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Visitor45763
Roku Guru

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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@glend123 wrote: The only way they'll try to improve their products is if people stop buying them. 

I've got a feeling the tv makers could ditch Roku. Now that Android is on TV, and more makers (including Roku's first partner, TCL) are producing Android TVs.

Not only that competition, but something looks very "off" about Roku's relationship with tv makers. Roku pushes the software updates out. Nobody knows who's testing updates before being pushed (or even if they're being tested. Everything looks like they aren't tested. Updates break tvs.). Then Roku blames the tv maker, saying they're responsible for everything. The collusion tactics are obvious. Roku doesn't want any clear lines of responsibility.

I wouldn't be surprised if the tv makers want out of that toxic arrangement. Especially when they can contrast it to Android's mature & professional structure (between software and hardware). It looks like a no-brainer to me. Android allows turning off updates, and going back to an older version (I believe). TV makers are in control of pushing out updates. Not the scam of fielding all the complaints and blamed for something they didn't do.

For me, the real key is how Roku acts like nothing's wrong. Like, if they can put on that act forever, nothing ever will be wrong. I think they're miscalculating that tremendously. The pandemic was a seeming windfall bring all these new customers. But, that's just that many more people to see the dark underbelly. It's not like any company is terrific. But, who does this? This is like Alan Arkin Catch-22 stuff. You wouldn't believe it unless you saw it yourself. There's that many more people potentially seeing it themselves. That many more people making it apparent to the tv makers ("Roku said it's your fault.").

This latest "disaster" with the guide was interesting. People were acting like they were severely impacted (when you view one of twenty different guides online. I assume they could still watch channels. They just weren't getting information. Nothing was blocking their view of the channels the way it does if you don't have internet at all). If it was just loss of easily-replaced information, you'd think they'd be concerned with how UNTESTED, NON-OPTIONAL software updates can completely break their TV. And, how Roku acts like nothing's happening. "It's the tv maker who did it to you."

IMO, if people get as excited as we saw yesterday about easily-replaced information & obvious system-wide outage (i.e, likely to be fixed since it affects everyone), you'd think they'd be disconnecting their tvs from the internet knowing they're just one untested software update away from being the random loser who is ignored and left behind (entirely, with no help or partial functionality).

Someone remarked "why so angry?" I agree. Look at the real stuff to be angry about. Imagine how you'd feel if a NON-OPTIONAL, IRREVERSIBLE, UNTESTED software update broke your tv, and the abuser's only help is to blame the tv maker. If they're angry about a 2-day glitch, imagine how they'd feel with smiling Enzyte Bob giving them the canned send-off.

TCL, Onn, et. al., must be seeing this stuff too. It seems to me they'd ditch Roku at the first opportunity.

"People are often amazed at how much we’ve done with the number of engineers we’ve got." (Roku CEO Anthony Wood, Austin Statesman, Oct 4, 2019). "Amazed" is one way of putting it.
takalevy
Binge Watcher

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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How do I hide some of the streaming channels.  I'm running OS 10 on TCL 55 and 65 inch TV's.  I see how to hide individual OTA channels, but all I can see for streaming is Hide All or Show All.

TCL55 and 65 inch Roku TV's.
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electromek
Reel Rookie

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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I have to agree.

after giving up early on on using my voice remote ( to this day it has trouble understanding me) I got used to scrolling back and forth through the OTA channels.

When Roku added all the streaming channels at first I was pleased. but when I realized that there very few worth the time Waiting.. and waiting to scroll to the ones I settled on. 

draining my remote batteries.  Is there a remote made that works for Roku that allows random access?

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julieboboolie
Reel Rookie

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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Months ago I reset my Roku TV to factory settings and attached a Fire TV stick to the tv so that I can stream shows and not have to deal with all the really bad Roku updates and streaming channels.  I've connected to the wifi multiple times just to see if the channel set up has improved and end up resetting the TV back to factory settings and not connecting to wifi.  I will NEVER buy another Roku TV.

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pmanstan
Newbie

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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What brainiac came up the idea that this new option would be better for the consumer than the favorites list.  What a completely horrible idea when you had one that worked and customers loved.  Thanks loads Roku (NOT)!

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GC103
Reel Rookie

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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So, am I to understand that ROKU will no longer have a favorites "group" that we can select or default to ao that we can view/watch only the channels we want to watch ?

Jus bewildering that ROKU would eliminate this functionality.

I see the new group column in the guide (for live tv) but it does not work - If I select the Favorites, I see the favorite channels but system is not limited to the favorites - it defaults to ALL channels.

THis may be enough to make me switch. I have not the inclination to waste my trying to find my way thru all channels.

The grouping column in the guide is a neater and cleaner solution - IF IT WORKED ! LMK when it does.

Just mind boggling. Who thought this was a good idea

Sincerely...disappointed

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lschopf
Channel Surfer

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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I was annoyed by that when it first happened but I got a voice remote & that has solved that issue for me.   I use antenna TV & it's works fine to push the mic button & say play channel 4.2 or whatever...If flipping between channels you can still use the last channel button.  I've gotten used to the voice remote & it's very easy to pull up the channels you want.  And you can still scroll if you want to.  Still hate those stupid shortcut buttons though!!!  

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PGB1
Streaming Star

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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Factory Reset & No Internet is a good suggestion & Thank You for posting it Golf Dot Nut.

I had to go back & add internet for the streaming channels. It was good for about an hour until Roku shoved an update into the television. Sadness!

From your post, it seems that a no internet on the TV sets & an external Roku streaming device would be OK, but wouldn't the remote control drive them nuts since they are both Roku? I didn't find any non-Roku streaming device that gets Roku channels.

I guess we have to wait for the Roku people to give us back what we had.

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PGB1
Streaming Star

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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I often wonder why Roku programmers change things to either take away a feature or to make things more difficult. And, every time they update something breaks.

 

Example of More Difficult: Closed Captioning used to be 2 clicks away for on-off. Now it is a project.  Example of Taking Things Away: One used to be able to click the Home button to do something, then return to Live TV and not lose the channel that shows up on the "go back" button- the circle with an arrow.

 

Example of Something Breaks: After the update where they took away the new Favorites, Kids, Sports, etc., if one streams and the station goes to a commercial, the station returns blank screen. Every time. Every TV but one. Previous updates have left us with closed captioning going off after a commercial break, sleep timer being turned off randomly, Sound Mode is gone and there are more.

As far as taking things away goes, Favorites- old way or new way- is the one I miss most. That's probably because my 2 watched channels are about half way between each other in the Guide list.

 

The only reason I can think of to take this away is that some high Muckety-Muck in the company thought we might not watch the other channels, thus Roku would lose revenue.

Guess what? We can hide channels, too. (Oops- now they will take that away. Should Roku do that, someone will be happy when they get our 4 Roku TV sets donated to their charity.)

 

I hate to be mean, but enough is enough. The streaming competition is looking better every day.(Google, Apple, Amazon, etc.)

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tysoncat
Newbie

Re: Favorites completely gone!

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Why in the Fk would you do that?  I keep have to go to my father's house and show him how to get to the favorites.  IT WON'T stay on favorites and defaults every time to ALL CHannels

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