Discussions

[Visitor45763]

---

@BourbonOwen wrote:

adding of streaming channels has immensely bogged down the up/down channel changing. 

---

I bet "recently viewed" slowed down channel changing. With favorites, you did all the work. You created the list, and the tv never had to do anything other than show you the list on request. Now they keep some kind of history about what you watched. Every channel change requires updating the "recently viewed" list, sorting it, saving it.

IMO, channel changing was already incredibly slow before the update. I'm not sure they even intentionally turned off continuous channel changing. It could be that the serialized "recently viewed" updating slowed things down so much that it misses the event (of continued press). Just a timing problem they missed. It's hard to believe they'd miss it. But, the resulting "recently viewed" list doesn't work. They missed that, apparently. 

---

@PGB1 wrote:

(PS: Look at their stock chart. They are doing a great job of making money- Price March 16, 2020 = 63.84. Price Close January 11, 2021 = 403.00. Roku knows how to generate profits.)

---

A couple of points:

    1. Stock price doesn't equate to doing the right thing. It's just speculation (among many whom the ancient chinese proverb applies: "10 million flies can't be wrong.").

Consider MagicJack. They had similarly bad customer sentiment, not advancing their product features. Their price movement was often used as "everyone complaining is wrong." After a couple years, the share price cratered and remained there until the stock was de-listed. You don't even hear anything about that product anymore (even though it still exists.).

    2. The time period showing great results (earnings) coincides with the virus (people staying home more, watching more delivered content). The questions should be:

        2a. How much better would earnings be if Roku actually cared about their customers, listened (not just a bottom-line opportunity while chasing short-term investor sentiment)?

        2b. The virus was good news to Roku's earnings, bringing more people in need of entertainment. Unfortunately, now there are more people receiving Roku's buggy updates. Getting a peek at the man behind the curtain. The problem which already existed is now worse (more negative word of mouth, etc.).

I liked my TCL/ROKU for a year or so. Channel changing felt slow. I didn't like how I had to navigate a few menus to hide channels (and fav metadata wasn't alongside the hide list). I didn't like how we can't re-scan as an update to our existing discovered channels (and hard effort adding metadata to them). But, I didn't have anything to warn anyone of (much). I would've given it 4 stars out of 5. Maybe 3 for antenna, a 5 for streaming.

That's all changed now. (I have a very real & personal warning, one that I wouldn't have believed if I heard it from someone else. I had to see it myself to believe it.). Unfortunately, all those new virus-driven customers are being exposed to Roku's dark side too.

The public trade of Roku is a good point though. Commenting on investor forums could help. Roku might listen to shareholders more than customers. (That alone speaks volumes. But, work with what you have. I think Roku is a good idea and could be so much more than it is. If investors could steer Roku in ways customers can't, that would be good. I'm not talking about vengeance. Just investors having an interest too.).

[Szalaj]

Bring back favorites... Recent Channel in some jumbled **bleep** order is not helpful.

[ncguy68]

---

---

@ncguy68 wrote:

I have a Mediasonic HW130STB coming tomorrow. 

---

---

The Mediasonic is NOT a good choice.   The remote sensor is useless.   The remote has to be pointed directly at the box exactly.    Changing channels is also slow and EPG is limited to only a few hours and some channels have no guide info at all.   My experience with the Mediasonic was worse than using the TV itself. 

[Visitor45763]

Thanks for the review. I'm sorry for encouraging you to try it. I'm going to try the ViewTV AT-300 & iView 3500. They may not be any better. I was thinking these might be like the "voucher" DTV converter boxes. They're essentially the same functionality (but with HDMI output, and recording capability). I had good experiences with those.

I know the MediaSonic HW-150 comes with a different (larger) remote. I wonder if that would work better. I may get that one too just to compare. I was debating between it or the 130 you got.

I'm also wondering if a universal remote would work better. (I.e., if the difficulty you had with the remote was the remote, or the box.). I'll probably play with that.

I knew the guide info (from broadcasted info) would be limited, not as nice as Roku's. But, then again, Roku's reaching out to the internet for program info might be whats slowing down channel changing. (Pick your poison).

The more I consider this topic, the more I think android tv will be the future. I've been wondering if a person could write a tv-tuner interface for Roku Tv (as an app). I've been looking at the Roku developer's SDK/API info. I don't think they expose that hardware that much. I'm not seeing it yet.

But, looking at Android, it looks like that can be done. There could be a community-developed tv tuner of choice for all Android tvs. There could be a better future there for antenna tv. More accessibility to different visions of how that should work. (That will be important in a few years when ATSC 3.0 is a thing.).

My only concern with Android is if it's just more openly/unabashedly geeky. It could be difficult for the average person, and suffer the same problem of trying to remain compatible with a plethora of hardware. I don't know how its updates might compare to Roku's (which presents itself as a more normal tv, but has all the instability of a geeky platform). All things being equal, I believe Android will be the future/dominant tv OS. It's more open and has a much broader developer community. Roku could distinguish itself by curating its hardware platform as a more stable environment (like Apple does), more responsive to customers, etc. If it continues to be a roll of the dice, I think Android will takeover. (TCL started going with Android last summer.).

I'll order my digital tv tuner boxes today, and post info when I have it.

[ncguy68]

Good Luck.   I Hope you have better results.   I look forward to hearing your review(s).

[PGB1]

From Visitor 45763:

" 1. Stock price doesn't equate to doing the right thing. It's just speculation "

You ain't "Just A Wistlin' Dixie" with that spot-on statement!

Look way back when Amazon was brand new and only sold books. The stock price kept consistently climbing for years & years. But the company showed a loss for each of those years. Go Figure!

[LM2M]

I really resent the latest “update” to both of my TV’s. I had them set-up for my convenience of OTA viewing. This update has completely ruined my ease of viewing the channels I like to view and “recent channels” doesn’t get it. Also, I like to preview what’s on the channels ahead of time, which I no longer can do. Now if I check something coming on later that night, there is no description of what the storyline is so you can’t tell until the program comes on and you can then read the description of what’s on that program. Very inconvenient!

Roku tried this last year around July 2020 and got nothing but complaints, so it was put back the way it was! I want it back EXACTLY the way it was, I want my “favorite channels” back and the description of the program coming on anytime of the day! I pay for all of this and I really don’t like my viewing being ruined by Roku!

[wa2exz]

After this last firmware upgrade .... Every time I change OTA channels now I get madder and madder at you folks for changing the favorites. Way to many key strokes and scanning of channels to get to the right one.  Why don’t you just go back to letting us do MANUAL favorites and have to ability to turn that feature on or off.  This is just CRAZY.  you’ve really screwed it up this time.

[mikeism]

@wa2exz 

What wa2exz said.  Multiplied by infinity. 

Bring back Favorites so we're not forced to navigate all over the place and waste time.

[purrfectpatty]

Pretty sure we're all wasting our time here. If each of us only bought one ROKU they've made their money. We all bought one. They made their money. Now they really couldn't care less about our opinions and our misery. Nobody is listening. The only reason they switched it back in the past was because the product was fairly new and they were worried that it wouldn't take off. It's all about their yachts.