Roku like a hurricane

June 5th, 2008

Last night I finally received my newest toy, the Roku Netflix Player. After waiting almost two weeks for backordering and Fedex’s slooooow ground shipping to get here I came home after work and there it was. A tiny black box roughly the size of a paperback book (if that book is the Bible) that I could watch my Netflix movies on! No more waiting for the mail to get here! I was excited. Then I tried to set it up which turned into a major pain in the ass.

The contents of the box were simple. The player, a remote, and cables. Easy enough. I hooked up the Roku to my TV via HDMI and plugged it in fully expecting it would detect my wireless network and be on it’s way. Not so fast. It found my network alright but it refused to let me connect. After unhooking and reconnecting wires and restarting modems and routers I still had nothing. I was pissed and a little sweaty.

I logged on to the Roku support website where I was told to hook the player up through a wired connection “just to get it started”. Apparently there was a software update that needed to be installed which would greatly improve the networking capabilities of the box. Now how I was expected to know that a product that was just released two weeks ago needed a software update I’m not sure but I decided to give it a try. I dug out my 25ft ethernet cable and hooked it directly into the box. Everything finally worked. The software installed and I was viewing my queue in seconds. I wasn’t quite prepared to be tripping over ethernet cable for the next 6 months however so I gave the wireless route another go.

Of course that didn’t work. Same error as earlier. I was seriously about to smash this POS with a hammer. I took a deep breath and tried it one last time. Unhooked and power cycled everything then said a little prayer to Jeebus Cripes. And what do you know….it worked! Estimated time of install = 2 hours.

Making up for all the hassle is the interface. It is slick! The videos are near DVD quality and after adding a movie to your instant queue it appears in about 15 seconds on screen. Netflix has done it once again.

There are, of course, some areas for improvement:

Selection Only about 10,000 of Netflix’s 100,000 movies are available for instant watching. They need to work hard to increase this selection. Most TV shows seem to be there so that is a plus.

Blu-Ray All the videos are standard def. It would be nice to have a few HD choices in there as well. Like I said the majority of videos I tested were DVD or near-DVD quality but a few looked like they were on the edge of VHS quality.

DVD Menus/Controls I understand the nature of the Internet and the effect that it has on video but I would like the full DVD controls to be available on these videos. FF/Rewind/Next/Previous/Extras etc. Right now there is a rudimentary FF/Rewind functionality.

More than Netflix One of the biggest drawbacks is that this box only plays Netflix videos. I realize that’s the point but I would like to see it incorporate content from other sites. If they add Hulu, DailyShow.com, and South Park Studios I don’t think I would ever leave the house. Mp3 and XVid would be gravy.

I would like to personally thank George W. Bush for the economic stimulus which allowed me to purchase this $99 box. Thanks Bushie this almost makes up for the time you cock-blocked me back in 2004 (that’s a story for another post).