Amazon Fire Stick: Complete Guide
By Bradly Spicer July 21st, 2020The Amazon Firestick is a fantastic little streaming device, whether you go standard or 4k, it’s perfect for turning any dumb TV into a Smart TV on a budget.
In essence, the Amazon Fire TV Stick allows for seemless video streaming services direct to your TV without any hassle, perfect for any Smart Home. It’s developed by Amazon and is considered one of the major products that Amazon continously supports (Likely because it’s integrated with the Amazon Prime Video Service).
Table of Contents
How to Turn Off Amazon Fire Stick
To confirm, the only way to full turn off the Amazon Fire Stick is to unplug it or turn it off at the wall. The device is always on but when left it will simply put itself into sleep mode.
Want to put it into sleep mode? Follow these Steps to turn off our Firestick with your remote:
- Simply press the power button located on the top left of the remote, I find this typically doesn’t work very well. My next suggestion would be to hold it down for 5-10 seconds. If this doesn’t work please follow the nest steps.
- Hold Down the Home Button located in the center of your remote
- Scroll to the right until you see a button labelled “Sleep” with a Moon Icon, select this option
- Your Fire Stick will now turn the device off, to wake it up simply press any button on the remote.
Note: From personal experience, even in sleep mode the Amazon Fire Stick runs hot. Older models also have had issues with heat, so if you can use a Smart Plug to turn it off occasionally that will likely provide a longer life span.
How to Turn Off Amazon Fire TV Stick with the Phone
This requires you to have set up the Amazon Firestick remote App on your Smart Phone or Tablet, if you have an Android it’s super simple to set up!
Installing the Amazon Fire TV remote on your Android
- Open up the Google Play Store / Samsung Store
- Search for “Fire TV”
- Install the Application as you would any other
- Once installed, find the Fire TV app on your phones menu and select it
- Make sure you’re connected to the same network as the Fire Stick via Wi-Fi and Simply select the Firestick you wish to connect to.
That’s it! You should be connected now and able to control your Fire Stick directly from your Smart phone or tablet.
What is Fire TV Stick Sleep Mode?
Sleep Mode for your Amazon Fire Stick is there to make sure your device doesn’t overheat or use power at a maximum capacity. Saving money is one thing but keeping a device powered constantly that has no real cooling is in my opinion, a hazard.
If your Firestick is overheating, consider using the HDMI extender to give it some more breathing room from the back of your television.
The Fire Stick automatically puts itself to sleep after around 5-10 minutes, so there’s no real need to forcefully try and engage a sleep on the device unless it’s a force of habbit.
What’s the difference between the Amazon Fire Stick and Fire Stick 4K
Other than the obvious difference that the Fire Stick streams in UHD 4K, what else does the 4K version offer to it’s standard variant?
For the most part, you would want to get this device for the Dolby Atmos support alone, it’s absolute fantastic, boasting a quad-core processer and 1GB of Ram just for streaming.
The 4K variant of the Firestick is only an additional £10/$10, as such, it really is a great investment. The 4K device doesn’t provide any free access to Amazon Prime, but you can always get a free trial here.
What is the difference between the Fire TV Cube and Fire Stick 4K
The Fire TV Cube really isn’t worth getting, itcosts a lot more money and the most you get out of it in comparison to the 4K stick is that it can tune into Live TV and has more resources (Hexa-core processor).
As such, you’ll get access to a quicker experience also in 4K Ultra HD, HDR, HDR10+ and Dolby Vision. But at the price of £60 / $70 more than the Fire stick 4K, is that really worth it?
| Fire TV Stick | Fire TV Stick 4K | Fire TV Cube | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost of device | £39.99 | £49.99 | £109.99 |
| Our Rating | 3.5/5 | 5/5 | 4/5 |
| Picture Quality | Up to 1080p (HD) | Up to 4K Ultra HD (Supports HDR, HDR 10, HDR 10+, HLG and Dolby Vision) | Up to 4K Ultra HD (Supports HDR, HDR 10, HDR 10+, HLG and Dolby Vision) |
| Built in Speaker? | No | No | Yes |
| Far-field Voice Control? | No | No | Yes |
| TV and Device control with Alexa Voice Remote? | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Listen to Fire TV Services with Bluetooth headphones? | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| What Processor does it use? | Quad-Core | Quad-Core | Hexa-Core |
| How much Onboard storage is there? | 8GB | 8GB | 16GB |
| Support Audio Types | Dolby Audio | Dolby Atmos | Dolby Atmos |
| 802.11ac Dual-Band MIMO Wi-Fi? | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Ethernet Support? | Optional Adaptor | Optional Adaptor | Adaptor Included |
Where can you get the Amazon Fire Stick?
The best place to get the Amazon Fire Stick, Fire Stick 4K or the Fire TV Cube is directly through Amazon via those links, otherwise, a second hand store or via a Facebook Group would be your best bet.
The Firestick can be Factory Reset should you have any issues or have a device with someone elses account on it.
Why is my Amazon Fire Stick remote not working?
Without knowing the exact issue you’re having, it’s extremely difficult to resolve this, however, feel free to post in the comments your issue and I’ll do my best to answer for you.
One of the more common issues I’ve seen and experienced is that on a battery change the remote simply won’t work anymore.
I changed my remote batteries and now it won’t connect?
Whilst I recommend not using any off-brand or cheap batteries this fix often resolves the issue at hand:
- Insert your new batteries into the Fire Stick Remote
- Hold the Home Button for 10 seconds
- This should now re-pair with your Local Firestick
My Home Screen won’t load?
I get this all the time, it came down to my walls being too thick and it not being able to connect to the internet or the internet connection being so weak it took too long to load the page.
My solution? Use a Wi-Fi Range extender, it works wonders once set up. I can often leave it turned on and once the Fire-stick is connected to it, it has no issues!
One issue with this is that it’s technically a different network, so your Alexa devices may not work with it (The remote will)
My Amazon Fire Stick Menu Buttons are stuck
The Amazon Fire Stick menu buttons actually allow you to pop off the front plate to allow you to re-assign / rejig it.
How did I find this out? I sat on my remote and found putting everything back together that the input buttons were a lot more responsive.
It takes a little force (I used a flathead screw driver) but once done, make sure the gel circle doesn’t change alignment to the one in the picture seen.
Can I factory reset the Amazon Fire Stick without the remote?
If you wish to do this without the actual remote, it does require you to follow the steps above and use the mobile app virtual remote.
Once you have access to this app and have assigned it to the Fire Stick, follow these steps:
- Make sure you’re on the main home screen
- Scroll to the right untill you see “Settings”
- On Settings, select “My Fire TV”
- From here, select Factory Reset Firestick
- There will be a confirmation prompt, select to continue and wait whilst this resets your device
- It may reboot multiple times, allow it to continue until you’re on the initial set up screen
Is it possible to Jailbreak it?
You can Jailbreak an Amazon Firestick, however, I must suggest this be avoided unless you have spare Firesticks or know what you’re doing.
Because of the way the Fire Stick is set up, you can use APK files which are typically for Android devices. Firesticktricks.com has a fantastic guide on this here
Can I install Kodi on the Amazon Fire Stick?
Yes you can, following very similar steps above you will be able to control the access to third party applications on your Firestick and as such install an APK for Kodi directly on your Firestick.
Troypoint has a guide on this which allows you to simply use a URL to install the application.
How do I download YouTube?
YouTube can be downloaded directly onto the Firestick (If it’s not already) via the search option. Simply press the voice button on your firestick remote and ask for YouTube.
Your Firestick will then prompt you with a YouTube screen and download button as required.
