Amazon Fire TV Cube (3rd Gen - 2022)

Update to below review: I hate this device with a passion that will never fade. It'd be great if it worked, but it doesn't--at least not as advertised. I pulled the trigger and bought a receiver and speakers, so sound is resolved for my home theater, without any help from the Fire TV Cube. But, I still have the Fire TV Cube, so I figure, OK, I'll hook it up and maybe.. 1) I can use Alexa voice control as a universal remote. Nope. After setup, it just doesn't work. Nada. Completely non-functional. 2) OK, I've got an Apple TV and receiver to watch most of my content. Maybe I can use this as another Alexa to stream Amazon Music, to which I have a subscription, to stream to the main level of the house. Nope. Crazy buggy. The Fire TV Cube is in the "main level" room and all audio is supposed to stream on a set of devices, including an Echo Plus and a Stereo Echo Link. But, where does the Fire TV stream to without any reason? An Echo Flex. You can't assign the Fire TV to the audio in the room, even though it is assigned to the room. You can't even direct it specifically to the room. Junk! Junk! Junk! These guys have no idea how to write reliable software. ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA! I've had it. I'm ripping it out because it is less than useless. In fact, I'm heavily invested in the Amazon Echo ecosystem. I'm out. I will never buy another one of these devices and when I need or want something else, I'm slowly transitioning out. Who? I don't know, probably Apple. More expensive? Yes. However, their stuff mostly works and you can get decent support. Try to contact Amazon and you'll spend hours on the phone with a runaround. So, for the home theater I have Apple TV, a Denon receiver, Klipsch speakers, a PS3, and a Nintendo Switch. Almost all my content is available through Apple TV. If I need to use the Nintendo or PS3, I'll just pick up another remote. I can turn on the entire system, turn off the entire system, and control volume through the Apple TV remote. Most of the time, that's all I need, once everything is set up. Do yourself a favor and just do what I did and get an Apple TV. If you're happy with your TV audio you can even dispense with the receiver and speakers, or maybe get a sound bar. Save yourself the money and the endless grief. Hate it. Hate it. Hate it. -------------------- I suppose if you're going to use this as your main streaming device with external audio (TV or Receiver) it'll probably work OK, although the UI is absolutely horrible and the system is buggy. But, for my use, it just didn't cut it. I wanted to hook this up with the Alexa Home Theater mode with 2 x Echo Studio and an Echo Sub, connecting other devices (including Apple TV, which has a far superior interface and better integration with the Apple ecosystem) to my LG OLED using ARC to return audio. The point was to roll-in Alexa Music into better sound for the TV. But, it just doesn't work that well. Here are some of the problems I ran into: 1) When I use the Echos to play music, the Fire TV Cube will lose audio on TV content. When it comes back seems random. I get a lot better results if I go to the Fire TV Cube and try to play some content there first, but even that doesn't always work. I wound up turning off audio input on this system to try to manage this better, but it only helped marginally. 2) Automation is terrible through voice. It just stopped working. At first it seemed to work fine, so I got another one for the main home theater system in another room. When I told this one to turn on the TV, nothing appeared to happen...until I discovered that this system was turning on the OTHER TV connected to the other Fire TV Cube. 3) ARC from the TV mysteriously stopped working. 4) Setup is inconsistent. I probably tried going through the set up 2 dozen time to try to fix some of this. Sometimes it recognizes the other devices. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it'll allow you to configure the inputs on the TV. Sometimes it doesn't. 5) Always trying to upsell you. You think you used the generic screen saver, which is important to prevent burn-in on plasma and OLED TVs and it'll often revert to try to get you to try new content. 6) A lot of stupid annoying random bugs. After sinking a bunch of dough (AND TIME) into this, I'm throwing in the towel. Bought a Yamaha receiver and speakers and just sticking with that. I wish I hadn't spent so much time on this and was in the timeframe to return the two Echo Studios, Echo Sub, and Fire TV Cube. One of the most annoying devices I ever had the displeasure to wrangle with. Unless you're seriously anti-Apple for some reason. Save yourself the trouble. Get an Apple TV, a receiver (I like Yamaha), and some speakers. True, the ATV doesn't have the pseudo universal remote capability, but it just doesn't work that well with the Fire TV in any case, so you'll save yourself some grief if you get something that just works, even if it doesn't do everything you want.