Amazon Fire TV Cube (3rd Gen) Review | 4K Streamer with Alexa voice control

[@WitchyButSweet]

Subscribed just because you bleeped Alexa. Now THAT is thoughtful

[@jaybaar1]

Why did he do that though?

[@WitchyButSweet]

Because all of us who own an Alexa device already, our devices will hear him say “Alexa” and try to respond even though he isn’t in our home talking to it. It’s a common irritation for Alexa owners.

[@jaybaar1]

​@@WitchyButSweet I never even thought of that. Thank you!

[@johnleitch5313]

Just an FYI, you can change the top row of apps that show on the home screen. If you go into 'Your Apps & Channels' and use the menu button (3 lines) to move your apps around, the ones you select at the top and their order will be replicated on home screen

[@hardikmalpani4444]

That's possible since fire TV stick 1st generation

[@dmitryr1223]

there is rearrange button right on main screeen next to the buttons!!

[@kingming3738]

Should come bundled with the new Alexa Voice Remote Pro for the price.

[@helenalovelock1030]

What’s the difference between the remote that comes with the cube and the pro one

[@TheUltimateCola]

​@@helenalovelock1030the pro one is, pro

[@davidowens6749]

I have an Alexa device in the same room so I named the cube Echo. It is very handy to be able to control the TV by voice (pause, play, volume, mute, find and play media, and any other TV control) from anywhere without the remote. Even in the next room if you talk loud enough.

[@nitrohite]

"So simple even a Prime Minister can do it" 💀⚰

[@taxitrekking]

Hi Chris. You mentioned Roku, near the end of that video? You cannot sideload if you have a Roku device. As i understand it, most people buy fire devices to side load, so I wouldn't touch Roku with a bargepole. I have the 4k fire stick and a 2nd generation 4k fire cube. My favourite device's! 👍

[@waynethomson84uk]

I just got one today and it is far better than the firestick 4k max

[@presentprogressive8780]

I concur. The stick was way too sluggish even more so than the regular 4k one and I had constant issues when playing KZbin videos. After a full reset the stick even refused to connect to the Amazon servers anymore. The Cube on the other hand feels way better and the connectivity to my Wifi 6 router works splendidly. The only real downside of the Cube for me is the high price point, but if you can get a discounted one during the regular Amazon sales it is well worth the upgrade.

[@TheBluevicky]

Hello Can we use this cube sometime without switching on tv Like listening music without tv

[@TE5LA-GAMING]

A stupid thing is that this Cube will turn on the TV to play "sleeping" sounds like rain, thunder, streams, etc. through the TV speakers while displaying a screen of that skill playing, thus providing your bedroom with a giant lamp. It is apparently not possible to have these sounds play through the Cube's internal speaker. What engineer thought this was a good idea? I wouldn't be so sure that you couldn't remap those "dedicated" buttons. I did it on my Nvidia Shield Pro. I also use KZbin on this Cube without ANY ads being displayed.

[@adammoonface]

One of my cats is called Dexter and Alexa pipes up every time we call his bloody name... After living with Alexa for a couple of years in various rooms, I can confirm she's handy, if a bit of dickhead.

[@TorqueFormulaWon]

Change the wake word to echo or computer. I had to do the same due to a different name that is used that wakes the cube up.

[@systemsbuster9539]

It looks a lot smoother and snappier than my fire stick. Is there be something to be said for it from a performance/grunt point of view? As well as the extra smart-speaker functions?

[@dmitryr1223]

no mention of the media player!!

[@An.Individual]

These now support FAT32 and NTFS on USB external storage

[@MarkSynthesis]

Informative review, thank you. I'm particularly grateful for the last minute or so regarding using that HDMI In (which I had no idea Fire cubes came with); I have to imagine you lose HDMI 2.1 (so, no 4k/120hz) if you use it, but then again, a 4K/60hz passthrough would be good enough for 99% of the customer base surely, and after Xbox dropped the HDMI input on the Series X and S, it's not like there's been a lot of devices that come with built-in passthrough anyway.

[@camotech1314]

Wow a small empty box inside a bigger box 😅

[@NaturebyGus]

Crazy that they still use IR for the remote so you need line of sight with the sensor to use the remote instead of Bluetooth. So absurd.

[@augustinecs9472]

*bleep* Alexa, leave a thumbs up to Uncle Spurt. Alexa : *bleep* done. Nay, I manually click the like 😆cant wait for next TSW. Hopefully upcoming samsung A series powered by Snapdragon & not exynos bollocks

[@xintimidate]

can this do dolby vison profile 7 with loseless audio? also does it do DTS:X?

[@imthejoker1310]

As a family we've had several firesticks but at 130notes i cant justify spending that when a 4k stick is half the price and does what we need it to do.

[@VinsysVlogs]

Does it play Dolby encoded USB media files?

[@richardjones8699]

Hoping you're going to review the Oneplus11 and the Xaomi 13 pro.

[@songqiaocui2950]

Does it support truehd with passthrough?

[@TonyaInWV]

TECH ISSUE: I got my Alexa Cube to pair up with my sound system, but for the TV she does not answer me through the CUBE, she answers me through the TV speakers. I want her to answer me always through the CUBE. What am I doing wrong? I have an Alexa Fire TV by Omni. Omni was not on the TV selection, so I chose Fire TV when I paired it up to my TV. Thank you for your help!

[@JamesSmith-qs4hx]

I remember the BBC had a children's programme called Why Don't You. The theme song suggested switching off your TV set and doing something else instead. Good advice!

[@mikes9637]

I have a sonos sound system with surrounds. My last gen fire cube was dolby digital 5.1. I hooked everything up to this box and my sound is dolby MAT 2.0…what the hell is dolby mat 2.0??

[@bradygorman6510]

I like the Alexa integration as I have other devices that use it, so the synergy is cool, but the absolutely abysmal UI and shoving Prime content in your face makes it a No from me.

[@jdanorthwest]

Ironically the only, only, only advantage this box has over a tiny PC is that you can control it (like Roku) with an app on your smart phone. I have a smart TV so no need for something like this.

[@DeraPlays]

hey there, this comment is unrelated but... im thinking of getting a motorola edge 30 fusion, i hate the notification area, do you know any launcher or app that can change it ?

[@helenalovelock1030]

Please can you help?. For some reason sometimes when I turn the cube and TV back on the the TV says says there is no signal from hdmi and I have to fiddle around to get it to work by switching on the tv

[@mathaihouse504]

Does it support DTS HD or Dolby Atmos TrueHD? That's was one advantage with Shield.

[@xintimidate]

Did you ever find out? I have the same question as well as DTS:X

[@mathaihouse504]

@@xintimidate I think it does not. On spec sheet I see Dolby Atmos but not TrueHD. Since none of the streaming applications use HD audio formats chances are slim.

[@xintimidate]

@@mathaihouse504 Ive seen so many conflicting responses from people on reddit, some say it works perfectly fine others say you have to have kodi and others say it doesnt work at all lol

[@philiprobar]

Yes, as of the 12/2022 update.

[@Sparky3D]

The worst thing about Amazon Prime is the categorisation and sorting of films and shows on Prime. Who designed it. A drunk salesman? It's just a random load of old stuff mixed with stuff I would never watch. Pointless

[@Lufc-Chaddy]

My current setup is a Firestick 4K with a home theatre consisting of two echo speakers and an echo sub. My question is, if I may. If I upgrade to the new Fire Cube, which has an HDMI in, will the home theatre side still work if I run my satellite system through the Fire Cube? In other words, will sound from the satellite system come out of the two echo speakers and an echo sub? Thanks

[@sixwestpoint]

Good review and I have just bought one after giving up on 2 previous Firestick 4 K's and I shall explain. I have 2X Echo's in the room and I wanted to use these as a Home Cinema system. Now when it works it's amazing but after random periods of time they just stopped working with the Firsestick. Would not re-pair and the Firesticks would not re-pair with the speakers. Queue Amazon tech support who replaced Bothe the fire stick and the speakers. Same issue about 5 weeks in with the second Firestick, lost connection no sound and just would not re-pair with the speakers. Amazon relented and just refunded me so I have bought the Cube instead, hoping this will resolve the problem permanently. Now it all works perfectly fine again but I'm keen to know if you have heard of or experienced similar issues and if you know of any way to resolve. I'm an unwilling and unintentional expert now on Firestick $k, Alexa app, Echo's latest generation. That said if the cube gives up the ghost I'm going to explode because genuinely I think there is an issue and Amazon knows about it. Be great to hear if you have any ideas or experience of similar issues using the Amazon Firestick and or Cube with speakers to create a home cinema system

[@muhammadnazim3366]

One main question KZbin in HDR or not ?

[@ellistonmclean939]

This review was useless. We need to know if this thing can handle UHD on Netflix, Prime Video, and Disney Plus, and if Dolby Atmos is active on these apps and you haven't touched that. You haven't done any test to show how this handles 4K content with a high bitrate.

[@ellistonmclean939]

@jamieradford8069 yeah, but lacks the ability to use most third party apps and a real streamer does not need restrictions, we need freedom to stream

[@terrythewelsh]

Will wait until it’s bundled with the remote pro, won’t hold my breath though.

[@dallase1]

You're not beeping out saying Amazon and that makes my Google Assistant activate.

[@nicholasjonesroguecroce]

My Bleep Alex wakes up at Echo... Makes life easier...

[@Paul-ng4jx]

I don’t know on top of it. I changed up to voice to a female Australian accent.

[@gilbertos1984]

Thank you for bleeping the word. Other ways my alexas go cucu

[@mattsanchez4893]

Nice review Chris, I've used the Roku, the fire stick, and Google TV and I much prefer the Google TV interface, it's easy to customize and does an excellent job of keeping track of what you watch across all of your Apps.

[@Al3xg13]

It’s July of 2024 would yall still recommend this?

[@pauls826]

Go onto the app settings press the 3 lines and you can move the shortcut icons

[@Paul-ng4jx]

It’s best to change the name up instead of Alexa. I changed it up to echo.

[@JohnSmith-qn3ob]

Do you have any plans to install Kodi on it?

[@Patrick1985McMahon]

I bet the small empty box was meant to hold the HDMI cable.

[@highflowhighflow9896]

only interested for a streamer if it can play movies in rar archives direct from local network , not found one yet who can do that

[@TangoMikeOscar]

Why the f would you want to do that? Just build a NAS and run Plex. Sorted.

[@edonis2787]

It’s 2024 and the liz truss references still hold up

[@peterbrown2208]

"... even a prime minister could do it'... Lol. 😂

[@Dakol-1]

I have a few gripes about this product but the biggest one is by nature its hooked up in close proximity to the TV speakers so when playing a loud show it can't hear my commands very well. Is there any way to hook up an external mic? My other huge gripe is I use an HD Homerun box and for some reason it only recognizes my command to start the HDHomeRun app about 50% of the time. When it doesn't work it thinks I'm saying something that doesn't even sound close to this.

[@redclaw72666]

Why not use the remote lol if not spend another $30 for the pro remote

[@SunMaximus]

Can the tv sound be output through the Firetv Cube speaker?

[@Drew-ql3gq]

I don't go Alexa i go pixel 7a and goo home with screen

[@gcarter1973]

How is it better than the Amazon Stick?

[@fellowcitizen]

Please collaborate with Kaiman Wong at some stage!

[@bruthermark]

I caught a $30 Off when I purchased mine a few weeks ago, I believe it was during one of those "Prime" week promotions, any hoo, I already have the 4k and 4k Max, the Gen 3 Cube is a MONSTER!! Great video 👍🏾

[@wraynephew6838]

What is the purpose of a Amazon Fire TV cube in 2022 or 2023? Every modern Smart Tv from since 2014 can render video and stream in 4K. Almost all smart tv from since 2014 come with or has the ability to install Netflix, KZbin, Amazon Prime, hulu etc! Even for older television sets the 4K Amazon FIre TV is still limited to the native resolution of the Television it is connected to. 4k Cube box connected to a 720 P Television set will still be down sampled to a 720P.

[@rit1chea]

Thanks for the info. I've replaced three Fire Stick 4k's with Cubes, gen 2. I really like them as they "play" better with my PLEX server--FF and RW. I will replace the last stick when the next great sale arrives in the US. Cube 3 will play from NTFS so I won't need to spend time reformatting and putting videos on the flash drives when I want to avoid using the internet.

[@paul-57]

So this will play .mkv files from a hard drive formatted in NTFS? I have heard fire tv cube does not support DTS or True HD sound, do you know anything about that?

[@RobStarsinger]

No usb C for power?

[@SeanMulligan95]

What's the final verdict if you had to choose between the Fire stick and Fire Cube?

[@markgrimshaw2716]

I think he did briefly mention if you don’t use the voice control, you may as well use a fire stick, so if you don’t really need the voice control from the cube, you may be better off with a fire stick. I already have an echo next to my tv, so I’ll be sticking with fire sticks. I currently have the 4K max and have no problems with performance, so £130+ seems like too much to spend, for any potential gains

[@pauljsedmak]

My Fire cube TV 1 st Gen from 2018 was finally giving me issues with opening apps that I decided to buy the 3rd gen. I Was able to trade an old device and get 20% off for the new model paying under $100

[@Patrick1985McMahon]

How is Xbox cloud gaming on it?

[@rangerhawk]

I'm curious, you said it can also be a smart speaker assistant. The smart assistant would be cool, but my real question is, can it play the TV audio through this built in speaker? This is actually the only reason I am even considering this device. But for some reason I can't find any literature on the built in speakers' functionality. Let me explain my situation so you understand why it is important to me. I have an AORUS OLED computer monitor. It is primarily my computer monitor, but I want to be able to picture in picture TV and streaming content while I am using the computer. This creates a problem with audio out to my sound system, it can't play from both at the same time. If this box can play the TV audio, then this problem is solved without adding another audio system. Most of the Streaming services I use I can get Windows app for, but not all of them, additionally they do not work as seamlessly picture in picture [go figure, good one Microsoft], nor do they have a remote control.

[@DeeTeaDee]

Does this perform better than an amazon firestick does when viewing ….. *ahem* many many channels??

[@ByMitus]

I’m having issues pairing my 2 studios with my 3rd Gen cube, in the app when trying to setup the home theater it says my fire stick is not compatible… can anyone help?

[@drewtheline9995]

Cube is a money grab. I have an actual fire TV, I can play movies with atmos but not amazon music in atmos. It's a gimmicky money grab.

[@emilytravelstoplaces]

Hi, do you know why my TV box won't open the fire tv hub. When we ask her to turn the TV she does and she brings up to normal TV so then we ask her for example.. Open Netflix, open itvx, open fire TV. But she won't and she stops replying, she does respond to open HMDI 1 but only sometimes. My parents have the older version and their Alex listens to everything even switches form sky TV. Do you know why this might be happening 😂

[@regis32]

The equipment is STILL not available in Poland, Amazon refuses to ship it to Poland, so at their own request, I will buy e.g. vSeeBox V2 Pro. That's how you lose a customer.

[@mr58311]

Love your reviews

[@fabulousfred5096]

Can this device pick up my universal media server thats on my pc?and can this device pick up my personal videos and music thru this media player cube?and not use plex media server which in my opinion is not good👎,thanks

[@mayurbhatti4273]

The 3rd Generation Fire TV Cube (2022), still only 16GB 🤦🏻‍♂️😤. Why Amazon WHY?….

[@uptownphotography]

Nice review. I am new to Streaming TV so I hope ordering the Fire TV Cube 3rd Gen will be a good choice. If you have an alternate devices that you feel I should check out please feel free to advise...Thanks. Philip

[@papaeli123]

Unfortunately the ethernet connection on Gen 3 Cube is a limited to 100 meg. max. My internet is 400 meg which I can get with a wifi connection to the cube, I have Gen 2. So if you have greater than 100 meg download speeds you might want to try wifi connection on the Gen 3.

[@ricardogarza4840]

Is not good product I have the 2nd generation and have to many problems since I bought abd Amazon had replaced it and still have the same problems. Don't buy it

[@flicka25]

I have Chromecast Google TV......smaller, cheaper and does a great job. Even remembers your favourites. But I enjoy your videos lol

[@gilbertos1984]

Isn't it cheaper to just buy an Alexa an a fire stick separately???

[@ZK-APA]

Yes. But then that will be 2 separate devices. The cube is more for convenience, and the fact that the cube will last longer before it shows sign of slowing.

[@JustNel]

A lot of the complaints you present are personal complaints... I don't have any issues with these things and i have older versions of this device.

[@jasondessenberg6096]

When I ask Alexa to do a time or one of my routines while watching TV. My program will stop and this is very annoying. I am almost ready to disable her on the cube and buy another Dot.

[@19kreeper]

Can this read content from my network synology NAS "Media server" to watch video from NAS directly?

[@wirelessinsight9170]

Is there a way to lower Alexa's voice without changing the volume of the TV? She is way too loud but when I use the volume on the cube or remote it also lowers the TV volume. I have searched for this issue and seen many complaints but no solutions.

[@ricbrook7059]

Annoying bloody thing always turns over the TV around 4.30pm'ish to it if you using something else and it also regularly fails to start up properly with no picture unless you shut down and restart. I hope it's just mine that has issues but having the last gen too I doubt that's the issue.....

[@djbenr10]

The problem is people side loading IPTV on it with a max port ethernet speed is still only 100meg max? It's absolutely shocking that the port still only handles up to 100meg yes wireless is faster but a high speed port would of been better!

[@wachyHoney]

can the speaker be used to output apps audio? I have an old projector (Spro 2) and cannot managed to route audio to the cube

[@allsportsexpert]

In the 3rd gen fire cube, there is no "my apps and channels" anymore which is a deal breaker for me. Only the recently viewed app is still there. I have 30+ apps but some of them I don't use very often, I have to find them in the app store and I might not remember what they are.

[@droidx1191]

It's defective. Settings don't stay set. Amazon won't provide support for their product.

[@FAFOCLUB]

Does anyone know if the speed will decrease if you hook this up to an older slower smart tv?

[@teacherg28]

I understand I can’t use firetv cube b/c my fire tv has a 6 operating system. Am I correct?

[@spindleswift8667]

Wow, am I glad I watched this! Our local audiovisual guy recommended this device. But what the video shows is an over-complex way of selecting a bunch of entertainment we would hate. I like this presenter: his diction is so crisp that this Chicagolander didn't mishear a single word.

[@davehood1514]

Can you output high bit rate digital to an external dac from the usb output ? Come on the Toon 😂

[@sanderrombouts8809]

Hey baldy what is the 🐏 in this box? Do u know if it supports Dutch language

[@PeterOkeefe54]

I have a great deal of trouble with english accents. I cant watch a movie without captions. I understood every word you said....thanx for that

[@sedemnyatusah775]

Tech spurt's the best.

[@markblock1039]

Does it make any difference whether you have a FIRE TV or not?

[@shaunsfrench1942]

hey reservation dogs... did u watch it. just here to find out what the firetv cube is about.

[@neildixey]

If you accidentally click out of an app and click back on it the app usually starts afresh again however for say kodi etc if you go into applications and manage, find your app and select launch from the list it will go back to where u were. Bit long winded but good for some apps

[@marceloarnez1491]

The remote control is different now so this video is already outdated

[@Snoopy53]

Hello Chris, gereat review. What are those beautiful lights next to your tv?

[@AJJJ-co2vd]

If you go into settings you can reduce the amount of advertising

[@LeviUnboxing]

Can you compare the old flyer scandal TV in the new one

[@SylphidUndine]

so i could hook up the xbox into the fire tv cube and still play xbox that way? because my monitor is running out of hdmi ports.

[@ZK-APA]

Yes.

[@taxitrekking]

I've no reason to upgrade yet, but I'll buy this when I do.