My jellyfin collection has finally become large enough that I have been able to cancel all my streaming services. My issue now is that I want to get rid of my Roku’s that are hooked up to each TV.
Is there a good alternative? It MUST be family approved, meaning:
- It is not visible (no desktop/laptop hooked up)
- It is low power
- It has a simple remote control
- It supports Jellyfin
- It is relatively cheap (< $150)
I am sure I could build something out of a raspberry pi, but:
- I don’t need another project I have to fiddle with
- It MUST support new codecs (h.265/AC1/aac/…) as I want direct play from my server
- If it stutters/buffers once, it goes into the trash!
I’ve generally been mostly happy with my Roku, and my pi.hole blocks most of their analytics, but last week, I pressed the home button on my Roku and it started play a video add with audio. Completely unacceptable (That has happened twice in the last week). And in general, the more of this crap I can get out of my life the better!
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I second the AppleTV recommendation based on your disgust with the Roku UI ads, I am completely on your side there, but my similar search has bought me to AppleTV.
I currently run Amazon Fire Sticks which also have UI ads but my pihole is catching most of them and it’s dirt cheap with h.265 support. Plus it runs various hacked apps like TVMob, Cinema, and Cyberflix. That’s what keeps me from moving to an AppleTV or an n100 box already.
How good is Jellyfin on AppleTV? My understanding was the app was a bit lacking…
The Swiftfin app is awesome
Oh I haven’t made the leap yet due to the jailbreak apps but I’ve seen read that Jellyfin is decent on AppleTV, about as good as anywhere else. Probably not as polished as you’d expect on AppleTV but serviceable. I’ll update if I end up buying one!
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Swiftfin is the official Apple TV jellyfin app. Swiftfin is great on iOS, but hasn’t been updated on Apple TV for a while. It also lacks a lot of polish and features but it is being worked on. There should be an update soon.
I’ve been using infuse on Apple TV. Infuse isn’t open source and needs a subscription to watch most 4k hdr content. I think it’s worth it if Swiftfin gets an update soon.
Apple TV is definitely a better experience compared to Samsung and Android. Apps are nicer and there isn’t any ads, privacy controls and privacy statements are much better. Recommended content can also be disabled and only shows when your hovering over the relevant app.
Use SwiftFin app instead on Apple TV, but better than the Jellyfin app.
What filters are you using in pihole to filter the fire stick ads?
Hagezi’s pro and above blocks the sponsored video ones which I found most intrusive: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists/main/domains/native.amazon.txt
These usually break the UI but you can still access apps so it’s functional.
I’m using the hagezi list for now
Thanks!
Any guide you recommend for tvmob, cinema, and cyberflix?
This worked best for me for Linux ISOs on my fire stick: https://www.firesticktricks.com/jailbreak-fire-stick.html
Edited to un-embed, thanks u/lka1988
Why did you embed the link? Just paste the link directly into your comment.
Oh shoot, didn’t realize it just worked. Thanks!
👋😢
LibreELEC on an old chromebook!
I’ve personally been using a raspberry pi with a Bluetooth mouse and keyboard. I just run jellyfin in Firefox and navigate with the mouse - the keyboard rarely ever being necessary. I was able to increase the icon size so it’s acceptable on a tv and bookmark any streaming websites I use. It’s certainly not as clean as using something like an apple tv, but it’s serviceable and I don’t have to fiddle with plugins like when I tried Kodi. Honestly though, apple tv probably fulfills what you’re looking for like others have said.
If you don’t want ads creeping in everywhere, the only prebuilt option is appletv. otherwise you have to build it yourself :/
Not true, unless by “build yourself” you mean install Projectivy Launcher on any Android box that supports it.
What boxes support this then?
I run it on an NVIDIA Shield. Can’t speak to any others with certainty, but from a quick search, there are guides for installing on Fire Stick and ONN devices too.
I suspect it’ll run on just about any Android or Google TV device as long as the default launcher setting isn’t locked down, and even then you can probably enable it with a couple quick ADB commands.
The aTV will give you the best experience when it comes to dark patterns. But just note, a new model is on the horizon, so hold out a little longer.
I use the ONN 4K Pro and the ProjectIvy launcher. You can completely hide the standard Android TV OS launcher and its ads. Button Mapper is another good app to have on Android boxes. The remote is full of app-specific buttons that I’ve either disabled or remapped to alternative apps
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spocky.projengmenu
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=flar2.homebutton
I have no idea which codecs are supported.
This is my exact setup. The upgrade from the smart TV was night and day. Apps load instantly and Jellyfin works great. Most importantly the remote is easy to use and can control the TV.
I second this setup.
I have 3 ONN sticks and they do the job. Great for the price. Just sideload Kodi, new launcher, remap buttons.
I even paid for button mapper. Totally worth it.
I have a Shield Pro and several Rokus, but my next will be the ONN 4K Pro. Hopefully it is $30 at black friday again, I’ll buy a few.
I am about to switch over to this setup from a Roku myself. I had seen recommendations for Flauncher, but I’m glad to see another launcher recommendation. I will have to try out Project Ivy. Thanks!
Flauncher is a great pick too
Im on flauncher, works for my needs
Its AppleTV.
There is a working app there now? Infuse etc. do not support HW transcoding…
Swiftfin. Works great for me with transcoding.
- If you do not want stuttering, use a graphics card. Higher energy consumption but you can play everything
If they have a 5th gen or newer Intel CPU, Quicksync will work excellently for transcoding. No discrete GPU needed.
For how many devices?
As many as most GPUs without all the extra cost and power draw. Nvidia sets a transcode limit of 2 sessions unless you disable it. You really shouldn’t ever be transcoding 4k content. Most people will duplicate 1080p and 4k content and not share the 4k library for remote streaming/external users to avoid transcoding, and 1080p transcodes are no sweat. Furthermore, the goal should be to avoid transcoding wherever possible, so it’s unlikely that you’d have multiple people doing intensive transcoding simultaneously if you follow the above advice. You’ll want everyone to direct play as much as possible.
how many 4k streams?
As many as your hard drives or upload bandwidth can handle since they would be playing directly and not transcoding.
Thanks, it’s good advice that you do not need a gpu if you watch movies in 1080. It’s sufficient for 99% setups anyway
If you are in the USA. The Walmart onn 4k (20$) and 4k pro (50$) are amazing for the price. The remotes are really good too.
It’s just a matter of time before those are enshittified as well.
Edit: ok my bad… apparently you can side load different launchers. I may check one of those out then.
Can you de-google these? I have a personal rule against any google accounts or google devices…
If you’re happy with the Roku hardware and you’re going to cancel all your other streaming services, why not just firewall block the Roku from reaching out of your local network?
If you do that, Jellyfin will still work fine, and you won’t have the ability to get posted ads or anything else from the Roku, so it’ll just become a Jellyfin box.
I’ve taken this approach, sometimes these boxes will act up when they can’t phone home. Definitely worth trying though.
Worth that at least before you start looking at different hardware.
Otherwise, it’s the same thing if you have a smart TV, download the Jellyfin app, and then just completely stop it from being able to connect anywhere else.
Have you tried it with a Roku? My pi.hole blocks most things, but I haven’t yet tried to completely block it from the Internet. In the past, I’ve had to allow some domains through my pi.hole or things would be completely broken, but that hasn’t happened in a while…
I suppose I’d have to occasionally unblock it to get updates to the jellyfin app, which is doable.
i have a roku express 4k and pihole shuts it down completely. it has the jellyfin app, nothing else. works great. I only open up internet to update the app from time to time.
I have a Rocku streaming stick and it won’t work without an internet connection
Oh, that’s absolutely horrible that they designed it that way. 🤮
If it’s an option, the Xiaomi mi box it’s a cheap android TV device that plays probably everything. Costs around 60 euro in eu. If not you coul always go for Google TV with a custom launcher to block stock android launcher ads.
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My plan is to use the $20 Onn (Walmart store-brand) Android TV box LTT recommended as being eminently jailbreakable about a year ago, but I haven’t actually gotten around to hooking it up yet so I can’t authoritatively endorse it.
Been using Onn boxes for years and absolutely love them. They are about as pure android TV as you can get. I would definitely recommend the 50$ pro version over the 20$ original though.
For my parents, I got a $150 N100 mini PC (tiny little thing), installed Bazzite, installed Jellyfin, and got the Pepper Jobs W10 Gyro remote. You have to configure Jellyfin to know it’s running on a TV and to accept keyboard input (the remote acts like a keyboard), but then everything works great. It’s a little over your budget, with the added remote.
Excellent - thanks for the remote recommendation, it’s one thing I’ve been struggling to find.
Not sure I like the gyro idea - I had a gyro presentation mouse in the past. Worked well, but how do your parents like the gyro element?
They don’t use it unless my dad is watching a perfectly legal sports stream in the browser. It works really well though. I have 3 of those remotes, cause I love them.
But Bazzite is a gaming OS, isn’t that very user unfriendly? Or do you auto start Jellyfin on startup? Or are your parents just… not boomers?
Bazzite runs the SteamOS interface. It’s extremely user friendly. It’s designed to look like a console.
You have no idea what ‘user friendly’ can mean for boomers. A button that says “Next” is already something that need to be talked about explicitly
I did similar https://github.com/zombiehoffa/hyprjellynix
Edit I tried your way and it works better but is slightly more annoying to setup than running a nixos update (but only slightly more and making the nixos config file was a pain in the arse).
I’m currently using a raspberry pi 5 flashed with Konstakang’s Android TV image, it works pretty flawlessly and takes less than an hour to set up, assuming you have the APKs of everything you want to install. You don’t need to mess around with Google play services because most TV android apps are also designed to run on firesticks which don’t have it.
The one issue I have encountered is that the Jellyfin client very occasionally won’t play some 4k HDR media in the default player (all my 1080p stuff works fine) so I also installed MPV and I turn on alternative player in the Jellyfin settings in the rare case something doesn’t work.
I did not like the Rpi5 with Android TV as a jellyfin client. There is no support for Dolby Vision HDR content and playback of other 4k media was stuttering. With DV content I got the purple/green tinted picture. Sometimes the pi would only display a quarter of the picture.
I used Konstakangs AndroidTV image with a flirc USB Dongle for use with a tv remote. F-Droid store apk for all necessary apps.
If you have any recommendations how to fix stuttery 4k playback I would be interested. For now I just stick with the built in Android TV of my sony television.
I remember trying the Android TV 14 image a while ago and it was basically unusable as you describe, the new Android TV 15 image has fixed virtually all those issues for me. YMMV but IMO it’s worth experimenting and seeing if it works for you, there’s a chance I just got lucky though
Thank you for taking the time to respond! I guess I’ll pop in another sd card and give the android 15 image a chance!
Way over-budget for your taste I guess but I still wanted to make a note here for representation sake. Look into the brand Zidoo. I have Zidoo Z9X 8K, it’s the best client I could dream of! ~250$
Cons:
- Android based (outdated AF but still)
- Maybe not so secure (http server always on while the device is on, atm)
Pros:
- Very good support of Dolby Vision, 4K (8K maybe?)
- Very pretty, both hardware and software very polished IMO
- The remote is glorious, tactile with backlight
- Lots of other cool things
- Very snappy Android experience
- it just works™
- The audio downmixing works great, compared to the Google TV which was very bad
- First party Jellyfin support among others
