HIMEDIA Q5 Pro Review: Android TV Box powered by HiSilicon

HIMEDIA Q5 Pro Review

HIMEDIA Q5 Pro is an Android TV Box equipped with the latest Hisilicon Hi3798c chip and Dolby Vision 4K technology, bringing a new level of image quality and colors. Q5 Pro Case has a Durable Design, made from aluminum material, enabling highly efficient heat dissipation. Also, Q5 Dolby Pro integrates sharing abilities through a wireless connection, such as Miracast latest, Airplay, and DLNA screen making sharing from your phone, or tablet to your TV screen, or projector.

Product in HiMedia Website

HIMEDIA Q5 Pro Main Highlights 

1. External WiFi Antenna.
2. Metal Made Case (Aluminum).
3. Dolby True HD 7.1 Support
4. Comes Pre-installed With Kodi/XBMC
5. Sharing data via Samba, UPnP, and NFS
6. 3D Blu-ray and Blu-ray ISO Playback.
7. Airplay features, Miracast, Hicontrol, and HiShare.
8. HiVXE 2.0 Video decoding engine.
9. Graphics and Display Processing Imprex 2.0 Processing Engine.
10. Connectivity: Dual-Band WiFi (2.4 Ghz/5Ghz 802.11 AC) ,  1x Gigabit LAN.
11. Capable of playing: Ultra HD  4K@60fps, 3D Blu-ray ISO.
12. Video formats:  Blu-ray ISO, and 3D Blu-ray BD-ISO,   3D BD-ISO with subtitles.
13. Audio formats: Dolby True-HD, 7.1 HD -audio, Dolby True-HD ATMOS, DTS: X, DTS-HD MA 5.1 / 7.1 LPCM, DTS, Dolby Digital AC3 all can be downmixed and bit streamed (pass-through) using the built-in applications HIMEDIA video player, or any version of Kodi with HIMEDIA wrapper (External Player).

Q5 Pro Specifications

Q5 Pro Package 

Package Contents

1. 1x Q5 Pro TV Box
2. 1x IR Remote
3. 1x User Guide
4. 1x HDMI Cable
5. 1x 12V – 2A Power Adapter

Basic Operation

Setting Display

The Q5 Pro comes with an LED display panel that shows the local time. To set it up correctly user needs to go to android settings and select the proper time zone and then time is automatically synced and displayed time accordingly.

Power and Display

In the front of the device, you have an illuminated power on/off button that completely shuts down the unit when pressed. When the unit is not powered, the power button color is turned red. Once the unit is powered on, it turns blue indicating the unit is operational. Alternatively, the unit can be powered by a remote IR Power button which is also very comfortable and easy.

IR Remote

The Remote control included in the package offers basic functionality, including “Fly Mouse” mode where you can move the cursor on the screen using the navigation keys, something that is less comfortable and slower in response.

User Experience

Overall user experience using it was very good. the remote control is easy to operate and is well designed with high-quality build design.

Other Special Buttons:

• 3D: Enter/Exit 3D mode.
• “7”: Change the Subtitles track during playback.
• “9”: Change the Audio track when playing a video.
• TV Buttons: Included such as volume, AV, and power buttons so you can basically use the remote control to control both the TV and the Q5 Pro Box.
• TV MODE: Default video resolution Switching is set automatically according to TV’s optimal resolution. With this button, the user can switch between different resolution modes: 480i /675i/720P/1080P.

How to Program the TV remote functions:

Step 1. Make sure the SMART TV BOX remote and the TV remote are in line. Then direct the SMART TV BOX remote IR sensor at the TV remote IR sensor. (Please keep a 1-3 cm distance between the two remotes.)

Step 2. Hold the SET key of the SMART TV BOX remote for 5 seconds. The LED light will turn on.

Step 3. Press the programmable POWER key of the SMART TV BOX remote, and the LED light of the SMART TV BOX remote will flash, indicating that the POWER key is in the programmable state.

Then hold the POWER key of the TV remote for 2 seconds. The LED light of the SMART TV BOX remote will flash 3 times quickly, indicating that the POWER key has been programmed.

Step 4. Press the SET key of the SMART TV BOX remote to exit the programmable state.

Q5 Pro Remote Control

Design, Looks & Quality

The Q5 Pro Hardware specifications are almost the same as the previous high-level Q10 Pro, except for the internal 3.5″ hard drive SATA Bay compartment which came at the expense of increasing the size of the product case.

In addition, the Q5 PRO is only equipped with 8GB eMMC compared to the Q10 Pro that’s equipped with 32GB eMMC of internal storage. From a total of 8GB of used space user is actually left with remaining space of about ~3.6 GB which could be pretty limiting. If you still need extra space, the best option is to install a Micro SD Card or connect an external hard drive / USB Flash Drive through one of the USB 3.0 / 2.0 ports.

Design and Quality

From my personal impression, the case’s external looks and quality are both superb. The product is mostly made of aluminum material which provides effective heat disputation through the case envelope. At the bottom (base) of the unit, you will find additional venting holes to get the extra heat out (As shown in the photo below).

Q5 Pro | Full View

Software & UI

The software in the Q5 PRO and the Q10 PRO are identical, based on Himedia’s special customized UI. The software bundle that came with the box was kept pretty minimalist including pre-installed Kodi media player version 16.1 (Jarvis) which also performed very well.

KODI/XBMC Support

Himedia added a special “Wrapper” application that basically lets the user choose if KODI will use an Android video player for decoding the video or alternatively use its default Internal player. This feature comes very practically if for some reason KODI has issues decoding very high bit-rate video files that need better decoding capabilities under the Android system OS environment. From my tests playing high-resolution videos, most of my samples played smoothly through KODI default internal player including 4K@60fps as specified in the product technical sheet.

Q5 Pro Hands-on Review

Final Words

The Q5 Pro is an excellent Android TV box, which offers both high-quality and good software support. Defiantly a good product worth buying.

PROS

• Great Kodi/XBMC Support.
• External WiFi Antenna.
• Aluminum Case.
• Excellent Build quality

CONS

• Limited internal storage (Only 8GB eMMC).