[noggin]

If anyone is looking for a cheap Netflix HD + Kodi platform at a price comparable to a Raspberry Pi 3/ODroid C2 - then keep a look out for the Lenovo Idea Centre 300. Earlier this week Amazon.co.uk had it on a Daily Deal for £49.95.

That's a 2GB RAM / 32GB eMMC Windows 10 Home (32 bit) Compute Stick form-factor based on a Bay Trail Z3735F (1.33GHz). This SoC has some limitations - it's low power, has limited Execution Units in its GPU, and doesn't do HEVC video acceleration. It has a single USB port, a uSD slot, integrated WiFi (2.4GHz only) and Bluetooth. It also has an integrated fan to avoid the thermal throttling that has afflicted other Compute Stick form factor devices.

However it does do PCM 5.1/7.1 sound, and will play Blu-ray quality video as well as handle Live 1080i and 576i TV in Windows Kodi using a TV Headed PVR client. And it does Netflix in HD, along with all the useful Windows stuff.

I'd pair it with a cheap USB2.0 hub + Ethernet adaptor combo for wired Ethernet, and to allow external drives and USB keyboard/mouse (or something like a Logitech 400 RF Keyboard+trackpad) to be used.

It's not perfect - but for the price it may be of interest to some. I'd not suggest paying huge amounts for it, but at only £15 more than the Amazon Fire TV, I think it's probably a better buy.

OpenElec/LibreElec could be tricky to run on it as it has, I think, a 32bit UEFI BIOS on a 64bit architecture (though I haven't checked - it's just what most of the Compute Sticks have). However it may have an option, like the Intel stick, to boot 64bit UEFI too for Ubuntu. (There is a way of getting 64bit Ubuntu to boot on 32 bit UEFIs anyway)

[hdmkv]

+1 ... also integrated 3D possible via Kodi MVC builds. Not as cheap in the U.S., but can be had for about $80 or so.

It's too bad as we're less likely to get these kind of cheap mini PC's/stick in the future due to Intel's recent decision.

[noggin]

+1 ... also integrated 3D possible via Kodi MVC builds. Not as cheap in the U.S., but can be had for about $80 or so.

It's too bad as we're less likely to get these kind of cheap mini PC's/stick in the future due to Intel's recent decision.

Yeah - it was an Amazon Daily Deal. GBP £49.95 including VAT aka 20% UK Sales Tax (and I'm Amazon Prime so free next day delivery) which translates to roughly US$75 after tax. (£41 before tax or US$60 before tax)

Lenovo list price is £129.95, Amazon's normal price is £99.95 (there are other Intel-based compute sticks going for a bit less than that, but I'd not seen them as low as £49.95 before)

Hadn't realised the Z-series was 3D MVC compatible. Will give it a go.

[hdmkv]

It was $80 for new I think for Black Friday in November. Now $80 for used and about $100 new. Still, for an all-inclusive stick w/Windows 10, not bad.

[noggin]

It was $80 for new I think for Black Friday in November. Now $80 for used and about $100 new. Still, for an all-inclusive stick w/Windows 10, not bad.

And it has a fan - which is a good sign. The Z-series can suffer badly with throttling (the early Pipo X7 was terrible as it had a very poor passive cooling solution and as soon as you started doing anything significant the CPU speed dropped like a stone)

[hdmkv]

This is timely... just got a Beelink Pocket P2 for review from Everbuying. Same Intel Bay Trail Z3735F chip. Will test this weekend.

[noggin]

First time I tried the Netflix app I got stereo audio only (even when selecting the 5.1 audio track). After all the Windows updates had happened I got DD+ audio bitstreamed fine, and with shortcuts to switch to 1080/23.976p it's a nice way of avoiding 3:2 in Netflix. So far this little stick is actually proving quite fun. It's not a UHD HEVC demon, but it's a pretty capable little box for £50.

As a TV Headend client it does a much better job than the Fire TV stick.

[Topken]

Yeah it sucks that the pc on a stick movement has never really taken off and with Intels recent decisions its going to be even more barren going forward. Of course you have the successful rasberry pi but that falls into the diy/coding niche more then anything. and not very useful as a more general computing device. Netbooks come to mind as more general computing devices that were small and cheap compared to your standard laptops/desktops but those were replaced by even more mobile devices like phones and tablets and the tablet market is starting to slow down as well since phones are getting better and larger. Also Chromebooks are digging into tablet sales as well. At least those can be modified to run a standard linux os even tho many are limited to ubuntu only which I just hate as a linux distro. the low end stick market has been bombarded with cheap offers that use cheap and pitiful arm based cpus like rockchip, mediatek, and the like. It sucks that intel has decided to forgo the cheaper x86 based cpus that finally made such cheap sticks semi useable as general computing devices, Ok I may as well end the rant now since I am starting tto repeat myself here.

TLDR portion Intel is stupid to pull out of the lowend cpu market.

[noggin]

TLDR portion Intel is stupid to pull out of the lowend cpu market.

Unless they were losing money on it?

(Given the high tray price of some of their low-end chips - which were often higher than full products with screens, keyboards, RAM, Flash etc. with similar CPUs - you do wonder if they felt forced to subsidise low-end SoCs to compete with ARM-based SoCs ?)

[Topken]

I would love to see AMD join that market with a decent APU. Should work well.

[noggin]

I would love to see AMD join that market with a decent APU. Should work well.

Don't AMD still have issues with power and heat consumption? Last time I looked their APUs were far less power efficient (and thus run a lot hotter) than Intel equivalents?

[Topken]

Honestly all I know is that their highend game comes nowhere near intels no idea about the rest of it

[noggin]

Yep - 3D MVC + Frame Packed output confirmed with Kodi 3D MVC builds for Windows. Great little solution for the money. Ironic that £50 Raspberry Pi and Windows boxes can do this, but more expensive devices can't.

[hdmkv]

I'm having issues getting my Logitech K400 keyboard to work properly on Beelink Pocket P2. It'll occasionally work, then mostly not. Even tried manually installing the Logitech Unifying s/w and plugging dongle via a USB hub, but no luck.

Will test 3D MVC on this later today, but overall P2 is a little slow (even compared to Beelink's BT3 Intel Atom X5-Z8300), and the stick gets rather hot.

[noggin]

I'm having issues getting my Logitech K400 keyboard to work properly on Beelink Pocket P2. It'll occasionally work, then mostly not. Even tried manually installing the Logitech Unifying s/w and plugging dongle via a USB hub, but no luck.

Will test 3D MVC on this later today, but overall P2 is a little slow (even compared to Beelink's BT3 Intel Atom X5-Z8300), and the stick gets rather hot.

Interesting. I've had no problems with my K400 on the Lenovo (I'm using it with a USB Hub+Ethernet adaptor combo to avoid WiFI). The Z-series are noticeably slower than the X5-series - I've had both as tablets in the past and the X5 definitely had the speed advantage.