Assuming the nvidia shield.

I'll also echo my general disappointment with the direction of these devices. A decade ago, they were one of the best streaming devices you could buy.

then a couple years back it was "there's a new discover tab, filled with ads! Don't you love it?"

then it was "not enough people are viewing the discover tab, so we're merging the discover tab with the home tab! Don't you love it?"

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They're still decent hardware for a streaming device (although somewhat dated at this point), but now you have to go out of your way to make the software not shitty.

Removing the stock launcher helps a lot, but requires ADB access. (easy enough, and [insert llm of choice] can both generate a minimal replacement launcher and install it for you for about $10 worth of tokens, so technical users are fine, but I can't really recommend them to non-technical family anymore.)

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rurp 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Are there solid existing launchers that can be swapped in? Changing the launcher is one of the first things I do when I get a new Pixel phone and highly recommend it, but I don't really want to have to maintain a vibe coded one.

	▲	toraway 3 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I've used Projectivy for years on every Google TV stick I own (Google/Onn). Works perfectly with full customization/zero ads on the free version and has a workaround to take over the Home navigation to bypass the built-in launcher without ADB or rooting. I chip in for the premium version to help out the dev since I get so much value out of it but the freemium features are mostly just cosmetic and the free version has everything you need.
	▲	ja2 4 hours ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		Projectivy seems good and I use it on cheap android / Google TV devices since learning about it last month.
	▲	nemomarx 5 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		I tried projectivity launcher on one of these and it seemed reasonably good.

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timeinput 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

At this point if I'm dealing with that level of hassle I'm much happier running linux on a computer. The value add of these devices was plug and play, and if it's not that why bother.

	▲	toraway 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		ADB is rarely actually a requirement unless you really want to do it the "right" way and fully remove the launcher. I always use a custom launcher (Projectivy) on my Google TV devices, lately typically the $20 Onn stick and intercept the Home navigation to open the launcher either using the option built into Projectivy or with a free app from the Play Store/Fdroid. Takes <5 minutes to setup everything once and then I basically forget the native Google TV launcher exists. Pretty much unbeatable value for a $20 ad-free Jellyfin/Plex/Kodi/Stremio setup. YMMV with different models but I also had no issues remapping the remote buttons from Netflix/etc to my own apps (including the "Free TV" button to launch Stremio which I always enjoy). Also (somewhat ironically) the best smart TV OS to look for on cheap/subsidized TVs is built-in Google TV. Since they can easily be configured as 100% "dumb" on startup without any ads/nags/etc (it's the first question you're asked). The TV never hits Wifi to update and the remote/menus just do normal TV stuff without any "smart" features. Otherwise, it's luck of the draw how miserable/impossible the manufacturer makes avoiding Wifi/updates. (Or you could do the same process installing the custom launcher on the TV's built-in Googe TV, but then you're at the mercy of the CPU/RAM the OEM included in BoM some # of years ago and lose the clean seperation between dumb TV/replaceable stick). $20 Onn stick + $199 "smart" Google TV in dumb mode goes really far these days for a locally hosted setup without ads/annoyances.