One of the busiest segments of the Android market is TV/PCs-on-a-stick, with a variety of devices constantly rolling out from various overseas manufacturers.
Recently, an Android-powered TV stick manufactured by the Japanese firm KDDI began making the obligatory round. Dubbed the AU Smart TV Stick, the device is powered by a Texas Instruments OMAP 4430 chip.
The device boasts a typical Android TV stick appearance, looking like a chubby flash drive. One of the differences between this device and some of the others we’ve seen is that rather than having HDMI connector sticking out one end, the AU Smart TV Stick appears to have a standard HDMI port.
It also ships with a large wireless remote control, making it easy to control the content from across the room. The device is powered by a PowerVR SGX 540 GPU along with 1 GB of RAM, 4 GB of integrated storage, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, a micro USB port and a microSD card slot for storage expansion.
The AU Smart TV Stick runs Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) and supports full access to the Google Play store. However, as with many Android-powered TV sticks, quite a lot of the apps on the rather expansive storefront simply won’t work.
The Smart TV Stick is currently available for about $99 in Japan.
