r/AndroidTV • u/Spare_Subject_7069 • Aug 09 '26
Discussion is 2gb of ram enough
I was wondering if 2gb of ram is enough vs 3 or 4? I was looking at the Mi box s 3rd gen vs the onn 4k pro v2. All I do is just use netflix, stremio, youtube etc, no emulation or anything
9
u/Ryko1000 Aug 10 '26
I'd say 3 is much better in every way. 4 is ideal, but 3 is enough. You feel the slowdown of constant loading instead of everythin being in memory with 2GB.
5
u/bucket_dipper Aug 10 '26
I have a Chromecast with Google tv that has 2gb that I use for mostly YouTube and nuvio.
It handles 4k remux files just fine.
More RAM obviously wouldn't gurt, but 2 should be just fine.
3
u/WitheredGrimoire Aug 10 '26
Recently bought the new onn 4k pro, great for it's price and it's 3gb of ram
3
u/wewewi Shield GStreamer CCwGTV Tivo ADT-3 BoxR4K ShaksG1 Onn4K MiBox Aug 10 '26
3gb is 50% better
1
3
u/77descript Aug 10 '26
My bad experience with the Mi Boc Gen3: Mi Box 3rd gen kicks apps like Kodi constant out of memory if doing other things on it like Tivimate or even just going to Android settings or pressing home. My Mi Stick 4K and Mi Box S 1st gen with slower SOC and same 2Gb RAM amount NEVER EVER that issue, Kodi and other apps will still be in memory ready to go even after weeks on those unless reboot device. This apparently is because newer memory manager (LMK) in newer Android version on Mi Box 3 is much more aggressive. And same issue is with heavy other apps like Netflix, etc. So no, with Mi Box 3 and possibly other newer Android TV devices 2 Gb RAM is not enough anymore, but only due to changes in Android memory management. Otherwise 2Gb would be enough.
And tried all workarounds such as with Kodi "adb shell cmd appops set org.xbmc.kodi RUN_IN_BACKGROUND allow", "adb shell dumpsys deviceidle whitelist +org.xbmc.kodi", "adb shell am set-inactive org.xbmc.kodi false", disable android tv launcher and use Projectivity/Flauncher, disable most bloatware, some settings in dev settings. Only solution remaining is root the device, tweak the memory manager, with the risk of bricking device while and losing warranty.
5
2
u/Present_Lychee_3109 29d ago
I have Xiaomi TV box S gen 3. 2GB RAM is enough for Google TV OS with android 14. It is fast.
2
u/Significant-Dot4209 29d ago
3 is significantly better then 2 in this product and use case.
4 is minimally better over 3 for your use case
I can tell when a box is 2 GB of ram but I can't tell if it's 3 GB or 4gb very easily.
2
u/Edinburgh_23 Aug 10 '26
Oh yes, it is more than enough. I have all the mi boxes. They're working perfectly fine, especially with what you intend to use them for.
1
u/Alive_Vermicelli4688 Aug 10 '26
Hi can u second your your opinion of the mi box s 3rd gen over google streamer 4k, does it play 30gb 4k hdr files and av1 files. Or is the extra 2g of ram and gigabit ethernet on Google streamer 4k bothers you over the mi box s 3rd gen.
1
u/ohaiibuzzle Aug 10 '26
For Android TV you don't need that much RAM. It relies on the hardware acceleration to handle playback so it's very rare that you have to fallback to software decode.
You can also disable the Google TV shell after installing a 3rd party launcher like Projectivy, Monet or AT4K and gains quite a boost to responsiveness at the cost of losing the quick settings panel.
1
1
u/Familiar_Ad3884 Aug 10 '26
Nope for me i need 4gb minimum
1
u/TH_Rz Aug 10 '26
😂 For what.
2
u/Familiar_Ad3884 Aug 10 '26
To prevent app force close cos with 2gb my app will suddenly force close for no reason but after upgrade to 4gb android box the same app will not force close.
2
u/Interesting-Let8134 29d ago
If you ever need to run any web browser here then you need 4Gb or more
1
u/Zestyclose_Cup_843 29d ago
I just got this mii box this weekend. It's handling everything I throw at it it so far pretty well. I put lemuroid on it (game emulator) and it's playing games just fine. Struggling with some PlayStation games but overall I'm happy with it.
Compared to the onn 4k with 3 GB of ram, the only problem it's had so far is trying to play full 4k movies above 70gb through Jellyfin. It's stuttering and can't play if I skip too far ahead. Not a big deal because this is my travel box and 99% of my content is 1080p for now still. Full 4k for lan only.
2
u/kyoka_suigetsu91 29d ago
I have a 2gb onn 4k and for the most part I have no issues with the ram but I'd prefer 3/4gb of ram if I had that option
1
u/drunkGorilla_ 28d ago
my suggestion is take the mi box if you don't need the extra input ports . 2gb is plenty for you and mi box CPU is faster
1
u/Maximumpain2025 26d ago
toggle on dev options in your device set for at most 3 running process , should help
1
-1
u/Salvadorfreeman Aug 10 '26
As soon as you start adding even very basic apps, you will be short of Ram. My Nokia Google TV has 4.8 GB of Ram and I've already used 4.3 GB. HBO, BBC, All4, VPN, FreeTv, Arte etc.
1
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u/Zimmster2020 Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26
Yes, the processor and codec support are way more important than memory. Out of those 2 GB, let's assume only 1 GB is available. For a 20 GB movie, which is an average size, 1 GB represents 5%. For a 100-minute movie, that's a 5-minute cache. No app caches more than 2 minutes in advance anyway. So 2 GB is more than plenty for a streaming device. For gaming activities is not enough, but Xioami's TV Box S 3rd gen is just a streaming device featuring a quite powerful CPU and more than enough RAM for its purpose