At a media event today, Amazon introduced Amazon Fire TV ($99), a streaming box designed to compete with Apple TV. Citing search, laggy performance, and closed ecosystems as issues with similar products on the market, Amazon’s Peter Larsen says the company sought to address those issues.
The box has a quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM, and dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi for fast downloads. Larsen claims it’s three times as fast as Apple TV and other boxes. Many apps are supported, including Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and of course, Amazon Prime. The included remote control supports voice search with a built-in microphone. fireTV also supports games with the physical remote, an upcoming app, or the Fire game controller ($40). It’ll begin shipping today.