NVIDIA: The Battle For Your Living Room Has Begun

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At its annual developer conference Thursday, Google described how it’s bringing Android — and its 1.3 million apps and Google-powered cloud services — to your living room with Android TV. Ten days later, industry watchers expect Apple to introduce a new version of Apple TV at its annual developer conference. This isn’t the first time that tech giants have tried to reinvent TV. But it is the first time all the pieces have been in place. For one, the content’s already here — Netflix, YouTube and Twitch.tv are thriving on smartphones, PCs and connected streaming boxes. So are the apps — with mobile game developers showing how content and community can be bound together in powerful new ways. The last piece is the power to put all this at your command. That’s NVIDIA SHIELD, Android TV’s flagship device.
 
That slide is like an old Maxell tape commercial with the dude sitting in the chair.
 
Fine, make a DVR for all streaming services including sling. Make it to where any streaming service in the future will be added. I am tired of all the equipment piling up for all these different services.
 
Fine, make a DVR for all streaming services including sling. Make it to where any streaming service in the future will be added. I am tired of all the equipment piling up for all these different services.

Its coming... apps are becoming more mobile... entertainment is becoming more mobile (streaming to all sorts of devices).

Devices like Roku is a good example how one device can support a number of companies content etc

The problem is you have cable/dish companies that don't want universal equipment, and they certainly don't want their equipment to allow access to competitor content.

I think the best you can hope for will be... Cable/Dish/DVR box, BluRay player box, streamer/htpc type box, Console Box...

You will be able to git rid of 1-2 of those depending if you either don't use or have very limited need. But its still true that multi-purpose boxes generally suck at everything... BluRay players with netflix for instance always seem to suck and fall behind on software and features... thus its best to get a roku type box or use a console etc.
 
I will add boxes will be lessened once cable is dead and everything is available via internet.
 
Actually all you need is a cable box with DVR and a console (PS4 or XBone).

Modern console is already nearly all-in-one and damn good at it.
 
The problem is you have cable/dish companies that don't want universal equipment, and they certainly don't want their equipment to allow access to competitor content.

Actually, the problem is the broadcasters, not the providers. If Dish or Charter could market a box that could DVR everything and have neat features like Dish's commercial skipping tech, they would. They'd then be able to charge even more in lease fees or special capabilities fees but the broadcasters throw a shit fit. Look at Dish Network who was sued by local networks when they introduced commercial skipping DVR, or how nobody can use their DVR to record/retain indefinitely PPV.


I'll be interested to see, three years from now, how accurate that estimate on 4k adoption is.
 
I use an old A8 laptop with remote as my HTPC.

-Small
-Low power
-Plays games
-Streams steam games it can't play from my main rig
-Stream any service like Netflix... Etc...

My living room is happy.
 
Too expensive, redundant functionality, and not mobile. I dunno of many modern people who would bother being chained to a fixed television screen when its a lot cheaper to just buy a Windows tablet.
 
NVidia announced the "World's First GPU" in 1999 huh? News to me... So team green what were those dedicated graphics processing chips on those various video cards in any of my computers prior to that point?
 
Actually all you need is a cable box with DVR and a console (PS4 or XBone).

Modern console is already nearly all-in-one and damn good at it.

Even better, instead of a Cable box, a HTPC with a cable card and a xbox 360 to act as an extender for your 2nd TV.

Too bad Microsoft is killing off media center :(
 
NVidia announced the "World's First GPU" in 1999 huh? News to me... So team green what were those dedicated graphics processing chips on those various video cards in any of my computers prior to that point?

Yes
 
I dunno of many modern people who would bother being chained to a fixed television screen when its a lot cheaper to just buy a Windows tablet.

Watch a epic movie on a low res 8" tablet with tiny speakers vs. watching it on a large wide screen TV with full DTS surround sound? No thanks.

I don't know anyone who would rather watch TV on a small tablet over a decent TV.
 
The battle has begun cause nv says so well hmm i would say the battle is over as nv has completely lost the living room being that no console manufacturer will touch them with a 10ft pole.
 
NVidia announced the "World's First GPU" in 1999 huh? News to me... So team green what were those dedicated graphics processing chips on those various video cards in any of my computers prior to that point?

Yes!

NV Wiki said:
GeForce 256 was marketed as "the world's first 'GPU', or Graphics Processing Unit", a term Nvidia defined at the time as "a single-chip processor with integrated transform, lighting, triangle setup/clipping, and rendering engines that is capable of processing a minimum of 10 million polygons per second."

The integration of the transform and lighting hardware into the GPU itself set the GeForce 256 apart from older 3D accelerators that relied on the CPU to perform these calculations (also known as software transform and lighting).
 
NVidia announced the "World's First GPU" in 1999 huh? News to me... So team green what were those dedicated graphics processing chips on those various video cards in any of my computers prior to that point?

the term GPU arose with DX7 where geometry processing was taken off the CPU an put on the graphics card. nVidia was first to market then.
 
Watch a epic movie on a low res 8" tablet with tiny speakers vs. watching it on a large wide screen TV with full DTS surround sound? No thanks.

I don't know anyone who would rather watch TV on a small tablet over a decent TV.

Hi, I'm CreepyUncleGoogle and though watching TV shows and movies is general is something I don't do, I would prefer having like a screen on my lap instead of hanging on a wall. Also, surround sound is hugely silly. I have like a pair of headphones I got for $14 a couple years ago and they're fine if I want something other than integrated device speakers.
 
^^
That's interesting, didn't know that. I too am interested to see if their 4k prediction comes true - seems a bit aggressive. Right now there are very limited options for 4k at 60hz for gaming unless you want to pay for huge, top of the line 4k TVs or ultrawide PC monitors which are expensive. I know that I'm part of a 'niche' group for this but it seems that 4K has a ways to overtake 1080p.
 
been using my Shield Portable as a console for a while now. I have it permanently hooked up to the projector w/ a bunch of adapters (so the shield can charge and be on wired ethernet instead of wifi)

I will probably pick up the console anyways so I can not have to use all the adapters and relegate the portable back to portable use. It's pretty awesome being able to pull up all the games on the bedroom computer w/out the need of having a beastly computer in every room. I also use it for Netflix and controlling WMC via touchscreen (using a Ceton card w/ Comcast) and playing PSX emulated games. Lot of awesomeness for the $$$.
 
Hi, I'm CreepyUncleGoogle and though watching TV shows and movies is general is something I don't do, I would prefer having like a screen on my lap instead of hanging on a wall. Also, surround sound is hugely silly. I have like a pair of headphones I got for $14 a couple years ago and they're fine if I want something other than integrated device speakers.

Listening to movie/TV audio with $14 head phones is "silly".... Ok so now that 2 people in all the world dictated their preferences as fact, everyone else must adhere to those facts as truth...

No more $14 headphone or surround sound usage allowed ever by anyone.

While the original poster didn't mention a trend of expand mobile/smaller device usage for media consumption, he still has a point that most people (from my experience) still use a normal TV device for more traditional media.

Sure people do use laptops and mobile devices MORE but I would still guess those would be more stop gap measure... like watching something while on a road trip, hotel or airport.

Also have to consider how the content has changed as well. Youtube is a perfect example of content that is almost exclusively consumed on mobile or other computer devices instead of TVs. So while mobile/PC consumption of media has gone up, the types of media have also grown. I would guess you would see a huge portion of mobile consumption being these new media types, more so than more traditional methods like TVs.

Is the trend changing... I am sure it is. Younger generations that probably have a mobile phone/tablet/laptop before or instead of getting a TV in their room probably are used to it. That behavior continues into college where space in dorms is a premium...

Me personally if I am consuming media entertainment of 30min or more it probably is going to be on a TV OR in a specific circumstance like on a plane passing time.
 
Thanks, but no thanks.

I'm completely uninterested in any TV connected device that is not a full fledged computer.

Any proprietary locked down non-x86 device is just not going to cut it, regardless of wheter it is made by Google (or whoever they contracted this time), Nvidia, Roku, Microsoft, etc. etc.

I won't have any of that smart tv nonsense either. If a TV has "smart" functions, it pretty much guarantees I won't buy it.

Currently I have two hacked $159 Asus Chromeboxes.

The 2GB of Ram, 16GB SSD and low end mobile Haswell Celeron make for a perfect XBMC (now Kodi) streaming frontend, pulling data off of my NAS and TV off of my MythTV Backend.

12W at the wall under full load, 5W at the wall at idle. 0W when it falls asleep (good wall wart somehow disables itself when the box isn't on)

The fact that it is only $159 blows my mind. Makes it cheap enough to put one next to every TV.
 
Listening to movie/TV audio with $14 head phones is "silly".... Ok so now that 2 people in all the world dictated their preferences as fact, everyone else must adhere to those facts as truth...

No more $14 headphone or surround sound usage allowed ever by anyone.

While the original poster didn't mention a trend of expand mobile/smaller device usage for media consumption, he still has a point that most people (from my experience) still use a normal TV device for more traditional media.

Sure people do use laptops and mobile devices MORE but I would still guess those would be more stop gap measure... like watching something while on a road trip, hotel or airport.

Also have to consider how the content has changed as well. Youtube is a perfect example of content that is almost exclusively consumed on mobile or other computer devices instead of TVs. So while mobile/PC consumption of media has gone up, the types of media have also grown. I would guess you would see a huge portion of mobile consumption being these new media types, more so than more traditional methods like TVs.

Is the trend changing... I am sure it is. Younger generations that probably have a mobile phone/tablet/laptop before or instead of getting a TV in their room probably are used to it. That behavior continues into college where space in dorms is a premium...

Me personally if I am consuming media entertainment of 30min or more it probably is going to be on a TV OR in a specific circumstance like on a plane passing time.

I know there's gonna be a lot of personal preferences, but this forum's population is totally not representative of the rest of the world. It tends to be mostly older people who still are more comfortable using location-fixed stuff like desktop computers so the appeal of an immovable TV screen and box for streamed media kinda makes sense, but I really think the market is more limited to older people in their 30's and up (and even some of those older people are learning to be more practical by limiting the number of redundant and non-mobile devices in their lives to a smaller number of more flexible items) so the longevity of this whole model of fixed, passive media consumption is pretty limited. I think it'll go by the wayside and greater integration of entertainment into everyday, outdoors/social life will replace it as currently younger people wanna be outdoors more doing physically active, healthy things with one another instead of being isolated and couch- and chair-bound because their fun can't fit in a pocket or handbag.
 
Hi,

My TV is a 480i early 90's Zenith in a cherry cabinet with RCA jack connections. Is this device for me?

Thanks!
 
Zarathustra[H];1041630741 said:
Thanks, but no thanks.

I'm completely uninterested in any TV connected device that is not a full fledged computer.

Any proprietary locked down non-x86 device is just not going to cut it, regardless of wheter it is made by Google (or whoever they contracted this time), Nvidia, Roku, Microsoft, etc. etc.

Has it be confirmed that this device is "locked down"? I've been trying to find some info in that regard.
 
Unless the nvidia shield tv top box can run pc games... no thanks..

things like witcher 3.. the upcoming road warrior game.. star citizen..

without that, its just a netflix option
 
I believe you can stream your PC games to it.

Otherwise, natively, the PC game selection is limited. I think Borderlands TPS is probably the newest from the PC genre but I think nvidia is working with developers to get some more stuff.

If devs would just develop their games with OGL / Vulkan from the get-go, this would be a lot easier. *sigh*
 
Zarathustra[H];1041630741 said:
Thanks, but no thanks.

I'm completely uninterested in any TV connected device that is not a full fledged computer.

Any proprietary locked down non-x86 device is just not going to cut it, regardless of wheter it is made by Google (or whoever they contracted this time), Nvidia, Roku, Microsoft, etc. etc.

I won't have any of that smart tv nonsense either. If a TV has "smart" functions, it pretty much guarantees I won't buy it.

Currently I have two hacked $159 Asus Chromeboxes.

The 2GB of Ram, 16GB SSD and low end mobile Haswell Celeron make for a perfect XBMC (now Kodi) streaming frontend, pulling data off of my NAS and TV off of my MythTV Backend.

12W at the wall under full load, 5W at the wall at idle. 0W when it falls asleep (good wall wart somehow disables itself when the box isn't on)

The fact that it is only $159 blows my mind. Makes it cheap enough to put one next to every TV.

Good luck using any streaming services with a remote control. Mouse and keyboard in the living room are a non-starter for 99% of the population.
 
Good luck using any streaming services with a remote control. Mouse and keyboard in the living room are a non-starter for 99% of the population.

The Netflixbmc plugin mostly works from the remote, except for closing it, which requires an alt-f4 which feels a little Jacky, but I have a small Logitech k400 wireless keyboard/trackpad for when that is needed.

Everything else in XMBC just works with the remote, but you are right. This is one area that could use some improvement.

The XBMC devs are hardcore DRM haters though and refuse to do anything to support services requiring DRM, meaning that most streaming streaming support is implemented through lower quality 3rd party plugins.

All that being said, I'd still go with it over a consumer TV service 100% of the time
 
Picked up a Shield (16GB version) and the remote this past week.

It's a decent upgrade from a chromecast, but not as powerful as a full HTPC.

It's worth it to us because we no longer need an HDMI cable run over to the couch to plug in my wife's laptop -- she's got a 970M chip so we can stream any application over with no noticeable latency via WiFi (5Ghz AC).

Works well for casting and the ability to navigate netflix, plex, etc directly is a nice plus.

NVIDIA's GRID service is neat, but we're in the LA area and it wants to connect to a datacenter on the easy coast -- ping is 75ms at best and games are too laggy and skip.

We've had some crashing & network issues with the device... still giving it a couple weeks and some hopefully some updates from NVIDIA to see if those get resolved.
 
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