Roar!, I've mentioned these units for a long time already, there are people that love it, and some hate it but face it, Nvidia Shield TV has long been one of the best Android TV boxes on the market, and indeed one of the best set-top boxes or media players. However it is time for an upgrade, sure. 

And guess what, according to code spotted in Google's developer tools, that refresh could be rather sooner than later. Earlier spotted by @AndroidTV_Rumors on Twitter, an updated version of the Nvidia Shield TV codenamed “mdarcy” popped up in the Google Play Developer Console this weekend, hinting at an updated version of the hardware. Immediately obvious from the listing, we can see that this box would be running on Android Pie as opposed to Oreo on the current version.

Beyond that, it seems like a new Tegra X1 chipset is being used as well. XDA-Developers explains that the new “t210b01” version of Nvidia’s chip is a refresh of the original that’s been in use for a few years now. Apparently, it will deliver better power usage and a higher maximum GPU clock speed. Unfortunately, most details on this new chipset are simply rumors at this point, so everything ought to be taken with a grain of salt. Nvidia Shield TV was released in 2015 and in 2017 a new model with a smaller housing followed. Both versions use the Tegra X1-soc, which dates from 2015 but is still relatively powerful thanks to the Maxwell-gpu with 256 Cuda cores.

Recap, the specifications are the same on paper, with still an Nvidia Tegra X1 and 3 GB ram. However, the software version has been upgraded to Android 9

Nvidia Shield TV running Android 9 Pie pops up in Play Console device catalog