
Nexus Player - gulbrandr
http://www.google.com/nexus/player/
======
moskie
I fear the release the this new Nexus Player portends we're not going to see
an update to the Chromecast anytime soon, if ever. That makes me sad.

I guess I'm just not the average user, but the Chromecast handily beats what
this (and other options in this genre, i.e., Apple TV / Fire TV / Roku) have
to offer. I don't want another remote control. And making my phone the best
remote control is an awesome solution. And the Chromecast doesn't take up any
room in my living room / entertainment center. And it's only thrity-five-
goddamn-dollars.

I guess the downside is that I can't play crappy games on my big screen. Darn.

~~~
dchuk
My girlfriend and I have two TVs (bedroom and living room) in the house, each
with a chromecast hooked up. I have a media center computer running plex in
the living room. We use my original Nexus 7 tablet as our "remote".

NO REMOTE IN THE WORLD will ever beat an app on a tablet or phone. I can
search and browse so easily on my tablet to find what I want. I can start a
video and then explore other stuff. It's the perfect setup.

If only I could pay the NFL for a streaming-only HD football package, I would
have literally everything I need for consuming video. But I don't think that
will ever happen (at least without having to get a cable/satellite
subscription which I refuse to ever do again).

~~~
thefreeman
How are you able to get NFL games without a cable / satellite subscription? Or
did you just give up on the NFL? I am in a similar situation with sports being
the only thing keeping my cable subscription active.

~~~
canvia
Give up on sports and utilize that time (and money from cutting the cable) for
something productive, you won't regret it.

~~~
kasey_junk
Question: Do you literally spend all of your time on "productive" things? You
never watch a movie or tv show, you don't go to a concert or read a comic? You
don't listen to a record or play a video game?

I'm pretty sure I'd regret giving those things up.

~~~
blocke
We live in a sea of available entertainment and sources of amusement. Why be
so attached to one particular form of entertainment when the cartel that
controls it doesn't make it easy or inexpensive to consume?

~~~
kasey_junk
Where I live something like 5 football games a week are available in HD for
free.

~~~
enobrev
@touchmuchtodo, unfortunately you cannot stream digital antenna content to a
Chromecast directly. I would assume it would need a digital signal converter,
at the very least. I've been considering getting a TV tuner card for my
desktop explicitly for streaming live games to my Chromecasts.

(I couldn't seem to reply to you directly for whatever reason)

------
josteink
What? A media-hub with NO wired ethernet? How am I supposed to take that
seriously?

I don't care about what people saying about wifi having gotten "better". By
every single measurable criteria, it is slower, is less reliable, has lower
capacity and higher latency than wired gigabit ethernet and I doubt that will
change anytime soon.

I demand wired ethernet on my devices, and I know a bunch of other who do too.

~~~
taeric
You and the bunch of other folks you know, sadly, aren't really much of a blip
on the market for this. There is probably a bigger market that wishes this
thing could hook up wirelessly to the tv.

~~~
josteink
> There is probably a bigger market that wishes this thing could hook up
> wirelessly to the tv.

Sure. We can all wish.

Back in the real world, this is the group of buyers who buys stuff like this,
hook it up in a wifi-crowded area and then complain when things don't work
properly.

Which is absolutely fair enough, because they're not technicians and not
everyone should have to be capable of diagnosing network issues.

So why not just give these "commoners" something reliable in the first place?

------
smackfu
$99 plus $40 for the controller. Since Google doesn't seem to want to provide
that information.

~~~
freehunter
A silly price, considering their competitors cost the same, and have been in
the game for much longer. Google is late and entered the market at the same
price as established players, but with a track record of failure in this space
(Google TV and Nexus Q).

They probably don't want to provide the information because it's embarrassing.

~~~
smackfu
At this price point, I don't think a lower price would do anything. If you
charge $99, no one complains about the price. If you charge $79, do you really
get any more buyers? If they could do box + controller for $99, maybe that
would attract people, but a crummy controller would get a lot of bad attention
in reviews.

~~~
pbreit
I think it's high. Amazon TV is $84 right now and has two major advantages:
voice search and all the free Prime content.

$99 seems high since it's the same as Apple TV and almost triple the
Chromecast.

~~~
kissickas
This has voice search. And I assume it will support "free" Prime content:
[http://www.digitaltrends.com/home-theater/amazon-finally-
lau...](http://www.digitaltrends.com/home-theater/amazon-finally-launches-
prime-instant-video-for-android/)

~~~
pbreit
Didn't see the voice search feature mentioned. And not requiring a phone is a
bug advantage.

------
dangrossman
I wish this was a real Google TV replacement.

My 4-year-old Google TV box (Logitech Revue) -- with Android 3.1 -- is really
showing its age. The app store is pretty empty and it only supports things
like Amazon Video and HBO Go because Android still had Flash back then.

The missing key is an HDMI input. My TV is always tuned to the Google TV input
whether I'm watching live cable TV, a Netflix movie or casting a YouTube
video. I have a single remote control (the Google TV one) for all of them. It
changes channels and settings on my cable box with HDMI CEC.

All these new boxes make you switch inputs and remotes all the time. I have
too many remotes already.

~~~
chambo622
I thought all of the original Android TV devices got updated to the second
major version of the platform based on Android 4.2.

------
nogridbag
I realize the controller is sold separately, but I did find it a little odd
that the controller says "ASUS" at the top instead of "NEXUS" since it seems
to be the official controller.

------
tachyonbeam
I wonder why they went with an Intel Atom CPU instead of using ARM chips as
they do in the Nexus phones. Seems like a strange choice.

~~~
rwg
Intel is almost giving away Bay Trail-T CPUs to try and claw marketshare away
from ARM-based CPUs/SoCs. As an example, Intel's advertised price for an Atom
Z3735F (quad core, 1.33–1.83 GHz, 2.2 W SDP, 2 GB RAM max., Intel's Gen7
graphics) is $17, but I've read that the "real life" price dips under $10 in
volume. This is an absolutely mind-boggling price for a quad-core x86-64 CPU
with really quite good integrated graphics.

An exciting (to me, at least) development is that OEMs are starting to produce
sub-$100 HDMI sticks with Bay Trail-T CPUs and 16 GB–32 GB of eMMC storage
inside. Assuming the firmware isn't crippled, those sticks should be able to
run unmodified copies of any modern x86 operating system. On Linux and
FreeBSD, there is stable, functional, non-proprietary GPU support, which is a
huge win over the vast majority of ARM-based systems. (Even the "OPEN hardware
and software platform" Matchstick is currently chained to a binary blob
because of the Mali GPU. Maybe one day the reverse engineered Mali driver will
be awesome, but it's not there yet.)

~~~
ZenoArrow
"An exciting (to me, at least) development is that OEMs are starting to
produce sub-$100 HDMI sticks with Bay Trail-T CPUs and 16 GB–32 GB of eMMC
storage inside."

I'm very interested in this, but it's the first I've heard of it, please can
you share some examples? They sound like a great match for a Motorola Lapdock
(I have one, but currently unused).

~~~
rwg
This article came across my Twitter feed this morning:

MEEGO-T01 HDMI TV Stick Supports Android, Windows 8.1, and Ubuntu/Linux
[http://www.cnx-software.com/2014/10/15/meego-t01-hdmi-tv-
sti...](http://www.cnx-software.com/2014/10/15/meego-t01-hdmi-tv-stick-
supports-android-windows-8-1-and-ubuntulinux/)

There are other models by other OEMs out there, but I can't find any URLs for
them off-hand.

~~~
ZenoArrow
Thank you, the MEEGO-T01 looks like a great device, will almost certainly pick
one up (or something like it).

------
dchuk
There is so little innovation going on in the apple tv-esque space. All of
these devices look and act exactly the same (Fire, AppleTV, this thing, Roku,
etc)

~~~
baldfat
I don't care about innovation I care about Silos.

Stares at the lack of Amazon Instant Video on Android and rolls eye. I stopped
giving amazon money for videos and music until they have it on Android as they
already have it on Fire, and iOS.

~~~
VikingCoder
You can get Amazon Instant Video on your Android phone, but not your Android
tablet. /half-glower

[http://www.amazon.com/Amazon-com-Prime-Instant-
Video/dp/B00N...](http://www.amazon.com/Amazon-com-Prime-Instant-
Video/dp/B00N28818A)

~~~
fpgeek
I still glower, but I know of two loopholes:

1\. You can get Amazon Instant Video on your cellular tablet if you use the
Amazon Appstore directly. It's kinda vague on the distinction between a
cellular tablet and a phone.

2\. Amazon Instant Video works just fine if you sideload the Amazon for Phones
and Amazon Instant Video apps.

------
dataminded
The lack of Ethernet is a deal breaker for me. Ethernet is the only thing my
chromecast is missing. I don't want games or apps, just a stable internet
connection.

~~~
Nux
I've used the R-pi and now a Intel NUC with XBMC and for watching streams I
could tell that I had major issues with WIFI. Everything is SO much better
with a proper network cable.

------
apayan
I've had the pleasure of using one of these for the past month and it's been
really great. I have a Chromecast that I used all the time before, but because
I can cast to the Android TV (Player), I don't use the Chromecast anymore (I
only have one TV).

The whole UI feels very snappy, and videos load very quickly.

The game pad feels great in my hands. No complaints there.

The selection of games on Google Play isn't huge (yet?). I currently see 16
games listed on it for download/purchase. My favorite so far is Leo's Fortune.
I enjoyed it on my Nexus 5 when it came out, but after playing it on Android
TV, I won't even play it on the phone anymore because I've experienced how
much better the game is with a controller. I suspect that's going to be the
case with a lot of games that come out for Android in the future. Touch
interface only games have a lot of limitations.

Besides Netflix, you can also use Plex (PlexPass subscribers only right now)
and that works pretty flawlessly as well.

I've been very happy with the whole setup and I'll be recommending it to all
who are in the market for a set top box.

~~~
izacus
Um, does it support playing files from local Samba stores? At least through
app? (Plex refuses to make a build for my Synology NAS so that's out of the
question.)

------
thefreeman
This is a legitimate question, not a troll. Are there actually any mobile
games out there that you would _want_ to play on your tv with a controller?

Pretty much every mobile game I have ever tried has been a cesspool of
micropayment dark patterns, or else something that really just serves to kill
time when there is nothing else to do (riding the bus, waiting at an office,
etc.)

~~~
MarkMc
I would love to run Sky Force on a big TV.

And no doubt the Nexus Player will spur the development of new 'TV' games (or
ones ported from Xbox and playstation)

------
wnevets
With the chromecast, I have no interest in another box that plays video
content. Having a dedicate box to play casual android games on my tv isnt very
appealing to me either.

Is there really a big market for this thing?

~~~
heymishy
my thoughts exactly - what does this give me that a chromecast doesnt? i dont
care for a controller (or for games).

i can't think of anything this can do (that id want to do) that the chromecast
cant for a lot cheaper.

~~~
Igglyboo
Chrome cast mirrors a screen and requires a separate device to control, this
can run actual applications.

~~~
sanderjd
This is a common misconception. Chromecast runs "actual applications", which
are controlled by an application on a separate device like a phone or tablet.
One of those applications (I believe the _least useful_ one) enables you to
mirror a display from the controlling device. But most of the applications are
things like netflix, google play movies, and hbogo - very similar to the nexus
player.

~~~
Igglyboo
By run actual apps, I mean actually run the app's code on the device. There is
no netflix app for the chromecast, it requires a separate device with the
netflix app.

The chromecast is a glorified wireless hdmi dongle.

~~~
sanderjd
I guess I'm being pedantic by saying that there is clearly an application
running on the chromecast, which the controlling device sends information to,
because it's admittedly more like a dumb proxy for the application running on
the controlling device. But it's not like it is completely dependent on that
device - you can turn on a movie and turn off your phone while you watch it.

~~~
Igglyboo
Yea I understand that, I know there's an actual CPU running actual code but I
was trying to make the distinction between a full blown app and something that
just streams a url given to it by a device.

------
cfontes
Hum... interesting.

OUYA was almost dead. Now it's done.

~~~
tracker1
Ouya was an almost great implementation of that idea... honestly, I think the
controllers were pretty bad. The fact that you have to put the Ouya on its'
side to get decent controller reception is close to unforgivable. It just
wasn't quite fast enough for a full screen interface. Also, the media options
were an also ran. It's okay as an emulator box, but the gimped controllers
ruin the experience... I have two ps3 controllers that I haven't tried with it
as of yet, but plan to.

------
mahyarm
Now we need a $20 google audiocaster. It would kill the airplay speaker market
for android devices. You can hack it with a $20 hdmi to 3.5mm audio adaptor,
but then it becomes a $55 device.

I'm somewhat surprised there is no ethernet in this player. For some places,
wifi just doesn't work in their environment.

~~~
csulok
[http://www.motorola.com/us/accessories-headphones-
speakers/M...](http://www.motorola.com/us/accessories-headphones-
speakers/Moto-Stream/moto-stream.html)

~~~
mahyarm
Bluetooth is not a replacement for wifi audio.

------
omnibrain
Looks like "Nexus Q reborn". It looks very similar to the Amazon Fire TV.

~~~
smackfu
Nexus Q was so bizarre. They included a stereo amp in it and you could run
speakers directly. I'm sure that added a lot to the price when most people are
either going to plug it into their TV or their existing receiver.

------
jewel
I've been anxiously awaiting this. We're thinking of shipping an enterprise
product on the Amazon Fire TV, but it's relative lack of control is quite
limiting. Hopefully this is priced similarly.

I've tried nearly every android TV stick, and while they are pretty close to
what we need, and infinitely customizable, we had trouble getting consistent
hardware. It seemed like each batch would behave slightly differently.

~~~
Igglyboo
Same here, I want a Fire TV but Amazon's particular flavor of android seems to
be a lot more locked down than ASOP and has a smaller ecosystem. This will be
perfect for me.

------
gagege
Did anyone else not see Amazon in that list of apps?

~~~
general_failure
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.amazon.avo...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.amazon.avod)

------
taeric
This really looks just like a circular version of the FireTV. The remote looks
very similar. To the point I'd assume they are the same design.

Is this just a case where Amazon got a reference implementation out the door
before Google did?

~~~
slinkyavenger
If you go look at all the Chinese Android consoles, you'll see they did the
remote first, down to the integrated mic for voice search.

There are even a few of them that have a hockey-puck appearance.

~~~
taeric
That just furthers my suspicion that this is some sort of reference board
implementation. Curious that Google is entering the game as late as they are.

For disclosure, I should say I have and rather enjoy a FireTv. Not the most
amazing device ever, but more than capable of what it is made to do. (And more
to the point, does a good job by me.)

------
UK-AL
I don't get this. I have a Chromecast + nexus 7 as a remote and its already my
preferred way of watching Netflix etc. Much better than a clusmly remote.

I hope this doesn't mean there backtracking on Chromecast.

------
Pxtl
Now that every company is releasing gamepads for their set-top devices
hopefully we'll see android games support them properly.

------
kin
Google Cast sounds a bit too good to be true, just like the Chromecast was. I
hated the Chromecast 'cause it simply didn't have enough content for me and
the performance was terrible.

I'll have to wait and see how the performance for the Google Cast is. I'd like
it to at least be as good as my ability to airplay HD MKV files to an Apple
TV.

~~~
malbs
I have a chromecast too, its not even plugged in, I hate having to "cast" to
it from another device. I use a raspberry-pi with xbmc running on it, but this
could be great.... could be.

------
higherpurpose
Shame it comes with a much weaker Atom processor instead of the new 64-bit
Tegra processor, that's already in the Nexus 9 tablet. That decision doesn't
make any sense to me, which shows once again that Google's Intel-related
decisions are all political, and not technical.

~~~
Zigurd
It's a $99 product, vs $400 for the N9 tablet. It's an easy bet that the Atom
is cheaper and battery life is not an issue.

------
d23
Is it just me, or do the controllers (both of them) look _just_ like the Fire
TV's controllers?

I just don't get it. Does every company have to jump in head first to any
emerging market just because the others are doing it?

------
AdmiralAsshat
I think the question on everyone's mind is: how well will it run XBMC?

------
izacus
Ah, this will replace my RPi with XBMC (for local playback) and Chromecast
combo nicely - not having to use two devices will clear up some HDMI space on
the receiver :)

The Android TV interface looks pretty sleek as well.

~~~
Fuzzwah
I have a similar setup to you. I'm not sure where you're storing your local
content, mine is all on a couple of external USB HDDs connected to the R-Pi.

I'm not seeing how the Nexus Play is going to replace the R-Pi running
XBMC.....

My initial take is that the Nexus Play is like paying $65 extra for a
chromecast that has a remote. I realize there is more to it than that (due to
it running full android) but for my use case that doesn't seem to matter much.

~~~
dmayle
There is an Android XBMC app, maybe that's what he/she is referring to.

------
xngzng
Feel quite certain we will see Apple announce 4th generation Apple TV tomorrow
with a gaming capable A7 processor for Metal games, and voice capable remote
control the same as Nexus Player.

------
ccozan
"Start here, finish there" is one of the good features. However is not really
new, I can do the same with Amazon Prime ( w/ App from Smart Tv and App on
Tablet ).

------
agumonkey
Surprisingly not mentioned on the _fr_FR_ main page
[https://archive.today/zYpBZ](https://archive.today/zYpBZ)

edit: ha... probably market limited.

------
mmanfrin
So this is a Fire TV + Chromecast - Amazon Siloed Content.

------
Igglyboo
Wanted this ever since I saw the Amazon Fire TV, will no doubt be much more
"hackable" than Amazons version of android.

------
devin
Sad that a bunch of designers can't come up with an original thought. Looks
exactly like the Apple TV.

------
baq
intel inside. interesting times.

------
general_failure
This kills Roku.

Roku is dead, long live Roku.

~~~
freehunter
At $99, how is this a Roku killer? At least Roku has Amazon Instant Video.

~~~
general_failure
For a start, roku has an extremely closed app development policy. Have you
seen how you develop apps for the Roku? The Player will have it open just like
other devices.

On amazon, Roku 3 streaming player costs 90USD. So, it's the same price range.
Except that Player will have more apps in no time.

(And from a developer perspective, Roku is using a custom language. You read
that right, a DSL of their own)

~~~
general_failure
@freehunter: I cannot reply to you for some reason. but ouya was marketed as a
gaming device. Completely different thing compared to how Roku is marketed.

~~~
freehunter
HN is kind of weird with the comments. If you don't see the "reply" button,
click "link" then there should be a comment box that will work.

Anyway, no one knows how this will play out, but Roku didn't kill Apple TV,
FireTV didn't kill either, and I wouldn't expect this thing to do much damage
in the very crowded market either, all things considered. Brand name doesn't
mean that much these days, as Microsoft and Blackberry can tell you. What
matters is how cool it is and how quick the adoption and lock-in is. Lots of
people already have smart TVs, gaming consoles, or Apple TV/Roku devices.

------
thedangler
Maybe it is just me but I do not see it in the play store. (Canada)

------
acgourley
Does anyone know if it has miracast?

------
swartkrans
Is that running Google TV?

~~~
wldcordeiro
Android TV, Google TV was an OS purely for TVs that failed. Android TV is
Android with modifications to run on TVs.

~~~
lern_too_spel
Google TV is also Android with modifications to run on TVs.
[https://developers.google.com/tv/android/docs/gtv_documentat...](https://developers.google.com/tv/android/docs/gtv_documentation_intro)

I think this is just a rebranding to distance Android TV from the failure that
was Google TV. I'm taking bets on what the name of the next revision will be
when Android TV fails.

~~~
Shooti
I think the difference is Google TV was built by the Youtube division, Android
TV was built by the Android division.

------
cbeach
"Your favourite apps are on Nexus Player"

Spotify and iPlayer are my favourites. Notably absent.

~~~
dmayle
I'm confused, both of those offer Android apps. How are they absent?

------
cbsmith
A.K.A.: Nexus Q 2.0

------
wfjackson
>Get your apps on Google Play, or rent a movie if your app doesn’t have what
you’re looking for

What? Are they exclusively targeting movie content with this? It doesn't make
much sense to rent a movie if store apps don't have a feature I am looking
for.

~~~
freehunter
Rent a movie from Google if it's not available to stream on Netflix is what I
read it as. They just didn't want to say the name of their competitor.

------
notastartup
Remember ouya?

