Introduction

Back in December, I ended up finally pulling the trigger on an Amazon Fire TV. Initially, I wanted a Fire TV Stick, but they were sold out, so I bit the bullet and bought the larger and slightly more expensive model.

I needed a replacement for my recently-deceased PS3, which had been a reliable streamer for entertainment in my bedroom (basically, Amazon Prime, Netflix and Crackle). I was particularly excited at the prospect of the Fire TV bringing HBO GO into the experience, not to mention, less noise and power consumption.

Shortly after unboxing and plugging in, I was quickly disappointed by finding out that despite being able to install the HBO GO app, I was not able to activate it, because Comcast Xfinity did not have Fire TV on the list of devices to activate from their website.

At first, I figured I needed to be patient, since obviously this is an oversight, and it’s new technology, so maybe it’ll take a while for Comcast to get their act together and setup the pairing (or whatever else happens behind the scenes) with Amazon. I even went ahead and bought a Fire TV Stick, since I thought it would be perfect for travel.

Here we are, a few months later, and it’s turning out to be some kind of game of chicken, where Comcast is just refusing to put the Fire TV on a whitelist, even though customers have access to HBO GO on a number of other devices (mostly handheld): iOS/AppleTV, Xbox, Android phones/tablets, and Roku (after they put up a fight).

Well, not to be discouraged, and understanding that Fire TVs are based on Android, I knew I could count on the community to have some kind of hack to make this happen.

Since there was not clear step-by-step, I decided to aggregate what I did to get things working, and hopefully save some of you some time while these corporate games and net-neutrality politics get worked out.

Hope this helps!

Getting HBO GO to work on Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick over Comcast

What you need to get started:

A computer with Internet access on the same network as your Fire TV

A bluetooth mouse, or a USB wired/wireless mouse

Your Comcast/Xfinity credentials



Step 1: Get the mobile version of the HBO GO “apk”

The Internet can be a shady place when you’re searching for an APK outside of the official Google Play store. That’s why I was pleasantly surprise to find the existence of web-based services that appear to download the latest APK for you. Simply get the path of the HBO GO app from google play, and paste it into this site, and you should be able to download the APK. Beware of shady pop-up ads; it’s probably best to surf these sites in Incognito mode.

HBO GO on Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.HBO



APK Downloader: http://apps.evozi.com/apk-downloader/

Step 2: Get the Settings APK

The Settings.apk is going to allow us to connect a mouse via bluetooth later. You can skip this step if you have a USB wired/wireless mouse and a Fire TV with USB port. Fire TV Stick users will want this APK, though.

Android Settings APK: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2714494

Step 3: Enable Developer Debugging mode

Fire up your Fire TV and go to the Settings / System / Developer Options, and switch ADB Debugging to “On”. Also, get your Fire TV’s IP address from Settings / System / About / Network. Keep that in an open notepad window somewhere to use here later.

Step 4: Connect to your Fire TV via ADB

SideloadFireTV.com is where I got most of my information when I was figuring things out. Follow the instructions based on whether you’re Mac or Windows on how to ADB connect to your Fire TV.

ADB instructions: http://sideloadFireTV.com/

Mac, via platform tools and terminal: ./adb connect FIRETVIPADDRESS

Windows, via ADB drivers and command prompt: adb connect FIRETVIPADDRESS



Step 5: Sideload the HBO GO and Settings APKs onto your Fire TV

Continue to follow the SideloadFireTV.com instructions based on Mac or Windows, installing the APKs on your Fire TV over the ADB connection. Make sure you’ve already deleted the HBO GO app from your Fire TV; you know, the one that Comcast won’t let you use.

Mac terminal: ./adb install /Users/ YourUserName / Desktop /com.HBO.apk



/ /com.HBO.apk Windows command prompt: adb install C:\filepath\filepath\com.HBO.apk

Step 6: Connect your mouse

For USB wired/wireless, just hook up the mouse the Fire TV USB port and move on, but if have a Fire TV Stick or want to use a Bluetooth mouse, go to the Fire TV menu for Settings / Applications / Manage Installed Applications and launch Settings. Here, you’ll be able to pair a mouse (and keyboard, too). The mouse cursor will appear as a circle on your screen, once it’s activated, and disappears when the mouse is inactive for a few seconds.

Step 7: Activate your HBO GO app

Go to the home screen and you should see that you have HBO GO installed. Launch it from there, and then use your mouse to navigate to the settings menu and log into HBO GO via your Xfinity Comcast credentials. You’ll find that the Fire TV’s remote control only works part of the time, since this app was not build for a 10-foot experience. The mouse takes care this though. I’d be interested in hearing if the OEM game controller activates a mouse cursor that’s useful for this.

Step 8: You’re Done!

You should now be able to watch HBO GO on your Amazon Fire TV or Fire TV Stick! I will say, the streams aren’t quite as good as they are on my Xbox 360, since this app is meant for mobile, but it definitely does the job. Also, you’ve probably already made the leap realizing that you could use this method to sideload other entertainment apps, too, right? That’s correct! I got Showtime Anytime running as well; even the live streams work. The CW app is great as well, even if there are some little UI quirks here-and-there, again, from this being a mobile app stretched onto a TV.

Anyway, I hope this helps you get Game of Thrones, Silicon Valley or whatever else is your cup of tea on TV tonight.

And if you don’t have Fire TV yet, here are my affiliate links to get your own directly from Amazon:

Fire TV (with USB port): http://amzn.to/1NuK7wP



Fire Stick: http://amzn.to/1HilP40



@porfitron