[teki4u]

Just kodi + LibreElec, not mentioning Android (out of the game for amlogic devices)

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[wrxtasy]

Yes the Shield is a good device, and its still the king of the AndroidTV boxes, but for kodi only 'which is what OP is asking in simple terms' is overkill and OP can get what he/she needs for much less $$$, that is a fact. The links are a good read source to be informed.

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It depends on what is wanted, but there are pure Kodi uses where the Shield will be a better value due to the raw power it has. For example, it can handle both video output in 4K as well as the Kodi GUI always being in 4K. An S905 box will not be able to keep up with doing that. The GUI will be slow as heck of it was being rendered that way.

Sorry but that is just plain Wrong. Very Wrong.
Especially if you are running a pure S905 LibreELEC Kodi box from fast, high quality, Samsung eMMC Flash memory.
My S905 ODROID C2 defiantly does NOT slow down running a 3840x2160p GUI @ 60Hz with Kodi Jarvis. No difference to a 1080p GUI.

And we have not even started talking about the 4K and RGB colorspace issues yet on the Shield.

[teki4u]

And we have not even started talking about the 4K and RGB colorspace issues yet on the Shield.

I shared a link about critical issues mentioning that among other things in the shield <posts #11 and #53>, but not going offtopic. OP question has been fully answered.

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[Koying]

I don't think there is really any argument that, for pure Kodi, libreelec boxes, be it rpi, S905, chromebox or even nuc are better.
IMHO, the days of "pure kodi" (non piracy, of course) are just gone, though...

[Ned Scott]

Sorry but that is just plain Wrong. Very Wrong.
Especially if you are running a pure S905 LibreELEC Kodi box from fast, high quality, Samsung eMMC Flash memory.
My S905 ODROID C2 defiantly does NOT slow down running a 3840x2160p GUI @ 60Hz with Kodi Jarvis. No difference to a 1080p GUI.

And we have not even started talking about the 4K and RGB colorspace issues yet on the Shield.

And the Kodi GUI felt reasonable to you in 4k? I don't actually have a 4K TV myself, but others from LibreELEC were reporting that scrolling through their large movie libraries that artwork was not snappy*, to the point where Chewitt was thinking of decreasing the default thumb/fanart size for WeTek builds. The existing defaults are already 720 for thumbs and 1080 for fanart, IIRC. There's little point in running Kodi's GUI in 4K if the fanart and thumbs aren't showing at least at those defaults, if not higher (how practical this is or not depends on the skin, of course).

I would be glad to be wrong about this, but I'm very skeptical of an S905 and Kodi's current code being able to handle all of that as smoothly as an Nvidia Shield. Especially with a "heavy" skin.


*I personally feel the default fanart/thumb size results in very snappy behavior, but maybe I don't have a big enough library to test with. Either way, pushing things to a 1080 max for posters and fanart (Amber, Nox, etc, display posters full screen, making it a nice option) can make things slower.

[Ned Scott]

Let me put it this way: increase thumbsize to max and increase the quality on cached images for a 4K GUI:

Code:

<advancedsettings>
  <imageres>2160</imageres>
  <fanartres>2160</fanartres>
  <imagescalingalgorithm>lanczos</imagescalingalgorithm>
</advancedsettings>

Even if this isn't the common use case, the point I am making is that you can find a reasonable example where someone wants/needs more power for "just Kodi" usage. There is no universal yes or no.

[wrxtasy]

Sorry but that is just plain Wrong. Very Wrong.
Especially if you are running a pure S905 LibreELEC Kodi box from fast, high quality, Samsung eMMC Flash memory.
My S905 ODROID C2 defiantly does NOT slow down running a 3840x2160p GUI @ 60Hz with Kodi Jarvis. No difference to a 1080p GUI.

And we have not even started talking about the 4K and RGB colorspace issues yet on the Shield.

And the Kodi GUI felt reasonable to you in 4k? I don't actually have a 4K TV myself, but others from LibreELEC were reporting that scrolling through their large movie libraries that artwork was not snappy*, to the point where Chewitt was thinking of decreasing the default thumb/fanart size for WeTek builds. The existing defaults are already 720 for thumbs and 1080 for fanart, IIRC. There's little point in running Kodi's GUI in 4K if the fanart and thumbs aren't showing at least at those defaults, if not higher (how practical this is or not depends on the skin, of course).

Running from eMMC makes a big difference to pull Artwork at speed from Flash Memory with a large video library. You have to compare Like for Like when comparing various Kodi versions running from eMMC flash across different Hardware.
Honestly if I did not pullup the OSD of my TV to tell me it was a 2160p (4K) GUI I would not be able to tell the difference.

It really does not matter anyway as AMLogic S905's do not have issues when running LibreELEC Kodi with a GUI @ 1080p60hz and then viewing 2160p content. Because AMLogic LE Refresh switches, Scales correctly and there are no colospace issues that you see on other Hardware platforms.

If your an absolute "Power user" with a massive Video Library and Kodi Skins with Huge textures I would not even be buying a Shield.
SSD equipped Intel gear all the way running LibreELEC.

[Ned Scott]

These people and myself are comparing like for like. If you are running Kodi in a situation where you cannot tell the difference between the GUI being 4k or 1080P then that has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a situation where someone wants to push things so that they see posters and fan art in the best quality possible for a 4k screen. I'm not talking about upscaling 1080 to 4k. Honestly, do you really think I don't know what I'm talking about here?

[wrxtasy]

If you can show me mainstream Kodi users who use 4K Artwork and a 4K Kodi GUI day to day, then yes more powerful Kodi platforms will likely be worth the money.

I saw no mention of 4K requirements in the Original Post however. So it was assumed generic 1080p was used.

[Ned Scott]

If you can show me mainstream Kodi users who use 4K Artwork and a 4K Kodi GUI day to day, then yes more powerful Kodi platforms will likely be worth the money.

I saw no mention of 4K requirements in the Original Post however. So it was assumed generic 1080p was used.

I am trying to clarify an example that I gave several posts back. It is a real example. It was not "wrong", as you put it. It is possible, even practical, to want/need more power for a specific use case. The point is to not always dismiss something simply because "only Kodi" usage is typically viewed as light on CPUs. Nothing more, nothing less.

[wrxtasy]

Where is 4K Artwork mentioned in this quote ?

For example, it can handle both video output in 4K as well as the Kodi GUI always being in 4K. An S905 box will not be able to keep up with doing that. The GUI will be slow as heck of it was being rendered that way.

I could have responded to the Example correctly in the first instance if you had of framed it correctly in the first place.

[gsmtech]

So in other words if you only want pure Kodi and you dont run your GUI in 4K with maxed out 4K artwork then , yes the Shield is overkill and a waste of money

[hansolo]

And we have not even started talking about the 4K and RGB colorspace issues yet on the Shield.

No issues... see my response to that thread. Yes, there are other issues but not that you mentioned here.
Yes, for plain Kodi Shield is overkill, however is not very expensive compared to a supported/trusted good Kodi box (no chinese pirate junks included).

[couto27]

So in other words if you only want pure Kodi and you dont run your GUI in 4K with maxed out 4K artwork then , yes the Shield is overkill and a waste of money

Even a laptop can run Kodi, just need a 5$ hdmi cabe to connect to the TV....
Ive use LibreELEC USB-SD Creator in some SD card and use it my everyday laptop.... why spend 70$ in a chinese box, its not overkill to run Kodi also ??

In other words...everything else above 5$ its overkill and waste of money...

[gsmtech]

So in other words if you only want pure Kodi and you dont run your GUI in 4K with maxed out 4K artwork then , yes the Shield is overkill and a waste of money

Even a laptop can run Kodi, just need a 5$ hdmi cabe to connect to the TV....
Ive use LibreELEC USB-SD Creator in some SD card and use it my everyday laptop.... why spend 70$ in a chinese box, its not overkill to run Kodi also ??

In other words...everything else above 5$ its overkill and waste of money...

You have to own thwe laptop first, for pure kodi usage why would you use a laptop ?

Whats the power usage on a laptop and practicality of leaving it on 24/7 connected to your TV, is a laptop specifically designed for STB usage as a TV box ? Whats the initial outlay cost on a laptop why would you buy one if all you want to do is run Kodi ? What spec of laptop would you require for HEVC X265 4K ?

Fair enough if you already had an old laptop lying around that you wanted to re-purpose for Kodi, but it's hardly a good candidate for a pure kodi device...