So I got the Mi Box S a month ago. It’s been… Okay, but always kinda choppy. I’ve seen posts online where people recommend setting it to 1080P to fix stuttering, but I bought a 4K box, damnit.
After the box kept freezing up and I had to unplug it once a day, I finally decided to try and fix it.
I pryed the casing off, unscrewed the board from the top half, and found that there was a small thermal pad connecting the shielding on the board to a metal plate in the top half of the case.
I pulled that out, hacked a hole in the top of the case, and attached some small heatsinks I had laying around.
It’s not pretty, but after putting it back together, this thing FLIES. No stuttering, and so far no random freezing.
Here’s a picture of the VERY hacky work: https://i.imgur.com/TiDWvOg.jpg
I don’t have a dremal, so I grabbed a knife and my heat gun, which… Worked.
So yeah, I fixed all the choppiness/stuttering/lag/freezing on my Xiaomi Mi Box S!
Anyways, I realize this is a VERY niche post, but figured I’d share for anyone googling this down the line.
That’s a good mod you got there lol. Well, as long it works well.
>some small heatsinks I had laying around
#Small!?
Btw, great work! This deserves to be in
r/techsupportmacgyver
Environment. Some places are really hot and some are cold. Room temperature difference of just 1°C can have big impact on the cooling.
I have no idea. There are more factors, like surface it’s placed on, air flow in that place, heat radiation from other electronics and so on.
Nice job, but I never had stuttering problems on my Mi Box S. Maybe I have better air circulation around mine. Lots of factors that can combine to give problems with overheating.
TBH I’ve had Mi Box 3 and it was overheating in 21°C, placed on metal Blue Ray player. Every movie stuttered in 4K.
I got Nvidia Shield TV Pro 2019 and the difference is huge.
Do you have a fan in the room with the box? That might explain the difference.
Or just that both are playing 4K but different codecs or bitrates.
I thought my freezing and stuttering was due to the newest update. Only started happening since then, and I also have to unplug and start again each day.
strange… i have zero issues with mine
The heatsinks are noticeably warm, but not uncomfortable.
And yeah, someone else commented saying they’ve had to unplug their box regularly since the latest update, so something is just wonky.
Same here. I made a favtory rreset and now is working fine. Took me 10 min to reinstall everything but no more resets needed.
I remember reading somewhere that the update they rolled out, was more of an Alpha build, not a stable release.
The Mi Box is one of the few Android boxes that support DRM like Netflix HD (widewine at least). So you don’t really want to root the box.