Roku Streaming Player

[Gwynplaine]

Not sure if I should post this in general, tech, or entertainment. I think this is the best forum. I did a search for this and was surprised there don't seem to be any topics.

Curious to hear about experiences using Roku. I get a sense I'm late to the party hearing about the Roku. Do they work good? Can they replace a standard cable subscription? Are there better competitors?

http://www.roku.com/#1

[tyven]

This has been something I've wondered about as well. Seems very fairly priced and I hear good things but I'm weary of being limited to Netflix and hulu. A man needs his sports

[Kaisha]

Doesn't seem real useful for anyone with a 360/PS3 already.

They recently came out with Roku in Canada, but there's even less reason for one up here due to lack of real video streaming options outside of Netflix/Crackle, and limited bandwidth on internet plans.

[Pabst]

I got one because I was sick of lugging my ps3 and xbox upstairs to watch some Netflix. There are a few sport channels I think like ufc and hockey. Some of them have games like angry birds.

I like it. It's small and it does the job. Granted I would love it to be able to stream shit from my PC. If I could find a logitech revue I'll pick one up to replace my roku.

[6souls]

My Dad has one & it's fine. He mostly uses it for Netflix, but finds some uses for the other things. About half of the apps on it require a paid subscription & the freebies can all be found on youtube (unless it has changed, they're all pre-recorded). You're also dependent on a wifi connection which at times can be iffy. It's not perfect, but compared to what else is out there, excluding PS3/360 & Wii for Netflix, it's not a bad deal.

[Headspace]

This has been something I've wondered about as well. Seems very fairly priced and I hear good things but I'm weary of being limited to Netflix and hulu. A man needs his sports

Nothing will really give you sports besides ESPN3 or a subscription service (MLBtv, NBAtv, Sunday Ticket, etc). Roku has some user channels, like JustinTV, where you could probably find some shitty streams.

I got one because I was sick of lugging my ps3 and xbox upstairs to watch some Netflix. There are a few sport channels I think like ufc and hockey. Some of them have games like angry birds.

I like it. It's small and it does the job. Granted I would love it to be able to stream shit from my PC. If I could find a logitech revue I'll pick one up to replace my roku.

Look into Plex. Roku has a channel and it's a media server you set up on your PC.


I'm considering getting one. I have the $ for it and it'll save on my energy bills because I use my ps3 to stream a lot recently.

However, they just got a $45M investment from NewsCorp, so who knows what that means for the product.

[Pabst]

Awesome. Got plex. Now my old lady can be happy since I got her into downloading movies.

[Gwynplaine]

Well I don't watch sports and I don't have an Xbox.

Is there noticeable internet slowdown if Roku/netflix is running while at the same time youre online gaming? Like with any average internet cable speed.

[Caiyuo]

Have both a Roku and a WDTV Live box and they're both pretty neat. WDTV seems more suited to streaming your own content to a TV since it has crazy file support, but also has a good number of services to choose from. Haven't tried out Plex, though, so Roku might be strong in that regard, too. I think Roku's main strength is the variety of "channels" / services you have to choose from, but it depends on if they appeal to you.

[bungiefan]

WDTV Live is $10 more where I work, and I've been considering it. Main thing I want a device like that for is to replace the old XP tower hooked up to my TV that I just use to play video files off my network, where I could use a remote instead of having to remote desktop with RealVNC. It would also cut down my electric bill that way.

Roku says it only does MP4, and they point you to HandBrake to convert anything you have that isn't in that format, which is about 4 TB of my video library. WDTV plays everything I've ever heard of, and has an ethernet port.

Roku says it does CrunchyRoll though, which I don't see on the WDTV list.

[Caiyuo]

I don't know about Crunchyroll either, but if anime is at all a thing for you, I'll just warn that WDTV doesn't do styled subs. I don't know if it's on their roadmap at all, but for now they just come out like any other plain text srt subs you'd see. No idea with Roku or if Crunchyroll's stream is done in a way that they play like hard-subs.

[bungiefan]

If I watch something with stylized subs, they're hardsubs.

[Jakson]

I got one for my mom, it seems to hardly pick up the wifi signal (3 walls in between, maybe 20 feet) and gets ridiculously hot.

[Hirronimus]

My parents own Roku 2 XS model and it's great. They can subscribe to Russian Netflix equivalent channel and pay only $10 a month for it's use. I'm not sure if if it's the issue with player itself or the Russian site they get their programs from, but occasionally you get loading prompt whenever you watch a stream.

@Jakson: They've had similar issues with wifi. Roku XS has dual connection; ethernet and wifi. I bought them electrical outlet ethernet plug and just run internet through there. Solves any issues with connectivity they had before.

[Gwynplaine]

I bought them electrical outlet ethernet plug and just run internet through there. Solves any issues with connectivity they had before.

Wow I never heard of that, those are cool.

[Hirronimus]

It's great if you don't feel like drilling holes in the wall or running a 30' wire across your house.

[Franzer]

I use one wirelessly in my bedroom, and use plex to stream from my media server. The quality is decent enough on wireless, but there's mixed opinions on the internet. The extra channels are just a perk for me.