[Nuluvius]

I'm looking for suggestions as to what device is currently considered the best and most pragmatic option for probably LibreELEC & Kodi i.e. best set of features and update support.

H265, 4k and Atmos (less important) are the intended use cases...

The research that I've done so far seems to suggest that:

• S912 boards have issues due to Amlogic support ref: here
  
• Rockchip support is at best fledgling to non existent ref: here (I actually have an Asus Tinker Board and am considering selling it)
  
• Odroid C2 seems powerful however its not the latest hardware/feature set
  
• RPi 3 seems to be a mature and well supported option but quite underpowered
  

I've been using an old RPi B+

I'd like to keep the budget under £100 ideally.

[wrxtasy]

Options:

Vero 4K (HDR) - excellent often individualised, prompt support. Quality hardware.

DIY S912 (HDR) devices are fine too. What you are reading does not in any way effect Audio or hardware Video decoding. The co-proccessor VPU does hardware video decoding. The GPU and its drivers are used to draw the Kodi Graphic user interface which is fine now as well since recent GPU driver tweaking. Ignore the warning. Many have and have virtually zero issues.

ODROID C2 is still what I use for all non HDR LE Kodi use. Nice and snappy with eMMC flash when Overclocked and using a Bluetooth Xiaomi Mi Box remote that has excellent responsiveness. Great combo.

All devices mentioned get regular updates and are well supported.

[Nuluvius]

Options:

Vero 4K (HDR) - excellent often individualised, prompt support. Quality hardware.

DIY S912 (HDR) devices are fine too. What you are reading does not in any way effect Audio or hardware Video decoding. The co-proccessor VPU does hardware video decoding. The GPU and its drivers are used to draw the Kodi Graphic user interface which is fine now as well since recent GPU driver tweaking. Ignore the warning. Many have and have virtually zero issues.

ODROID C2 is still what I use for all non HDR LE Kodi use. Nice and snappy with eMMC flash when Overclocked and using a Bluetooth Xiaomi Mi Box remote that has excellent responsiveness. Great combo.

All devices mentioned get regular updates and are well supported.

Thanks @wrxtasy for replying, I appreciate it. I must admit that I find the prospect of the much newer and more advanced hardware offerings of the S912 particularly attractive. Would you happen to have a specific device in mind? Being relatively new to this I'm a little unsure of what we mean when we say DIY. Are we meaning to source a development board such as the Khadas VIM2? Or perhaps pulling apart one of the more common plastic shelled S912 boxes one can find all over amazon?

[wrxtasy]

I suggest you start reading from HERE (click)

[Nuluvius]

So it seems that the Khadas VIM2 Max​ may indeed be viable. What about H265 10bit with it?

[noggin]

So it seems that the Khadas VIM2 Max​ may indeed be viable. What about H265 10bit with it?

 
S905, S905X and S912-based devices all play 10-bit HEVC. The S905 may dither down to 8-bit for output and doesn't do HDR, the other two devices do HDR10 and have a full 10-bit path (subject to software support)

[Nuluvius]

So it seems that the Khadas VIM2 Max​ may indeed be viable. What about H265 10bit with it?

 
S905, S905X and S912-based devices all play 10-bit HEVC. The S905 may dither down to 8-bit for output and doesn't do HDR, the other two devices do HDR10 and have a full 10-bit path (subject to software support) 

Software support which is available here right?

[noggin]

So it seems that the Khadas VIM2 Max​ may indeed be viable. What about H265 10bit with it?

 
S905, S905X and S912-based devices all play 10-bit HEVC. The S905 may dither down to 8-bit for output and doesn't do HDR, the other two devices do HDR10 and have a full 10-bit path (subject to software support)  

Software support which is available here right? 

 
Yes - if you want LibreElec then there is support there, if you want OSMC then the Vero 4K has good support, and there are also people running some Android builds happily. I'd recommend LE or OSMC.

[Nuluvius]

 
S905, S905X and S912-based devices all play 10-bit HEVC. The S905 may dither down to 8-bit for output and doesn't do HDR, the other two devices do HDR10 and have a full 10-bit path (subject to software support)  

Software support which is available here right?  

 
Yes - if you want LibreElec then there is support there, if you want OSMC then the Vero 4K has good support, and there are also people running some Android builds happily. I'd recommend LE or OSMC. 

Yeah I'm going the LE & Kodi route with it. Thanks for your help.