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> I think the Apple TV is the best streaming box out there

It definitely is.

IMO the only advantage of the Nvidia Shield is better HDMI audio passthrough but it has so many other issues. And with more recent versions of the Plex client for tvOS the lack of audio passthrough is much less of an issue than it used to be (PCM conversion used to introduce sync issues). Also the Plex app for Android TV has been getting consistently worse over the years for me. Plus all the ads Android TV added a couple of years ago. Ugh.

Some of the more exotic boxes out there to run CoreELEC have tehcnically better DV support. These might work if you only want a Plex or Kodi client but for general streaming the Apple TV is just better.

Honestly can't wait for Apple to release a new one. Hopefully with audio passthrough of more codecs.

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what are the shield issues? I've had 2 of them for 10 years and I haven't noticed anything.
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For years it had frame rate issues. Every second or so when watching eg Netflix you would see a micro stutter if the content wasn't at 24fps (eg PAL content at 25fps). I think this was improved recently but it's been years since I've used the Shield for anything but Plex.

As for Plex I've had way too many issues to list. Networking issues, having to restart the Plex app after the device went to sleep, etc. When I switched to using Plex on the Apple TV all the issues went away.

It should be noted that I have re-pasted and cleaned the dust of my Shield a couple of times since I got it 10 years ago.

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A few reasons I'm staying positive towards Apple, despite being a streamer themselves, is that they're not large at all. They've currently remained a small, niche content provider of reasonably high-quality content. They don't seem to have the aspirations to be bigger than those on their platform. Also, they have so much increasing oversight on their App Store and decisions there, that they likely do not want to do anything that shows a preference and gains the ire of governing agencies. I'm hoping this keep them relatively neutral.
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Despite becoming quite critical of Apple in many other areas, I agree with your assessment here. And hopefully they realize if they started getting so anticompetitive in this space that they start elbowing "non-Apple" streamers out of the picture on their platform, the loss would be Apple's. A streaming box that doesn't have Netflix, or that is missing another major, would be far less compelling than what it is today.
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If the box where I can’t set up a third party player to do the ‘replay last 5 seconds with subtitles on’ because it’s all locked down is the best then I don’t want to know what the worst is, I’ll just keep using LibreElec. At least if LibreElec does something I don’t like Claude can fix it.
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The Apple TV (hardware) can do what you're asking using a voice command "What did he/she say". It's possible it no longer works in every app because services insist on writing their own players that don't work as well as the player provided by Apple TV.
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When Subtitles are set to 'auto' i think it now automatically turns the subtitles on like that when you do the skip back command.

But yeah, the Siri way (much as I loathe using Siri) is the definite way.

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What box do you put librelec on?
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[Removed bad comment. Sorry.]
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Wow entitled gatekeeping much?

What if parent already knows the answers to that and the question they really want to ask is … wait for it… the one they actually asked?

If you want to ask a different question go right ahead but cutting off others like this is plain rude.

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|If the box where I can’t set up a third party player to do the ‘replay last 5 seconds with subtitles on’ because it’s all locked down

You do you, but I find that to be a truly niche thing to throw away an entire platform over. It literally does everything else better imho.

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Can confirm Apple is best but Roku is amazingly good number 2. In some ways its UX beats Apple.
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Especially because you can get TVs with Roku built-in. I would guess most Roku users aren't using a box these days.
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> I would guess most Roku users aren't using a box these days.

Sure I guess. But those devices objectively suck. the CPU and storage in "smart TVs" are so underpowered that using streaming apps on them is painfully sluggish.

For comparison, I've used the "Chromecast with Google TV" (a $50ish at its release 4k streaming stick that uses the 'Google TV', fka 'Android TV' platform) and a Sony TV on the same platform, released the same year. The Sony UI is a lot more sluggish than the Google stick device. Also tested running an SNES emulator. The Google device can easily do it, the Sony TV can't keep up even on a basic game like Super Mario World.

And then of course, on the other end of the spectrum, the Apple TV exists, which specs-wise can easily play 3D racing games at a fine framerate.

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With Roku built in as well as whatever ad pipeline(s) the TV manufacturer wants. These days my AppleTV is allowed to talk to the internet. My television is not.
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Eh those TVs are a dubious value proposition. I grabbed one and wound up returning it because it won't even let you use the TV as a damned TV without connecting it to the internet and creating a roku account so they can track you.
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My Roku TV (that hasn't been turned on in years, but was left plugged in for years...) literally tries to reach out every minute to home servers. Before u plugging it, I had blocked it's DNS, and was blown away at how frequently it tries to phone home. Easily the noisiest device on my home network.
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Why is that ironic? This is exactly what you should expect, unless you feel very strongly about sideloading apps or installing different operating systems. Or if you love ads.
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The only issue with Apple TV is they still can't figure out a good remote. I feel like I need to hold my breath and be very intentional with my swipes so when I'm e.g. swiping up/down to get to a menu where I can turn on subtitles I don't accidentally swipe left or right, sending me scrubbing 17 minutes forward.

Either touch is a bad input mechanism for controlling your TV, or Apple hasn't figured it out.

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Yeah, I hate the remote, which is why I never use Apple TV even though I both own one and have the Apple TV service.

Maybe I'll try the remote the other user here mentioned.

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The latest remote at least has directional buttons, and I think you can disable the touch part entirely. Might be worth looking into, I think you can buy it separately and it works with most if not all Apple TV's.
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Yep, Apple TV has long been my preferred streaming box. I put one on every TV and don't connect the TV to the network. Plex and YouTube are probably my top apps and while YouTube is maddening (just horrible UI/UX), I find Plex to be mostly enjoyable or at least reliable and unsurprising.
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ever since tvOS came out (and by extension, the app store) they've really leapfrogged every other streaming box. I would have thought android-based boxes like Nvidia's shieldtv would have won here (and created a casual gaming platform) but I was dead wrong.

i worked on a roku tv app once upon a time... and their OS couldn't even draw circle primitives. frustrating.

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Some apps on the apple tv still have ads on the pause screen (covering the content I may have wanted to pause to see, a terrible UX choice). It can't be entirely avoided.
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It can if you avoid a dedicated device and just hook a desktop up to your TV. It's a one time cost to set up a host you control and that seems to be getting more and more worth it.
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Is there a solution for audio and video downscaling when accessing content via the browser in a linux htpc setup?

I don't think any of the big streaming content providers have native apps on linux and no browser can pass through audio bitstreams to HDMI. Video quality is limited as well.

Having a dedicated streaming box is better in this regard

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Unironically, the best streaming box out there is a PC where you can hook up ad block and stream content from independent content providers like Dropout and Nebula using their web-based UI.

We seem to have an economic cycle of enshittification => piracy => people realizing they've over enshittified => goto 10. We were in phase 3 a few years ago, now we're in phase 1 and it's an insane race to the bottom.

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I certainly wouldn't mind being able to block ads on the Apple TV for certain services (by which I mean YouTube), but for services which aren't as aggressively terrible as ad-supported YouTube is, I'm generally fine just making the choice between paying a higher price to go ad-free or putting up with ads. I know some folks are absolutely against all ads no matter what no exceptions, but I'm okay with the notion of "you pay for this by watching ads" if they don't abuse their end of the bargain (by which I mean YouTube).

Also, I watch Nebula on my Apple TV pretty frequently, and Dropout's available there, too.

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Definitely. It's un-bloated and simple in a sea of options that are progressively slower and shittier.
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