AMIKO Amiko A3 Owners Thread

Hi Everyone,
I have a similar problem as described above. My A3 looks like is all european model. I got this in March 2016. I was using it as Kodi and works fine. When I tried to configure satellite I see only Eastern satellites. Version is 2.0.78. I don't have any backups. I want to get Satellite Downloader App but its missing. See the attached screen pics, Pls let me know how can I get US satellitles.
Thanks
 

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I hope you don't take this the wrong way but backups are essential, especially with Android or Linux receivers with customized software. The first thing I saw in the box of every Amiko receiver I got (from the first Alien 1 to the sample A3 Combo) was the reminder to make a backup of the factory firmware and put it in a safe place.

BTW, which NA Amiko dealer still had A3's in stock in March of this year? I think the FridgeFTA store closed at the end of last year but I don't know what the status was with the authorized dealers. If I were you, I'd contact the dealer it was purchased from and see what he/she has to say.
 
Hi mc6809e
Thanks for the reply. Yeah my mistake, I wasn't aware of doing backups, this is my first Android box. I bought this from TI in classified, he tried to help also and suggested to ask someone in forum if they have a backup. But I don't understand why Spark App is not working, errors out with no connection. Does it need some special ports to be open in my router?
 
OK. That explains it. As soon as you get an Americas file and get it loaded be sure to make a full backup after the receiver reboots.

It will save a lot of problems later on.
 
I finally retired mine today. Used the toolkit a few times to rewrite the ROM but still get settings quit working and Spark has stopped responding, along with the occasional lockups witch reverts it back to European. In the closet for now it goes. I have the Micro HD sitting in its spot. Look soon in the classifieds for a A3 and a A2.
 
I finally retired mine today. Used the toolkit a few times to rewrite the ROM but still get settings quit working and Spark has stopped responding, along with the occasional lockups witch reverts it back to European. In the closet for now it goes. I have the Micro HD sitting in its spot. Look soon in the classifieds for a A3 and a A2.

Were you running Kodi on yours? I never did get around to trying it without it (I don't mean just not running it, I mean deleting it entirely) but some people seemed to think that Kodi might be the problem.
 
Well, I guess that kills that theory.

Would be nice if we could upgrade to a newer version of Android to see if that would fix anything -- although I have an Android 4.4 tablet whose manufacturer refuses to update it and it's never flaked out on me...
 
Well, I guess that kills that theory.

Would be nice if we could upgrade to a newer version of Android to see if that would fix anything -- although I have an Android 4.4 tablet whose manufacturer refuses to update it and it's never flaked out on me...
How does one obtain a newer version of the Android operating system. I mean where can the Andriod operating system be downloaded for free?
 
The android roms are not hard to find with google. The two problems are, Joe protected his stuff well, will a new Rom brick it? Also were to find a tuner app that will work with that hardware. Nothing is impossible if you have time and money. I just chose to lick my wounds and move on.
 
Less than 2 months after the last Recovery, the A3 is back at it again. It seems to me it does matter what Version is installed the issue will still arise. I'm upgrading to Ver.78 This is really sad!!
It happened again! This is now a cyclical occurrence... It now happens every 2 months or there about! :oldmad
 
Sometimes I feel as if they had a time bomb in them. All was well then all of a sudden everyone is having the same problem and Joe bailed out. Oh well it is one of my more expensive paperweights now.
 
Sometimes I feel as if they had a time bomb in them. All was well then all of a sudden everyone is having the same problem and Joe bailed out. Oh well it is one of my more expensive paperweights now.

........and the hype before and during push to sell the product was unbelievable.
 
So much for Joe working directly with Amiko to make sure the product was good...

And the whole "I can't offer a money-back warranty, only an exchange, because it's hobbyist equipment" story is one of the most outrageous policies I've ever heard, and I don't even think it should be legal! I've never, ever, heard the "hobbyist" excuse from, say, a radio vendor, or a camera vendor, or a telescope vendor... If your product is manifestly unfit for use, you don't blame the user!

Now, as to the cause of the problem, I think there are two parts. First, I don't think Amiko is capable of writing software without race conditions or memory leaks, because my Alien2 also had unexplained random lockups that were never fixed in any firmware update. (Another $150 down the drain!) Second, I don't think Android is fit for real-time applications (how the cell phone people have gotten away with it, I have no idea...) To replace my A3, I bought the cheapest Chinese satellite receiver I could find (it works fine) and the cheapest Chinese Android media player I could find. This latter was a real piece of work. It didn't crash back to the boot loader the way the A3 did, but it did lock up at random. I deleted all the pirate streaming addons that were installed in Kodi and it behaved a lot better, but would still get sluggish or even stall for minutes at a time responding to the remote at times -- very unexpected for a quad-core CPU! So I grabbed an SD card, downloaded LibreELEC, and it works BEAUTIFULLY! Super-fast and bug-free!
 
So much for Joe working directly with Amiko to make sure the product was good...

And the whole "I can't offer a money-back warranty, only an exchange, because it's hobbyist equipment" story is one of the most outrageous policies I've ever heard, and I don't even think it should be legal! I've never, ever, heard the "hobbyist" excuse from, say, a radio vendor, or a camera vendor, or a telescope vendor... If your product is manifestly unfit for use, you don't blame the user!

Now, as to the cause of the problem, I think there are two parts. First, I don't think Amiko is capable of writing software without race conditions or memory leaks, because my Alien2 also had unexplained random lockups that were never fixed in any firmware update. (Another $150 down the drain!) Second, I don't think Android is fit for real-time applications (how the cell phone people have gotten away with it, I have no idea...) To replace my A3, I bought the cheapest Chinese satellite receiver I could find (it works fine) and the cheapest Chinese Android media player I could find. This latter was a real piece of work. It didn't crash back to the boot loader the way the A3 did, but it did lock up at random. I deleted all the pirate streaming addons that were installed in Kodi and it behaved a lot better, but would still get sluggish or even stall for minutes at a time responding to the remote at times -- very unexpected for a quad-core CPU! So I grabbed an SD card, downloaded LibreELEC, and it works BEAUTIFULLY! Super-fast and bug-free!
Did you install LibreELEC on the Cheap Chinese Android Media Player or something else? Is it possible to apply the same measure to the Amiko A3?