NVIDIA gives the aging Shield TV a new lease on life with fresh update

Despite its age, NVIDIA’s Shield TV is still one of the best Android TV streaming devices on the market. However, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to recommend due to inconsistent software support in recent years. It has only received one hotfix update since NVIDIA upgraded it to Shield Experience 9.1.1 in November 2022, but the company is finally rolling out another hotfix to address some common issues.

The second hotfix update (version 33.2.0.252) includes a host of bug fixes and introduces a new beta feature that can match your display’s refresh rate to the content frame rate. According to the official announcement on NVIDIA’s forums (via 9to5Google), the update also fixes issues that resulted in GeForce Now crashing after launch and DRM-related crashes in streaming apps. You can find the full changelog reproduced below:

• Match Frame Rate (beta) enhancement
• Resolves issue with SHIELD drive filling up
• Fixes the issue of No audio heard when headset is connected to controller and DAP is on
• Resolves issue of Geforce now crash after launch
• Ability to clear HDMI 1.4 flag via factory reset
• Fixed video distortion on “RGB 8-bit Rec.709” display mode
• Resolved USB HDD/Flash drive showing corrupted after hotplug
• NAS folder info shows 0 B and not the actual capacity
• Mounted storages aren’t listed after upgrade
• Fixes occasional crashes in DRM apps

To get the second hotfix update, you’ll have to head over to NVIDIA’s forum post and sign up for the hotfix using the linked Google Doc. NVIDIA has listed some caveats to joining the hotfix process that we highly recommend you go through before signing up. The update should land on your device automatically if you signed up for the previous hotfix update.