The NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV Review: A Premium 4K Set Top Box
by Ganesh T S on May 28, 2015 3:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Media Streamer
- Home Theater
- TV
- 4K
- Shield
- NVIDIA
Netflix in 4K and HEVC Decode
The NVIDIA SHIELD is currently the only Netflix 4K-certified set-top box in the market. This certification involves two important requirements:
- Presence of a HDMI 2.0 port with HDCP 2.2 capability
- Presence of a hardware decoder for HEVC Main and Main10 profiles
NVIDIA was the first in the PC space to bring HDMI 2.0 together with HDCP 2.2 support as well as a hardware decoder for HEVC in the GTX 960. They are also extending this lead to the SoC space with the Tegra X1. Thus, the NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV has turned out to be the first set-top box to meet Netflix's criteria for 4K certification.
The UltraHD-capable Netflix streaming plan is the highest-end one, coming in at $11.99 per month before taxes. If the SHIELD is connected to a HDMI 2.0 4Kp60 sink supporting HDCP 2.2 and the Netflix account is on a supported plan, the Netflix app's UI presents a row of Ultra HD 4K streams in addition to the generic categories. We tested out Netflix 4K on a Samsung HU6950 without an AV receiver inbetween.
Netflix has a special test stream that shows the characteristics of the currently playing stream. As expected, the SHIELD had no trouble in getting to the 4K encode.
In the adaptive streaming process, we came across a host of different encodes. They are listed in the gallery below.
Regular readers of our HTPC reviews might remember that the Windows 8.1 Netflix app tops out with a 5.8 Mbps 1080p H.264 stream. On devices with HEVC support, it appears that this is replaced by a 5.16 Mbps HEVC Main10 stream at the same resolution. There is also a higher bit-rate version (6.96 Mbps) with similar characteristics. Beyond that, we have the 4K stream at 9.6 Mbps. Unfortunately, we don't know the exact characteristics of the encode, but, based on the immediately preceding lower bit-rate streams, it is probably a HEVC Main10 encode too.
The Netflix app gives us an indication that the SHIELD has no trouble with HEVC. In order to confirm this, we put our HEVC test suite through Android's native Video Player.
The video shows perfect playback of 4Kp24, 4Kp25 and 4Kp30 HEVC Main and Main10 profile streams. For 4Kp60, we only have Main profile videos, and the SHIELD has no trouble with that.
On one hand, it is nice to see the SHIELD Android TV's 4K Netflix capabilities as well as support for high frame-rate HEVC playback in a power-efficient system. Though the 4K TV adoption rate is still very low - it's the start of what will be a long process - of anything and everything NVIDIA needed to do to secure their spot as the set top box to have for 4K TVs, getting Netflix 4K support in place is it.
On the other hand, it also reminds us of the sorry state of HTPCs with respect to HDMI 2.0, HDCP 2.2 and HEVC playback. For enthusiasts, it is imperative that PCs catch up soon, given that local media streaming is not a focus point for the SHIELD.
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ES_Revenge - Wednesday, June 10, 2015 - link
Perhaps not but Tegra X1 might be Maxwell but it's only 256:16:16 with 512 GFLOP SP performance. That in the realm of a GT 730...and the GDDR3 730 is faster than that, lol. In AMD-speak that's around equal to an R7 240.PS4 OTOH is a little below an R9 270 (around a GTX 660) and has over 1800 GFLOP SP performance. "On paper" it's already about 4x faster computationally, and it has about 7x the VRAM bandwidth.
Trying to compare a 7850/R9 270/GTX 660 to an R7 240/GT 730 is lulz though and it's very hard to find any kind of direct comparison between the two because they're never tested together and low end cards are typically tested at lower res and settings than higher end ones. It may not be actually an order of magnitude difference quantitatively but that's not really here nor there in the real world. In 1080p, we're talking about the difference between 10-15 FPS (i.e. totally unplayable) to 30-50 FPS (not spectacular but still very playable), between the two. The qualitative difference between 10FPS and 30FPS is HUGE so it seems like "an order of magnitude" in realith.
Nevermind the CPU side is well behind the 4M/8T Jaguar x86 CPU in the PS4.
MJJackson - Saturday, June 29, 2019 - link
Isso que eu chamo de bíblia hein. Como você teve disposição para escrever tudo isso? E como este site suporta tantos caracteres em um comentário?MJJackson - Saturday, June 29, 2019 - link
Isso que eu chamo de bíblia hein. Como você teve disposição para escrever tudo isso? E como este site suporta tantos caracteres em um comentário?Samus - Friday, May 29, 2015 - link
So this is a $200-$300 Roku on steroids?Udo - Tuesday, June 2, 2015 - link
No, on gamma radiation.ToTTenTranz - Friday, May 29, 2015 - link
And it'll do jack for selling Tegra devices because:1 - Such games have been in the PC for years or even a decade. Whoever wants to play them, can do it on a PC.
2 - Being greedy and making these games exclusive to Tegra devices/consoles means they won't ever enlarge the market for higher-end games on Android, which in turn won't ever raise the demand for higher-performing Android devices (like Tegra X1).
mkozakewich - Saturday, May 30, 2015 - link
People are replacing their computers with tablets and things, so I could imagine someone junking their six-year-old computer and getting this, and just getting a large phone for any mobility needs.I personally don't have any of the latest consoles or a new TV; so if I was going to get one right now, I'd try to get a 4K TV and this console would be really tempting.
smorebuds - Thursday, May 28, 2015 - link
Nintendo should come out with an Android-based console. And start making mobile games that can scale up to tv size. And let us play touch optimized pokemon on our phones dammit.testbug00 - Thursday, May 28, 2015 - link
Why android? They have ARM consoles, they know to do touch. Going android just makes it easier for other android users to get Nintendo games pirated...tipoo - Thursday, May 28, 2015 - link
Their own operating systems all being slow as molasses could be a reason, though that could also be down to the hardware.