Amazon Fire TV Cube (Newest gen) | Hands-free streaming media player with Alexa, Wi-Fi 6E, 4K Ultra HD

Best on the market
I have owned many, many Android streaming devices and I always keep coming back to the Fire devices. I recommend them to my friends…..
Because the Amazon range of streaming devices are probably the best you can get on the market – why? Because it comes down to one thing – device support. With updates and the might of Amazon behind it, nothing else really comes close. Yes there’s the Nvdia Shield (expensive) and Google’s Chromecast with Android TV(laggy), Apple TV (no sideload, no Android apps) but they too have limitations – they simply don’t support some of the apps you want – very recently, this was the NOW app. Not much use to me. In fact I sold my Shield for a Cube. The cube is actually amongst the most powerful devices you can buy. Yes, it is kinda expensive, but it does have Alexa built in, plus a speaker and a damn powerful streamer in there. I waited for a sale and then traded in an old Firestick and got a hefty 47 odd quid off!
The Cube (and any Fire stick) will support any Android app and if it’s not in the Amazon App store, you can easily sideload using the Downloader app / or EasyFireTools. You can easily use the device/s as a hub and if searching, it will search across any app you have installed. With the Cube, Alexa is quick to respond to all commands. It was a breeze to setup to control my TV and soundbar. I have multiple Firesticks around the house and they are all easy to setup – I could not recommend these more over generic Android, unsupported streaming devices.

Very versitle and able media streamer, let down by ethernet connection…….
Please see my photos
This is a most wonderful piece of kit, not realising just how much more responsive it is than the 4K Max TV Fire Stick, but it is. Using some of the apps like iPlayer, ITVx, Channel 4 apps etc….All very fast at loading and navigating. Great improvements there.
The Octa Core processor seems to be much faster than the previous Hex Core one they had used.
This is not the first Cube we have had, but it has been a very decent improvement over the older model.
We very much like its Alexa integration possibilities as well as the remote having buttons for Netflix and Prime instant launch options. The Alexa integration goes as far as using voice controls to switch on and off smart sockets attached to lighting that is controlled via Alexa in our home. It will do that.
Voice command support is interesting and we are beginning to appreciate that. Playing the radio etc…..all that is meant we have now freed up an Alex device in the room the Cube is in to use elsewhere, great value.
Note you can’t ask the Cube to play music from its internal speaker, it is not an Echo device. The TV would need to be on for it to play music and the audio for that is sent via the HDMI lead.
That is why we have connected our Cube by BT to a Sony standalone speaker, to be used when needed for playing music without the TV needing to be on.
The super resolution scaling is as good as what our TV could do, meaning it is very good. When running SD content, or 1080p, upscaling using the Cube looks incredibly sharp, not overly, and detail is vey much retained and, seemingly, even improved.
Super Resolution set under Settings and the Display and Audio, just scroll down and enable.
Setting it up was very very easy, it came linked to my account, option at purchase, and even allowed us, see photo, to synchronise the visual picture animation of a bouncing ball with the sound. That ensures both are synchronised.
As noted the responsiveness of this box is faster than the Max 4K stick, whilst enjoying the integrated speaker, HDMI in, Full sized USB A and, this part not entirely useful, built in Ethernet.
That leads me to the reason why I dropped a star from the review.
This is the third generation Cube and it is using a 100Mb Ethernet connection. That can be problematic if being used for Plex or Emby AND you are streaming very large 4k material at very high bit rates.
We have Wi-Fi 6 and we then tried going from the rather slow Ethernet connection to Wi-Fi, the router being close to where the Cube is. It is decent, well better than the Ethernet for our needs, BUT our Wi-Fi is not used just for the Cube and we have that many other devices, including Wireless VR, that the bandwidth can be limited.
See applicable photo for the next part.
We had a Ugreen 1GB Ethernet adapter to use, that connects to the Cube via the USB A port on it. That allows a much faster Ethernet connection than the 100Mb, but still seems to be limited by the USB port to around 350Mb. Still, faster than the Ethernet port on the Cube.
For our needs that is perfect.
I can also connect, low powered, devices to the adapter by its 3 onboard USB ports, in our case a Wireless adapter for our Logitech keyboard.
So, overall, the DV and HDR support that this Cube offers works a treat. Sound wise, nothing exotic for us, as long as it supports DD and DTS, and that works fine also, then we are happy enough. That is passed through the HDMI lead. It has never failed to pick up the correct HDR / DV content correctly, nor the appropriate audio stream.
Storage wise seems ok, if you did not need to use the USB port as I did then you could have additional storage there, with the option to move apps to it that would help to supplement the onboard storage.
An excellent piece of kit, very much improved from their previous generation and what is offered works well. Whilst there have been work around for the rather pedestrian 100Mbs LAN options there should have been a 1Gbs connection fitted to this device.
Recognising that the Cube is NOT and Echo device be prepared to understand its limitations on playing music etc, a described above.
Perhaps the Ethernet and sound limitations could be improved on for newer generations of this device.
Very much recommended and very much enjoyed.
Hope this review has been helpful.