Gadgetory

this is Jimmy from Jim's review room welcome to another review today we will be looking at the amazon firetv amazon's first attempt at their entertainment streaming device now what makes these devices shine that allows your TV to become smart you can say by allowing you to watch your streaming services like Netflix or Amazon Instant on a TV that doesn't have those built-in features now if you don't have a smart TV which at the present time most consumers don't you're only watching your paid subscription services through either your phone or tablet and if it is on your TV it may be through an Xbox or Playstation and some people don't want to buy a gaming system or move their gaming system into a different room so this is where these streaming devices come in handy but Amazon has some very unique features and offers a gaming device as well based on Android which looks very promising and now go over those features shortly and price that only $99 it's on par with other competitors like in Roku 3 and Apple TV and be sure to watch my review on the other streaming devices on my channel or by clicking the videos displayed so without further ado we'll get started going over its physical layout first the fire TV is beautiful very slim and sleek it's a perfect square at 4.5 inches wide and also 4.5 inches deep in standing just a little over a half an inch tall now on the rear does offer a power port for the supplied AC cord HDMI connection which oddly enough Amazon did not provide a cord for optical opt for digital surround sound up to 7.1 channels to be specific a Ethernet port just in case you don't have Wi-Fi and lastly is a USB port altogether the unit is a very solid built machine and my favorite so far compared to the competition now the unit does run a bit hot though so I would not suggest putting anything on top the same quality can be said for the controller too very slim and sleek with a slight silicon texture for added grip it's very subtle and doesn't leave behind fingerprints or unsightly scratches you have up top your microphone for voice commands which I'll test later the mic button a directional pad for up down left and right and it wasn't a touch sensitive jog out which I personally thought at first similar to the very first iPads really Appl then the very middle is your enter button to execute commands back home and menu buttons are to follow with the standard back play pause and forward to finish up the controller now the remote does take to triple-a batteries which are supplied by Amazon now if you'll be purchasing this yourself through your Amazon account once they ship it to you your login credentials are already in there there's no need to set up your account which was very convenient for me so we'll jump straight into the content before going over some of the unique features once around your home page as shown here you have your menu on the left and several rows have suggested and featured content and the write pretty self-explanatory for suggestions on movies apps - TV shows and games now just real brief here before I get into the free content you can say amazon firetv just like the other companies offer movies and TV shows to rent or purchase most rentals for movies are around $4.99 while purchases are $14.99 and all the way up to $19.99 to me somewhat on the expensive side but you can say convenient if you're not willing to run down the street to rent from let's say red box for just 2 dollars but what makes these devices worth buying are they're free apps and also the paid subscription services like Netflix or Hulu now being accessible on your TV now more importantly if you're already an Amazon Prime holder you receive a decent library of free movies to watch as well and I'll casually flip through some of the channels here so you can see what's offered by Amazon and if I'm going a little bit too fast be sure to rerun the video now everything is available through the app menu here you can find your standard and well-known apps like YouTube Vimeo revision3 and stated earlier Netflix and Hulu Plus just the name of you now one of the most important channels missing was HBO GO it's unfortunate for those Game of Thrones out there but there could be an update down the road amazon also loads up on audio content as well like pandora iheartradio and VEVO now once you scroll down to categories you can see other useful apps genre-specific first example scrolling through entertainment has decent amount apps that provides a decent amount of free content to watch example like frequency which normally is a smartphone and tablet app is available here frequency rounds up all the most watched videos on the internet and puts it all into this one centralized location for viewing now if you have cable or satellite already at home and don't have a cable box for that TV you can sign in with your cable company's username and password to make full use of ESPN the ESPN plays live through your fire TV with only a minute delay from the actual live feed from the TV downstairs now having just reviewed the Roku several days ago the Roku provides full access to your TV lineup not just what apps are available for example what Time Warner you can watch your cable shows on your tablet or smartphone and this feature is also present on the Roku but on Amazon TV you're only limited to what apps are available not Time Warner as a whole Amazon in general does well with providing many of the popular apps but does have some missing content here and there now looking in the sports genre which there's other sports like the NFL racing soccer whatever it may be and I personally like watching the Food Network but looking through the food availability as you can see there's only two now don't expect to see Bobby Flay or shows like Iron Chef or chopped as you won't see those on the competitors like Apple TV or Roku but the other two brands just mentioned do offer a bit more content than what Amazon has provided so far but to be fair after my experience with testing Roku and Apple TV the apps and content that Amazon decides to make available are a great content there isn't any channels where I noticed it was low budget internet TV type content which is a good thing there's no fluff there's quality over quantity if I can sum it up all together if you're happy seeing those main channel lineups you're perfectly fine then and I would suggest watching my Roku streaming stick review and you can see how much content is on there now getting back on topic here the next great content feature is gaming what's amazing about the fire TV it's based on Android which means some games normally found on smartphones and android power tablets are playable here games like minecraft asphalt dead trigger Riptide etc which are very good titles now some do require a Bluetooth gaming controller and you cannot use the supplied remote from the fire TV Amazon sells their gaming pad for $40 and the peripheral is top-notch and when playing these Android games with a controller it's almost like a completely new experience and if you purchase the control at this moment Amazon does provide ten dollars worth of Amazon coins used to purchase apps and games in the future again that's free money and per Amazon the average cost of the game is a dollar and 85 cents and rest assured Amazon States there is a quad-core processor built-in claiming this fire TV is three times more powerful than the Apple TV Roku and chromecast and with my test games ran perfectly fine and to be honest the entire interface from switching screens to video playback it's very fluid very smooth making the user experience frustrating free and among streaming devices this has been the most enjoyable and most pleasant experience I have encountered so far so to round up Amazon's unique features the remote control features a microphone hold down and speak naturally into the controller of any actor movie or genre it will pull up all that's related and it works well to saving time and effort rather than typing everything out now one big bonus on the chromecast was the ability to watch your content on either your smartphone or tablet then cast that video onto the TV that chromecast is plugged into Amazon has something similar but only works with devices that have this feature called second screen the only tablet that I know of so far that does this is the Amazon's own Kindle Fire HDX which makes this feature pretty limited now another feature with your Amazon account you already have five gigs worth of cloud data storage videos up to 20 minutes and all of your photos can be viewed on the fire TV which makes sharing photos and screen or watching again 20 minute long videos pretty simple and lastly Amazon has always taken parental controls pretty serious on all their devices it's nice to see it's available here to prevent children from accidentally or intentionally buying content and your credit card you can also restrict content type to ensure they're watching something age-appropriate as well so hands down this for me has been the most enjoyable experience with any streaming device very smooth fluid and the gaming feature is a plus then keep in mind this is Android based so we will of course see more apps and content the smartphone and tablet world come over to the fire TV and not to mention for the geeks out there you can say you'll probably be route this soon and customize the experience even further so Auto limited in some areas in regards to channels and apps what's offered again is quality content and again for me it's enough to satisfy my needs so that's it I know this video was somewhat long but I hope this review helped you in some way be sure to watch the Roku streaming stick and group Google chromecast review here when available and if you have not please take your time to like and subscribe to this video for future alerts to new products and of course visit my Facebook or Google+ pages for behind-the-scenes stuff so this is Jimmy from Jim's review room take everyone by