Jailbroken Firestick - Recommendations

[FSU_Chris]

We had a lightning strike hit near our house last Sunday and it blew out the HDMI ports in our TV, fried our DirectTV receiver and Apple TV. I'm going to attempt to see the cost of fixing the TV (if possible) today. However, this has sped up the timeline of me potentially trying to get rid of cable/ satellite tv all together and go to streaming only. My wife is somewhat beside herself on this idea as she likes the fact she can quickly scroll through and see real time content along with the DVR capabilities. She is a TV junkie and is trapped in the house with our four young kids.

Now, what little research I've done on jailbroken amazon fire sticks is that Amazon does not allow them to be sold on their market place anymore. I'm finding prices on ebay for $70 to $80 bucks. Kodi seems to be the app of choice in order to watch content. I also need to invest in a VPN for security purposes. We pay roughly $170 a month for DirectTV so the annual savings could be amazing if I can get my wife on board.

Here are my questions:

• Is an Amazon fire stick the best choice for streaming content?
• What is the best place to purchase a jailbroken amazon fire stick?
• How fast should I increase my internet speed? I'm paying $50 bucks a month through Xfinity so I'm assuming I need to crank this up a bit just based on how much I'm paying
• Any recommendations on VPNs to use?
• How do you find both local and live programming (e.g., sporting events)?
• Any downsides for those that have gone from cable/ satellite TV to only streaming?
• How did you convince your significant other to switch over if they have an unhealthy relationship with their TV programming?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts. I'm going to try to get the TV fixed now but I'll be back online today to look at your thoughts/ recommendations.

 

[BelemNole]

The thing about those is that they point to a particular service on kodi for your “free” content, and those services tend to be short lived. Which means you have to become familiar with kodi and how to load new services when you do your research and find a replacement. It’s fine if you want to spend the time and trouble.
Personally- I cut the cord but pay for a streaming service. Gives me my locals plus a bunch of others a I wanted and still save a bunch over satellite. Look into PS Vue or YouTube TV.

 

[FSU_Chris]

The thing about those is that they point to a particular service on kodi for your “free” content, and those services tend to be short lived. Which means you have to become familiar with kodi and how to load new services when you do your research and find a replacement. It’s fine if you want to spend the time and trouble.
Personally- I cut the cord but pay for a streaming service. Gives me my locals plus a bunch of others a I wanted and still save a bunch over satellite. Look into PS Vue or YouTube TV.

Thank you. Yeah the wife is pushing back on the entire jailbroken fire stick way in which to go about this. I'll look into what you mentioned as well.

 

[dmm5157]

Warning about any options mentioned Xfinity typically has a 1TB/month cap. The first month I switched from Cable to PS Vue, one of my Roku devices would stay on streaming even if TV was off (my mistake in not telling my wife to be sure to exit app before turning off the TV).

First month, I went over and got a notice form Xfinity that I had used one of my 2 complimentary overages on data. After that, they charge $10 for every 50 GB you go over 1 TB.

It's been about 9 months since I switched back to Cable after moving so PSVue may have changed and allowed you to pick lower resolution, but previously data used will be dependent on your bandwidth.

If you have hard core TV watchers that always have the TV on and in multiple rooms, then you're going to go over your data limit often.

I suspect the same would be true for Kodi as well.

I tried Kodi a bit, but I hated the interface and navigating all the sources and such were a pain. It would have been fine for just me but my wife hated it.

 

[SoddyNole]

I bought a JB Firestick and used it twice at most and it has been collecting dust since. As DMM stated above the interface of Kodi is awful and going through 100s of sources, most of which end up being movies in Chinese and rarely finding a HD link that isn't Chinese was more than my patience could handle. Maybe I was doing this wrong but it is not like you can read the files and know where the English movies are. Click, download, play and swear after you just wasted a few minutes downloading another Chinese version of the same movie.

 

[ATLNole1]

No need to buy a jail broken fire stick, just buy a new one and load what you want, it’s just charging a couple of settings to allow outside programs to be loaded.
As other have said, Kodi is a mess with different builds and dead links, your wife will hate it. I do use Terrarium TV which is a good option for TV shows and I have IP Vanish installed on the fire tv for a VPN.
For ease of use and to keep the peace you should just try major streaming sites like PS Vue, YouTube, etc. and hope she can get used to it.

 

[West Duval Nole]

Kodi requires tinkering with and isn't really set up to watch TV channels live other than finding a good stream for pay per views like UFC. IT does require maintenance and knowing which add ons are best to find what you want. But it is free and when you find the right add ons you can find high quality movies and tv shows to stream or even download. It is not as easy as channel surfing that you can do with live TV and at times can be frustrating trying to find the right feed.

I haven't moved to streaming service yet because Xfinity provides internet and TV channels (slightly more than basic channels so no ESPNs) for the same price as internet alone. Also I like surround sound and I don't think I the streaming services stream in 5.1 surround.

 

[Random_John]

Go outside. There's a whole world waiting for you. You don't even need a remote!

 

[RangerNole]

We don't have fire stick; but I need to get one before I travel overseas again. As far as going without satellite or cable we did that mostly with a very basic package so I could get sports. I understand you can stream stuff though as well and when my son lived at home that just wasn't an option due to his video gaming bandwidth. Now we might look at that again.

 

[NoleGrad83]

Been on streaming through FireStick for two about two years now. Won't go back to satellite or cable. I've gone over my allowable data only once, July last year, and came close this July but that was only because I have more time to watch TV during the summer. Along with gaming, I still think the FireStick or Firebox are the best options.

 

[iowanole1]

Go outside. There's a whole world waiting for you. You don't even need a remote!

What channel is that on?

 

[MIKE_G]

What channel is that on?

 

[InjunJoe]