2017 Nvidia Shield TV initial impressions.

You can read the specs. here.

I connected it using ethernet wire to my router. Setup and software update was simple.

Tested playback of few media video files with external USB hard drive using the media player which came with the startup. Could not see the file names. I installed Kodi media player and liked it much better. So, it is a decent media player.

Tested youtube and Amazon video playback and it was good.

What did not work was Google Photos App, Did not connect to my google account and show allthe albums like it does on Android phones and Tablets. Chromecast worked when controlled from Android devices. Chromecast backdrop also does not see Google Photos. There is no options to connect as well. This was the big surprise. I did not test 4K video because I did not have a TV to connect to.

I plan to download the google photo albums I want to see on a USB thumb drive to get around the non-working Google Photo App. Not sure if the problem is with Google's Android TV or Nvidia's implementation.

I got the basic model with 2 USB 3.0 ports. Other good thing is a USB device called SmartExtend which is supposed to connect to Smartthings hub. I will get it and see how it works.

I suggest we rename Internet of Things IoT to MoT.

I have always said that it is not about internet when it comes to things we use every single day.

Can you think of one thing every person in the world sees and probably uses every single day?

I think it is the light bulb.

I did a dumb search and found that 2.5Billion light bulbs are sold each year worldwide at average cost of 92 cents. In the US we have switched mostly to CFL bulbs and now switching to LED bulbs but 82% of the bulbs in the world are incandescent.

The retail price of a 60W equivalent LED bulb is when bought in a pack of dozen is less than $3. The retail price of the cheapest connected bulb is $10. The cost of making a bulb connected vs dumb is probably less than a dollar. That means in high volumes it is possible to bring down the retail price of connected bulb to less than $5. That is 5x that of incandescent. Now wonder that 82% of the bulbs sold are still incandescent.

There in lies the challenge and opportunity. With enough volumes LED bulbs could come to the price of incandescent. and for a bit more it could be smart connected bulb.

However, the title of this article suggests MoT instead of IoT. I believe it is all about Mesh of Things MoT. No need to flood the internet with more things connected which do not really need to connect most of the time. However the cell phone is seen all over the world where there is electricity available to charge it and hence a light bulb. A cell phone knows the time and it knows when it is sunset. It has alarm. Most smart phones have bluetooth and wifi. Bluetooth is lower energy and lower range than wifi and more secure because the range is less.

Bluetooth mesh networking is coming. So, connect the dots. Bluetooth mesh enabled led bulbs controlled by phones can lower the global emissions and energy costs. This is the challenge to inventors, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and governments all over the world....

Build it and they will come.