Terrarium TV

When I first tried Terrarium TV, over a year ago, I had absolutely no success in getting it to work. The interface was slow, and unresponsive, and I just couldn't be bothered fiddling with this new program when I was already quite satisfied with KODI. I've been a devoted KODI user since, well, before it was even called KODI. My history with cord cutting goes back to the days of XBMC (X-Box Media Centre), which is what KODI was formerly known as, way back in 2002. 

You have to take intro consideration, that, when Terrarium TV came on the  scene, KODI 16.1 was the must have application for the cord cutting community. However as KODI moved past Jarvis (16.1) to Krypton (17.0) some machines were now being rendered useless, as the new KODI now required Android 5+ as a minimum requirement. This seemed to maybe indicate the beginning of the end for KODI, not only was it losing touch with its target base of users (by requiring new Android TV Boxes), their developers were scrambling, forced to keep up with these changes. Many of these KODI add-on developers were also beginning to feel the pressure, as the outside world focused all its eyes on KODI and the question of it's legality. It would seem this one-two punch may have been enough to bring the mighty KODI giant to it's knees, and as a result, many developers (wanting out of the public spotlight) branched out and away from KODI. The giant that had ruled the cord cutting realm for the past 15 years had been toppled. In its wake, the cord cutting community eagerly awaits as a plethora of new streaming applications have begun flooding the scene.

It wasn't until a few weeks ago that I first went back to try experimenting with Terrarium TV, and boy was I astonished. The Terrarium TV I had now started using was a completely different reincarnation than the original. It was completely redesigned, looked impressive, was very responsive and most importantly it worked very, very well. What was most shocking was the ease and simplicity of Terrarium TV when comparing it to how complicated it had been to set up KODI. Yes, folks, it would seem we have a valid up and coming contender for the championship title of best cord cutting application. Only the future will tell for certain, but this is definitely a step in the right direction.

If you're interested in trying out Terrarium TV, then you should be able to download it through Aptoide TV, or Google Play Store. You can also download it directly from this link.

** Now while I've praised the new Terrarium TV application, it isn't without its shortfalls, and the most notable in my eyes is the omission  of TRAKT watch-lists (For those unfamiliar with TRAKT, I will have an upcoming article on it). While Terrarium TV does integrate with TRAKT, it only sync's  some information like Watched TV, Watched Movies and Favorites. According the Reddit forums, work is being done by Terrarium TV developers to implement more TRAKT information, with Watch-lists hopefully coming soon, and maybe even a calendar (fingers crossed).

Aptoide TV

While there is nothing wrong with using the Google Play Store, if you're looking for a slightly easier to use alternative, then may I suggest Aptoide TV.

So what makes Aptoide TV so good that I list it first? Well for starters, you don't need to have an account to begin downloading applications onto your Android TV Box. For most of us, we are all to familiar with the GMail login process that follows us around from device to device. The Android TV Box is usually used as a shared family device, do you really want everyone having access to your Google account? What if you don't have a GMail login account (I'm specifically referring to the IPhone users), do you really want to create one just for you Android TV Box? 

If the above mentioned reason wasn't enough motivation to get you to switch, then maybe this will. Unlike the Google Play Store which was designed to be used with a touch screen interface, Aptoide TV can be completely controlled by the Android TV Box remote. That's right, no more need to hook up a mouse and keyboard, or spring for a fancy air mouse. Aptoide TV was specifically designed with Android TV Box remote users in mind, which means Smart TV owners also get some love now.

Installation is pretty straight forward, just click this link and follow the instructions. 

KODI, WTF?

A little while back I informed everyone that I would be starting a KODI section, with updates on builds,add-ons and such. Well since those days it seems every time I got around to writing up a segment on what is the best KODI build to use, or what was the must have add-on, no sooner then did pen touch paper (figuratively) that the build or add-on would die. This little charade went on for a few weeks, and I've finally come to the point of realization that KODI, the all around, most useful tool to traverses and navigate the cord cutting realm, is simply too broken and volatile to use. Sure I still use KODI, but it's become much too difficult to maintain for the casual enthusiast. Stay tuned as I bring you some alternatives

Pumpkin Carving Templates

For the regular followers of Mass-IMO, you can still find all kinds of pumpkin stencils over at this link.

Please consider clicking the sponsor below.

The World Is Flat: Damietta, Egypt

I'm not exactly sure if this is Damietta, Egypt. I did a google translate and that's sort of what it threw back at me. Maybe someone can clarify this?
Ahmed sure has his scuffing down to an art form. Well done, keep up the good work

Dead R-Box Pro?

Im back everyone. 

This update I'm going to talk about my most recent experience with the R-Box Pro android set top box. In the past I've discussed some of the shortfalls with the RBP's initial firmware, and how updating to newer firmware solved a great deal of problems. While the update was a vast improvement over the originally shipped firmware, the RBP still wasn't without it's issues. 

The most notable problem was inconsistent internet speeds when hardwired to my gigabit home network. What I noticed as strange with the RBP is that it would seem to drop internet signal once the cache was full, so when watching TV shows or Movies once the cache portion was played it would start to buffer and seem to no longer buffer to cache. With a machine that had 3GB of ram, you would assume buffering would never happen but it actually buffered more than my 1GB OUYA. Playing around with advanced settings helped a bit at times, but this was always an ongoing problem.

Crashing, the RBP was always crashing out of Kodi. It wouldn't take much to crash, simply moving through the menu was enough for it to crash. 

Overheating, or at least running hot, was possibly the root of the above mentioned issues. My RBP was always showing an operating temperature of somewhere in the 170+ degrees Celsius. No matter how cool the ambient temperature was the RBP always ran hot. (I even installed a 120mm usb fan underneath to reduce temperatures).

So those were the issues plaguing my RBP, and then one day while surfing youtube videos, the machine just froze. I unplugged the unit, waited a few seconds and powered it back up. Once back into youtube, the RBP then froze up again, this time rebooting itself in the process. On the third boot up the main menu appeared and then RBP turned itself off. This would be the last time the RBP was functional. Repeated rebooting never managed to get past the initial boot logo (not even the sound played). 

In an attempt to fix this situation, I began to re-flash the firmware, but unlike my previous experience with firmware flashing, this time the flashing stopped after a few seconds and did not continue.

I'm sure my device was bricked!

I contacted Geekbuying, as I had purchased the unit from them, and inquired about some sort of resolution to my problem. I explained how unsatisfied I had been with the units I had purchased, and their response was that I should have returned them right away, and that since the units were 10 months old and under their warranty, all they could do is have them repaired. Geekbuying was willing to repair my RBP, however I needed to send the unit back to them with a tracking number. Well the cost of sending the packaged RBP back to Geekbuying is $9 Canadian, but with tracking that same package then becomes $50 Canadian. 

WTF!!!!

I could buy a cheaper more reliable replacement unit directly from Amazon, for less money then sending my unit back for repairs.

Geekbuying refused to offer me any more assistance on this issue, so they are now officially on my shit list of companies for whom I refuse to do business with. As far as I'm concerned Geekbuying,  can continue to pedal their crappy wares, I wont be supporting them, nor will I be referring customers to them.

So I'm stuck with a piece of shit RBP paperweight. 

But hold on, I'm not going to give up that easily. I've read enough forum posts to know that there were some people out there who have claimed a godlike ability to revived bricked devices. This process consisted of manually erasing the ram chips (which involves shorting out some pins while the machine was on). So I'm going to research this a bit and possibly have a follow up post.

If anyone wants to donate a new android set top box for me to use, I would greatly appreciate it.

No, I'm Not Dead

Hey everyone, I know it's been a while since I posted anything. I've been taking advantage of the great summer weather to tackle a bunch of renovation type outdoor projects. Don't worry I'll soon be back to updating this blog.
Also there are some new changes in the works which I hope I can announce soon.
Until then, enjoy the rest of summer and we'll be back soon.