After spending the last few days, tinkering and trying to put together an HTPC for my family, I wasn’t able to get a smooth enough experience to match even our old, ad-filled, laggy, Roku. In particular, every streaming service I tried needed to be controlled almost exclusively by mouse, as everything has been reduced to electron apps/websites with little-to-no keyboard or controller navigation support. As such, I’m looking for other options, although considering how quickly these platforms change and how outdated a lot of the information available on them is its hard to single out the best options.
In particular, I’m looking to be able to:
- Use Netflix, Prime Video, and Disney+. Ideally other services too, since we tend to juggle subscriptions.
- Control it with a remote, controller, or similarly simple device
- Be able to cast to it from a phone
Does anyone have much experience with options for this - esspecially if you’ve tried multiple and can compare?
I am using a Chromecast ultra 4k and I replaced the launcher with one which doesn’t shown anything but the apps I want it to show in a grid: FLauncher
And then I can use it with the remote as usual for Netflix and all the other apps. It’s quite nice doesn’t stutter or anything.
I also replaced the YouTube app with the SmartTube one to get rid of sponsors and advertisements in videos.
Does your FLancher start up by default? I have a similar setup on a Shield, and the home button does go to FL. But whenever it comes out of standby it still goes into the Google launcher with ads on it…
Yes it does because as far as I remember I disabled the default launcher with help of adb: https://www.gearrice.com/update/how-to-change-launcher-on-android-tv-and-which-ones-are-the-best/
To OP though, be careful doing this, you might soft lock yourself out of the OS
Nvidia Shields are another option, and there are some Bluetooth keyboards with trackpad that could work for these options + the PC
What I’d love to see is a Wii remote style interface. It would be much easier than trying to snake your way over to the thing you want to select
I have a shield connected to a projector through an av receiver. I love the setup for its audio visual fidelity, but I love the simplicity of operation almost as much. The shield remote turns everything on and off and handles all my streaming services + steam link flawlessly. Wonderful user experience.