Amazon Launches 'Fire TV' Media Streaming Box with Voice Search, Game Support, and More

[MacRumors]

In line with earlier rumors, Amazon today announced the Fire TV, a new media streaming device that will compete with the Apple TV, Google Chromecast and the new Roku Streaming Stick.

The Fire TV is set-top box with a bluetooth remote that supports voice search. Internal hardware includes a quad-core processor with a dedicated graphics processor and 2GB of RAM. It supports 1080p via HDMI and features dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi with MIMO for fast video downloads. Amazon claims it Fire TV hardware is three times as powerful as its competitors.

The Fire TV streams Amazon Prime Instant Video titles as well as content from third-party providers such as Netflix and Hulu. Owners can browse through popular movies and TV shows on Amazon Instant Video, with personalized recommendations and a watchlist making it easy to find and save content. A new ASAP (Advanced Streaming and Prediction) feature learns what movies and shows you enjoy and gets them ready for you to watch. The more you use the Fire TV, the better it gets at predicting your media choices.

Setting it apart from its competition, Amazon also bundles games into the Fire TV device with support for a $39 wireless Fire game controller. Well-known gaming studios such as Disney, Gameloft, EA, Sega, Ubisoft and Double Fine are partnering with Amazon to bring their titles to the Fire TV device. Amazon also is launching its own gaming studio, with the tower defense game Sev Zero debuting as the studio's first official game.

Extras packaged into the Fire TV include photos with slide shows and X-Ray that provides IMDB details for movies and TV shows on a second screen device like the Kindle Fire HDX. Music services such as Pandora, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, and Amazon's own Music service will debut on the Fire TV starting next month with support for X-Ray, which will display song lyrics.

Not just for adults, Amazon added its FreeTime service, which offers parental controls and personalized profiles for children. A $2.99 monthly option for a FreeTime Unlimited subscription adds unlimited access to programming from Nickelodeon, Sesame Street, PBS Kids and more.

The Fire TV will ship today from Amazon with a $99 price tag.



Article Link: Amazon Launches 'Fire TV' Media Streaming Box with Voice Search, Game Support, and More

 

[Sky Blue]

What happened to this rumored Apple TV update?

 

[iLoveiTunes]

oh look a new Apple TV....

Hang on, wait a sec .....

 

[Jack Delgado]

Coming soon: controlled Apple TV leaks in order to deter interest

 

[keterboy]

Are you kidding me now? That's it, everyone's doing everything?

 

[Kirb112]

Excited about the potential of this from Amazon. I have Prime, and I'd love to see them roll-out amore streaming titles. I am sure that will come with this device.

 

[maflynn]

Not surprising given their desire for content delivery which is why they have their Android tablet. Its a natural extension.

 

[spyguy10709]

The success of this will depend highly on the price, and if it runs android. Not because "android is android" - but so developers can easily make apps and games for it.

EDIT -
I posted this comment BEFORE pricing and games were announced.

 

[milo]

I guess they intend for it to run games and apps? Otherwise quad core raises the price but isn't really necessary for video streaming.

 

[BJMRamage]

Looks like a squarer/harder edge AppleTV...and a dark Apple Remote/Roku remote.

I can see this being big with the Amazonians/Prime Members. Guessing price will be between $35-55. basically do "outshine" the AppleTV in power and price.

 

[KazKam]

Oh good, another one. And here I thought consumers might be getting confused. /s

 

[Noble Seven]

"My cable box is three times as powerful as your cable box, bruh"

 

[brianvictor7]

That thing doesn't look ergonomically friendly like my Apple TV. That Fire TV box has sharp edges.

 

[Macboy Pro]

Coming soon.... Apple sue's Amazon for creating a competitor to Apple TV that is square with rounded corners.

 

[pedromcm.pm]

Again trying to mislead costumers.

I thought that the point of vomiting "quad core" to define something that is supposed to be faster than "dual core" was already gone.

Give specifics and be honest, or shut up. Some good people here have a 1.3 dual core that would easily smoke that processor and those 2 gb of ram.

Seriously tech companies, stop targeting the lowest common denominator. About the TV itself, it's just another Apple-TV like with Amazon services. Good for amazon clients, I guess.

 

[jrswizzle]

Depending on price, I might get one of these to go with the 3 AppleTVs we have in our house. The AppleTVs are on each of our TVs, but we have Prime and it would be nice to have the option to use Prime Video on my TV without Airplaying it.

 

[Captainobvvious]

These things are always a non starter for me if they can't stream and organize local content.

I had an ATV 2 and got fed up with jailbreaking and got a Raspberry Pi and it my setup has never been better.

 

[wiredup72]

But can it stream .mkv without wrapping from my server?

 

[rhett7660]

Are you kidding me now? That's it, everyone's doing everything?

I think it would be nice for them all to play together, but I don't really see that happening anytime soon.

AppleTV
Roku
Google
Amazon

One device, I know I don't want any more devices.

 

[Revearti]

It should be called the Amazon FirePlace with relaxing screensavers that crackle!

 

[bawbac]

Don't hate the player, hate the game.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

That thing doesn't look ergonomically friendly like my Apple TV. That Fire TV box has sharp edges.

Is this important to a set-top box- how ergonomically friendly is looks? My TV 3 is almost invisible on a shelf of my A/V stack. No one could readily tell if it's ergonomically friendly or not (probably can't even see it except for the little white light).

Sure, we love our stuff to be "pretty" but what's probably much more important to most is how well does it work, how much can it do (that we want it to do), how much will it cost to do what we want it to do, etc. In short, the guts and companion service is probably more important than the pretty shell.

Personally, competition is good-to-great. I hope this thing is fantastic such that it might motivate Apple to take their incarnation much more seriously. All these other guys already have much desired benefits we covet in Apple's little box. We're quick to put them down (because what else can we do for anything that doesn't have an Apple logo on it) but elsewhere we'll post wishes for Apple to implement some of the very same (differentiating) features & benefits. Why does a Roku have so many choices of streams/channels? They're a relatively tiny company vs. Apple but wow are they loaded with sources of content. Does this Amazon version bring Android app versions of popular games? Why hasn't iOS games made it to Apple TV?

It seems like those (bad, old, evil, incompetent, trolls, idea-thieving, _________, etc) other guys know how to focus on building each part of their businesses out, rather than getting overly focused on 1-2 things while deeming other, high-potential opportunities as "hobbies". Whining about it doesn't get us anywhere. But competition might. I hope this thing is HOT and sells really well. Maybe it will wake the distracted giant?

 

[Titanium81]

The Fire TV has a quad-core processor with a dedicated graphics processor and 2GB of RAM. It supports 1080p and features dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi with MIMO for fast video downloads. Amazon claims it is three times as powerful as its competitors.

It's not ONLY about the specs of a device, that makes it perform well. Software has a huge factor. Just look how iOS handles graphics better than any other mobile operating system out right now. Yet the devices that iOS run on have bare minimum amounts of ram and slower clock speed than the competitors.

 

[Solver]

"... one more thing. Amazon Prime will now be available on Apple TV."
(we can only hope )

 

[Thunderhawks]

Oh good, another one. And here I thought consumers might be getting confused. /s

It's okay, let these dudes push each other. Eventually we'll get a box that makes
everybody happy. (One can hope)

Next: Comcast et al. will have their cable modems combined with their streaming device to stay in the game.

BTW: The dude needs a T-shirt and jeans.