Firestick in Thailand

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

2 hours ago, giddyup said:

I'm a little lost here. Why does Amazon sell an International version if the regular Firestick works in Thailand? And if I have the regular Firestick sent to me from the US will I need any extras like a new router, VPN etc? Remember, I'm not that tech savvy, so I won't be interested in messing around with routers etc.

 

Re the main part of your question re the use of a Fire Stick 4K in Thailand:

 

--you would not need to change wifi routers or mess in any way with whatever existing wifi router you may be using in Thailand.

 

--you would need to have an Amazon U.S. log-in and account, which you'd also need in order to actually buy the device from Amazon.

 

--you would need to use it with a TV that has an available HDMI port, which is what the Fire Stick plugs into on your TV (probably just the same port as your Roku device plugs into).

 

--once in Thailand, the Fire Stick might work marginally with a regular Thai internet connection. But to make full use of it as intended, once installed, you'd need to download and install a VPN app from the device's Amazon app store, just like you'd do on a mobile phone with the Google Play Store.

 

--Then you'd need to pay for and create an account with your chosen VPN provider in order to use their service and app on your Fire TV device. The VPN provider will give you a user ID and password for your account, and then you type those into the log-in screen on your VPN app to activate the service.

 

--At that point, you'd just need to select what U.S. city/VPN server location you want to use (usually West Coast locations work best here) of the various ones your VPN provider offers (all of which would be listed in the app). And then decide on the settings menu in the VPN app whether you want it to connect automatically any time you turn on the Fire TV device or only connect when you manually open the app and tell it to connect. In the case of using it with a Fire TV device, normally you'd want to set it to always connect automatically.

 

And from that point forward, your U.S. Fire TV stick would happily operate just as if you and it were sitting in the U.S., and give you all the same functionality and access to all the things available there.

 

-----------------------------------------

 

Re your broader question about WHY, in years past, Amazon sold the Fire devices ONLY in countries where it also offered Amazon Prime services like the U.S. originally, and later a few other European countries, etc etc. It didn't sell or even ship those devices to non-Amazon Prime countries such as Thailand.

 

But then a couple years back, Amazon expanded its Amazon Prime Video service more or less worldwide (trying to keep up with Netflix) to have a substantially crippled international version with only a small portion of the content available in its U.S. Prime Video world. And in order to support that expansion to all the non-Prime countries such as Thailand, they added new Fire Stick version (Basic Edition) that didn't rely on the big broad Amazon Prime services including Alexa etc. and instead had a standalone app for the narrow international version of Amazon Prime video.

 

Thus the Basic Edition wouldn't rely on needing a U.S. IP address or access to all of Amazon's various services, and instead would support just the international version of Amazon Prime Video via its standalone app and whatever local apps might be offered in individual countries. So that's why the Basic Edition Fire Stick exists and is easily available to Thailand. But if you were to use that, you'd only get international or Thai specific applications plus the crippled international version of Amazon Prime Video, but you could use those with a regular Thai internet connection.

 

 

 

[giddyup]

14 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

--once in Thailand, the Fire Stick might work marginally with a regular Thai internet connection. But to make full use of it as intended, once installed, you'd need to download and install a VPN app from the device's Amazon app store, just like you'd do on a mobile phone with the Google Play Store.

 

--Then you'd need to pay for and create an account with your chosen VPN provider in order to use their service and app on your Fire TV device. The VPN provider will give you a user ID and password for your account, and then you type those into the log-in screen on your VPN app to activate the service.

 

--At that point, you'd just need to select what U.S. city/VPN server location you want to use (usually West Coast locations work best here) of the various ones your VPN provider offers (all of which would be listed in the app). And then decide on the settings menu in the VPN app whether you want it to connect automatically any time you turn on the Fire TV device or only connect when you manually open the app and tell it to connect. In the case of using it with a Fire TV device, normally you'd want to set it to always connect automatically.----------------------------------------

 

Thanks for the response but I'm probably better off sticking with the Roku, that's all far too involved for me. By the time I've spent money on all those extras that bargain basement Firestick isn't the bargain I thought it was. I could buy a 50" TCL 4K UHD Android TV, add Kodi, and get unlimited programs for free. I appreciate your advice though.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

17 minutes ago, giddyup said:

Thanks for the response but I'm probably better off sticking with the Roku, that's all far too involved for me. By the time I've spent money on all those extras that bargain basement Firestick isn't the bargain I thought it was. I could buy a 50" TCL 4K UHD Android TV, add Kodi, and get unlimited programs for free. I appreciate your advice though.

 

No problem!  But just to be clear, the only "extras" you'd be paying for would be buying a $25 Fire Stick 4K, paying USPS postage (probably a similar amount) to send it to Thailand, and then subscribing to a VPN service to give you a U.S. internet address, which typically will cost anywhere from $3 to $10 a month.

 

[giddyup]

6 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

No problem!  But just to be clear, the only "extras" you'd be paying for would be buying a $25 Fire Stick 4K, paying USPS postage (probably a similar amount) to send it to Thailand, and then subscribing to a VPN service to give you a U.S. internet address, which typically will cost anywhere from $3 to $10 a month.

 

And maybe another router if the Thai one doesn't work well?

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

5 minutes ago, giddyup said:

And maybe another router if the Thai one doesn't work well?

 

I already answered that clearly... nothing whatsoever to do with your Thai ISP router.

 

Your Thai ISP router would provide your Thai internet feed to the Fire Stick just as it would to any other device in your home. Except, on the Fire Stick itself, the VPN app you'd install there turns the Thai internet into a U.S. one...just for the Fire Stick only where the VPN app is installed.

 

[DPKANKAN]

On 11/25/2019 at 10:19 AM, giddyup said:

Which Android box did you buy? If it was a MXQ Pro, mine has already been binned. It was a nightmare to navigate, ended up freezing and I couldn't unlock it.

It is. And works fine. Many friends have them for months no problem. Only thing is it only picks up my 2.4G WiFi not 5G!!!

[giddyup]

1 hour ago, DPKANKAN said:

It is. And works fine. Many friends have them for months no problem. Only thing is it only picks up my 2.4G WiFi not 5G!!!

Perhaps because I'm not that tech savvy, but I hated the thing, I did manage to get it loaded, but after that it was nothing but trouble.

[DPKANKAN]

3 hours ago, giddyup said:

Perhaps because I'm not that tech savvy, but I hated the thing, I did manage to get it loaded, but after that it was nothing but trouble.

I have downloaded other apps to it running all sorts of live sports films etc too!