OK this is weird. My son living in Costa Rica told me his Firestick stopped working after he bought a new RCA TV. I was surprised, but accepted it at face value and he didn’t want help troubleshooting so I didn’t get any details. On my next visit I took along my stick as I always do when I travel. He was off on another adventure so we had the place to ourselves. I noticed his new RCA had a Chromecast dongle and that was his chosen alternative. I plugged in my stick and nothing. Not recognized. I tried all the HDMI ports, different and proven power outlets, TV settings and could not get the TV to recognize the stick. Has anyone else seen this? And when I got home my stick fired right up as usual so it wasn’t a strange coincidence. Sorry I didn’t think to check the TV model number.
Firesticks are heavily controlled by Amazon switch to Mecool KM9 ( on Aliexpress for $37.00 ) I find my Nvidia Shield works the best it has Google software and gives you a lot of flexibility also Mecool has Google software and works great also easy to navigate. Your situation is not uncommon. Hope this helps
Well since you brought it up here’s my opinion on the Firesticks and why I’m committed to them.
Fire Sick vs Nvidia Shield
Onn and Android Boxes
Nov 11, 2023
First, I’m not trying to sway anyone’s preference. I’m just providing my experience and knowledge as guidance to what is arguably the most often asked question by those new to streaming, some variation of, “Should I buy this device or that?”
When I was 18 and looking to buy my first motorcycle an older, wiser rider told me not to buy the biggest, most powerful bike I could afford. Start small and spend less to learn and decide what you really want. The same applies to streaming devices. You can spend $200+ for an Nvidia Shield or start small with a $20 Onn or a Fire Stick 4K for $25-30 depending on promotions. Later if you feel you need the Shield, they’ll still be available.
In the great debate, I’m on the Fire Stick side even though I admit I’ve never used any other device. Here’s why…
1. Price. I can have multiple Fire Sticks on all 3 of my TVs That’s 6 Fire Sticks for the price of 1 Nvidia Shields.
2. Having multiple Fire Sicks allows me to quickly switch between shows by simply changing the source on the TV. Although my TVs don’t support Picture-in-Picture for HDMI input, if yours does, you have that capability as well. Available memory is not a problem for me personally, using multiple Sticks allows you to distribute applications among them negating the argument that Sticks don’t have enough memory. Also, TiViMate allows recording, but recording while viewing often fails. Using a separate Stick for recording solves the problem.
3. Although it’s true that Amazon controls the Operating System on the Stick and loads up a lot of bloatware (software you don’t need or want) that has been inconsequential for me. It is largely outweighed by easy access to a plethora of free apps in the Amazon App Store and the ability restore your settings and apps from Amazon. This is tremendously helpful if you need to do a factory reset, upgrade to a later version of the Stick, or want to duplicate your setup on multiple Sticks. There are other more advanced controls available through the Amazon site which most people won’t use, but give you more control of your Sticks by restricting access and resetting remotely. I don’t think you’ll find these convences with any other streaming device.
4. I can use my TV remote to control both the Stick and TV simultaneously. This is incredibly convenient especially when switching between multiple Sticks. The Amazon Fire TV Remote smartphone app is a good alternative to the Stick remote, but it also has one outstanding feature for advanced users. You can cut and paste to the app. This won’t be of importance to you until you find yourself attempting to use the onscreen keyboard to enter long strings of text necessary to setup some applications. Onn and Shield may support some are all of these capabilities, but as of this writing it appears Onn does not allow Cut and Paste and it’s unclear to me if Shield does.
5. Portability. I’ve taken my Fire Stick traveling in multiple countries with no problem. It’s small, easily packed and if lost, stolen or damaged you’re only out about 30 bucks. Most hotels and Air BnBs have sufficient, unrestricted internet and TVs with accessible HDMI ports to plug into. Remember when traveling you’ll want to take the Fire Stick remote since the smartphone remote app has to be on the same network and the TV may not support the CEC remote sharing feature. You’ll need the Stick remote to establish a connection to the hotel network, then you can use your smartphone. You might also want to carry an extension cord. If you’re traveling outside the US and canada you might want to include a 3 prong to 2 prong electrical outlet converter as well.
6. Speed and picture quality. Nvidia proponents will say that the Stick is slower and has lower video quality. I have yet to see a real world side-by-side comparison of how this results in a better viewing experience. No question the Shield is significantly faster and has more memory, but the Stick delivers a true 4K picture without buffering (screen freezing or stuttering). Most buffering on the Stick results from an Internet, WiFi provider issue, or lack of memory. I'm able to run K O D I with several addons, TiViMate, a few other apps and several diagnostic apps with 1 gb of free memory. But, as I said earlier, you can always spread your apps across multiple Sticks. Since the Stick plays 4K without any problems, the only advantage of the Shield's speed is in non-viewing operations such as searches, navigation, file transfers and deletions.
7. Durability. The Stick was introduced 9 years ago. First gen Sticks are still functioning. My 5 year old 2nd gen is still kicking. Yes functionality, speed and memory have improved with the subsequent releases, but you could buy every upgraded version and still not have paid as much as one Shield.
This is based on my 5 years of experience with the Stick. I may not be 100% accurate about the Shield or Onn, but I’m not debating or trying to change anyone’s preference.
Sounds like a TV defect/deficiency, rather than a deliberate design feature.
I think you hit the nail on the head. I’ve researched forums for this issue for an hour and the only possible issues amounted to a bad HDMI port and insufficient power for the firestick from users plugging into the USB port on the TV instead of using the power brick supplied.
Hey Miki, as my post says I tried all HDMI ports and multiple proven power outlets. The Chromecast was working fine on the same ports and power sources and my stick worked fine at home before and after. If it is an unintended problem with the TV, it’s very weird and selective.
Oh I know what you tried. The suggestions I posted were the only possibilities that I could find on any RCA forums and unfortunately I couldn’t find any exact answer. Sorry.