I replaced my Fire TV Stick with a mini PC, and now my TV does things Amazon never intended

Published Aug 16, 2026, 3:00 PM EDT Samir Makwana is a technology journalist and editor from India since past 18 years and his work appears on MakeUseOf, HowToGeek, GSMArena, BGR, GuidingTech, The Inquisitr, TechInAsia, TechWiser, and others. He has written news, features, and gadget reviews for national technology media publications. His passion is to help people with their technology problems and gadget purchases. For that, he has worked for some of the biggest international technology publications, covering news, explainers, how-to guides, listicles, and product-buying guides. He has worked as an editor and managed teams since 2015. His expertise broadly covers computers, smartphones, game consoles, headphones, smart home products, browsers, and apps. My living room’s TV has had a Fire TV Stick 4K plugged into its HDMI port for the past few years. The Fire TV Stick does its job of providing quick streaming access to Netflix, Prime Video, and other services my family enjoys. As I delved deeper into building my home lab, the Fire TV Stick struggled to keep up. Initially, I just tried using the streaming stick to access my home media server and assumed that was the end of it. As my family started using Jellyfin and Emby for streaming content locally, the Fire TV Stick felt a little out of place. While it could stream just fine, it couldn’t handle any other work. Instead of upgrading to a streaming stick with the latest hardware, I decided to replace the Fire TV Stick with my mini PC. So now, my HP ProDesk 600 G6 works as a streaming device and goes beyond being a media server. The Fire TV Stick never matched what I had already built A dedicated streaming box with a locked-down mindset I was sold on the Fire TV Stick’s home screen, which reeks of convenience. I could install every major streaming service’s app on the Fire TV Stick’s home screen. Besides juggling more than a handful of subscriptions, the one thing that got me was Amazon’s promotional content ads on the home screen. It didn’t play nicely with the rest of my setup. And that’s why I replaced it with a streaming box that runs Jellyfin Media Player to watch content and a Jellyfin server to manage my media library. Though it offered a single interface for all my streaming accounts, the experience never felt fully satisfying in terms of video and audio quality. Instead, I turned to my local media library to stream content offline at higher quality. The Fire TV Stick couldn’t decode several 4K movies without stuttering when I tried streaming from my local media library. Moving my mini PC next to my TV to work as a streaming box Setup was mostly repurposing, and hardly buying anything new Fortunately, I didn’t need to buy a new machine to replace the Fire TV Stick. I used my HP ProDesk 600 G6 mini PC and installed Windows 11 directly. I did try running Windows 11 in a VM, but connecting it to a TV for streaming was clunky. I installed the official Netflix, Apple TV, Prime Video, Hulu, and other streaming apps on the Windows 11 PC, just in case someone wants to watch 4K content directly from the streaming servers instead of using a browser. The setup took an entire afternoon, and I wanted to use an HDMI cable to connect my mini PC to the TV. But my mini PC only had DisplayPort, so I had to order an active DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter. Then I configured Windows 11 to log in immediately, so it boots directly to the desktop instead of waiting for me to enter the password every time. Since the mini PC isn’t too large, I comfortably tucked it behind the TV. Native DRM support checks all the boxes My mini PC earns its keep by running Windows 11 for the TV side. The copy protection for the streaming services is handled natively, and I don’t need to dabble in sketchy workarounds. Netflix, Prime Video, Apple TV, Hulu, and other streaming apps are installed straight from the Microsoft Store. They run just like any other app, with no missing features or reduced quality. I went so far as to disable Windows Update to prevent the mini PC from rebooting mid-movie. There are no interruptions for the streaming apps. For the media server, it was easy to install Jellyfin Server on Windows 11. I installed Jellyfin Media Player on the same mini PC and alternated between it and the Kodi interface. The media browsing experience on a much bigger screen felt different, yet satisfying. Since the Jellyfin server and player run on the same box, I can open them individually to check if something’s amiss without getting off the couch. The versatility of a single box goes beyond streaming A full PC does more than a half-baked streaming stick Turning a mini PC into a dedicated streaming device didn’t come without challenges. For starters, the lack of proper launchers is a bit discouraging. However, I found the Streaming Launcher from the Microsoft Store pretty helpful. When configured to launch at startup, the app opens an interface for pinning shortcuts to popular streaming apps and services. That goes beyond the video content, since I can pin URLs for YouTube Music and a shortcut for the Spotify app. The only thing missing is remote and controller support, just like Kodi offers. Though I could install a custom launcher on the Fire TV Stick to remove ads and optimize its interface a bit, it still left a lot to be desired. Beyond that, I was limited to streaming-service content that could be pulled away at any time, plus lackluster casual games. With a dedicated Windows 11 mini PC, I can enjoy light gaming with my friends anytime. That wasn’t possible on the Fire TV Stick since it wasn’t a computer, but an app store with a remote attached. That said, I’ve ordered a universal Air Mouse remote with a gyroscope to control Windows 11 on the TV. Settling for the trade-offs and living with them I won’t pretend that the switch was entirely painless. The Fire TV Stick wakes up in 5–10 seconds, while I had to tweak a lot of things to make the mini PC boot faster. It wasn’t dramatic, but you’d know if you’ve ever stripped out unwanted programs and disabled a pile of unnecessary services. There is some maintenance and upkeep involved since I’m dealing with a proper PC rather than the locked-down TV interface of a streaming stick. So I occasionally keep an eye on whether it’s working more than it should and drawing more power. Irrespective of that, I won’t go back. My streaming device is powerful enough to run any media file I throw at it. Swapping out a streaming stick for a powerful streaming box is exactly the setup I didn’t know I needed. Jellyfin iOS compatible Yes Android compatible Yes Desktop compatible Yes Jellyfin is one of the best Plex alternatives you can get, and that's thanks to its open-source nature and powerful set of features. There are apps for basically every platform and it's completely free to run your very own server.