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Now a quick history lesson if you're not familiar with Amazon fire tv.
Amazon Fire Tv is a streaming media player, which means it lets you watch videos, listen to music, play games and use other types of apps from the internet on your TV. There are similar devices that you might have heard of Roku and Google Chromecast, but I'm not going to make any comparisons with those here. The fire TV comes in two form factors: fire TV box which is a higher and higher specs, higher video quality and also higher price. And the fire TV stick which is smaller, mid-range specs and also cheaper. Still has HD video but something like the box would give you up to 4k, while the fire sticks are full HD at 1080.
The first generation of the fire TV stick was released in 2014 in the US and after that, there was the first gen with a voice remote. Essentially this is the same device but they added a microphone on the remote and it allowed you to use voice commands to control your fire stick this is done through amazon's voice assistant, Alexa.
Then after that, there was the second generation fire TV stick, which had a faster processor, the same voice remote, upgraded Wi-Fi antenna and Bluetooth, and the ability to use a hardwire Ethernet cable if you didn't want to use Wi-Fi. So the second gen was actually an upgrade and it was a faster device.
And that brings us to a few days ago. Amazon released a basic Edition: Which specs wise is identical to the second-generation but without the voice remote - the remote is actually the first gen remote, and is priced $10 more than the second gen. CONFUSING I know!
So to recap: Three years after the initial release of the fire TV stick, Amazon took their latest Fire stick, renamed it, and took the remote from their first fire stick, packaged them and gave them to us in Canada and 99 other countries for $49.99 USD or $49.99 Canadian the price is the same on Amazon Canada and Amazon US.
This is pretty much it. There is nothing new about the "new" fire TV stick basic edition other than the name and the price,
however you can still read if you haven't heard of the fire TV stick before and want more details.
Let's talk about the remote first: The remote is simple. It has a basic navigation pad, with a select button and the basic media buttons with the back home and menu. As I mentioned earlier, there is no voice or Alexa button. However, you can download the free Amazon fire app and get the voice control ability, in addition to many other quick access options that the remote doesn't offer. My advice would be to definitely get the app and keep the physical remote as a backup.
When you first plug the stick into your HDMI port it will boot up and look for a remote to be paired with. If you bought it directly from Amazon, it will already be registered to your account and you will notice that most of the highlighted content is Amazon Prime video content because Amazon wants you to use their service. You don't necessarily need to have Amazon Prime to use the fire TV stick but you do need it if you want to access
Amazon's Prime video content.
Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, HBO Go, HBO now, ABC, NBA, HGTV, ESPN and many other services and channels are available on the fire stick, but you need to have individual access to each one of those in order to use them. As it's always the case for us Canadian users I kept getting the famous this content is not available in your country in all its variations.
So in reality, if you're in Canada you can use the fire TV stick for Netflix YouTube and Amazon Prime, maybe a few other apps but all the popular ones I tried did not work. If you are in the U.S. though, you will have access to all the channels if you have cable service that you can log into the app with. So for example, when you go to ESPN you will be asked to activate and to do so, you need to choose a provider and then log in with your provider's account info.
The search function is helpful. You can type a name of a show for example, and the search will run across all apps and services at once. Similar to Google's Chromecast, the fire TV also allows you to stream content from your phone or tablet rather than browsing it on the screen, for example, you can find a Netflix show or a song on Spotify on your phone or tablet and then choose to cast it to your fire stick. You're also able to mirror your phones or tablets screen to your TV using the fire TV stick.
So, should you buy it? It depends! If you're in Canada, or in one of the other 99 countries that this was just released in, and you only need something to plug into your TV to watch Amazon Prime video Netflix or YouTube then sure. Amazon fire tv even offers a few games and you can buy a separate game controller for that. But if you don't have Amazon Prime or prime video is not a deal-breaker for you, you can also get a Google Chromecast, which is often on sale and allows you to stream content from your mobile device and your computer as well. You also have the option to get a Roku stick, which offers similar content set as the fire stick including Amazon Prime content.
If you happen to be visiting the US, or if you live in the U.S., you might as well just get the fire TV stick 2nd gen with the Alexa remote for $10 cheaper! As I mentioned earlier, you'd be getting the same specs with the voice command remote control.
Check out my YouTube video for links to the full reviews of the fire TV stick 2nd gen Google Chromecast and Roku. Let me know in the comments if you have any questions.
