As you may be aware, Google announced a ton of cool stuff today. Much of it had been rumored for months, though, so the unveiling of the Nexus Player came as somewhat of a surprise.
Essentially an Android TV reference device, the Nexus Player is a $99 set-top box made in collaboration with Asus. It packs a 1.8GHz quad-core Intel Atom processor, 1GB of RAM, a Bluetooth 4.0 and dual-band Wi-Fi radio, 8GB of storage, and a microUSB port. It ships with a microphone-equipped remote for voice search and navigating around the UI, and hooks up to your TV via HDMI.
Following in the footsteps of Amazon’s Fire TV, Google is making a play (pun intended) for gaming. The Nexus Player sports a powerful PowerVR Series 6 GPU, and supports an official gamepad accessory that will retail separately for $39.
As Google demonstrated earlier this year at I/O, Android TV will support a bevy of entertainment apps at launch. The operating system also has built-in support for Google Cast, meaning screen mirroring and casting should work without a hitch.
Pre-orders for the Nexus Player begin October 17. Brick-and-mortar buyers will have to wait until November 3.
