[Fire TV General] shyam09:
Hey everyone, a few weeks ago I had posted asking for experiences on the audio out feature on the 2nd gen Amazon game controller. I got some answers and I went ahead with my purchase since I was able to get $20 knocked off the retail price. This is my review of watching movies on Kodi while connecting my headphones to the game controller.

Connection

This connects via WiFi Direct. As soon as I inserted my headphone wire into the jack, a small notification appeared on the tv saying that the audio was being sent to the game controller. Once I removed it, sound played from my speakers.

Audio Quality

I felt that the audio quality was decent. Initially, I ran into the issue where the audio was extremely distorted (like the sound was deep and disgusting), but I disconnected the audio cable, restarted the movie, and played at some random part to ensure to the audio quality was good. I then reinserted the cable to the jack and listened. The audio was good. So I restarted the movie and watched. At times, I did feel like the audio wasn't very rich, but it was decent enough for me. Oh and the most important part -- you know how we had to adjust the audio offset in Kodi when we played via bluetooth? Yep, not an issue with the controller. Audio synced perfectly. :good:

Volume

I faced the biggest issue with volume. Kodi doesn't have a volume control option (since all it does is play around with the amplification), and there was nothing on google that I found that helped. Out of desperation, I thought about giving up and just watching something on Sling.tv (an app I downloaded from the app store), and while in the process, I changed the volume. Curious, I went back into Kodi to see if the volume was reduced (since originally the volume was extremely loud), and it was. I went back and forth (thank you FireStarter!) and adjusted the volume to my liking. I didn't have to change the volume throughout the rest of the movie. As a side note, the right stick adjusts the volume in Kodi (since a little popup on the top right appears with a volume bar) -- yeah, that does nothing.

Issues I faced

There was only one issue that sort of fixed itself. When I watch movies on my bed at night, I have a tower fan oscillating about a few feet from the side of the bed. This happened to my bluetooth receiver as well, but there were these noticeable gaps / drops in audio. Sort of like a hiccup. Anyway, I turned off the tower fan and the audio didn't drop. I turned it back on and the audio didn't drop again. It was a weird experience.

It's only been one day, one movie. So I can't say how long the battery will last. Since this will be used primarily for audio, maybe an occasional game or two, I'll keep track of when the battery need replacing.

Overall Thoughts

Strictly speaking, is $50 worth it to listen to audio while on the bed? It depends. Bluetooth is significantly cheaper and it is rechargeable, so you aren't spending a lot of money on AA batteries. I was facing issues with audio while listening using a BT receiver. Audio offsetting wasn't a big deal since I figured out my magical number (+0.375 sec), but the audio gaps really took away from an excellent experience. At retail price, I probably wouldn't go for it. But having received a $20 discount ($10 in GC, $10 in discover promotion), I'm going to keep it.

That's all. HTH. :p