It has been 4 years since the Fire TV Recast was released and it appears as though the over-the-air (OTA) DVR companion to Fire TV devices is being discontinued. The Fire TV Recast has been a consistent staple of the Fire TV lineup ever since its release in 2018, but now, for the first time, Amazon is no longer selling the cheaper of the two Fire TV Recast models and both versions are no longer available across several other 3rd-party retailers.
Searching Amazon for the Fire TV Recast no longer brings up a listing for the model equipped with two tuners and a 500 GB hard drive. Only the Fire TV Recast with four tuners and 1 TB of storage is currently available for purchase. Clicking to see the buy options on the cheaper 500 GB model’s review page is now redirecting to the more expensive model. Best Buy, on the other hand, does still have the 500 GB model for sale, however, it is now marked as a clearance item and the 1 TB model is no longer available at Best Buy. Both B&H (500 GB & 1 TB) and New Egg (500 GB & 1 TB) list both Fire TV Recast models as unavailable, which is further evidence that the Fire TV Recast is being phased out.
The Fire TV Recast provides access to local OTA broadcast channels through an HD antenna for Amazon Echos Shows, Fire TVs, Fire TV Sticks, Fire TV Cubes, and the Fire TV mobile app, much like the built-in tuners in Fire TV Smart TVs do. The Fire TV Recast also serves as a DVR to record those broadcasts and stream them over your local network. Ever since its release, it has been a bit of a niche device, since most Fire TV users seem to prefer to stream local channels through various Fire TV apps instead of through antennas.
It became clear early on that Amazon wasn’t going to put much effort into improving the Fire TV Recast after its release since the once “considered” feature of commercial skipping never arrived. The only significant update to the Fire TV Recast after its release was the addition of external hard drive support, for expanding its recording capacity, which was promised at launch. While the Fire TV Recast has consistently received software and security updates since its release, no other changes have been made to its functionality over the years.
When Amazon released its big Fire TV interface overhaul in 2020, the Fire TV Recast began to be treated as a second-rate citizen. Whereas it once had its own dedicated “DVR” tab in the Fire TV’s main navigation menu, accessing Fire TV Recast recordings became buried under several sub-menus in the new interface. This made my DVR Recordings Shortcut app among the most used variant in the bunch of apps. Amazon did slightly remedy this annoyance months later with the addition of a DVR row in the Live tab, but, to this day, there are still Fire TV Recast interfaces, such as the device’s settings screen, that were never updated to match the new interface’s asthetic and, therefore, now look out of place.
Amazon is expected to announce new Fire TV devices next month, such as the 3rd-gen Fire TV Cube that leaked in recent software updates, so, perhaps the discontinuation of the Fire TV Recast is leading up to a new model being revealed. Adoption of the new ATSC 3.0 broadcast standard, which the current Fire TV Recast does not support, is slowly making its way across the US, so this would certainly be a good time for a 2nd-gen Fire TV Recast with support for 4K broadcasts to be released. Given the little attention Amazon has given the current Fire TV Recast over the years, I don’t see that as likely, but one can hope.
Update
Amazon has now confirmed that the Fire TV Recast is being discontinued with the following statement to TechHive:
We are constantly evaluating our product and service offerings to best serve the evolving needs of our customers. Many of the features offered by the Recast are now available through other apps on Fire TV, and we are focusing our efforts and resources on other Fire TV devices and services that provide great value to our customers.
-Amazon spokesperson
@AFTVnews
AFTVnews
A new version of the Recast would make sense if Amazon were to include an ATSC 3.0 tuner. That would make it a useful upgrade for all the existing TVs (meaning nearly all of them) that can’t receive the new broadcasts.
Ya, I was thinking they would come out with an ATSC 3 recast for sure, I guess maybe not, we’ll see.
ATSC 3.0 is far more niche than the Recast. All markets that have 3.0 still show most of their channels on 1.0 so you need both tuners. Silicon dust makes a hybrid network tuner with 2 3.0/1.0 tuners and 2 1.0 tuners. Amazon could to the same thing but they would have to charge significantly more for the device.
Samsung and LG TVs 2021 and up have ATSC 3.0 or NextGen TV with Quadtuner for cable/satellite or Antenna and streaming combined. With my LG channels /antenna local works great 375 ch. We get Sling for LG free no need for HD tuner DVR or any external player just added Dolby Atmos Soundbar and Deezer Spotify Apple Amazon music and Tidal which we use makes the tv into all in one entertainment center.
I have one and it’s still hooked up and recording. It does an OK job, but you’re right. It’s always been a blowout special for Prime Days, and its development seemed abandoned shortly after its release.
My primary OTR is a Silicon Dust Duo (https://www.amazon.com/SiliconDust-HDHomeRun-Flex-ATSC-Tuners/dp/B092KM482V) paired with my Synology NAS using Silicon Dust’s DVR software. The UI is better than the AFTV recast but there is a $35/yr license fee.
I have the Rcast with 500gb storage 4 tuners. Use mine every day. Fast forward past commercials. I love it. I have six firesticks can access it through any two at the same time without running extra coax to access over the air broadcast. Access home broadcast when I away through my mobile phone and mirror to another tv.
Hope amazon doesn’t ignore this device.
I use mine almost every day, either to watch a recording or to watch an OTA broadcast on a Show. I sure hope it stays functional, unlike the soon to be disabled Cloud Cams. I may not buy any more Amazon electronics if they are not functional for more than four years.
Were you able to fast forward through commercials?
Yes, with the Fire Stick remote. Not automatically.
The recast is the only reason I have fire sticks everywhere, I just ordered a cube because they said it works best with the recast! I might as well send it back I guess. I guess it’s going to be back to Roku. You can’t have anything anymore.
I am little confused on this decision. Just because it is discontinued, it shouldn’t stop working. It may not get any more firmware updates, but why would Amazon be so stupid as to disconnect it from the Firesticks? That would anger ever more customers, IMO. It certainly will me since I just bought one three months ago.
What Amazon might do is discontinue the television guide service for the Replay. That would make it much less useful; you would no longer have an overview of what is available to watch, and you would have to schedule recordings by channel, date, and time.
Discontinuing the channel guide would make it virtually useless as far as I’m concerned. I’ve read that they will support that function until 2026, but somehow I doubt it. They’re going to stop supporting CloudCam at the end of the year. Fooled me twice Amazon!! Never again!
I’ve had one since 2019. This week, they disabled them from recording series. I can only record individual episodes of shows now. They say their techs are aware of the issue and working on a fix, but I won’t hold my breath. This is how they’re gonna kill it, slowly dropping features ’til it just doesn’t do anything worth anyone’s time anymore.
I have talked to them as well. All series are not impacted on my system. I am not buying this. We’ll see.
I lost ability to record series about four weeks ago, but today when I was setting episodes to record I decided to try to record series again and it worked. I didn’t know Recast had been discontinued until reading this article today.
Always was a very USA focussed device (like much of Alexa) and didn’t seem to make it to other regions where it could have been successful. Amazon does work in mysterious ways…
Building it for other regions would have required different hardware. The ATSC tuner in the Recast would have been useless in most of the world; ATSC is limited to the US, Canada, Mexico, a few Central American countries, and South Korea.
But it was never available in Canada.
I quickly lost interest when I found out it was only 720p. It made no sense to release a whole house OTA NVR with less than 1080p in 2018, maybe in 2008, not 2018.
Except that no OTA broadcast in the USA is even being broadcast in 1080P. That would have been a pointless addition.
The Recast does store recorded video in its raw 1080i format, when available. The raw file does look noticeably sharper than the 720p encoded stream that it sends out.
In Austin Texas and Cleveland Ohio where NextGen TV did it’s first test there are some networks in 4k already . You can look up NextGen TV to see whick markets have it and which ones are launching soon. But the truth is they’ve enjoyed double dipping having to provide free OTA and betting consumers would rather pay cable or satellite to provide their local lineup.so hopefully smart TVs where your able to use your personal advertising ID businesses local and abroad work just like your phone and YouTube direct marketing will get those stations and vendors an incentive to upgrade sooner.
Right, I have a few 1080i channels and a few 720p channels. No 1080p. All of the sub channels are 480i, which is 90% of the channels. I only have 6 HD channels, the rest of the channels are 480i.
As others pointed out, I meant 1080i not p. I see quite a few things in 1080 on the main channel, but not on the subchannels, those are always low resolution and usually highly compressed (i.e. look terrible).
No doubt it depends on the market one is located in, I’m sure in some markets there is little 1080 content. So maybe a pointless addition for you, but the content I would record does benefit from 1080 capability.
Many of the major networks are in 1080i everywhere: CBS, NBC, PBS, The CW, and Univision are all that resolution. Fox is 720p, and ABC is either 1080i or 720p depending on where you live. ION is also 1080i, but only 30fps.
The subchannels that show old movies or 60s TV shows are almost all 480i. And the stations usually don’t give them enough bits so they look terrible even by the standards of that resolution.
Some of the major networks produce some of their programming in 4K, and offer it that way on their ATSC 3.0 pilots. But mostly not.
I use mine daily, and to be honest, I can’t tell any difference between the picture it displays, and the native 1080 broadcast. But then, I’m probably older and less picky than some.
Will Amazon eventually disable the Recast with an “update”?
I don’t think so, but I expect at some point Amazon will at least stop providing guide data, since that is an ongoing cost. I wouldn’t expect that to happen for another 3-4 years at least.
I think if you can’t get guide data, the recast would be disabled, unless you could program it like a VCR by specifying the channel and the time to record.
That would be a really bad PR move. Amazon can afford the guide data until the end of time. So, time for a review of other OTA DVRs options for the Echo Show?
Hey Len…
Who would have thought the Recast would have gone the way of simple.tv?
Do you still have your OTA blogs?
Well… this answers my question about what they plan to do about broadcast stations moving to MPEG-4 (which is currently not transcoded by the Recast) – Thanks for the update Elias!!
I think you mean ATSC 3.0. The Recast will never pick up ATSC 3.0 channles. The ATSC 3.0 channels are so sparse now that only hybrid 3.0/1.0 network tuners are being produced.
We’re in the early days of ATSC 3.0 introduction. It’s like ATSC 1.0 in 2003 or thereabouts, there wasn’t a lot to watch. Eventually we’ll reach a tipping point and the floodgates will open… either that or the technology will be a flop, hard to say.
Wow. This really sucks! I rarely recorded things, but I loved being able to place the antenna remotely from the TV and not having to run coax to physically connect them. I had frankly been waiting for an upgrade and not a discontinuation. Kinda surprised. This will end my Amazon-centeic setup if true.
I bought the two tuner version mainly for the free guide as the OTA on my Dish Receiver (211k) the guide is really messed up. Now this news. I wonder if there is some other unit and offers a free guide? I have noticed several newser channels we have received have no OTA guide or a wrong one on the ReCast. I called but nothing improved so now I have my answer.
Airtv2 and AirTv Anywhere have free guide: https://www.airtv.net/products/
I’ve had my 4-tuner for a few years, in a center closet where I drilled a hole in the ceiling to run the antenna coax. Has been very reliable in recording, and I like to watch them in the kitchen, with a 10″ Echo Show that replaced my TV. This will be a bummer.
The only issues I’ve had are deleting shows sometimes (“You’re not connected to Recast – check the Wi-Fi…”, but I can playback shows), which I try to solve with reboots of both fire stick and recast, but it’s not clear yet what the issue is.
Renatonico, I thought I was the only with that issue (can’t connect when trying to delete). I had Google Nest (replaced with Eeeo Pro 6 E). I thought that possibly the Recast was connecting on 2.4ghz and Fire Cube on 5ghz. There is no way to force it on either of those routers.It picks what it thinks is best. Rebooting Recast and/or Cube usually resolves it.
Same thing happens to me sometimes. I have to do a factory reset of the Firestick to get it to work again. I found that even when the stick causes that problem, I can still delete shows using the app.
I too had issues with deleting recorded programs until recently, when I upgraded to two of the latest fire sticks, and lo and behold I can now delete with ease, approximately 90% of the time. Hope this helps some of you…
It could have been great. An avid Tivo user, I bought the 1 TB Recast during that first Pre-Prime Week where they were $179. It actually worked really good, and I loved the integration into one guide of a budget pay tv streamer, free OTT channels, and my antenna channels, but was relegated to my use only because it was difficult for family to use due to interface (until the FireTV remote with the live tv button came out). Mine went on eBay when I got tired of visiting vacation home and only being able to watch my shows on my phone or Fire tablet. Still use exclusively FireTV to access in both places, but now they are used for Channels DVR with a Silicon Dust HDHomeRun 4 channel tuner with ATSC 3. Amazon seems to be far more mainstream than niche and I see the physical DVR being more and more a niche “geek” thing as the streaming services and their limited and expensive cloud DVRS take over. Recast had a great thing going with the free lifetime guide, but for the remote viewing I get with Channels I’m willing to spend the $8 a month.
I have the Rcast with 500gb storage 4 tuners. Use mine every day. Fast forward past commercials. I love it. I have six firesticks can access it through any two at the same time without running extra coax to access over the air broadcast. Access home broadcast when I away through my mobile phone and mirror to another tv.
Hope amazon doesn’t ignore this device.
Hi Rik, I have a channel in my market(Phoenix) that broadcasts in MPEG-4. It does not generate a picture (only sound) on my Recast (as it only supports the older MPEG-2) I have an 2 Tuner Silicon Dust HDHomeRun (it’s older than the Recast) that DOES decode the channel. I learned of this change from Tyler (The Antenna Man) who reviews antennas and provided updates on things like NextGen TV(ATSC 3.0) and other OTA topics. It sounds like broadcast stations will be moving to the MPEG-4 standard (perhaps as part of the NextGen TV rollout, but it speaks to the fact that without any planned update to the Recast (software or hardware) it’s likely to become a $200 doorstop. Sad as it has (had) a lot of potential…
I love, love the recast! I have a Antop antenna and I have saved $140.00 a month on cutting the cord. The recast works perfectly. I watch TV, and the Recast record’s all we need. We have 2 fire sticks and we can watch recordings on either one watching the same recording at the same time on different TV’s. Amazing.
The advantage for Tivo is that you don’t need broadband internet for OTA. You can get by 100mb of slow mobile data per month to download the guide data. The recast should have the ability to record from streaming apps that support the tv everywhere protocol. If you’re using the fire tv recast you have to have broadband so you would want to record from every source, OTA and TV Everywhere.
If I was moving back to the Los Angeles area, I’d go pick one up at Best Buy as there’s a crap ton of OTA channels you can pick up with a piece of wire on the antenna plug,thanks to Mt Wilson.
But sadly, I now live like a hermit in BFE, with just a speedy innertube connection.
We have the larger Recast and use it every day. As our schedules don’t allow viewing programs live and we don’t want to subscribe to multiple streaming services to watch the variety of shows that are available OTA, we use the DVR function almost exclusively. The main reason for getting the recast in HD first place was for broadcasting thd signal over WiFi throughout our house. I think this wouldn’t be such a niche product if they had hyped it as much as Alexa. Most people have never heard of it.
Well, I just hope they continue enough support that I get to use it long enough to get my money’s worth out of it, as I haven’t had mine that long. I have internet, and all my 6 TVs are “smart”, so without the recast, I have zero use for any of these Fire sticks I bought either. And this probably wouldn’t have been considered a “niche” product, if they’d advertised it just a little.
Very sorry to hear this. I use mine everyday and love being able to watch local channels on every TV.
I was hoping they would come out with a ATSC 3.0 tuner version, which is available in my area.
Don’t they need to continue to provide the guide for OTA broadcasts on Fire TV’s anyway?
Amazon has disappointed once again.
Fire Phone
Fire TV Gaming Edition
Fire TV Recast
Promises and then abandoned. The Recast works, but has many quirks. Audio sometimes is not in sync, having to rewind and fast forward to sync up again. Switching between english and spanish broadcast causes issues when switching back to english where audio stays stuck on spanish audio stream. Many of these issues were reported but no official fix was made by their support team. This product had potential, unfortunately it was never enhanced beyond the basics. I was fine without commercial skip as the fast forwards was easy to use to get past commercials. In the end, I hope this is not what the future of their products will be like.
I feel like a sucker having paid over $300 for my 4 tuner 1T model but I use it all the time. I love recording live over the air free TV. The question is how long will it continue to operate as an unsupported device? My guess is not long.
That was short lived. Glad I stuck with my Tablo and walked away from FireTV products.
I will begin my transition from Amazon fire products immediately. My tv viewing strategy is long term which does not map to Amazon’s short lived product strategy. I’ll keep this in mind when considering Amazon branded products in the future. I’m sure this decision will affect spares and support.
Me too. Very disappointed. Looking at this as a replacement: SiliconDust HDHomeRun Flex 4K ATSC 3.0 NextGen . I guess it’s no great rush, but I’m steering away from Amazon/Echo/Eero starting now. Google Nest is really a better voice assistant anyway (at least for information questions). I’ll be slowly leaving my Amazoncetric set up as I start replacing things.
Support? There is no support. This group is the only support I found. Amazon seems to be focusing all its efforts on their cloud computing for business, and obviously its retail, but all the other things like Amazon Music, personal cloud storage and (to a lesser extent) their TV production business are all in a lower class for them, and at risk of being cut. Google hasn’t been as successful on the business support, and mines a lot more consumer data, so they seem to be the winner for us.
Recast is no longer available at any of the retailers mentioned in the original post.
Damn that sucks. I use mine every day during the fall; my wife watches a lot of broadcast TV. Sigh
I watch a lot of OTA tv compared to streamed shows, except when there is conflict OTA and it’s one of the networks who rebroadcast the next day on Hulu. If I can’t use my Fire TV for OTA (I will not buy a new dvr that requires a subscription) I’ll not be using Fire TV. I can’t be the only one. Hope Amazon has thought this through.
My recast stopped working two days ago. I have no more local channels after resetting today. We enjoyed it so much since we bought till now. It’s terrible.
Ok I’m dumb to all of this
I just bought the new fire stick 4k max so will I be able to sure it?
It won’t have any effect on you unless you have and use a Fire TV Recast, the black box in the picture at the top of this post.
Just ordered Hdhomerun Flex last night. Arriving today. Nvidia Shield arriving Monday. Already have HDD to use as DVR and plan on using Plex and/or Channels (trying both). Will be far more versatile than Recast and ATSC 3.0/NextGenTV capable. I’ll be selling my Recast on eBay while it’s still in demand. Already leaving Amazon Ecosystem.
Good plan. I might sell mine, too. I don’t really use it much anymore.
I’m happy with the Silicin Dust DVR software hooked into my Synology NAS.
I’m also moving back to Roku from AFTV.
I bought a Recast on one of the last Prime Days. I love it. I dont watch live tv much but I love to record some shows to watch later, plus I like the idea that my antenna tv is right there on my Fire Tv devices without having to switch imputs. I hope they realese a new one, maybe one thats not so big since the current one takes up so much space.
I wonder how long Amazon will provide guide data whether free or charged. I choose the Recast simply because Amazon does not charge for the guide data.
I really enjoyed the recast, especially the feature that syncs with other live apps. What are the apps that would replace the features of the recast the were mentioned in the article
Me too just go to 1 live guide and I have all my OTA channels along with Pluto TV, Amazon Channels, etc. Also if my internet is out I can still watch all my OTA channels. Seems like most of the replacements are cumbersome to setup or need to use the SlingTV app to see OTA.
It is more cumbersome. Using Plex server and Hdhomerun has some additional features that are fun to mess with, but not as easy and straight forward as Recast. Takes more tweaking and a monthly, annual or lifetime Plex Pass for channel guide and full function.
My cord-cutting plan is now up in the air. I planned to pay for two months of Sling to get the recast for free. If I decide not to wait for the inevitable replacement, then will not be able to get the deal since I have already signed up and probably can’t afford the full price. Thanks!
I just set up my new Hdhomerun Flex and set up a Plex server on an Nvidia Shield Pro. I split the coax cable between the Hdhomerun device and my old Amazon Recast so I can watch/DVR live TV from either for right now. Probably will sell the Recast while there’s still a demand. Recast is definitely the simpler device of the two. Bummer Amazon decided to ditch it.
Sorry to learn this since I just bought one of the damn things.
Mine no longer works with my Echo Show
Probably not working with your Fire Stick/Cube rather than Recast. Recast itself doesn’t link to Echo. I’m constantly getting frustrated with voice control of my various streaming devices. I have Fire Stick Max, Apple TV 4 K, Nvidia Shield Pro and Chromecast with Google TV. Right now they seem to be working, but inexplicably, sometimes Alexa will tell me she can’t control that device.
I am not familiar with Echo, what is meant by it no longer works? It is really going anger me if Recast functionality disappears from the Firestick.
Just realized you said Echo “Show”. I was thinking Echo speaker for voice control rather than device for viewing. I imagine the Show device would normally work with Recast. Never had one of those (probably won’t as I’m skeptical of Amazon Ecosystem now). I have several Echo speakers and just recently purchased a couple of Google Nest speakers.
I just checked mine and it’s working. There was one time when it stopped somehow and it took a couple of days to regain access. As usual, no messages and no troubleshooting possible. Rebootted both a few times in different orders and gave up. Then, the next day it started working again. I learned that the echo show caches the listing (I assume the programmers wanted the show icons to load faster), but it’s buggy. I have shows I deleted a long time ago which still show and nothing gets rid of them. Good luck!
It used to be able to display the news on my Echo Show in the kitchen and bedroom TV
By setting up a routine to turn it on at 6am.
Now it tells me “you don’t have any available video skills that can do that, please choose one to get started”
The routine worked amazing for a few months.
We have had our Recast set up since July 2019 and loved it! We finally cut the cord on Dish bc I am the only one that watches live tv in the house and I really only watch the news in the morning and evening.
Any suggestions on a replacement would be great appreciated! My husband and I spent an entire day getting the dang satellite thing set up just right on the roof and running the cable down the wall fishing it out of a tiny hole but that is sadly in my kids’ playroom, so I can’t even just use the cable to tv directly. So anything that I guess would be an OTA? I am tech knowledgable to a degree, but don’t know much about this
I bought a Silicon Dust two channel network receiver. I can view live TV from any mobile or desktop cevice, using an app, anywhere on my network.
As an option, they offer a DVR service $35 yr) that allows you to record off the air onto a compatible NAS (Network Attached Storage) device. It supports most major NAS brands including Synology, QNAP, and others.
I have both Fire TV Recast and the Silicon Dust DVR running, but over time, Silicon Dust became my preferred OTA DVR solution.
In addition to their two tuner ATSC 1.0 device, they also offer two 4 tuner devices. Each has two ATSC 3.0 capable tuners. All four tuners are ATSC 1.0 compatible. One of the devices is a tuner only; the other has a 1 TB disk.
Hope this helps.
Amazon never updated the Recast product nor did they add new features. When they demoted recast off of the Fire TV top-level menu about ayear ago, I concluded that the end of Recast would come soon.
I purchased a SiliconDust HDHomeRun Flex 4K ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV: 2/4 Tuners HDFX-4K
on Amazon last month. No completely free guide like with Recast, but several cheap options including life time Plex Pass.
If Amazon is building a 2nd gen recast for ATSC 3.0, that would be awesome!! If not, would like to see Amazon integrate other OTA DVRs into their Fire ecosystem guide that is currently on Fire Tv products!!
I agree that would be great.
I was just reading Amazon’s response regarding Recast again.
“Many of the features offered by the Recast are now available through other apps on Fire TV…”
That’s not actually true at all. Recast offers OTA viewing/recording. Pretty much everything else showing up on the home screen is only Fire Stick (apps like Prime, Netflix, Hulu, etc). The basic function of Recast is gone once it stops being supported. Damn, why didn’t they build an ATSC 3.0 Recast? I would have pulled the trigger immediately!
Being a new owner of Recast, I thought that comment from Amazon had an odor to it, but thought I was missing something.
Love my recast, hard to believe they stopped offering it.
I really like mine as well and just recently purchased it as a first step to cut the cord. This plan has been shaken. The product statement by Amazon that implied this functionality was being included in other products is not believable.
What a shame. The recast may have been a niche product and certainly was flawed (especially the setup), but it filled a useful market need for people committed to Amazon product with multiple OTA TVs. Hopefully it will be replaced, instead of dropped completely, with an ATSC 3 version.
Kind of bad marketing if they intend to replace it with a 3.0 ATSC. Since they announced they were in fact discontinuing it, I’ve replaced mine with another product. Not going back to Amazon now. Not trusting long term support for anything of theirs. They’re not going to support CloudCam anymore either.
Sad news. I have four TVs and have the four-channel version and we use it a lot. What are the chances Fire Recast will soon cease to function?
I had a plan B which which became my Plan A.
I’m using a Silicon Dust network receiver along with their DVR software. All recordings go to my Network-attached Storage server. It works well but is $35.00/year.
They have an app for most platforms – MacOs, Windows, iOS, Android, Roku and Fire TV.
https://www.silicondust.com/hdhomerun/
They now have a 4 channel 4K device with build-in storage, but I haven’t used it.
I’ve been using my 2 channel SD tuner for about four years. Over time, I’ve captured all 7 seasons of Star Trek Next Generation OTA. I watch most of my OTA DVR recordings on either my iPad or MacBook Air.
I’m not shilling for them – I’m just sharing what works for me.
I still have my recast, but am using it less these days. When they took the DVR off of the top bar and buried it, it became less useful.
Sadly disappointed in Amazon in dropping the Recast. I have invested in Amazon infrastructure throughout the house with FireTv Cubes and Firesticks.
I have been a big supporter of the Silicondust tuners and just recently purchased the 4K ASTC 3.0 4 channel networked tuner and have it integrated within my Plex and Emby servers.
Now if an Amazon device quits working it will be replaced with a non-Amaxon device, primarily either Nvidia or Walmart Onn android 4K streamer.
I am really disappointed in the way Amazon has treated their RECAST DVR product.
I spent several hundred dollars on buying Recast unit and having it installed. Now to find out this unit has been discontinued and with no further updates is a slap in the face.
I have invested even more on other Amazon electronic products. Are they going to be discontinued as well?
My commitment to Amazon electronic products is in question. I am currently looking at other OTA DVR’s to replace my Recast. Fool me once, but never again.
Jon Heyden
See my other comments in the thread about my OTR DVD solution.
This is a huge disappointment to learn that this product is now discontinued. I’ve had the 1TB model a few years. I have it in a closet and hooked up to an antenna on the roof. I also invested in 4 Fire TV sticks. So now I’m 100s of $ in. I get >100 OTA channels. I use the recast every day. I have recently noticed a number of glitches in the series recording feature. I hope they fix this quickly. It’s getting very frustrating to come home and find my favorite shows haven’t recorded.
I have had my 1TB recast since prime day 2019 & very upset to see its now an antique which may soon become obsolete and worthless. Contrary to what I’m reading in comments, mine still records series and displays on all my firesticks & echo shows, but I probably should test the new 4k stick and 4k Firestick max I just bought on prime day 2023. I’m actually reading this because I’m thinking about replacing my DLP TV’s and wanted to see if the recast stream would be awful on a new QLED 4K or better TV. I guess it doesn’t really matter since recast will need replacing once ATSC 3.0 becomes mainstream ♂️