Formuler z Alpha good enough ?

by salawow

Hi, i'm new to all this IPTV and Android Box stuff. I have a friend who could sell me a brand new Formuler z Alpha for 100$CAD (Sounds great since the lowest price i can find for the Z Alpha in Canada is 130$CAD). However, by comparing the specs with other boxes, the 1GB RAM scares me a little bit. So, could you tell me if it would be good enough for what i intend to do with it ?

  • Watching 1080p IPTV (With occasional 4k, if the box is strong enough)
  • Watching Netflix and Disney+
  • Recording IPTV to an external hard drive
  • Installing and running NordVPN

Nothing more.

Is the Formuler z Alpha OKAY for that ? If it's not, could you recommand another one that is in the same price range ? (up to 150$CAD, but not more). I tried to search a bit, but it seem to always sums up to "Nvidia Shield or go away, peasant". Unfortunately, this box is way over my budget.

EDIT august 4th: Thanks everyone for your answers. I decided 2 days ago to buy the Z Alpha from my friend. At first, using the iptv server that my friend provided to me, the buffering was totally horrible, but after doing 2 hours of different test (changing settings, trying wifi/wired, and a few other things), my friend came to the conclusion that the server was having trouble. He's supposed to fix it this week by switching me to a better server. Oh and btw, i tested a few 4k "walk through [insert old city]" videos on youtube, and it plays it in 4k without any issue. The remote is really horrible though.. just holding it in my hand is a painful experience, it feels cheap as hell.. but i'll get used to it.

EDIT august 5th: My friend changed my IPTV Provider, and it's now working flawlessly without any signs of buffering after a few hours of testing. Thanks to everyone for your answers, the Z Alpha was indeed strong enough for my needs.

triplebeamz

The alpha will run most most apps you can throw at it. KODI wont run so well with a bunch of addons on a 1gb machine.

You will always get that response from sheild owners, they just proud they overpaid so much just to watch IPTV.

having an alpha, as well as Neo on my secondary tv it works just as well as my Z8 for IPTV. other "grey market" apps work just fine as well on it, just not as snappy as on a z8. Nord runs fine too.

Mol2 and PVR work great as well.

cteq1

Yes it is good to stream 4k. Alpha's big brother Z8 has 2gb ram. You can't go wrong with formuler and the mytvonline2 app is best in the market

res4me

If you’re going to be recording to an external drive, you don’t need a high profile money machine like Formuler. You can get the same quality streaming on a TiVo Stream 4K (Android device) for 1/3rd the price. Don’t get me wrong, the Formuler products are great, but from what your needs dictate though, the Formuler is not needed.

Products needed,

TiVo Stream 4K - $50.00 & USB-C (male) to USB (female) - $5.00

skomes99

Watching Netflix and Disney+ may be an issue.

The Formuler Z8 just got an update which installed the DRM to allow Netflix/Disney+, so Disney+ now works.

To watch Netflix in HD, you need the DRM and a Netflix certified device. There is a hacked APK that now works on the Z8 that allows non-certified devices to play in HD, but its no longer developed so eventually it may not work.

It does work for now though.

All this is assuming that the Alpha got the DRM update, the Z8 just got the update last week, so check to see if the Alpha got it too, otherwise you may be disappointed.

Newfeeflip

Why don't you just get the z alpha from your friend. Sounds like he's a reseller so he could easily buy it back from you and sell it if you didn't like it the box.

The specs are fine for iptv with the alpha. Even the z+ neo is fine for your needs.

triplebeamz

If you haven't bought one yet there is a contest for a couple free z8 over at r/formuler open to all.

MrBiglund

Just get the Alpha, it'll be fine, don't waste your money on something more expensive, you don't need it.