Roku setup

[JMP3]

I am helping a friend in Arizona who purchased 3 new Roku Sticks that he plans to use at his other home in Washington State.

He currently is using 3 Roku sticks on his wireless network in Arizona.

I was trying to configure his 3 new Roku sticks for Washington State on his Arizona home wireless network, so that all he had to do when he returned to his Washington State home is to connect his 3 Roku sticks to his 3 TVs and connect the Roku sticks to the Washington State wireless network.

I successfully activated his first Washington State Roku stick on his Arizona Wireless network.  It was called "Streaming Stick 4K-Sliving Room" with a Location called "Living Room".

I proceed to insert his second Roku stick into an Arizona TV and followed the on screen instructions.  When I went to his email account to activate the second Roku stick, it asked me to name it, so I named it "Streaming Stick 4K-SRec Room" and specified a Location of "Family Room". When it went to his account, it was still showing the 4th Roku device as the "Streaming Stick 4K-Sliving Room" with a Location called "Living Room".  Not "Streaming Stick 4K-SRec Room" with a Location of "Family Room"!

I repeated this 2 times and each time it ended up with the same result - "Streaming Stick 4K-Sliving Room" with a Location called "Living Room".

Does anyone have any idea as to why I cannot add his 2nd Roku stick to his Arizona wireless network with a name of "Streaming Stick 4K-SRec Room" with a Location of "Family Room"?  I thought maybe there was a limit of 4 Roku sticks on a given wireless network, but I don't think that is the case.

My goal is to activate all 3 Roku sticks on his Arizona Wireless Network, so that he can take all 3 sticks back to Washington State, plug them into his 3 TVs and connect to his Washington State Wireless network. 

Maybe my logic is flawed, so I will need to help him activate these 3 sticks on his Washington State network once he returns to Washington State.

[AvsGunnar]

@JMP3 

You can certainly setup and activate all the Roku devices in Arizona for later use in Washington.

With the Streaming Sticks, the power cable contains a "long-range wireless receiver".  Basically, the network/NIC card. or chip.  This is also where the MAC address of the device is programmed.

If you are using the same power cable to try and activate all three devices, the online account is likely confused because the MAC address of the first device has already been assigned to the device number/serial number of the first device ( Streaming Stick 4K-Sliving Room - Living Room).

Try using another the power cable that came with the second device on the second device.  Then go to the online account and see if you can now rename the device and location.

If that does not work, then you should just "unlink" the three devices from the account, and factory reset them. (press and hold reset button for 30+ seconds).  Then go through the activation process again for all three devices, but this time use their respective power cables so each power cable gets assigned/registered  to the corresponding device. (Might want to label which power cable goes with each device).

[atc98092]

Once the Roku players are linked to his user account, they can be used anywhere within the US without a problem. There's no issue with them being in one state then moved to another. I travel with my Roku Stick all the time, and use it wherever I am. @AvsGunnar has likely identified your issue if you're using the same power cable for each device. But there's no issue with setting them all up in one location and then moving them elsewhere.

One thing to remember, as long as the player is linking to his user account correctly, you can always change the names on his user account web page. You don't need to name them separately during setup. For a long time my three Ultra players were simply named Ultra. I finally got around to naming them more accurately. 🙂

[JMP3]

After I sucessfully activated the first Roku Stick destined for Washington State, I remove all the componets, including the power cable and placed them in a bag to keep them separate, so not to confuse them with the other 2 Roku sticks.

When I tried to activate the 2nd Roku Stick destined for Washington State, I used all the components that came with the 2nd box, including the power cable.  Since I was not reusing the same power cable for each activation, I'm not sure why it didn't work. 

Before I go through the process of unlinking the 3 Roku devices and doing a factory reset on them, is there anything else you can think of that I can try? 

Thanks.

[atc98092]

If all three are linked to his user account, can you rename them within the account? As long as they're correctly linked to the correct account, I wouldn't think you need to start all over. Or are you saying you can't link the second device to the same account? 

[JMP3]

I'm not able to link the 2nd Roku stick "Streaming Stick 4K-SRec Room" destined to Washington State to his account.

When I list all the Roku devices linked to his account, it lists 4 devices.  The 4th Roku device remains as the first new one that I successfully activated.  When I go through the activation process for the second Roku device and the email instructs me to go to the Roku account after I have named the device and specified the location, that is where it still shows the 4th Roku device that I just added and he will use in his living room in Washington State. Therefore I'm unable to complete the setup of the 2nd Roku stick.  Strange!

[AvsGunnar]

@JMP3 

Are you sure you clicked on the correct email link sent by Roku during activation?

Each device should have a seperate email sent.  Cannot use the email sent from first device to activate second device.

[edited to include]

Does the 2nd device actually work and is actually streaming?  Go to Settings/System/About, look at the Device ID and Serial Number, and compare it to the Serial Number listed under the online dashboard at https://my.roku.com/account.  

Sounds like perhaps the second device did not activate or get linked to the same account and you may actually be seeing the first device that did successfully activate.

[JMP3]

I know I was getting separate email messages each time and would click on the most recent email mwessage.

What was odd is that the email listed 3 seperate activation links, so Isimply clicked on the one at the top of the email message.

I never get to the point of getting the second Roku stick to work.

Maybe what I need to do is try it again.  This time first delete all the email messages that we previously got and once I get the new email message, see if I can get further.  Does tat make sense?

[RokuMary-F]

Hi @JMP3,

Thanks for posting in the Roku Community!

We want to make sure that we can get this resolved as soon as possible. If we understand correctly, you are having difficulties with adding a Roku device to your Roku device.

If this issue is not resolved, please let us know along with any additional information you may have that would be helpful for our team looks into this problem. Kindly include the serial number of your Roku device so we can assist further.

Please keep us posted.


Best regards,
Mary

[makaiguy]

@JMP3-

Which account are you referring to where the new devices are not showing up?

The %#@&* forum software used here on the support board has a long standing problem with continuing to show old units you have unlinked from the account, and not showing newer units  subsequently linked to the account.  That's why I have listed my current devices in the signature attached to my posts.

The definitive list of what is linked to the Roku account can be found via the web by logging into  https://my.roku.com.