[ianuk2005]

Even in 2016, media players focusing on Kodi, Plex, Emby, VLC, Netflix, HBO, and all of those apps, they don't realistically see any benefit in having more than 1 GB of RAM. It makes more sense when you are running multiple apps at the same time, have some light gaming going on, etc.

In other words, it keeps the cost down. If people need more RAM in a WeTek product, then there's the Play 2S. The Hub is meant to be an inexpensive and tiny solution that people can slap to the black of their TVs. It's like an HDMI stick without actually being in stick formfactor.

Not buying this at all. I'll not touch a box with less than 2 GB DDR3 RAM. What's next? Go with 500 MB of RAM and then you're heading into that pathetic Roku OS territory. Do not skimp on available RAM to save a buck. Just add it and charge for it accordingly. Seriously, just look at the difference between the Fire TV and Fire TV Stick regarding RAM and performance.

Okay...

Outside of Kodi, sure, more RAM is important for many games and other things. Kodi doesn't care if you have 1GB of RAM or 16GB of RAM. Some of the best Kodi players I've seen only have 1GB of RAM (Raspberry Pi 2 and 3, Google Nexus Player, various x86 systems, WeTek Core).

The difference between the Fire TV and Fire TV stick has nothing to do with the RAM and everything to do with the CPU. Even if the RAM was a noticeable factor, it should also be pointed out that the Fire TV stick only had 512MB of RAM for applications, and the other 512MB was for the GPU, due to the type of GPU in the stick.

If the rest of the hardware isn't taking advantage of the other specs then it doesn't really matter. It's like putting a jet engine in a scooter. These are purpose built appliances, not desktop computers or general use tablets/phones. What do you think the RAM will be used for in Kodi? At most, I can see people wanting more RAM for cache or live TV buffering to reduce wear on the internal memory. Other than that, I honestly don't think most people will ever see a difference.

The lack of ram on the fire stick makes a huge difference, by the time kodi's booted mine has less than 100mb, this isn't enough to display the EPG or playback live tv smoothly. It also runs out of RAM and force closes even displaying a relatively small library.

1GB just isn't enough for a lot of users who have large librarys. My main x86 box with openelec and 2GB ram even runs out regularly when trying to scroll through my movie library which is around 1500. Kodi just doesn't handle displaying a large library of posters well enough it seems to retain everything you scroll through in memory and doesn't release it when resources get too low. Instead it just crashes.

The only reason i've stayed away from wetek boxes is the lack of RAM, I would love the new s2 but i'm still unsure as only having a 2GB option is still lacking when you compare it to your upgrade options on x86 hardware.

It might not matter for the majority of users but RAM makes a huge difference as you scale up and the more options they include for it the more users they will get.