Amazon has recently announced the launch of its streaming media player called the Amazon Fire TV.
This means that Amazon would now compete against already established tech giants in yet another category. The Fire TV has instantly thrown a challenge to speckled hardware attempts of Roku, the promising app list of Chromecast by Google and the Apple TV’s closed ecosystem. The Amazon TV is the last in the line with regard to the release date of streaming TV media player. The already established Apple TV and Roku were released in 2007 and 2008 respectively and had been upgraded three times already.
The Amazon TV has a lot of work on its hand’s now. Amazon Fire TV would be competing against Roku, Chromecast and Apple TV. However, the Fire TV has enough features to be considered by the masses for purchase. How does the Fire TV stack up against Roku, Chromecast and Apple TV? It definitely sounds like an interesting comparison. Find below the similarities and differences between Fire TV, Roku, Chromecast and Apple TV in terms of their features, specs and price.
Design and Dimensions
Streaming media players come in various shapes and sizes. The Amazon Fire TV set-top box and the Chromecast dongle are a good example of different shapes and sizes. However, the best part about streaming media players is that they are relatively small. Therefore, they can easily blend with the black color of your television cabinet and can fit into the media cabinet with ease.
The Amazon Fire TV set top box has a little longer and wider dimensions. The Fire TV is square in shape with 4.5 inches x 4.5 inches measured of length and width. Roku requires bigger headroom at 1 inch even. The Apple TV has dimensions measuring 3.9 inches x 3.9 inches in length and width. The device sits in at 0.91 in height. The Roku and Chromecast media streaming stick dongles are smaller. These are no longer than an oversized USB drive. These dongle-streaming sticks can be plugged directly into the HDMI ports.
Specs
The Amazon Fire TV has approximately three times the processing power than its counterparts. The Fire TV is powered with quad core 1.7GHz Krait 300 processor and Adreno 320 GPU. The Amazon Fire TV also has 2GB RAM, providing the device with four times the memory in comparison to 512 MB RAM in Apple TV and Chromecast.
Price
Amazon TV and Apple TV are priced at $99 in comparison to the price of Roku that ranges from $50 to $100. The Chromecast streaming stick is priced at just $35.
Amazon is working hard to convince the potential buyers that it would provide more at the same cost as that of the Apple TV. Chromecast does not operate as a standalone device as its counterparts.
Related ItemsAmazon Fire TVApple TVChromecastRoku
