Nvidia Shield Android TV: A powerful do-it-all box that lacks content

The Nvidia Shield is almost certainly more important to Google than it is to Nvidia. After the failure of Google TV—in part thanks to its lacklustre UI and poor developer support—its follow-up Android TV needed to do better. Unfortunately, that hasn’t quite happened. Sure, Google’s own Nexus Player is a fine piece of hardware, and Razer’s Forge TV has its charms, but neither sports the flagship specs, nor the feature set of Nvidia’s sleek black box. There’s no doubt that the Shield is the best Android TV device money can buy, but like all Android TV devices, it comes with a few compromises.

But let’s start with the good stuff. Where the Nexus Player sported an odd, if largely inoffensive hockey puck design, the Shield is a thing of beauty. It’s slightly bigger in terms of footprint than your typical smart TV box at 25mm in height, 210mm in length, and 120mm in depth, but its sleek design made up of sharp angles and a subtle LED light strip just looks darn cool. The mix of glossy and matt plastics helps with the aesthetics, too, although, like seemingly all consumer electronics these days, it’s a magnet for fingerprints. Fortunately, with the Shield placed under a TV, you likely won’t be handling it all that often.

The Shield can be positioned horizontally or vertically, but it’s a wee bit wobbly in its vertical position unless you purchase a separate stand for a substantial £24.99. One word of advice if you do take the plunge, though: Nvidia has used some sort of black magic to create what might just be the stickiest rubber coating in existence and applied it to the bottom of the stand. More often than not it simply wouldn’t budge from the surface it was on when I needed to move it, and I ended up having to pry it up with a fish slice.

Round the back of the Shield is a vent for its internal fan, which—even under full load—wasn’t audible; a micro SD slot for storage expansion, which will come in particularly handy if you pick up the 16GB version; two USB 3.0 ports for peripherals or external storage; an Ethernet port; an HDMI 2.0 port with HDCP 2.2 for 4K 60 FPS video; and a socket for the included power adaptor. Powering it all is Nvidia’s Tegra X1 ARM-based processor and GPU, which boasts 256 CUDA cores, a memory clock of 1600MHz for its 3GB of LPDDR4 RAM, memory bandwidth that runs at 25.6GB/s, and 256KB of L2 cache.

Given Nvidia’s prowess in the desktop GPU market, it comes as little surprise that the X1’s GPU—which is based on the company’s desktop Maxwell architecture—packs quite the performance punch. Coupled with the similarly sprightly 64-bit ARM CPU with four Cortex A57 big cores and four A53 little cores, the X1 is one of the most powerful chips in an Android device today. Google has even given the chip its seal of approval by using it in its upcoming Pixel C tablet. Performance is helped by the fact that in the Shield the X1 isn’t constrained by battery or the poor thermal dissipation of a smaller chassis, allowing it to run at full speed for longer without throttling.

Included in the box with the Shield is one of Nvidia’s Shield controllers. It’s not exactly the most attractive looking lump of plastic out there and is noticeably chunkier and heavier than both the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 controllers, but it remains oddly comfortable to use. Nvidia promises up to 40 hours of battery life, and while I can’t verify this exactly, I have only charged the controller up once since the start of testing five days ago—and it still has half its power left. In addition to the standard d-pad, face buttons, analogue sticks, shoulder buttons, triggers, a microphone for voice commands, and a micro-USB port for charging, the controller also sports some Android specific features. There’s a capacitive back button, home button, and start button, along with a touchpad and volume control along the bottom.

While it’s nice to have these buttons, I do wish they were actual buttons rather than capacitive surfaces. Not only would that feel better when jumping from the traditional buttons, but it would also help prevent any accidental presses, which happen all too often during gameplay. Also, the d-pad isn’t great. Nvidia isn’t alone in this regard, but seriously, it’s 2015: can everyone please just stop making crappy, mushy d-pads? On a more positive note, there’s a headphone jack on top that you can route all of the Shield’s audio through, which is great for when you don’t want to disturb the rest of the household when watching a film or playing a game.

Not included in the box is the Bluetooth-powered Shield Remote, a thin sliver of black plastic and brushed black aluminium that sells for an outrageous £39.99. It’s a simple affair, with a four-way circle button at the top, home and back buttons, a capacitive volume control strip at the bottom, and a microphone button in the middle for activating voice commands. There’s also a micro USB port for charging, along with a headphone jack for private listening. Though I personally found it to be a bit too thin for comfort, the Shield Remote does its job admirably, even if the price is far too high for what you get.

That Nvidia bundles a controller rather than a remote in with the Shield speaks volumes about what it hopes most people use the device for. The company stopped at calling the Shield a console—unceremoniously dropping it from the name just before its US launch—but it’s clear that gaming is the focus above media playback.

Google sends its App-ologies

That’s not to say that the Shield isn’t a great media player, though. Its party trick is that it can output video at 4K (UHD) at 60 FPS, which means the Shield is one of the few ways to access 4K Netflix without having to use an app that’s built into your TV. The only technical proviso is that you need a TV (or a receiver if you plug in that way) that has an HDMI 2.0 port that supports HDCP 2.2. Earlier 4K TVs didn’t have these ports, so check before you buy. The new Amazon Fire TV also supports 4K video, though it can’t display 4K content from YouTube, and it’s limited to 30 FPS.

Honestly, 30 FPS isn’t as big a limitation as Nvidia makes it out to be. Most movies are filmed at 24 FPS, with even digitally shot TV shows coming in at 30 FPS. You probably won’t notice the difference most of the time. That said, the new £99 ($129) Roku promises to support 60 FPS 4K streaming, too, so if/when there’s a bevy of 60 FPS 4K content around (sports maybe?), it and the Shield will be able to handle it.

Content, however, is where the Shield starts to falter. You do get the most essential media apps such as Netflix, YouTube, Google Play Movies & TV, and BBC iPlayer, but there are some notable omissions. There’s no ITV Player, or 4oD, or Demand 5, or Spotify, or Flixster, or Now TV, or BT Sport, and obviously no Amazon Instant Video. How much some of those omissions matter will depend greatly on where you like to get your content from, but if you’re looking for the most comprehensive media streaming box out there, the Shield isn’t it.

The Shield next to the new Amazon Fire TV.

Admittedly, this isn’t entirely Nvidia’s fault. Android TV is still a relatively new platform, with only a few devices that run it, and, as such, the app ecosystem isn’t that strong. What’s particularly annoying is that the apps that are on the Android TV Play Store are supposed to be designed specifically for Android TV, but that clearly isn’t the case. For example, the popular MX Player—which can tap into the Shield hardware to accelerate video playback—is little more than a blown up smartphone app that’s incredibly awkward to navigate with a remote.

The situation may get better, or it may not, depending on how much effort Google really puts behind its TV platform and how many developers jump on board. There are signs things are improving in the US at least, where you can already use apps like Hulu, and where CBS has just launched a new All Access app for its subscribers. There’s still no HBO Go, though, sadly. There are a couple of ways to make up for the missing services. If the app you like is compatible with Chromecast, like Now TV, then you can cast that app to the Shield just fine. It’s not ideal, particularly as part of the draw of Android TV is that you don’t have to reach for a phone, but at least it works.

The other option is to stick to local media, either streaming in from a media server or NAS, or from some sort of USB storage. Plex works great on the Shield, as does Kodi, which covers most media server needs. The latter works with DLNA servers, too, should you still be running something like Twonky. For local playback there’s MX Player. Because it features hardware acceleration, it’ll play pretty much anything you throw at it, even particularly high bitrate files. It’s just a shame the UI really isn’t remote-friendly, and I had issues with more-remote-friendly alternatives like VLC stuttering when playing back certain files.

The UI problems are particularly jarring given how simple the rest of Android TV is to use. The big bright tile look is hardly new, but it works well as you scroll from left to right to find the app or content you’re looking for. A top row of tiles shows recommendations, based on your purchase history and what you’ve been watching or playing recently, while underneath that is the Shield Hub containing Shield Games, GeForce Now (more on those later), Netflix, and BBC iPlayer. Everything else is divided into Apps and Games. Unfortunately, there’s no way to organise these yourself, and if you have a lot of apps or games installed, it can be tricky to find them amongst the mess of tiles.

The top row of the Shield home menu shows personalised recommendations.

The top row of the Shield home menu shows personalised recommendations.

Below that are the Shield-specific apps, including 4K Netflix.

Below that are the Shield-specific apps, including 4K Netflix.

The top row of the Shield home menu shows personalised recommendations.

Below that are the Shield-specific apps, including 4K Netflix.

This is what the Play Store looks like.

This is what the Play Store looks like.

The Android TV Play Store lacks some notable entertainment apps, but at least there’s Vevo.

The Android TV Play Store lacks some notable entertainment apps, but at least there’s Vevo.

This is what the Play Store looks like.

The Android TV Play Store lacks some notable entertainment apps, but at least there’s Vevo.

Where the Android TV UI really falls down is with voice search. Given that search is what Google’s most famous for, it is rather odd that it can’t get it right with Android TV. For basic stuff, it works OK. Saying something like “show me recent movies with Scarlett Johansson” brings up a nice list of her films, and clicking on one lets you watch a trailer or rent it from the Google store. You can also do things like ask for the best action movies of 2014, or bring up the weather, or ask for film facts. You can also voice search within apps like YouTube, which saves having to peck in search terms with the on-screen keyboard.

But try anything more complicated (i.e. useful), and it completely falls over. You can’t, for instance, tell the Shield to “open up Netflix and play Breaking Bad.” You can say “launch Netflix,” but nothing more complex than that. The list of apps that the Shield can search from within the home screen is limited, too. You get results from Google Play and YouTube, but not from the likes of Netflix. Even for apps that Google can search inside like Vevo, the results aren’t pushed down off the bottom of the screen and aren’t all that useful. For example, when I searched for “Iron Maiden Number of the Beast” the Shield showed the YouTube video, but only showed an artist page on Vevo. If you were hoping for something as impressive as what Apple showed for the new Apple TV, prepare to be disappointed. Again, this is an Android TV problem rather than a Shield problem, but it’s worth thinking about if you’re particularly keen on voice commands.

One other issue I experienced was with 5.1 audio. While I have a 4K TV, because it’s taking so long for decent receivers with HDMI 2.0 and HDCP 2.2 to emerge (never mind ones with 4:4:4 colour support for the diehards), I don’t yet have a 4K receiver. That means audio for the Shield has to be piped through to the TV and then out again via an optical cable to the receiver. In this setup, no matter what I tried, I couldn’t get 5.1 audio out of the Shield, either from locally stored files with AC3 audio, or from services like Netflix. This isn’t an isolated problem, either, with several threads on Nvidia’s support forums highlighting the issue.

In theory the Shield should just pass through DD/DTS surround audio (which now includes Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio lossless audio, but only over HDMI), but it only worked for me when I plugged it directly into a receiver via HDMI. Nvidia says it’s aware of the issues and is working on a fix.

Video games!

Games are where the Shield really starts earning its £149 price tag. Essentially you have four different options for playing games on the Shield: the Play Store, the Shield Games store, GeForce Now, and GameStream. The Play Store doesn’t have a huge number of games on it, but you can find gems amongst the dross. There are casual classics like Crossy Road, Rayman: Fiesta Run, and Pac-Man CE, plus deeper games like The World Among Us, Titan Souls, and Final Fantasy VI.

The other interesting thing that’s on the Play Store is emulators. Thanks to the Tegra X1, the Shield is one of the best emulators around. Everything from the NES through to the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation worked—with a few exceptions—flawlessly, with high frame rates across the board. There are cheaper devices you can use for emulation, but they just don’t have the CPU and graphics chops for more modern consoles like the N64 to be emulated well.

If you’re after something more advanced than on the Play Store, Nvidia has its own selection of games that work solely on Shield devices. For the most part, these are good games, with the likes of Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number, Trine 2, and Half-Life 2 available to download. Pricing isn’t bad either, with Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number going for £11, and Half-Life 2 for £6 (the latter worked flawlessly during testing). The likes of Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel!, and Resident Evil 5 are also due for release soon.

While this makes for an OK selection of games, it’s absolutely tiny when compared to the big boys like Steam and PSN. It’s admirable that Nvidia is courting developers to bring some of their games over to Shield, but I don’t imagine there’s going to be a huge increase in the number of titles any time soon: there simply isn’t much incentive for devs to port them over to what is a comparatively tiny install base compared to the consoles and PC.

There’s also something of a content shortage in GeForce Now, which lets you stream games directly to your Shield from one of Nvidia’s all-powerful servers in the cloud. On my Sky FTTC connection, which tops out at 38Mbps, GeForce Now worked brilliantly, streaming in at 1080p 60 FPS, provided the Shield was plugged in via Ethernet. Over Wi-Fi—using an Asus RT-AC68U AC router that’s actually on the list of approved routers for GeForce now—performance was good, but I experienced dropped frames. Moving the Shield to the bedroom away from the router dropped the resolution down to 720p, but obviously this is going to vary depending on your router and the size of your home.

Still, the tech is really impressive, without a lot of the video compression artefacts that plagued OnLive. Latency isn’t bad either, even in twitchy games like Ultra Street Fighter IV. Don’t get me wrong, you’re not gonna be able to use GeForce Now for tournament play or anything like that, but for the average player, it works great. There’s a 30Mbps connection requirement for 1080p, and 9Mbps for 720p, which should cover most bases. That 9Mbps really is the minimum, though. I tried artificially capping my download speed down to 5Mbps, and the 540p video I got was too choppy to really be playable.

Pricing isn’t bad at £7.49 per month in the UK, $7.99 in the US, and €9.99 in Europe, which gives you unlimited access to 50 games. That’s cheaper than PlayStation Now, which charges $19.99 per month for a subscription in the US. UK beta users don’t currently have a monthly subscription option but can rent a PlayStation 3 PSN game for £2.99 for two days or £7.99 for 30 days, or retail PS3 games for £4.99 for two days or £9.99 for 30 days. The problem is that, while there are some great titles in those 50 games, there are some absolute stinkers too.

Who wouldn’t want to play the ancient racing relics F1 2010, or MX vs ATV Reflex, or so-so shooters Homefront and F.E.A.R. 3? The likes of Batman: Arkham Origins, Devil May Cry 4, and Witcher 2 help make up for such inclusions, but they—like the rest of the GeForce Now lineup—are older games. When you divide things up by genre, the selection is even weaker. In the RPG category, for instance, there are just seven games. Of those seven games, two of them are sequels to other games in the category, one of which is the truly painful Dead Island Riptide.

There are more recent games available to play, but those aren’t included in the subscription and cost the same if not more than a regular retail release. For example, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt costs £39.99 over on Amazon for a DRM-free GOG code, and the same on PlayStation 4, but costs a staggering £49.99 on GeForce Now. At the very least you do get a GOG code along with your order, which effectively means you’re paying £10 for cloud access. Most purchasable games on GeForce Now do come with a Steam code or equivalent, but not all, so check before you buy.

The Shield’s multi-core performance is miles ahead of the competition.

The Shield’s multi-core performance is miles ahead of the competition.

While Apple catches up in the single-core benchmarks, Nvidia still comes out on top.

While Apple catches up in the single-core benchmarks, Nvidia still comes out on top.

The Shield’s multi-core performance is miles ahead of the competition.

While Apple catches up in the single-core benchmarks, Nvidia still comes out on top.

The Shield’s GPU is miles better than anything else on the market.

The Shield’s GPU is miles better than anything else on the market.

The offscreen tests show just how big a lead the Shield’s GPU has over the competition.

The offscreen tests show just how big a lead the Shield’s GPU has over the competition.

The Shield’s GPU is miles better than anything else on the market.

The offscreen tests show just how big a lead the Shield’s GPU has over the competition.

If none of those work for you, there’s always GameStream, which lets you stream games from your PC, provided it’s outfitted with a GeForce GTX 650 graphics card or newer. GameStream is a little more forgiving when it comes to Wi-Fi, but the best performance is still only available when one of the clients is hooked up via Ethernet. My flat isn’t wired for Ethernet (I moved in two years ago and I’m still painting, leave me alone), so typically my gaming PC lives quite far away from the router. In this scenario, I got 1080p streaming, but again, there were a few dropped frames. On the plus side, with the Internet removed from the equation, latency was far less of an issue.

Flipping it around and moving the Shield away from the router, with the PC plugged in via Ethernet, worked better. Pretty much everything I tried resulted in a playable experience. Again, what setup you have at home will affect performance, but if in doubt, Ethernet is always best. It’ll be interesting to see how well Valve’s Steam Link box works by comparison, but if you’re eager to start streaming games from your PC at home right now, the Shield is an excellent choice.

The best Android TV box you can buy—but do you really need one?

There’s no doubt that, if you want an Android TV box in your life right now, the Nvidia Shield is the best one. It’s super-fast, looks cool, and comes with a multitude of gaming options that you can’t get on any other Android TV device (yes, all two of them). Sure, GeForce Now is more of an interesting technical demonstration than it is a service that you’d want to subscribe to, as are the Android ports of big games. But GameStream works well, and if you’re into emulation the Shield’s powerful hardware means it’ll breeze through almost anything you throw at it.

But as a media box, it’s harder to recommend. If you’re rocking mostly local content on a server, the powerful hardware means you won’t have any trouble decoding high-bitrate files, all the way up to 4K 60 FPS HEVC. For everyone else, the Shield is missing too many apps to make it a compelling purchase. 4K Netflix is great… but most 4K TVs will have that app built in, and the new Amazon Fire TV supports 4K Netflix and its own Instant Video service, while the new Roku also supports 4K at 60 FPS.

If the new Roku 4 supports anywhere near the same amount of services that the existing one does, then it and the Fire TV will be a much better choice if you’re looking for a media playback box. There’s also a new Apple TV on the way, which should feature a similar amount of services, but it won’t support 4K at all. Google’s two-pronged TV strategy—Android TV and Chromecast—is a confusing one, and it seems that Android TV isn’t getting the love that it deserves. Maybe more content providers will jump on board, maybe not, but for now at least, Android TV devices are some of the weakest streaming media players out there.

But you have to wonder if that’s really all that important for potential Shield owners. At £149, it’s a little pricier than most of its rivals, but you do get a nice controller bundled in, along with one of the most powerful Android devices on the market. The Shield is a device for the hardcore amongst us—the ones who will be happy to toy around with emulators, and side loading, and streaming their games from their tricked-out gaming PC. At this stuff, the Shield excels—and indeed, looked at in that light, Nvidia’s Shield becomes a very tempting purchase indeed.

The good

• Great industrial design
• The Tegra X1 is a super-fast SOC, with desktop-like GPU performance
• One of the best emulator boxes going
• GameStream works great for shuffling your PC games to the living room
• Video playback up to 4K 60 FPS, and includes 4K Netflix

The bad

• Android TV lacks several big media apps
• GeForce Now needs better games on it to be worth the subscription price
• Issues with 5.1 audio out over optical