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FireOS

IoT devices like smart TVs run their own operating systems, as demonstrated by Amazon Fire OS running on a TV alongside Windows and Raspberry Pi OS on connected computers.

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About this video

Operating systems are not limited to traditional computers and laptops — they are also found on Internet of Things devices such as smart TVs. Amazon Fire OS is one example, a purpose-built operating system designed to manage the hardware and software functions of Amazon Fire TV devices. Checking the device settings on a Fire TV reveals version information such as Fire OS 7.6.1, confirming that even consumer electronics rely on a structured OS to operate. A practical demonstration of this concept involves two TVs both running Fire OS while each is connected to a different computer. One TV acts as a display for a Windows machine, and the other mirrors output from a Raspberry Pi running Raspberry Pi OS. This arrangement highlights how a single environment can contain multiple operating systems functioning simultaneously — the TVs managing their own internal processes through Fire OS, while Windows and Raspberry Pi OS independently govern the computers they power.

What you'll learn

What's covered

Operating Systems Examples

Aligned to

CompTIA Tech+
2.6 Compare and contrast common computing devices and their purposes.
3.1 Explain the purpose of operating systems.
CompTIA A+ Core 2
1.8 Explain common OS types and their purposes.

Key terms

Internet of Things
IoT
A network of physical devices embedded with sensors and software that connect and exchange data over the internet.
Operating System
OS
System software that manages hardware resources, provides common services for application software, and acts as an intermediary between users and computer hardware. Examples include Windows, macOS, and Linux.
Single-Board Computer
SBC
A complete computer built on a single circuit board, integrating a CPU, RAM, and I/O interfaces into a compact, low-cost form factor.

Topics

Operating Systems Fire Os Iot Devices Raspberry Pi Os Single Board Computers Smart Tv

Transcript

Another example of operating systems are things that we install on the internet of things. For instance, these TVs back here have their own operating system on it. It's called Fire OS.

Checking the Version

So what does this look like? Here we have this TV here, and what I'm going to do, I've got the remote right here, I'm going to click on the home button and that's going to bring us back to the main menu here. I'm going to scroll over to the gear right here, which is all of the settings of this machine, and go down to device and software. I just want to see what version of OS this has on it, so I'm going to look at some details about this device. What we see here is that this says it's Fire OS 7.6.1. So that's the operating system that's running on this device right here. Actually, both of my TVs are running the same operating system.

Three Operating Systems at Once

One thing that's a little interesting is that both of these TVs are running Fire OS, however they're connected to two different machines that are running two different operating systems. So this one on this side is displaying my computer, and my computer that I have right here, it's just another display of that, and this one is running Windows. Versus the one I have over here is displaying something from a Pi; I have a Raspberry Pi connected to it, and that's running Raspberry Pi OS.

So essentially what you're seeing here is an example of three different operating systems. We've got the one that's running the hardware, the TVs as hardware, but then also they're acting as monitors for two separate computers.

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