The removal of the black gradient at the bottom is a plus.

Putting the controls in their own grey capsules so they still standout is a plus.

The moving of the volume button to the right is a negative.

I dont like change just for changes sake, but in fairness some of this is a good idea and a welcome design shift. I just hopebthey move the volume button back as having on the left with the main controls is pretty widespread and common design.

So I dont own one but was interested in what could be done.

As far as I can see the 3rd gen model is less versatile than the 1st and 2nd, because its so locked down and has very limited storage. Its more like an iPhone than a PC.

However apparently it can be jailbroken and Kodi installed onto it: https://github.com/NSSpiral/Blackb0x

Jail breaking means “unlocking” the restrictions apple put on the is on the device so you can do more with it.

But this project is last updated in 2021 and from the looks of it online, fundamentally there isn’t much more that can be done. Jail breaking it would be a first step to do anything with it if you want to experiment.

Kodi would certainly give it a new lease of life but that still keeps it as a media consumption device. Kodi is an open source media tool that has a good TV friendly interface, and a huge range of plugins for streaming video and audio (legally but also illegally; kodi itself is perfectly legit and legal but there are plenty of plugins that essentially allow media piracy). You could then sell it on eBay if its working? Someone might want it even if only for cheap?

Other than that, recycle it? If your local refuse centre doesnt recycle it some companies might?

Those devices are subsidised and you end up paying through all the subscriptions to Amazon (for example), lockin to Amazons ecosystem (they push their content and rentals) and the data scraping, and being sold to advertisers. Youre paying much more than that to Amazon in the long term.

Meanwhile you can get a raspberry pi 5 started kit for £82 - including the pi, a case, SD card to put your OS on and a HDMI cable. Then its just a bit of time to set up a system how you want it - lots of guides online. Its even a fun project and you learn a bit about setting up a system how you want it.

Personally I would put a bit more money in and get an 8gb pi plus a case for an nvme card, and a 512gb card. Then you can run the OS off the nvme and have loads of media storage, and a snappy machine with the ram. In that case you’d get the 8gb pi for £76, case for £38 and a 500gb card for £36. £144.

Yes it is more expensive than a fire stick for £60 (often on sale for £45 in fairness). Yes it costs more at the front end and there are compromises with 4k streaming and HDR. But you then have a device that is 100% yours, 100% private and secure and is also very versatile. You have a full linux OS to do with as you wish - including install steam and stream games from your PC or play lower powered games locally or use a huge range of linux tools and apps.

For example my PI runs a Jellyfin Server so I can access content from any of my devices, and it also runs Home Assistant so I can control my home, and Synching so I can transfer files between devices, and more. A media stick can’t do any of that.

My point is that like for like is not a fair comparison. Tge media sticks are subsidised and huge compromises to your privacy, plus aimed at locking you in to a corporate ecosystem. It coats a bit more upfront for your own device but you get much more bang for your buck. And you save yourself in terms of privacy - Amazon can’t scrape your data to sell you stuff or sell you to advertisers, and you dont have the privacy nightmare of the microphones listening for their Alexa service.

You can use your own home theatre PC with Linux, and use a Bluetooth media remote with a web browser to access streaming services. You can also host your own content and use Jellyfin. Kodi can also be used for a good tv interface. And you can even use it to game, pushing it beyond the media sticks.

I have a beelink miniPC in my living room, and I use it for streaming, web browsing and gaming.

Another cheaper alternative is to use a raspberry PI as a home theatre device. It can be a capable media PC.

The biggest issue with both is 4k content and HDR. Many streaming services dont allow content to be streamed at 4k in linux devices. Also HDR support in linux is lacking - no browsers support it, and its experimental in DEs like KDE and Gnome only so far. If you supply your own content then 4k is no issue, and for HDR if you get an AMD GPU you can play with the experimental features in KDE and Gnome.

If 4k/HDR is a deal breaker then Windows can be used but obviously thats american and brings in a whole host of privacy and security issues of its own.

And the company remains massively overvalued despite the recent falls in value. It has a long way to fall yet.

This is a nonsense. The drinks industry don’t want bourbon tariffs in the hope that will mean there won’t be tarrifs on EU booze. But there are blanket tarriffs on all EU products, so relenting on Bourbon specifically will do nothing but benefit the US drinks industry.

Robert Habeck is right - the EU is in a position of strength standing together and should target any response to most hurt the US President.

The US will have blanket tarrifs which are essentially a tax on Americans. The EU can’t directly affect those but it also should not have blanket tarrifs on US goods as that will just damage the EU economy further. Instead it should have targeted tarrifs and other measures designed to hit the US (particularly republican states - thats why bourbon was picked in the first place), and meanwhile work with other tariff hit countries to lower the cost of business in their directions.

One way to look at it, is if its now 20% more expensive to sell resources and goods to the US, its actually 20% relatively cheaper to do business with the rest of the world. So thats where growth is going to come from. Tarrif US stuff that strategically benefits Europe (cars for example), don’t tariff other US stuff so the EU benefits and look to the rest of the world for growth and opportunities.

In some ways the US is handing the EU a golden opportunity to take over much of the US economic influence and power around the world.

How is it misleading? Plex Pass is a subscription? It would be confusing to many people if it said “Plex pass” instead of “Subscription” as not everyone would necessarily even know what that is. Subscription is very clear.

I use Jellyfin as a home media server - in my set up I have it running on my desktop PC, and I use it to stream a media library to my tv.

A home media server basically just means its meant to be deployed at a small scale rather than as a platform for 1000s of people to use.

Your scenario is exactly what Jellyfin and Plex can do. If you have 5 users then you just need a host device running the server that is powerful enough to run 5 video streams at the same time. The server can transcode (where the server takes on the heavy lifting needing a more powerful CPU) or direct play (where all the server does is send the bits of the file and the end user’s device such as a phone or smart tv does the hard work of making a quality play, so a lower power server device can work).

If this is contained within your home, your home wifi or network should be fine to do this, even up to 4k if your network is good enough quality. If the 5 people are outside your home then your internet bandwidth - particularly your upload bandwidth - and your and their internet quality will be important determinant of quality of experience. It will also need more configuring but it is doable.

This doesn’t need to be expensive. A raspberry pi with storage attached would be able to run Jellyfin or Plex, and would offer a decent experience over a home network if you direct play (I.e. just serve up the files for the end users device to play). You might need something more powerful for 5 simultaneous direct play streams but it would still be in the realms of low powered cheap ARM devices.

If you want to use transcoding and hardware acceleration you’d need better hardware for 5 people to stream simultaneously. For example an intel or amd cpu, and ideally even something with a discrete graphics card. That doesn’t mean a full desktop PC - it could be an old PC or a minipc.

However most end user devices such as TVs, PCs, Phones and tablets are perfectly capable of direct playing 1080p video themselves without the server transcoding. Transcoding has lots of uses - you can change the audio or video format on the fly, or enable streaming of 4k video from a powerful device to a less powerful device - but its not essential.

Direct play is fine for most uses. The only limitation is the files on the server need to be in a format that can be played on the users device. So you may need to stick to mainstream codecs and containers; things like mp4 files and h.264/avc. You could get issues with users not being able to playback files if you have say mkv files and h. 265/hevc or vp9. Then you’d either need to install the codecs in the users device (which may not be possible in a smart tv for example) or use transcoding (so the server converts the format on the fly to something the users device can use but then needing a more powerful server)

I prefer Jellyfin as its free and open source. It has free apps for the end user for many devices including smart tvs, streaming sticks, phones, tablets and PCs. Its slightly less user friendly than plex to set up but not much. And the big benefit is your users are only exposed to what you have in your library.

Plex is slightly more user friendly but commerical. You have to pay for a licence to get the best features and even then it pushes advertising and tries to get your users to buy commercial content. Jellyfin does not do that at all.

Finally if your plan is to self host in the cloud, again this is doable but then you stray into needing to pay for a powerful enough remote computer/server, the bandwidth for all content to be served up (in addition to your existing home internet) and the potential risk of issues with privacy and even copyright infringement issues around the content you are serving. A self hosted device in your home is much more secure and private. A cloud hosted solution can be secure but youre always at risk of the host company snooping your data or having to enforce copyright laws.

Edit: the other thing to consider ia an FTP server. If you just want to share the files, its very simple to set up. What Jellyfin and Plex offer is convenience by having a nice library to organise things, and serving up the media. But direct play from a media server is not far off just downloading the file from an ftp server to your home device and playing it. But you can also download files from a Jellyfin server so I’d say its worth going the extra step and to use a dedicated media server over ftp.

Given trump loves name calling his enemies, I’m surprised he’s not just routinely called Traitor Trump.