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Ah, yeah, that's a big omission. Are you talking about the recent crop of Atom chips (last 1.5-2 years) or the old, crappier crop that was so common in netbooks in the mid-late 2000s?

But to be fair, I find it hard to believe that Intel isn't playing a key role in developing these drivers. In any case, I wonder what Intel was thinking to put the responsibility on the box manufacturers for the end drivers?

Sep 23, 2015. You don't particularly need a Nexus Player to get use out of the gamepad. It works as a standard Bluetooth controller, so you can use it with any other Android device as well. The included home and back buttons let you navigate without having to leave your seat, along with a D-pad, two analog sticks, four. Dec 25, 2016 - 6 min - Uploaded by SpykeTutorialsTested to see if this controller would work on my PC for gaming, and it passed with flying colors.

I can't imagine these companies being able to fully leverage the full range of features and power states, etc. For clarity, is everyone saying that some Atom chips have no driver support on Linux (=incompatible with Linux), or that the only drivers are proprietary? The problem might be with the PowerVR GPU design integrated into the Atom. Intel doesn't own that IP, and can't produce their own graphics drivers for it, and PowerVR has been pretty crappy about supporting them. That's what held back the 2009-ish netbooks. Android needs 2 GB for 1080p and it would be faster using a dual channel ram setup. I bet the chipset drivers are part of the problem as well.

I'd be interested if you can provide a source for Android needing 2 GB RAM (I presume that's what you meant) for 1080p output, because for what it's worth, a lot of Google TV devices did 1080p with 1 GB RAM or less. I think the bottleneck for the Nexus Player is entirely the software, though usually the bottleneck with video is the GPU, which probably isn't the case here. Well it looks like the lack of apps could be solved rather quickly. Google is just now allowing developers to publish apps and they just put out a guide that looks rather simple if you already have an app. I'm guessing they chose to only have a select few, blessed apps available to the initial reviewers. If that's the case, then from the reviews I've read, it sounds like they did a really bad job of telling the reviewers that there was an intentionally small set of apps available on purpose.

Hopefully there is a flood before customers get their boxes. After reading the reviews, I think my main reason for buying a non-nexus android tv will be that I want more than 8GB of storage and don't really want a usb stick hanging out the back.

Android needs 2 GB for 1080p and it would be faster using a dual channel ram setup. I bet the chipset drivers are part of the problem as well. I'd be interested if you can provide a source for Android needing 2 GB RAM (I presume that's what you meant) for 1080p output, because for what it's worth, a lot of Google TV devices did 1080p with 1 GB RAM or less.

I think the bottleneck for the Nexus Player is entirely the software, though usually the bottleneck with video is the GPU, which probably isn't the case here. There isn't a source for that, because it's not true. The box has plenty of hardware for anything video related. Any hiccups are purely bad software. The only reason anyone needs more hardware will be for games. Let's hope they fix the software before customer release in a few weeks.

They're cheap. That's all that there's really to be said. Google tried this previously with better hardware and a premium price tag and the market eviscerated them. Cheap crap is what the market wants. Few care about wired Ethernet, or XBMC/Plex, or direct decoding of end user content.

The thing is, it seems like the 'cheap box that can run NetFlix and a few other streaming services' market is fairly saturated. There seem to be a lot of options available for that. Where this device seemed like it could have differentiated itself would be in the 'more than just a cheap NetFlix box' category, but it seems to have failed at that. Give it access to the full Play store, processor and GPU that can kick a current flagship phone's ass (maybe a Tegra K1, with a heat sink & fan to let it run continuously at full power), wired Ethernet, and a 250GB SSD.

Basically make it an Android game console/media center. I think there are people who would be willing to pay a bit more for something that is better, but right now they're mostly building their own media center PCs because nobody is providing what they want.

I think quite a few would like to go to a nice, prepackaged device if it had reasonable specs. Sure, it would be more expensive than some of the other boxes out there, but it would provide an opportunity for Google to start blurring the lines between Phones, Tablets/Convertibles/Laptops, Desktop PCs, Game Consoles, and Media Centers. An app or game purchased in the Play store should run on any Android device, regardless of form factor. The Android dev team should be running Android as their primary desktop/laptop OS, and doing all of their development from within Android itself, not from some other operating system (and not just by remote desktop to a non-Android system either), just to prove the possibility of an 'Android everywhere' ecosystem, and identify areas where that concept isn't quite ready yet. As it stands right now, The OUYA that I got a year and a half ago beats this thing in many ways.

Nexus Player may have better raw benchmarks, but OUYA has wired Ethernet and can conveniently supplement its (also too small) internal storage with USB storage, without the need for a USB OTG adapter. It also sounds like the Nexus Player's restricted Play store has even less in it than OUYA's store (which has added quite a bit since launch, though still nowhere near the level of the main Google Play store). Fortunately, Google isn't the only company releasing Android TV boxes.

Razer is supposed to be releasing one this fall. I'm guessing that it will have a lot of what you are looking for, minus access to the general play store. However, the play store problem will likely be fixed with time.

Consumers aren't getting their TV boxes for over a week, and I'm guessing apps will start coming quickly. Porting should be stupid simple as this review indicated that most sideloaded apps just worked. I'll have to keep an eye on the Razer one. At the moment, the OUYA is working relatively well (though it occasionally stutters on some raw Bluray rips), but if Android-based gaming starts getting more demanding, the OUYA's Tegra 3 will show its age pretty quickly. Eventually, I'll replace the OUYA in my living room with something newer, but I'm still keeping my options open at this point. At the moment I'm also waiting to see whether any interesting SteamBox hardware comes out, and to see how well SteamOS works as a media center. My main PC runs Ubuntu, so I've got quite a few (118) SteamOS compatible games already in my Steam library.

One other advantage of SteamOS (for me) is that it uses PulseAudio, which means that a SteamOS device connected to my living room sound system could make the sound system remotely accessible on my Ubuntu laptop and desktop. From a hardware pov, this thing seems almost identical to Ouya. That too, had 1g of RAM (which scared away AAA devs), 8g of internal memory (which frustrated users), poor to completely broken gamepad connectivity and an extremely limited amount of decent games or media apps. However, even the ouya has got an Ethernet port.

The only thing that saved it (or which has kept the extremely tiny user base) was the ability to relatively easily sideload some apps and games, plus SPMC/XBMC for it. Oh, and the plaster over the bullet wound that was low internal memory came from being able to install to an external usb hard drive (but the Ouya only supports, even now, just one external memory device). This Nexus Device is classic Google at its best; release an unfinished, poor quality product, but leave it open enough for third parties to do all of the hard work and improve it. Wake me up when someone like Nvidia releases an Android TV with at least 32 gigs of internal memory, multiple usb external memory support, improved bluetooth connectivity, sound out ports (at least a headphone jack is just common design sense, for external speaker support), etc.

This has to be some kind of joke, right? My Raspberry pi running xbmc (trivial setup via xbian) can play 1080p without a hitch, and it only cost $35. Of course it can't play Android games, but it doesn't sound like this thing can, either! No offense, but who buys a Raspberry Pi? It was obsolete when launched and now it's pure vintage. I got an O-Droid U3 and can run most games with TinCore Keymapper with a cheap keyboard, and some games support keyboards directly. Problem with those Android boxes (RPi included) is, you really can't navigate the 'stock android' interface with a keyboard or gamepad, you also need a mouse.

This has to be some kind of joke, right? My Raspberry pi running xbmc (trivial setup via xbian) can play 1080p without a hitch, and it only cost $35. Of course it can't play Android games, but it doesn't sound like this thing can, either! No offense, but who buys a Raspberry Pi? It was obsolete when launched and now it's pure vintage. I got an O-Droid U3 and can run most games with TinCore Keymapper with a cheap keyboard, and some games support keyboards directly. Problem with those Android boxes (RPi included) is, you really can't navigate the 'stock android' interface with a keyboard or gamepad, you also need a mouse.

Well considering how long I had to wait to get one.I'd have to say a lot of people buy them. It was never meant as a serious computing platform, just a cheap learning one, so for it's target it's hardly 'obsolete'. (Also, it's popular with hobbyists, and it still offers things in that area that no consumer device would have reason to offer, like programmable GPIO.).

Google had to cheap out on things, I guess. The ADT-1 box was perfect.

It should have been the Nexus build and sold exactly as it was. Instead, they wanted Asus to make the box MORE profitable, so they threw away making a fantastic base spec in favor of compromises (intel chip, no ethernet) that just hurt the underlying Android TV platform's baseline expected hardware. Which is why video is choppy. The Intel hardware is just subpar.

Asus was happy to use it for something because Intel sold it to them for a song. Google had to cheap out on things, I guess.

The ADT-1 box was perfect. It should have been the Nexus build and sold exactly as it was. Instead, they wanted Asus to make the box MORE profitable, so they threw away making a fantastic base spec in favor of compromises (intel chip, no ethernet) that just hurt the underlying Android TV platform's baseline expected hardware.

Which is why video is choppy. The Intel hardware is just subpar. Asus was happy to use it for something because Intel sold it to them for a song. There is NO WAY IN HELL that Atom chip and associated PowerVR GPU can't playback video in 1080p smoothly. It's not that the hardware is 'subpar' (at least that part of the hardware), because those chips run quite fine in Windows for example. As others noted, the Raspberry Pi even plays back video in 1080p without a hitch.

The issue is software: x86 Android has been slow to come out and possibly Google didn't dedicate sufficient resources to get it out fast and in good shape. But you're right that picking Intel in this case was probably because of their contrarevenue program. The no ethernet issue is more problematic on the other hand.

As a general rule, it's best to keep the airwaves are clear as possible and having such a stationary device connected on ethernet is definitely better in my opinion. Not a deal-breaker for many, but regrettable nonetheless. I would love to see this review revisited. I just bought one of these (since I'm not afraid of first gen issues, and the side-load ability seemed worth the risk). Frankly, I think a large percentage of this review is now out of date. There was a software update available when I started it up (no details on what was fixed), and so far, here's what I'm seeing: * No remote disconnects after 10+ hours.

Not a single one. * No random slow downs or stutters. Everything's been shockingly snappy. * No issues streaming. Everything comes down in gorgeous 1080p HD, without and video playback issues at all. (And my 15M cable usually only hits 7M during peak hours.) * Play store has a search, now! Still the limited apps, though.

I suspect that some major work's been done on the software side; they have at least added a search to the play store. If Ars still has issues with streaming, I suspect their demo unit might have something wrong with it. I would love to see this review revisited. I just bought one of these (since I'm not afraid of first gen issues, and the side-load ability seemed worth the risk). Frankly, I think a large percentage of this review is now out of date. There was a software update available when I started it up (no details on what was fixed), and so far, here's what I'm seeing: * No remote disconnects after 10+ hours.

Not a single one. * No random slow downs or stutters. Everything's been shockingly snappy. * No issues streaming. Everything comes down in gorgeous 1080p HD, without and video playback issues at all.

(And my 15M cable usually only hits 7M during peak hours.) * Play store has a search, now! Still the limited apps, though. I suspect that some major work's been done on the software side; they have at least added a search to the play store. If Ars still has issues with streaming, I suspect their demo unit might have something wrong with it. Interesting, it would be great if Ars could update its review.

I'm pondering buying a device like the Nexus Player for my parents for Christmas and would really like to know whether the kinks on this device have been resolved. Since my last post, I've spent even more hours with the device. Here's what I've found.

Casting This is still a bit of a weak point, I'm afraid. Casting from my mobile devices seems to work fine, everything seems to be in full resolution. However, casting a tab from Chrome simply fails every time. Casting to my ChromeCast from the same computer works great. (Honestly, I haven't done much digging into this.) Sideloaded apps There's a great app () that works as a secondary launcher for side-loaded apps.

It's much more convenient than having to go into settings. Additionally, You can install some applications straight through the google play website. Not every side-loadable app can be installed this way, but several can, including Google Chrome. Chrome As an aside; Google Chrome works reasonably well. You will want to use the Chrome Beta, otherwise the initial setup screens are completely black, and you have to guess at getting through them. (IIRC, it's press down until you hear the second chime, do that three times. It's ~4 presses each screen.) But, the Beta just works, and that seems to indicate they're working on adding Chrome support for this form factor.

After getting it setup, it just works like chrome on android. I haven't figured out how to switch tabs, but it should be possible.

The biggest issue is that the remote basically reads like arrow keys. You pretty much can't click links. So, you will need either a USB OTG cable to hook up a mouse, or you'll need to root the device and install. This is the route I went, and so far, it works reasonably well. I can use it to stream from pages that don't have an app, and support HTML5 video. It's still a little clumsy, so this really is for the early adopter crowd. Streaming, Remote, etc I still stand by everything I said in my last comment.

Streaming works beautifully, and I've yet to have an issue, after 20+ hours of using it. I also haven't had a single remote disconnection issue. All in all, the entire thing seems really solid, fast, and has replaced 80% of my media PC's workload. Windows Trust 3 Fr Isopropyl more.

I'm now looking at Plex to get another 10%. The only things I'll be left unable to do entirely that my media PC currently does are: • Play Steam Games - I'd love to see Valve release an app for android TV that supports their in home streaming. It'd be a great use for this device. • Watch DVDs/Bluerays - Anyone have any ideas on this one? I mean, I rarely do this anymore, but for the ~50 or so DVDs/Bluerays I own that aren't on Netflix. Otoh, I have a Playstation 3 that works well enough.

• Watch anything on The Escapist - Their HTML5 player's behind a paywall. Solution's obvious, but it does highlight the fact that sites that don't support HTML5 video will always be a no-go on this device. • Watch anything on Amazon Instant Video - They have an android app, but it doesn't work on the Nexus Player, and the app doesn't support casting. On the web side, their player requires silverlight.