Roku Review
I'll start by saying, I won't give it back. Its limitations have revealed themselves over the last week, and even though they are irritating they are not irredeemable. In the pros column, $99 isn't throw-away money, but nor is it silly money. I think it's affordable, and considering the minimum Netflix plan to run it is only $8.99 a month, it's doable. It was so freakishly easy to hook up - attach with the cables they provide, hook up your ethernet or choose your wireless network from the list, and get a code from the Netflix website to associate the device with your account and - well that's it really. It's really small - the blurb said "size of a paperback book" but I would argue it is smaller. Mine automatically hooked me into Amazon On Demand at the same time, using my Netflix account. The difference between the two is that with your unlimited Netflix account, everything on that service comes free - Amazon is a pay per view service. Now why do you need pay per view with all that Netflix goodness at your fingertips? I hear you ask.
Content. While Netflix seems to have digitized a decent amount of their catalog, it is still horribly small, and what they do have is 50% watchable and 50% quite ridiculous (unless Pterodactyl Women from Beverly Hills or Nymphoid Barbarian in Dinosaur Hell are your thing, then have at it). This is the main con for the Roku player as a replacement for your movie channels. There are no big new release items that I can see, and only a moderate amount of movies that I would care about. They seem to be making better headway in television, however, and this looks to keep me entertained for some time to come. That said, they better be full steam ahead with new acquisitions to the Watch Now service, or they risk fucking up what is going to be an amazing service. As an early adopter, I'm used to this kind of thing, but I can't help myself. I often accept reduced functionality for the geekish thrill of being in on the ground floor of Cool Shit (*cough* my original iphone is a fucking dinosaur already *cough*). The only other con is actually the same con, with a twist. While Netflix has seen fit to digitize entire seasons of television, there are random episodes within these sets that are still disc only, which is more or less like sand in your knickers. This makes zero sense to me. I can't think of any reason they would discourage you from leaving the mailed disc service behind entirely.
So anyway, this is why I think they paired with Amazon On Demand. It fills in the gaps nicely, and the prices are not ridiculous. To use the On Demand service you create a pin the first time you go in, and this allows you to buy and rent (24 hour window) using the card attached to your Netflix account. We broke the Amazon/Roku movie cherry with a $1.99 rental of the new Day the Earth Stood Still. Gods that movie is horrible. If you rent or buy, Amazon stores your purchases in a 'My movies' section you can access at any time.
Did I mention this thing is fast? Well it is, even over my wireless. I have my provider's "Elite" DSL which means I get up to 6mbps (don't ask, I don't want cable and I live too far from the hub to get "modern fast") - even averaging 4.5 down as mine does, which is nothing to sniff at, it takes about 30 seconds to get a high quality 45 minute TV episode, probably 45-60 seconds to get a movie.
The interface is slick looking, and the simple remote feels nice and sturdy. The blip noises can be turned down, which I did, and they are reassuring during navigation. To Watch Now with Netflix, you still need to use the website to add items to your Watch Now queue, and they are immediately update into your Roku queue in the same order. You browse with a horizontal line-up of covers with titles underneath. Amazon is a little different, with everything available already accessible via the Roku directly. Unless I am missing something, there is no search, so for now you are stuck with browsing but everything is categorized and alphabetized for the most part, so no biggie.
Because the Roku streams, as opposed to playing from a hard drive, fast forwarding and rewinding isn't instantaneous. You get thumbnails of the scenes in a spread to see where you want to land, but when you select, it does take 10-20 seconds to reset its stream. I haven't road tested Apple TV yet, but if it works like Front Row on the Macbook, I'm going to guess it doesn't have this problem. That said, Apple TV is doing a bunch of things wrong to the tune of JILLION OF US CAN'T USE IT ANYWAY so that's neither here nor there. I look forward to the day when "they" offer a box that accesses all of these services with equal opportunity. Some combination of streamer and hackable hard drive would be enough to make me wet my pants.
In short - I love the Roku and am making good use of it. The only way to decide if it is for you is to go make a Watch Now queue on Netflix and see what you see, because your list will, at this point, be finite, trust me. Use the Watch Now tab on the home page and browse by genre - the splash pages won't give you access to everything. Decide if you want to drop the $99 on some slick tech and recheck that queue, deciding how fast you think Netflix is going to be fattening its digital catalog. Factor in the free access to Amazon On Demand.
Now go, consume.
Content. While Netflix seems to have digitized a decent amount of their catalog, it is still horribly small, and what they do have is 50% watchable and 50% quite ridiculous (unless Pterodactyl Women from Beverly Hills or Nymphoid Barbarian in Dinosaur Hell are your thing, then have at it). This is the main con for the Roku player as a replacement for your movie channels. There are no big new release items that I can see, and only a moderate amount of movies that I would care about. They seem to be making better headway in television, however, and this looks to keep me entertained for some time to come. That said, they better be full steam ahead with new acquisitions to the Watch Now service, or they risk fucking up what is going to be an amazing service. As an early adopter, I'm used to this kind of thing, but I can't help myself. I often accept reduced functionality for the geekish thrill of being in on the ground floor of Cool Shit (*cough* my original iphone is a fucking dinosaur already *cough*). The only other con is actually the same con, with a twist. While Netflix has seen fit to digitize entire seasons of television, there are random episodes within these sets that are still disc only, which is more or less like sand in your knickers. This makes zero sense to me. I can't think of any reason they would discourage you from leaving the mailed disc service behind entirely.
So anyway, this is why I think they paired with Amazon On Demand. It fills in the gaps nicely, and the prices are not ridiculous. To use the On Demand service you create a pin the first time you go in, and this allows you to buy and rent (24 hour window) using the card attached to your Netflix account. We broke the Amazon/Roku movie cherry with a $1.99 rental of the new Day the Earth Stood Still. Gods that movie is horrible. If you rent or buy, Amazon stores your purchases in a 'My movies' section you can access at any time.
Did I mention this thing is fast? Well it is, even over my wireless. I have my provider's "Elite" DSL which means I get up to 6mbps (don't ask, I don't want cable and I live too far from the hub to get "modern fast") - even averaging 4.5 down as mine does, which is nothing to sniff at, it takes about 30 seconds to get a high quality 45 minute TV episode, probably 45-60 seconds to get a movie.
The interface is slick looking, and the simple remote feels nice and sturdy. The blip noises can be turned down, which I did, and they are reassuring during navigation. To Watch Now with Netflix, you still need to use the website to add items to your Watch Now queue, and they are immediately update into your Roku queue in the same order. You browse with a horizontal line-up of covers with titles underneath. Amazon is a little different, with everything available already accessible via the Roku directly. Unless I am missing something, there is no search, so for now you are stuck with browsing but everything is categorized and alphabetized for the most part, so no biggie.
Because the Roku streams, as opposed to playing from a hard drive, fast forwarding and rewinding isn't instantaneous. You get thumbnails of the scenes in a spread to see where you want to land, but when you select, it does take 10-20 seconds to reset its stream. I haven't road tested Apple TV yet, but if it works like Front Row on the Macbook, I'm going to guess it doesn't have this problem. That said, Apple TV is doing a bunch of things wrong to the tune of JILLION OF US CAN'T USE IT ANYWAY so that's neither here nor there. I look forward to the day when "they" offer a box that accesses all of these services with equal opportunity. Some combination of streamer and hackable hard drive would be enough to make me wet my pants.
In short - I love the Roku and am making good use of it. The only way to decide if it is for you is to go make a Watch Now queue on Netflix and see what you see, because your list will, at this point, be finite, trust me. Use the Watch Now tab on the home page and browse by genre - the splash pages won't give you access to everything. Decide if you want to drop the $99 on some slick tech and recheck that queue, deciding how fast you think Netflix is going to be fattening its digital catalog. Factor in the free access to Amazon On Demand.
Now go, consume.