NVIDIA Introduces SHIELD 4K Android TV Console at GDC for $199

NVIDIA announced at GDC 2015 the latest evolution of their SHIELD device, now available for the living room. It is a AndroidTV-based device that is designed not just for 4K entertainment delivery but for games streaming as well. That is 4K @ 60Hz with H.265 streaming. The system itself is quite compact as demonstrated by NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang and comes with a simple remote control that can also accept voice commands and is USB rechargeable.

Inside is a Tegra X1 processor, equipped with 256 Maxwell GPU cores and is 35x faster than an AppleTV. This power also enables the Tegra X1 to perform almost twice as much at 512GFLOPS as the Xbox 360 with less power consumption at only 5 to 20W. As demonstrated at the GDC event, the Tegra X1 is more than capable of running a feature-complete Borderlands Pre-sequel directly from the SHIELD console (not streamed). Price is $199 and it includes a SHIELD controller bundled (not the TV remote) so users can play right out of the box.

Another major announcement at GDC was the launch of the NVIDIA GRID streaming service for home users delivering 1080p 60fps gaming from the cloud. This is a subscription service that loads the entire game within a minute as promised by NVIDIA, effectively becoming the “NetFlix” of gaming.

NVIDIA SHIELD Specifications: