yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Fire TV General] BlueChris:
Guys strangely Neflix after rooting says an error now... anyone else experience this? if not then something must huppened to unlocator that i use to show my aftv in US
[Fire TV General] Luxferro:
Netflix still works fine here after rooting.
[Fire TV General] Naddict:
Per info in post #1...and this..http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2783805...

Closing this bounty thread. Thanks folks.
[Fire TV General] jcase:
Pretty sure this is a qualcomm prop but ive never taken time to look at it.

Only the initial firmware, the root i intended to release, involved using /ota.sh which would perform chmod 666 /data/local/tmp/somefile. However they fixed this the first OTA, which everyone has to take to setup the unit.

I guess potentially exploitable still, with a virigin box and intercepting the update check
[Fire TV General] Valkyrie743:
awesome work !!!!!

once this bad boy has public root and i can install XBMC. im buying one of these. finally a nice set top box that can do netflix and all the other apps AND XBMC !!!!!! :)

hopefully ;)
[Fire TV General] garvani:
ummm xbmc is already running on the firetv. You don't need root to sideload apps.
[Fire TV General] Valkyrie743:
really?? i thought amazon would have locked down side loading apps on this. (why i thought i would need root)

o ****, i think ill be ordering one tonight.
[Fire TV General] Montisaquadeis:
May I recommend you take a look at this thread?

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=191109
[Fire TV General] garvani:
you can safely ignore the first 60 odd pages.. Xbmc is running for the most part fine on the firetv,. Xbmc 13 (gotham) is now up and running, there are a few things that arn't quite right but its getting there. 1080p, dts/DD is working.
[Fire TV General] elmerohueso:
Pretty much all you need to know is on the XBMC wiki page for the Fire TV: http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Amazon_Fire_TV.
[Fire TV General] tennisbgc:
though you may still want to wait for root if plan attaching a hard drive to it like I plan on doing
[Fire TV General] fazzy:
Yes that is exactly what I want to do with it .. XBMC and attaching my 4TB External HD
[Fire TV General] halmo20:
I'm accessing my NAS through network share built in to XBMC which is like having external HDD..
[Fire TV General] reposter432:
If we can eventually attach HDDs, I'll be all over this thing.
[Fire TV General] 2fastkuztoms:
If you have a modern router with usb connection you don't need to wait for HDDs support. I have a HDD connected to my router and I load the content via XBMC. Works great.
[Fire TV General] gmicalzoma:
Besides all the normal stuff about speed, etc., on this box, I'm really pleased with been able to sideload apps like XBMC and AllCast. XBMC for Ouya works great and I have my favorite add-ons working like Movie25, 1ClickWatch, 1 Channel, Icefilms and Jupiter Broadcasting (Linux Action Show). It works great and will only get better once Gotham keep releasing full native support for the Fire TV. I'm planning on uploading today the latest Gotham build for Fire TV to play with for a while and compare to Ouya release.

I'm streaming using Plex ($0.99 now on Amazon AppStore) from a 3Tb WD MyCloud and from a USB disk hooked up to my router. Now you can do mirroring from your android phone (no more waiting for Amazon) using AllCast too! Plex works nicely and the interface is better than that for Roku. I'm a Roku 3 owner and waited a long time for them to enable Broadcom built-in Miracast but they never did. Not even a hint of someone even been close to root or port XBMC to it via sideload... Now I have a box that is as good or better as Roku 3 but with XBMC and Miracast Mirroring. This is a keeper!
[Fire TV General] Abrasher:
So you know... You don't need Plex. With XBMC installed it is easy to ad the WD drive as a VIDEO SOURCE to XBMX. YOU CAN FIND IT AS NFS (network file system).

All your content in one ADDON. There's more about it at xbmchub.com or XBMC.org
[Fire TV General] bkdg100:
jcase , any updates on root ?
[Fire TV General] adfurgerson:
If you use @ symbol it should show as mention in notification ex. [MENTION=4451357]bkdg100[/MENTION] .
[Fire TV General] kairnage:
[MENTION=2376614]jcase[/MENTION]
[Fire TV General] jcase:
I didn't respond to your first question because general un official rule is "dont ask for ETAs/updates". It will come when I'm ready or someone else is ready.
[Fire TV General] kairnage:
Sorry I will put on my Carnak The Magnificent hat the next time.
[Fire TV General] jcase:
I would like to see this hat, and where can I order one?
[Fire TV General] kairnage:
Ebay, Mine needs cleaning. ;)
[Fire TV General] jcase:
does it come in a blue?
[Fire TV General] themantler:
Will the fire tv be like the kindle in that every time there's an update and new way to root will have to be found?
[Fire TV General] krelvinaz:
Most likely yes. Updates will be full updates, not just patches.
[Fire TV General] CiDhed:
I just hope amazon doesn't take sideloading away. I could live without root if I can sideload.
[Fire TV General] screwyluie:
none on ebay... too bad, I want one
[Fire TV General] garvani:
Im hoping theres some way to block updates once its rooted.. Im purely going to use this as a netflix/xbmc box and have no need for amazon updates. Even if it means just blocking out the update servers via IP that will be fine.
[Fire TV General] kairnage:
Wear one these days and you get blasted for promoting racial stereotypes.
[Fire TV General] HemRoyd:
Good enough. So can you at least comment on what interesting things you may have achieved with the device since rooted?
[Fire TV General] jcase:
Sadly, I have to report I have lost one. My 3yr old took the one with the controller linked to it, no way I am getting it back.

As far as what I have done, I have played the fish game to completion before my daughter stole that fire tv!

Maybe [MENTION=5808528]robclark[/MENTION] or someone could put together a guide to blocking OTAs using firewalls/routers/dns. If not I will next week when I get home. This is going to be important for those wanting root, as I believe the next OTA may fix the issue before Google pushes 4.4.3 (which I'm waiting on for release).
[Fire TV General] Phil402:
Are you saying that one should buy the device now if root is desired? If i wait to long i might get an updated device and the exploit wont work?

I am living in germany and i would have to import it so i am not sure after all.

thanks for your work anyways
[Fire TV General] robclark:
I'll have to double check when I get home, but I blocked the download site that the first update was downloaded from on my home router.

I did look into it a bit, to see if there was a way to block the initial OTA. The problem was the https communication to amazon servers which tell the firetv where to download the next update from (or that there is an update to download at all).

What I'm not entirely sure about is what happens if you reboot (after initial OTA) without access to amazon servers. Ie. will it still get far enough to start adbd on the network interface. On initial boot, it wouldn't get far enough to enable adb without first doing OTA. And I've already cleansed my firetv of android, so I can't check this. But maybe someone with a non-rooted firetv could try that out.

If you can get to adb even if the firetv cannot connect to amazon servers at boot, then the procedure to root your device is simply to 1) buy your firetv asap and do initial OTA, 2) block it's access to amazon servers (or at least OTA download server), 3) wait for the current embargoed vulnerabilities to become public, 4) then root your device.

fwiw, for anyone out there who plans to put "traditional" linux (fedora/ubuntu/etc) on their firetv, I've started documenting here:

https://github.com/freedreno/freedreno/wiki/FireTV

(not terribly useful to anyone *yet*, but just a matter of time)
[Fire TV General] robclark:
yeah, the url I blocked at my router was http://amzdigitaldownloads.edgesuite.net/

I've put a few packet captures here: http://people.freedesktop.org/~robclark/firetv/

probably last one is most interesting/complete. That was from a setup w/ my own local dhcp/dns/etc server, had it setup so all the amazon server addresses it was trying to contact resolved to my own https server.

Interesting amazon servers that it tries to communicate with before downloading update:

http://spectrum.s3.amazonaws.com/kindle-wifi/wifistub.html <-- looks for that UUID in that file to confirm that it is online.. that is easy to spoof

https://firs-ta-g7g.amazon.com <-- that seems to be where it figures out that there is an update to download

and then ofc http://amzdigitaldownloads.edgesuite.net/ ... but that url is coming, I think, from the https traffic.. so next update could easily be freom somewhere else.. or at least I didn't find that edgesuite.net url hardcoded anywhere in the filesystem.
[Fire TV General] HemRoyd:
Would be interesting to me if I can have XBMC with addons that actually work. Also would like to consolidate boxes and maybe run Logitech media server and Hulu desktop on this as well. Have Netflix and Amazon Prime on my smart tv anyways.
[Fire TV General] robclark:
yeah, I dig the flexibility of having a real linux htpc setup. But (and I mention this to everyone) if you want a nice little arm setup for linux, and don't want all the headaches of a locked down device (having to jailbreak, potential risks of bricking, etc) then check out the ifc6410 (http://www.inforcecomputing.com/product/developmentkit.html).. pretty similar specs, but plus GigE and SATA and minus case/remote. Pretty good bang for buck.
[Fire TV General] ImCoKeMaN:
I have confirmed that after getting the initial OTA when powering on the device again without any internet connectivity adb does still connect.
[Fire TV General] robclark:
cool, thanks. Then yes, get your first OTA in and then block amazon. From my end, all I can say at this point is that it will be more than two weeks before I can disclose the exploit that I found (but at this point I don't yet have a date, so not sure how much more than two weeks). Possibly a different jailbreak becomes available sooner (afaiu there are at least a couple in the current sw). But as long as we can block future updates from the current sw, then there is a path to root.
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
How do you recommend we block OTA?
[Fire TV General] kevkranker:
Thanks Rob. I'm redirecting this url in my DNS server to avoid any update. Should I also block the other sites to?
[Fire TV General] nhumber:
my router is ISP provided and there is no option for blocking available so i setup a windows based simple DNS server to try and duplicate what you did.. i redirected it to a bogus local address.. to confirm it was working i visited the amzdigitaldownloads edgesuite url from my computer using my default ISP DNS server and i get a file not found webpage and when i direct my router to my local DNS server, im getting cannot connect to specified server so im pretty sure its working.. crazy how easy that was.. lol good work guys and im excited to get the FireTV stuff off this thing.. lol im in canada so its all of no use to me.
[Fire TV General] Epicrean:
It's bad form to ask a dev about updates... it's equally bad form for a dev to not release updates for extended periods of time.
[Fire TV General] krelvinaz:
You haven't been reading. he has.

So... planned release is sometime after 4.4.3 is released.
[Fire TV General] jcase:
How the heck do you want me to update something that hasn't been released? FireTV hasn't even been out long.

Do it yourself instead of complaining if you don't like me doing things on my own terms.
[Fire TV General] krasny2k5:
I only wanna thanks to Jcase for his work on this device.

I don't have one (i'm from Spain and amazon doesn't sell it here), but i hope get one soon from a friend who travels to USA next month.
[Fire TV General] trongthuan0311:
I have had one in Vietnam from US. Its a valuable experiece

My Fire TV is pairing with Ipad and bluetooth receiver through AirPlay and bluetooth :)
[Fire TV General] iggypop123:
Question. Will rooting help get access to the USB port, to attach external hardrives?
[Fire TV General] garvani:
This is easily bypassed. Amazon dont sell the fire tv in New Zealand either, yet i had one a week after they were released. What you need is a freight forwarder. You send the package from amazon to the freight forwarder in the US then they give you several shipping options to spain.

It costed me an extra $18usd to get it from USA to NZ which i thought was more than reasonable and took 6 days to get here.

The freight forwarder that ive used several times now is shipito
[Fire TV General] robclark:
yes.. although seems a bit flakey if drive is taking power from firetv. Seems to do better if drive is self powered or has a powered hub between it and firetv.
[Fire TV General] krasny2k5:
Thanks! very useful information for non-us citizens. I heard about those services, but never tried one.
[Fire TV General] underworld1234:
Will blocking the URL http://amzdigitaldownloads.edgesuite.net/, also prevent automatic app updates?
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
Thats what i blocked and i haven't received that update since ppl started getting the update so I'm assuming it works..
[Fire TV General] steellz:
What DNS server for windows did u use?
[Fire TV General] deanemj:
Which URL are we banning to prevent the auto update?

Are we talking about h tee tee p://amzdigitaldownloads.edgesuite.net/?
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
Yeap. And i can comfirm that it works. I reseted my box to original

State and it restored. On startup it was searching for update but couldnt find any. Once i disabled my firewall on my router it actuslly found the update, however once it started downloading i enabled it again. I canceled the update. Then i checked for update again and it couldnt find it... Hope that helps
[Fire TV General] deanemj:
Cool! Thanks, man. :good:
[Fire TV General] underworld1234:
Will this also disable the app (e.g., Plex) auto updates?
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
Not sure...
[Fire TV General] nhumber:
i used simple DNS.. which works good but if you set it to be the default DNS server at the router leve and restart your PC.. the DNS server wont start because it cant authenticate the trial key without a working internet connect and dns server.. so its a pita.. what you need to do is set your local address at the router level so everything is blocked from accessing the amazon update URL listed above and then on your PC manually enter your ISPs DNS information into your computers network adaptor so its able to start DNS server on a reboot.
[Fire TV General] deanemj:
For the other guy asking about blocking via DNS. If you own your router, I recommend using OpenDNS. It's super fast to setup and easy to use.
[Fire TV General] Stevie G:
Those links for disabled blocking is not working. Anyone care to explain what exactly must be blocked
[Fire TV General] FrostyOrDie:
I thought I had done this correctly and blocked the address. But I apparently did not. I hope this doesn't stop me from root once it's released. Or a way to go back is found. I can't even tell what the update changed.
[Fire TV General] kwiksi1ver:
jcase, can you confirm/deny when you get a chance that your root method works with the latest OTA that downloaded?

I'm not asking for a release, or a ETA, in fact i'm grateful that you are holding onto it and saving the exploits for a higher build with bugfixes/more features. :good:
[Fire TV General] jcase:
They work fine

im not "saving" exploits for a higher build, some of them are particularly abusable and im waiting for an qualcomm/amazon to fix the vulns, hence saying if you want root dont take an OTA.
[Fire TV General] krelvinaz:
In that all the apparent ways to block an OTA to the FireTV that I've seen here didn't work, do you have a suggestion on how to do that?

Mine updated and I never even noticed until I checked which version I had and saw it had updated. Like when I first got the device, there was no choice in the matter.
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
Blocking the site does work. I've done via my router firewall. I have restored my firetv to factory settings which deletes everything to stock. Update shows up but once i enable the firewall it tries to diwnload the update but fails. It works
[Fire TV General] deanemj:
Did you block it through your router? Which URL did you block?
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
Look through this forum it has been discussed already. I dont know the URL off my head..
[Fire TV General] nhumber:
i can also confirm that the method i stated in this thread is working for me.
[Fire TV General] deanemj:
I just wanted to make sure you properly blocked the right URL...
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
Well if its not updating them it must be the right one.. Which one are you referring to?
[Fire TV General] deanemj:
Err...I think I replied to the wrong person. I thought I replied to the guy who didn't properly block the OTA update. My bad!:laugh:
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
No problem.. Yea im trying to stay on this build in hopes of a root if possible.. Not sure what that new update offfers anyway.. Does anybody have a clue?
[Fire TV General] garvani:
I havn't seen anything about what the new update offers?? Someone in xbmc forum is saying there youtube and plex is now broken thanks to the update, its the only post regarding it though so who knows.

So the original OTA was 51.1.0.1

And the new update is 51.1.0.2?

I need to check this when im home, im not sure if i caught the update in time as i didn't know the build numbers. I have since blocked updates via filtering at the router.. Ive blocked the words amazon, amzn, edgesuite, amzndigital and a few others i can't remember, im trying to catch any possible future sneaky url changes ;).

Jcase: Sorry just trying to get my head around what you mean. So your expecting amazon/qualcom to patch your current root vulnerability soon, so not wanting to release a root as it will be patched over? Are there multiple exploits available? or just the one?
[Fire TV General] droider137:
Blocking the url did not work for me. Is there any way to roll back to the first update and try blocking again?
[Fire TV General] krelvinaz:
According to this posting, you can reset the device back to default and do it again...

My access point wouldn't block it either... but I then added it to my firewall and that blocked it just fine. Not sure what else that blocks though.
[Fire TV General] JohnnyPrimus:
Blocked service?

How does the Fire TV download it's OTA update? Am I blocking an HTTP request or is it done by some other service/port?

I'm using DD-WRT and can certainly set up an access policy that will block HTTP requests, but I'm unsure whether or not it blocks other services. It definitely allows ICMP through.

Is anyone familiar with what needs to be blocked? edgesuite.net is actually akamai so I'm unsure if I can set up a long lasting iptables rule anyway.
[Fire TV General] JohnnyPrimus:
Found a solution. If you are using DD-WRT, make sure 'Use DNSMasq for DNS' is checked on the setup page, then on the services page under 'Additional DNSMasq Options' enter:

address=/amzdigitaldownloads.edgesuite.net/127.0.0.1

This blackholes it entirely and does not necessitate creating an access filter.
[Fire TV General] {ParanoiA}:
Just got my firetv, haven't even opened it yet. So from reading here it looks like I have to turn it on and it will do a force update, and then will try and do an ota which I don't want to do correct? Or will it go straight to the ota where I don't want to be?

Edit: is there a way to get it to go past the checking for updates part? I have website blocked on router but can't get any further. Don't wanna update
[Fire TV General] Esso1001:
It will search for and download at boot
[Fire TV General] innovaciones:
Hello jcase, thanks for doing this, I'm looking forward to get the Fire TV and start doing some experiments, I just want to ask you if you already know if is possible to change the home menu to include the XBMC option also if there is a way to show the XBMC logo on the recent block? I did a little muckup to show what I'm trying to explain (my english really sucks)

And the last question, if there is already a way to do it, then I guess the OTA updates from Amazon will remove those "hacks", I am right?

Cheers!! :good:
[Fire TV General] garvani:
A guy over at xbmc forum has made an app launcher that will launch xbmc from the home screen of the fire tv like you have mocked up. He has submitted it to the Amazon store for approval, he has gone through the terms of service etc and from what he can gather there is no grounds for them to deny it.
[Fire TV General] FrostyOrDie:
So is this a bounty thread? If so I'll pledge 10 dollars. I really want to use the usb in the back to expand storage.

Sent from my shiny new phone
[Fire TV General] innovaciones:
Thanks for the heads up!

I found the github: https://github.com/who-is-matt/XBMCOnFire
[Fire TV General] arcwick08:
I'll put up $25 on the bounty. Not to rush current dev, but as a thanks to those working on it and adding huge value to the device.:D

---------- Post added at 02:11 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:01 PM ----------

Here's the apk link for the lazy;

https://github.com/who-is-matt/XBMCOnFire/blob/master/XBMCOnFire/bin/XBMCOnFire.apk
[Fire TV General] steellz:
Just wondering if there is any new news about the Fire TV root? Its been awhile since someone talked about it.

Thanks for looking
[Fire TV General] alwaysbless:
Guy who posted the pictures at the beg of the thread said he wont be releasing until amazon closes the vulns that his root requires, something about they can easily be taken advantage of. I read somewhere amazon wasnt planning another fw release until near the years end so we probably wont see root until around that time (IF the update even fixes them, which it may not) unless there are other devs working on it which it doesnt seem like there is much interest.
[Fire TV General] HemRoyd:
Which is an eternity considering the current state of the game and similar devices popping up everywhere. For me personally, the device is certainly capable however it's usability leaves a lot to be desired. I'll probably move on before I wait that long. I want more control.
[Fire TV General] jcase:
Firmware update is coming very soon, and root will come that afternoon. Don't update if you want root (if you don't care to root, do update as it fixes some risky bugs)
[Fire TV General] HuddaDudda:
Can you tell us the proper way you think we should block the updates from happening? Will it give us a choice or force us to?
[Fire TV General] jcase:
Block it at the network lvl. Router DNS or firewall
[Fire TV General] HuddaDudda:
Thanks. I am guessing blocking the addresses previously discussed in this thread? If not can you list them for us for reference?
[Fire TV General] ahoslc:
I cant find a firewall in my router but I really want root what is easiest way to block my fire tv from getting update.
[Fire TV General] robclark:
maybe setup a private network for it (if you don't not having internet access from firetv, etc).. at one point when I was trying to see if something could be done before first update, I'd just plugged the firetv into ethernet on my laptop, and didn't set it up to route to the outside world from there.

you could probably get fancy and setup a spare pc/laptop as a bridge/firewall, ie. ethernet from laptop top firetv (disable wifi on firetv) and then wifi to your home network (with amzn server blocked).
[Fire TV General] FrostyOrDie:
I just unplugged it and use my chromecast till the time is right.
[Fire TV General] alwaysbless:
LOL, same here, Chromecast + DS Video is my go to for right now. I dont have a firewall on my my home router either but what ive done as a temp workaround is enabled parental controls with internet access blocked 24 hours a day for the mac addy of my fire tv (this will kill WAN access but still allow local stuff to work). If you wanted to be a little more creative you could also create a free open dns account and block the edgesuite url at the dns level ( This allows internet access but is more risky in the event amazon uses different servers / urls for different updates)