Which streamer player; Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV or Roku

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Amazon Fire TV.

The Amazon Fire TV is the speediest of the three streaming players and is the only one in the UK that has Amazon Prime and Amazon App content. It is also the only streaming player that will accept third-party application that haven’t been approved in their respective App Store, in particular the Kodi media streaming player centre is great in its own right and offers extra freely available film, TV and radio programme streams that are extensive because of add-on plugins offered freely by third parties, and that massively extends the usefulness of this streaming player. Kodi is a little difficult to navigate but well worth learning for its sheer flexibility and content.

Searching by the voice from the remote control for Amazon programmes and Apps is useful and operates seamlessly. Music playing is slightly disappointing for it doesn't have the great search facilities of the Apple TV, and it cost £21.99 a year for storing your own music in the cloud. The user interface is slightly disappointing, difficult to navigate and clumsy, but this is easily compensated by its voice searching abilities across Amazon content only. It is a pity that the voice searching facility doesn’t work across all programmes across all streaming services available on the Fire TV.

The VEVO music streaming service on this box is buggy; displaying the occasional blank screen when watching videos and is rather random with its automatic pick of music videos that it plays from the VEVO library. Video quality is excellent on the Amazon Fire TV and offers a crisp picture, which is slightly better than the other two boxes. The wifi on Amazon Fire TV supports dual-band 2.4/5Ghz and a wide 40Mhz frequency channel.

It has AirPlay for mirroring from an iOS device via a third party App available in the Amazon App store and a Plex client but they cost a few pounds each. Unfortunately, the Plex client isn’t at all useful as a list of media is missing when starting the Plex client and the only way of gaining access is to search for the programming media on the server, so gaining access to other programme media on external media servers is difficult unless you use Kodi.

Apple TV.

The areas the 3rd generation Apple TV excels is its music playing facilities. Apple iTunes match that stores your own music songs in the cloud, is a delight but does cost £21.99 a year. Genius mixes on the fly, searching and menu organisation are superb for music. The feel of the user interface is that of polish, its ease of navigation through menus is a super selling point for music lovers, but that’s where Apple started. There is a streaming radio service, but its choice of channels is very poor, and a major selection of channels aren’t even available when you pick them from the menu. The Apple TV supports dual-band 2.4/5Ghz wifi but only a 20Mhz width channels)

VEVO on the Apple TV doesn't have any competition, its facilities for playing all the artist tracks together in a continues session, and the addition of three IPTV VEVO channels that are not available on the other streaming player platforms is also a good selling point.

The film and TV programme choice, for those that have the funds, is superb, and a great deal is available on iTunes. If you do have an assortment of iOS devices it has AirPlay for mirroring the content from these devices, which handles both video and audio. Of the two main streaming rental and purchase services, Apple iTunes has the upper hand but is expensive in comparison to Amazon.

The Apple TV hardware is outdated in comparison to the Roku and Fire TV streaming boxes, and it shows with respect to the delay when moving around menus. And it is especially apparent when watching a lower quality video, for its video upscaling is poor. The inability to install additional applications on this streaming box does reduce its usefulness when further channels become available in the marketplace; it has no Plex client so the only media availability is through the iTunes store for video programmes.

Roku 3.

The Roku streaming box does offer a great deal of free programme content, unfortunately, the majority of the video streaming channels are slightly unusual and rather useless to the average user. In respect of Netflix, it is one of the best streaming player boxes in how it functions playing films and TV programmes, with its programme suggestions offered up and crisp interface. This box does have all the catch-up services available in the UK; including BBC iPlayer, 4oD, Demand 5 and ITV catch-up, the latter isn’t available on any of the other streaming boxes currently, and the Apple TV doesn't have any of these catch-up services. The Roku 3 supports dual-band 2.4/5Ghz but only 20Mhz width channels (and only channels 36-48 on 5Ghz, doesn't support DFS), so the throughput on wifi is less than the Amazon Fire TV.

It does have a lovely designed Plex client that operates flawlessly, so gaining access to your own library of films and TV programmes that you’ve ripped from DVD are easy as pie.

It is the worst music content player, as there are no services available that play via the cloud unless you count Spotify and that’s expensive when you already have your own music collection, which most individuals do. Spotify is also available on the Fire TV. One can gain access to a media client for music, but the interface on these Apps is awful and very slow when the music library is of a moderate size. But it does have a lovely interface to the standard YouTube App for iOS devices that allows them to cue in tracks for continues playing music videos to the Roku.

The Roku 3 does offer exceptional picture quality but is slightly behind the Amazon Fire TV with its video upscaling technology, the Apple TV comes last in this respect.


Each of the three streaming player boxes has something to offer above that of the other two, so it’s hard to decide on a winner. For music lovers, the Apple wins outright, for sheer content across the paid for monthly streaming services the Amazon Fire TV wins hands down and for gaining access to freely available streaming content and your own media the Roku 3 has the advantage. For speed, the Roku 3 and Amazon Fire TV are better and the overall picture quality when watching lower quality videos is best viewed on the Fire TV, but the Roku comes a close second with its upscaling technology.

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So delighted with the Amazon Fire TV, which we paid £69 for in December, and Amazon Prime that we got another Amazon Fire TV from Argos for £66 in the January sales whilst it was on special offer for our TV in the bedroom, unfortunately, those purchasing it now will pay the usual £79, but that is still a bargain for this very capable streamer. We are running these little beauties with Amazon Prime, Netflix streaming services and Kodi media centre with VEVO, Genesis and radio add-ons.

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Another great reason to get an Amazon Fire TV is that it has a native SlingPlayer app, which is great if you wish to receive HD content from a Slingbox 350 from component video output devices within the home. See my other article on this site for the equipment requirements for sending HD content from a Sky+HD box to an FTV for details.

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The Plex client for the Amazon Fire TV has now been fixed, but still isn't as good as Roku's client. And the Amazon Fire TV now has a native SlingPlayer app that operates in full HD that doesn't need an intermediate device, the Apple TV and Roku streamers need an intermediate android or iOS client phone/tablet.

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I've retired the Roku 3 streamer, as it's not offering the service app players that we as a household need. It's not even powered on in our house, without the Amazon prime service or Kodi media centre it's pretty useless, in my opinion in the UK marketplace.

Until they fix these fundamental app omissions for the Roku streamer it's unlikely to gain users in the UK; in the USA marketplace it's very much more useful, it's just a pity that the services that the USA Roku users have access to are so much better, why our country should put up with a less than perfect selection of apps for a streamer player that's expensive is a real down point for this streamer player.

For UK users the Amazon Fire TV is my recommendation now, followed by the Apple TV for the music services and interfacing to iOS iPhones, iPods and iPads.

And don't waste your money on any of the Roku/Now TV players...

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The Amazon Fire TV in the UK has become an even more useful streamer player with the release of Amazon Music streaming service, for the £79 yearly subscription for Amazon Prime its a real steal for consuming streaming content; with both Amazon Prime Video and Amazon Prime Music.

The Amazon Prime Music service has approximately 1 million music tracks to enjoy, not as many as Apple's offering of 30 million music tracks but far cheaper than their offering of £9.99 a month for just the music streaming service alone. I still recommend Apple's offering for music streaming because it is far more extensive than Amazon's streaming service and easier to use on the Apple TV, iOS iPod, iPad and iPhones currently.

And Amazon, why have not incorporated voice music track searching on your streaming music system on the Amazon Fire TV? Come on Amazon it is rather a pathetic user interface on the Amazon Fire TV for consuming music tracks without a searching facility!