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Old 10-25-2022, 04:16 PM   #1
OtinG
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New Fire TV Cube 2022 (3rd gen)

I just received my Fire TV Cube 3rd gen and am still setting it up. I pre-ordered it for $99 ($40 discount special offer) and it arrived about an hour ago. See attached photos. I will review it later after I finish setting up all my apps and give it a good workout.

If you get one I suggest using these steps to save yourself a headache. I was having gobs of trouble getting it to connect to Amazon even though it had a great ethernet and Wi-Fi connection. So here is what I learned through trial and error:

Step 1: Connect the Fire TV Cube 3rd gen cables as shown in the little foldout instruction pamphlet included in the box. In other words, plug in the HDMI cable (be careful to use the correct port), plug in the power cable, and plug in the ethernet cable are sign in to your Wi-Fi network if you use Wi-Fi.

Step 2: Connect to internet if you use Wi-Fi. If you use ethernet you probably only have to plug it in.

Step 3: Check for and install updates. Important, just do it are you will pull your hair out trying to figure out why you cannot connect to your Amazon account! So go to Settings —> My Fire TV —> About —> Install Update and install any and all updates before doing anything else.

Step 4: Follow setup and registration prompts that are displayed after the update(s) are installed. It walks you through this step but you might never get here if you don’t install the updates first.

Some helpful info:

If you attach a ethernet cable directly to the Cube, you will only get up to 100 Mbps speed. I suggest you buy a good USB to ethernet 1 Gbps adapter and plug the ethernet into it and plug the adapter into the USB port on the Cube. See my attached photos. I get over 300 Mbps speed for just a few dollars for the adapter.

Review to Follow in a Few Days

Way more ads now.

The interface is streaming in Dolby Vision so the video quality is stunningly good. Unfortunately, the usability of the interface and settings is subpar.

More to come..
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Last edited by OtinG; 10-25-2022 at 08:03 PM.
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Old 10-26-2022, 01:47 PM   #2
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So far it is a very impressive unit. It will become my primary streaming box for everything except Apple TV, but Apple TV has very little I care to watch.

One issue I encountered was with using the USB to ethernet adapter with the Cube 3 USB port. It always worked flawlessly with my Cube 2, but it started acting up last night. I switched from the adapter and just plugged the ethernet into the Cube 3 ethernet port and all the issues disappeared. I still get about 92 Mbps speed that way, and that is way more than enough to stream 4K HDR. I'm not sure if it is a firmware issue, a USB port issue, or an issue with my adapter. BTW, with Wi-Fi it got 340 Mbps (about the limit of my service), and if you have a 6E router Wi-Fi might be all you want or need. I prefer wired ethernet to prevent congestion with all the other devices, but with a good 6E router that might never be an issue anyway.

One thing that was rather odd was that every time I thought I had finished with FW updates I would get a notice that another one was available. So if you get the Cube 3 be prepared for a string of updates. Perhaps those piled up between initial boxing and getting the item delivered.

I could never get my Curiosity Stream app to accept my login credentials. All other apps were easy to sign in to, but I tried typing the email and password manually, scanning a QR code, and entering a one time code on a web page, but all three of those methods failed. I assume this is likely due to Curiosity Stream not updating their app for the latest Fire TV FW. Oops, my bad, I was using the wrong email address to sign in. The Curiosity Stream app works fine.

The menu system sucks as usual, but if you look long enough you can find quite a few useful options. Here are a few:
  • The ability to match the frame rate of the stream you view
  • The ability to force HDR or use the native dynamic range of the stream
  • The ability to toggle the super resolution option on or off. This upconverts even low resolution streams into an enhanced 4K format.

These are available on the Apple TV 4K boxes, so perhaps Amazon used that as a model.

The remote automatically set itself up to control my Sony Bravia TV and Sony sound system. That was very nice and fuss free!

During setup, I was asked if I wanted to reinstall all my apps from previous Fire TV models. I chose yes, it let me choose which older Fire TV models to use, then installed all of them. It takes a while but it beats having to search for each one and install it manually. You will have to login to each one though if it requires a login.

I have a Fire Recast DVR. It was a PITA to originally set up with my Cube 2, but to my surprise the Cube set it up without asking and it worked correctly from the start. It even restored all my scanned channels. I did lose my Favorite channels, but those are quick and easy to reassign.

It does appear that Amazon has made quite a lot of progress in getting the setup to work flawlessly. Except they should have noted that you need to install all the updates first. Otherwise it set up rather easily and quickly.

The new remote is a welcomed improvement over the one for the Cube 2 with a few more buttons and options, but not a huge update by any means.

So far I've streamed from Philo TV, Britbox, AcornTV, Youtube (fantastic looking 4K HDR BTW), Prime Video, Apple TV app, and some others. The video is impressive on all of those apps. I have my Cube 3 set to default which streams everything in DV (Dolby Vision). Unlike the Apple TV box which turns the screen dark for a second or two when it switches between DV and HDR10, the Cube 3 was seamless and flawless. The Cube 3 worked well with my 4K HDR TV and my sound system too.

The screen savers are visually stunning, though they come up with ads at first and you have to press the Right Arrow key to bypass those damn ads and get the screen savers started. But Amazon is likely always going to annoy us with ads! BTW, you can turn off suggestions, but I haven't seen a way to turn off ads. The menu system was organized by morons, so expect to do a lot of exploring to find where they put any setting you need to change. Apple is bad about that too.

Last edited by OtinG; 10-26-2022 at 03:45 PM.
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Old 10-30-2022, 02:24 PM   #3
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A short update to the issue I encountered with using the USB to ethernet adapter with the Cube 3 USB port. I thought the adapter or port was acting up, but I now believe the issue is with the Cube's FW. You can set the screen savers to come on from 5 minutes to never, but if they do they only run a few minutes then the Cube goes to sleep anyway. In other words, regardless of screen saver settings, the Cube 3 will go to sleep after 15 minutes of inactivity, or it will briefly play screen savers then go to sleep. That is likely a bug, or an incredibly dumb feature.

When the Cube goes to sleep, you can set whether it actually turns off or just sleeps. Unfortunately when it goes into sleep mode, it loses connection to the internet and that was causing issues when it awakes. Ironically it would come up as a black screen when awakening because the internet connection had not had time to reconnect before the interface gets displayed, so it just stayed black. Pressing the Home button immediately brings up the interface because by that time the internet connection is working again. I guess Amazon decided to stop comms with the internet during sleep and off modes to conserve energy and just didn't think it through.

It doesn't seem to be an issue if you use the actual ethernet port, but using the USB port with a ethernet adapter is when the issue arrives. Just give it a few seconds to reconnect with the mother ship then hit Home and all will work. Hopefully they can fix that. BTW, I never had this issue with the Cube 2. So either use the ethernet port for just under 100 Mbps, or use the USB port with a 1 Gbps adapter but hit the Home button after coming out of sleep or off modes.

Personally, I never had a bit of issue with data speeds using the ethernet port as I got a steady 92+ Mbps speed. That frees up the USB port for external storage if you need it. Apple makes you buy a fixed storage amount, but the Cube 3 can use what you plug into the USB port.

Last edited by OtinG; 10-30-2022 at 02:30 PM.
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