I’m trying to replace my Apple TV with a home theater PC

I’ve decided to test a radical change to my living room streaming setup.

For years, I’ve used an Apple TV 4K for streaming, and while it’s been a great device overall, I’ve always wanted to try swapping it for a home theater PC. In my early cord-cutting years (circa 2010), I used a cheap Intel Atom-powered Lenovo nettop (now obsolete) to access Hulu’s website (still free at the time) and avoid its subscription fees on connected TV devices. Plugging a cheap desktop PC into your TV today could yield similar advantages.

This experiment could fail for a variety of reasons, and I’ve already hit some snags in my initial setup. But if it works, it could offer a lot more control over the streaming experience along with some potential cost savings over time.

The case for a home theater PC (in 2025)

I’m going into this HTPC experiment with a bunch of use cases in mind:

Ad-skipping powers: With a desktop web browser, I can use MultiSkipper to fast-forward through commercials on Hulu, Peacock, Tubi, and other ad-supported streaming services, and I can use uBlock Origin to avoid ads on YouTube. This could save a lot of money as ad-free streaming subscriptions get more expensive.

Password sharing: Netflix’s crackdown on password sharing doesn’t apply to website or mobile app use, presumably because it’d be tricky to block out-of-home use on portable devices. Watching on a PC could make account-splitting easier, especially as more services follow Netflix’s lead.

Unrestricted multiview: Picture-in-picture is a mess on streaming platforms, with inconsistent support across apps and devices. That’s not an issue on PCs, where you can just open up more browser windows or use the handy picture-in-picture Chrome extension. This could really come in handy during March Madness.

Unlocked playback speeds: Some videos just don’t need to be watched at regular speed, but with the exception of YouTube, most video services don’t let you speed up playback on smart TVs and streaming devices. By contrast, Netflix’s web version has built-in speed controls, while the Video Speed Controller extension works across a broad range of sites.

Streaming guides galore: While most streaming platforms offer guide features for tracking shows and finding new things to watch, they don’t work with every streaming service and they tend to be loaded with ads and upsells. On a PC, you can take your pick of streaming guide sites such as Reelgood, JustWatch, Trakt, and Plex Discover.

More entertainment options: With an HTPC setup, I’m looking forward to using some apps that aren’t available on an Apple TV, such as Nvidia GeForce Now and Plexamp.

The hardware

I didn’t want to spend a lot on this endeavor, nor did I want a noisy desktop PC that takes up a lot of space.

That led me to Beelink’s Mini S12 Pro, whose $169 street price is only a little higher than the nicest streaming players, and its footprint isn’t much larger either. While its Intel N100 processor is lightweight, it supports 4K HDR video, comes with Windows 11, and includes a fairly generous 16GB of RAM and 500GB of storage.

Similar products abound from other mini PC vendors, but I’ve had a positive experience using a slightly pricier Beelink SER5 Ryzen-based PC as my everyday computer and decided to stick with a brand that I know.

One caveat: The Mini S12 Pro doesn’t support HDCP 2.2, which Netflix requires for 4K HDR video. The SER5 doesn’t have that limitation, but I stuck with the cheaper model for reasons I’ll explain below.

The trade-offs

While I’ve barely started using this new setup, I’ve already encountered a few issues.

The biggest problem is inconsistent 4K HDR video support on streaming sites. Netflix technically supports 4K HDR in Microsoft’s Edge browser, but even on Beelink’s higher-end SER5, it refused to budge beyond 1080p. Amazon Prime and Max don’t support 4K or HDR on PCs at all.

That said, I only upgraded to Netflix’s Premium tier with 4K HDR (which costs $25 per month, instead of $18) for testing purposes. Max charges extra for 4K HDR as well, and vast swaths of other streamers’ catalogs are limited to 1080p anyway. Surround sound can also be an issue on streaming sites, but my living room setup is stereo-only anyway.

The other obvious issue is usability. Keeping a mouse and keyboard in the living room is out of the question, and while I’m looking into air mouses with small built-in keyboards, like this one, navigating a desktop interface will be less ideal than clicking around on a real remote. This will take some finagling, and the rest of my family will likely need to switch over to the Apple TV or the Google TV software built into our television.

In other words, this won’t be an ideal solution for everyone, and it might not even work out in the Newman household. If this whole TV experiment fails, I’ll likely repurpose the little Beelink PC as a cheap way to play with some Linux distributions; if it succeeds, it could be much a more liberating way to access streaming content. I plan to report back soon with new tips and findings either way.

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