Google released its 2022 Chromecast with Google TV HD this morning and I picked one up to see how it stacks up against all the popular Google TV, Android TV, and Fire TV streaming sticks and boxes from Amazon, Walmart, Nvidia, Tivo, MECOOL, and more. First and foremost, here are Geekbench CPU and GFXBench GPU benchmark scores to see how much raw performance power the new Chromecast HD has compared to its big brother, the Chromecast 4K, and all the other streaming devices I could get my hands on.
In addition to the new Google Chromecast HD, it’s worth mentioning that I’ve also added scores for the Onn 2K Streaming Stick and the MECOOL KD3 4K Streaming Stick since the last time I posted a benchmark roundup. Remaining in the comparison lineup are every Fire TV Stick, Fire TV Cube, and Fire TV Box ever released, as well as the Nvidia Shield TV, Shield TV Pro, Onn 4K box, Tivo Stream 4K, and others.
As always, each new device that was benchmarked was running the latest software available as of today with nothing installed except the default apps and the benchmark apps. Each benchmark was run 3 times and the 2 top scores were averaged for the final score shown in the charts below. As a quick reminder, benchmark scores are a poor way of judging a device’s real-world performance because they push the device to its limits, which hardly ever happens in everyday use. That said, benchmarks like these do provide an even playing field to directly compare the raw power of one device to another, so, in that sense, they provide a decent idea of how well devices will perform relative to each other in normal use.
The first benchmark is Geekbench, which does a good job of determining the overall single-core and multi-core performance of a device by primarily taxing the device’s CPU, but it also tests the RAM and storage. The new Chromecast HD scored 667 in the single-core test and 1,797 in the multi-core test. That puts it at roughly 75% of the performance of the Chromecast 4K, which isn’t a great place to be considering a lot of people already complain about the Chromecast 4K being a bit sluggish. Relative to its equally priced competition from Amazon, the Fire TV Stick Lite, the Firestick is about 18% more powerful than the Chromecast HD. Coincidentally, that’s just about how much more powerful the Chromecast HD is compared to Walmart’s Onn 2K Streaming Stick, but, remember, Walmart’s 1080p stick costs about half the price of the new Chromecast HD.
Next up is the GFXBench T-Rex benchmark which is a graphical test that primarily tests each device’s GPU. This is most important if you plan to play games running locally on the device, but the GPU does also gets used in everyday streaming use to render the device’s user interface. With a GPU score of 706, things aren’t much better here for the Chromecast HD as it falls right around the same place in this GPU benchmark as it did with the CPU benchmark above. Apart from the Nvidia Shield TVs, which are in a league of their own, and the latest Fire TV Cube, which holds its own pretty well, none of these streaming devices are particularly good gaming devices. The Chromecast HD’s graphic capabilities are about 85% as powerful as its big brother, the Chromecast 4K. Nearly every modern Fire TV model, and some older ones, outperform the Chromecast HD in this test. The equally priced Fire TV Stick Lite is about 14% graphically more powerful than the Chromecast HD, while the half-priced Onn 2K Streaming Stick is about 81% as powerful as the Chromecast HD.
It’s impressive that Google managed to price the Chromecast HD at just $29.99 considering it comes with a remote that has TV power and volume controls, which the Fire TV Stick Lite does not include on its remote. For that you have to step up to the $39.99 Fire TV Stick. While the Chromecast HD has an impressively aggressive price, it seems the SoC performance is one of the places Google skimped on to get the price so low.
@AFTVnews
AFTVnews
These charts show why the first Fire Stick felt like such a dog! I had one of those until I traded it in for a discount on a 4K Max. I also still have my Fire TV 2 on another TV. If only Amazon would continue to update the software for it; it still outperforms most of Amazon’s Fire TV devices, being bested only by the second generation Cube.
I too am disappointed they did not update the Fire TV 2. At one point it was on the list of devices to be updated and at the last minute they dropped it.
FTV2 will always be a mystery to me. Was a powerhouse that was neglected by Amazon way, way to early.
I’ve tried all of these except shields & cubes and the only ones that worked well out of the box for me were Firestick 4k and 4k Max.
I too have a firestick 4k,not the max however, a roku tv and chromecast, but I also have the ONN 4k that for all intensive purposes out preforms all of them. As is possible with firesticks, the ONN can also be side loaded with additional apps. I don’t see much interest in the ONN stick anywhere, as I guess people write it off as just another everyday Wal-Mart wannabe!
I want to cast my ocolus 2 and cannot with builtin chromecast in my visio tv. Very disappointed.
It’s wild to think the old outdated Gen 2 boxes outperform everything else Amazon offers. Just disconnected my last Gen 2 to replace with a 4K Max. Hopefully the new equipment later this month will not disappoint.
The Fire TV 2 boxes were absolute powerhouses that were clearly built to serve the consumer. I got mine to replace an equally flawless WDTV Pro, which was an absolute media beast in its time. I only moved on from the Fire TV 2 when it started having problem with the new high bitrate BluRay rips.
It was basically the tail end of devices like VCR’s and DVD>BluRay players that were meant to be the end product themselves. ie. I had a Samsung BluRay player that supported .mp4 and other codecs, and had a then cutting edge USB port from which you could watch your own media. The firmware was even patchable, which was useful for things like enabling long filenames. None of those features provided any continuing stream of revenue for Samsung, they were just included as distinguishing features of the device itself.
Nowadays most streaming devices now are primarily designed to deliver the consumer themselves up as the product to the streaming services. Any feature or capability that doesn’t serve that end isn’t included.
Would be curious how Roku 4k stick (latest) compares. I love my new Roku stick since I cannot get it to run out of memory with 60 apps so far installed. My Fire stick 4k ran out very quickly.
So glad I spent the money and just bought a Nvidia shield when I did. Been well worth it.
The thing with the Shield that hasn’t been mentioned is that the GPU, which would normally be way overpowered for a streaming device, does actually get used for more than just rendering the user interface.
When streaming content that is under 4k, the Shield leverages the GPU’s excess power to drive a neural network fed AI Upscaler.
Its a pretty well reviewed feature and looks great to my eyes. So we non-gamers do get use of the Shield’s gaming GPU while we’re just watching movies.
I have two Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd generation). I’ve noticed that only Prime Video, HBO Max and Apple TV+ use the HEVC (H.265) codec. Starz and YouTube use VP9. The rest of the apps I have: Netflix, Disney+, Paramount+, AcornTV and PlutoTV use AVC (H.264). But for example Disney+ in one of my TV that has Android TV 9, it does use H.265. Do you have the same issue? I can only choose H.265 using Kodi and the plugins.
I enjoy the Google Chromecast