Is there something that will connect to an external harddrive?

p to the e

Have a non smart TV and was looking to get Youtube mainly for kids. Potentially some steaming service at some point. My current method is usually to download a movie via torrents and throw it onto my external harddrive so I have a lot of stuff on there. Is there something that will connect to it? I was looking at the NVidia Shield but it seems overkill for a non gamer. Are there alternatives?

Also regarding Youtube do you need to sign in to Google account to view? I was also reading up on a pi-hole to block ads/tracking. Anyone have experience with this or other methods?

Thanks

Spocker

Any of the android boxes on Adverts with a USB connection will do what you want, based on two assumptions: your TV has a HDMI input, and your external hard drive is formatted as EXT, FAT or NTFS

p to the e

Thanks for that

p to the e

One question. I see various boxes with different Android versions. Most have 9, some have 10 and I've seen a few with 7 and 8. Is there a big difference/benefits/drawbacks in the OS?

andy1249

The Shield is the Best of these boxes.

There are many many chinese black boxes that are cheaper and do the same , but they all fall down at some point shortly after you buy them.

The shield is the Android box from a big multi-national , is very well supported and always has an update to the latest version of android.
The Tube version is the non gamer version.
Its more expensive , but from my own experience , you end up paying a lot for multiple chinese black boxes , and in the end you get the Shield and realise it would have been cheaper to buy that in the first place.

Here it is on Amazon.de germany ( select english from the drop down menu at the top ) , it avoids all the brexit complications with duty et al.

https://www.amazon.de/nVidia-945-13430-2505-000-NVIDIA-Shield%C2%AE-TV/dp/B07Z7Y8QRT/ref=sr_1_2?currency=EUR&dchild=1&ie=UTF8&keywords=nvidia%20shield%20tv&language=en_GB&qid=1622729029&sr=8-2

p to the e

I like the idea of the shield of buying from a reputable company. Might see about a used one online. Does it matter that the shield runs on an older Android version? From researching online the Formuler android box seems reliant and powerful. Thoughts?

The Shield is expensive, but is worth every penny. It’s up there as my favourite piece of tech ever. Everything just works.

andy1249

p to the e wrote: »

I like the idea of the shield of buying from a reputable company. Might see about a used one online. Does it matter that the shield runs on an older Android version? From researching online the Formuler android box seems reliant and powerful. Thoughts?

The Formuler , along with Minix and two others , were the four cheap and nasty android boxes I got before I got sense and got the shield. All of them died/failed/ with some fault within a year. Either the hardware fails or some of the major apps stop working because they are out of date and there is no update support other than buying a newer model.

With these , it really is a case of "Buy Cheap, Buy Twice" or many times as it turned out for me.
The Shield is the best by miles , it works and is solid as a rock. There are many trying to imitate it on a budget , but none even come close.

The shield runs the latest version of android. Android is the OS Software , it gets updated regularly along with the apps on properly supported boxes like the shield.