve my 4k Fire stick, but I have the additional box to DVR broadcast stuff, which the Shield doesn’t do. I don’t use that anymore, once in 2 months, so I’m debating just removing the Fire stick. The shield just works but doesn’t have enough apps. What it needs is a music player that works with my Asustor NAS box. I can use Plex on NAS to stream a few hundred DVD disks I own and ripped, but music doesn’t work. Select a folder and it often just jumps to the root. I can cast (there are several phone apps on my Pixel that do that well) but a phone screen is small when I have folders of folders, couple of thousand CDs of music, over half is classical. Easy from PC, moderate from phone but it doesn’t work well in cast mode. Often I really to drill down to a folder – far quicker than artist or album (by probably a factor of 50-100) and then selectively play favorites. Nobody does that well in cast mode. Local mode to headphones is fine but not casting. I’m not interested in connecting a large multi TB drive to the shield as FAT32 winter cut it, NTFS will be necessary (I don’t use Linux except wsfl so EXT4 is out).Mostly I use YouTube, Plex (client mode), Paramount+ and may migrate from Fire Stick: Amazon Prime & Amazon Music. I dumped Hulu (on an old Roku) years ago, and Netflix because I didn’t find much content worth while. Paramount+ is close to that now, likely after the next season of Brave New Worlds. If Netflix hadn’t turned Formula One into a racing version of real housewives I might still subscribe. The apps, though, work well and it was easy to use any that I wanted except music on Plex (movies and documentaries are fine).I’d highly recommend the Shield TV. I saw an interesting YouTube video on Android TV boxes, the video was about security, specifically if they have a modified version of Android that allowed spying on your home network traffic. The answer was, and the person tested dozens of boxes, YES they do support spy with 2 exceptions. Shield was one, and it runs native straight Android and was clearly declared to be the one that should be considered trustworthy in this regard. The others had source code that was modified and some didn’t even try to hide it, the findings were enough to lose sleep over. Search YouTube for this:”Android tv box security” and one by Lon TV about “Is Your Android TV Legit?” is the one to start with but NordVPN “Pre Installed Malware on Android TV Box” is the other. Watch before you buy (these were made earlier in 2023) if you are thinking of a $40 Android TV box.So get a cold one or as I’m writing in December, since hot chocolate, sit back in your recliner and enjoy some excellent content available these days.Side note is that it was easy to get Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, combo from Microsoft, to work with the shield TV. The problem is more about how it isn’t easy to use them sitting in a recliner. But they do work. Just so you know.

We all know this is old now, but it’s still pretty quick.Android TV imo needs a new front end, if for nothing else but to get rid of the adverts. Luckily the Shield is more than happy to accept one. Instantly better.What is odd is that the Shield won’t play android games from the store, admittedly this could be cheap SSD I added as extra internal storage, so I am going to test that with a better one when it turns up.Edit: yup, certainly was the cheap ssd hard drive, I got a Samsung SSD and it. Is. Glorious.Talking of which, extra expenses:1. You will need an SSD to expand the memory, 16gb including space for the OS is frankly a joke.2. A decent hdmi lead.3. The possibility of needing a high speed hdmi splitter if your TV wasn’t made yesterday. My TV has four 4k hdmi ports but only two super high speed, one of which is arc.That’s fine, but the arc is taken up by my fancy soundbar and the other super high speed port is taken up by my Xbox.This means the shield can currently only go into a normal 4k port and that means no Dolby Vision or HDR10 etc.And really this box needs those settings as it’s just a bit lack lustre without them.4. You might also need to consider buying a powered USB 3(+) hub. There isn’t a massive amount of power to spare in the Shield and obvs running the usb takes up some of it. So to avoid digital drudgery, extra power might help.CEC is tricky to set up as it appears to conflict slightly with the rather nice IR settings you can tweak. I’m not yet savvy enough with the system to figure all this out yet, but I have hopefully stopped it randomly shutting down the Shield and my TV which was just annoying.My intention is to run this as a retro gaming/TV box. It’s not the easiest thing to set up, but after a few days of nerdling around I think it has potential… it’s just slightly out of my grasp so far.Edit: mostly got everything sorted for emulation. It’s fiddly and it’s a fine line between shaders and a CTD!Oh and the remote is very cool, if a little bit sensitive.Edit: all other controllers now feel old fashioned!

. Just some background info first. We “cut the cord” way back in 2008 and we’ve been using various Roku boxes to stream Netflix, YouTube and other streaming video platforms. As these streamers have updated their platforms, we’ve had to upgrade our Roku to newer versions, because these streaming apps would start to slow down while browsing and not being able to thumbs up/down videos and just overall slowness.Based on this, I started doing research on other Android streaming boxes and ran across the Nvidia Shield TV Pro. I spent several months reviewing videos and reading articles about the Nvidia Shield TV Pro and came to the conclusion that this is the best Android streaming box currently available (2024). In spite of the fact that this device has not received an update in several years.So, I waited until Amazon Prime Days and was able to purchase one for $169.99. After arrival, I relied on watching YouTube videos on how to set it up (included instructions weren’t very helpful) and I was up and running in a short amount of time. Another plus for the Nvidia Shield TV Pro is that is can actually run the Plex Media Server and host video streaming itself. Which was another plus over my previous use of Roku devices, which don’t have the capability to run the Plex Media Server.After several weeks of using the Nvidia Shield TV Pro, I’m very happy with this device. It’s very fast. It powers on/off the TV and Receiver and I can adjust the volume with the Nvidia Shield TV Pro remote.I’m not the biggest fan of the included remote. It’s nice that the buttons light up, when you pick up the remote. But, just the non-ergonomic design makes it difficult/cumbersome to hold in your hand and press the buttons. And the Netflix button is very sensitive and too easy to activate it, just by picking up the remote and not intending to launch the Netflix app. I hope Nvidia continues to manufacture the Shield TV Pro and that they redesign the remote.Otherwise, the Nvidia Shield TV Pro is perfect!

Es una lástima que la compañìa aún no haya anunciado una nueva versión de este producto. Es muy bueno y son pocos los errores que se le puedan encontrar. Muy contento con habberlo adquirido.