What box for me? Absolutely confused...
#1
Hi guys,
first of all hello to everyone! I'm completely a newbie of this forum.

I absolutely need your help because after a week of researches I'm totally confused on what media player to buy for my needs.

I need to replace my wd tv live that is gone last week. Sad

What I need is a multimedia player that lets me to:

- stream my films and tv series from my QNap NAS through a gigabit ethernet (throw a SAMBA or NFS share)
- it's better if it has wifi 'ac'
- support for 720/1080/4k and h264/h265
- I don't need 3D and usually I don't use ISO files (my collection is largely made by mkv files)

My budget is more or less 100$

I've seen the Zidoo X6 Pro, the Himedia Q5, the Wetek core but reading their threads all seem to have some problems.

What have I to buy??

Thank you very much for your help!
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#2
Don't get "Zidoo X6 Pro, the Himedia Q5" as you don't need 3D. Wetek Core is a good option w/4K and HD Netflix.

Also, Nexus Player or Amazon Fire TV are options. FTV is limited to only Amazon video in 4K.

A new option for 4K is Minix U1 (around $130), but as it's so new, there are bound to be some issues that need to be ironed out by Minix.
[H]i-[d]eft [M]edia [K]een [V]ideosaurus
My Family Room Theater
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#3
(2015-12-16, 22:55)hdmkv Wrote: Don't get "Zidoo X6 Pro, the Himedia Q5" as you don't need 3D. Wetek Core is a good option w/4K and HD Netflix.

Also, Nexus Player or Amazon Fire TV are options. FTV is limited to only Amazon video in 4K.

A new option for 4K is Minix U1 (around $130), but as it's so new, there are bound to be some issues that need to be ironed out by Minix.

Thank you for your answer!

So Wetek Core is better than X6 and Q5 on handling 4K videos?
Here in Italy their price is more or less the same and so I would like to understand if you suggest me to buy the Core from a budget point of view or if the Core is effectively better than the others.

Thanks again.
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#4
Yes, even if 4K@30. Only nVidia Shield TV and the new AMLogic S905 boxes (Minix U1, Tronsmart S95, etc.) can handle 4K@60.

nVidia Shield TV is really the most powerful option, but costs around $180 U.S. at the moment, or £149.99 on Amazon UK (not available on Amazon Italy I see).
[H]i-[d]eft [M]edia [K]een [V]ideosaurus
My Family Room Theater
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#5
(2015-12-16, 23:25)hdmkv Wrote: Yes, even if 4K@30. Only nVidia Shield TV and the new AMLogic S905 boxes (Minix U1, Tronsmart S95, etc.) can handle 4K@60.

nVidia Shield TV is really the most powerful option, but costs around $180 U.S. at the moment, or £149.99 on Amazon UK (not available on Amazon Italy I see).

Yes nVidia Shield TV is not available here in Italy and even if I can buy it from Amazon DE unfortunately its price is also too high for my budget.

You said that Minix U1 has some problems. But what kind of problems?
Because the prices of the Minix U1 and the Tronsmart S95 are more or less the same than the Wetek Core and they seems to have better hardware.

And what about the support? I know that Minix constantly updates its products but what about Wetek and Tronsmart? I have no experience with them.
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#6
Support... get Wetek; they're terrific. Re: Minix U1, I said there are likely going to be issues as the box just came out, but Minix has decent support as well, so any issues will be worked on.

Tronsmart... not sure about support; they at least have a user forum now, unlike before.
[H]i-[d]eft [M]edia [K]een [V]ideosaurus
My Family Room Theater
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#7
Rule One:
Get something popular, you can see the popular threads here on the forum and that is a very good indication of a devices support and interest from users.

Rule Two:
Don't believe the marketing Hype and rely on Tech Specs alone. This is a road to disaster.

Rule Three:
All media player devices have problems. Especially new ones, just released freshly out of the wrapper. Firmware bugs take time to sort out, and for that you need after sales support. The best support around these parts is for devices like the ASUS Chromebox, RPi, nVIDIA Shield, WeTek Core and the MINIX products.

If you need 1080p HD Netflix + other DRM video streaming services then get the WeTek Core. This will also run OpenELEC which you may prefer. Internal Antenna on this, 802.11 b/g/n WiFi so not as good as an external antenna. Terrific device tho. N spec WiFi is enough to stream high bitrate Bluray Rips.

The very new MINIX U1 has 802.11 AC WiFi (MIMO)and has terrific WiFi performance, it will have bugs as hdmv has said but will still be very usable. No 1080p HD Netflix or other DRM streaming on this one (max 480p)

Stay away from Zidoo or Rockchip. Quality Kodi devices come from the Kodi Sponsors. nVIDIA, MINIX and WeTek.

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#8
(2015-12-17, 05:00)wrxtasy Wrote: Rule One:
Get something popular, you can see the popular threads here on the forum and that is a very good indication of a devices support and interest from users.

Rule Two:
Don't believe the marketing Hype and rely on Tech Specs alone. This is a road to disaster.

Rule Three:
All media player devices have problems. Especially new ones, just released freshly out of the wrapper. Firmware bugs take time to sort out, and for that you need after sales support. The best support around these parts is for devices like the ASUS Chromebox, RPi, nVIDIA Shield, WeTek Core and the MINIX products.

If you need 1080p HD Netflix + other DRM video streaming services then get the WeTek Core. This will also run OpenELEC which you may prefer. Internal Antenna on this, 802.11 b/g/n WiFi so not as good as an external antenna. Terrific device tho. N spec WiFi is enough to stream high bitrate Bluray Rips.

The very new MINIX U1 has 802.11 AC WiFi (MIMO)and has terrific WiFi performance, it will have bugs as hdmv has said but will still be very usable. No 1080p HD Netflix or other DRM streaming on this one (max 480p)

Stay away from Zidoo or Rockchip. Quality Kodi devices come from the Kodi Sponsors. nVIDIA, MINIX and WeTek.

@wrxtasy, you interested in taking over the 'Pick the right Kodi Box' thread? Would (potentially) save you from having to repeat yourself so much ;-)
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#9
I have considered it and would be willing to do it if I had time, but I'm a bit busy with OpenELEC stuff at the moment.

What I could do is give my thoughts on a Page #1 / 2016 update (unless Poofyhairedguy is doing one) of that thread and collaborate with other guys like hdmkv for 3D and get opinions from the Intel guys for budget Braswell gear and the like. That would be preferred.

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#10
(2015-12-17, 05:41)wrxtasy Wrote: I have considered it and would be willing to do it if I had time, but I'm a bit busy with OpenELEC stuff at the moment.

What I could do is give my thoughts on a Page #1 / 2016 update (unless Poofyhairedguy is doing one) of that thread and collaborate with other guys like hdmv for 3D and get opinions from the Intel guys for budget Braswell gear and the like. That would be preferred.

that's all I meant, just giving you thread ownership so you could update the first post periodically
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#11
Thank you very much guys!

After all that I'm going to buy the Wetek Core.

Are there any other online shops that sell this device apart from Wetek official site?
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#12
(2015-12-17, 05:00)wrxtasy Wrote: N spec WiFi is enough to stream high bitrate Bluray Rips.

I'd add this caveat that though. 2.4GHz n-spec is now in incredibly congested RF spectrum. Sure, 2.4GHz 802.11n stuff (i.e. what 802.11bgn kit supports) may support Blu-ray bitrate streaming stuff in some locations, particularly if you are in a relatively sparsely populated area, but in other areas, you'll be very lucky to get 50Mbs throughput guaranteed (which is what you need for Blu-ray streaming of unrecompressed rips)

I'd always be looking for 5Ghz (802.11abgn or 802.11ac kit which also supports abgn - the "a" is key as it indicates 5GHz) as it is usually less congested, and though lower range (which helps with the congestion issue) if you get a decent signal you usually get higher throughput.

That said - in my part of West London now, even 802.11ac is far-from-ideal, so I use wired 100Mbs and 1000Mbs connections for streaming content from my unRAID server . My Mac WiFi list includes over 30 SSIDs to chose from in my living room. In iStumbler I can see more than 50. As a result I only really use WiFi for streaming stuff from web-based services like Netflix, iPlayer, SVT Play etc. where the bitrates are still pretty trivially low. My previous ADSL Modem+WIFi router was 2.4GHz only, so I soon added an external WiFi router with dual-band support to get better results. Our current router is a VDSL+802.11ac job (with dual band support) and is much better. I have a second router that provides a VPN connection to wireless devices which is also 802.11ac. Both are on relatively clear 5GHz channels, but even then I'm not sure I'd guarantee Blu-ray bitrates. The occasional Pis I use are a mix of 2.4GHz (the Pi foundation dongle is good) and dual-band (Tenda) - with the 2.4GHz Pis mainly used for audio streaming, and the 5GHz ones used for WiFi streaming of video services.

If you live in a low density residential area, with detached houses and large gardens, then 802.11bgn may well be fine. If you live in denser housing, such as roads of terraced houses converted to flats, or an apartment block, then your experience may be very different with WiFi.
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#13
Yes the old Microwave Oven interferes too much as well operating at 2.45Ghz when using 2.4Ghz WiFi.
Took me ages to work that one out when I was a Newb. Wink

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#14
Fortunately I live in a detached house and I haven't these problems!
Next week I'm going to buy the Core!
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