My experience with streaming Netflix with TiVo, a poll

[mikeyts]

People's tales of woe with Netflix streaming vary so greatly that I'm curious to know how many people are having what degree of difficulty. (I fall into the "Have had a few problems with it, but nothing too discouraging" bin). It's difficult to pick a good set of responses for these thing, so if I haven't quite described your situation, forgive me.

Please only respond to the poll if you have a Netflix-streaming-capable TiVo and have used the "feature" (or contemplated using it, but were scared away by horror stories :)).

[jgantert]

Other than a few outage (couple Saturdays and a few evenings at launch) there haven't been too many issues for me. There are occasional encoding issues as well (bad video, video/audio sync), but it seems lately Netflix has been catching up on them slowly. Since the Roku player has released new firmware, they are using the same VC1 encodings as the Tivo units that have the same issues, which helps get the encodings fixed faster, IMO.

I'm using a Tivo HD, btw.

[tbb1226]

This poll is ridiculous. There are a pile of negative choices and only one positive, which stipulates "lots" of problem-free use of the feature. There can be no objective conclusion from this.

I have used it a few times and it worked fine each time, but can't claim to have used it a "lot" yet. I would bet the majority of S3 owners who have tried it have had similar experiences.

I would also lay odds that most who have not tried it are not "scared," but simply haven't had the urge to use it yet.

[johnny99]

I think most people's satisfaction level with Netflix streaming is directly proportional to their internet connection speed and reliability.

[mikeyts]

This poll is ridiculous. There are a pile of negative choices and only one positive, which stipulates "lots" of problem-free use of the feature. There can be no objective conclusion from this.

I have used it a few times and it worked fine each time, but can't claim to have used it a "lot" yet. I would bet the majority of S3 owners who have tried it have had similar experiences.

I would also lay odds that most who have not tried it are not "scared," but simply haven't had the urge to use it yet.I'm really interested in finding out who's been cruising along using it, or who've made repeated attempts to use it and failed. That some people have tried it once or twice without a problem or once or twice and failed really aren't significant data points--the next time they tried it could have worked for the first time and never failed again, or stopped working altogether after working a couple of times. The responses that I chose typify what I've seen people post in the other Netflix threads.

And in my opinion "Have had a few problems but nothing too discouraging" is a positive response. I've used this thing to watch many dozens of hours of movies and TV series episodes, but have had it die in the middle of my watching something several times and had to reboot my TiVo once. It's obviously not perfect, but I've gotten my money's worth out of it.

In other Netflix threads I've seen several people post, "I was really interested in this but after reading about all these problems that people have had, I'm scared to try it. What if it breaks my TiVo, too?" At this writing, at least one person has choosen to use that response.

As I said in the top post, I apologize if my set of responses doesn't cover you. If it doesn't, please don't respond.

[greg_burns]

I have been using it a lot. Watched a bunch of movies. Watched season 1 of Weeds, starting season 2.

I have an S3, not TivoHD if that makes any difference to anyone. Thought I read people having more problems with original S3, but that has not been my experience.

Have ran into some encoding problems (latest Man On Wire). Is there a way to report these to Netflix, like you can with a damaged DVD?

[addman711]

My main gripe with Tivo and Netflix isn't really with the quality but the interface. I really don't use Tivo for my Netflix watching very much because the Interface is so much better on my XBox 360.
The main thing that really turns me off about the Tivo interface is that I can't tell what I have watched already and what I have not. This is really important where a series is involved. For example a TV series involving 20 some episodes. On Tivo there is no indication which episodes you have watched or not watched, so unless you have memorized the title of everyone you've watched, you have to go into each episode to see if it says resume playback or not. On the XBox 360, next to each episode title it shows the percentage of that show you have already watched. So if it says 50% you know you have only watched half of that one, or if it says 98% you know you have watched all of it and probably stopped it in the ending credits. If there is no percentage watched indication then you know that you have not watched any of that episode.
So I will always fire up the XBox to watch Netflix content just for that one reason.

[mikeyts]

I have an Xbox as well and would agree that the interface is much snazzier and faster, but I use TiVo when possible because it's much quieter than my launch-model 360. I use the Xbox when the encoding for TiVo and the other embedded platforms is screwed up and the Xbox one works. The 360 is the only player which still uses the WMA3 encodings (for however long that lasts).

For example, I watched all three available seasons of the Doctor Who reboot; the VC1 encodings for Season 2, episodes 2 through 13 were screwed up (as were the ones for the PC Silverlight player, which may be different still), so I watched those on Xbox and switched back to TiVo for Season 3.

[pdhenry]

Have ran into some encoding problems (latest Man On Wire). Is there a way to report these to Netflix, like you can with a damaged DVD?TiVoStephen's first post in the Netflix issues (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=413339) thread says "contact Netflix at 1-877-NETFLIX (638-3549) to report the issue."

[Mindflux]

No option for "I occasionally use it, and have yet to experience issues with it".

[forthekill]

I've used it alot, and if I don't use HDMI, and use component/composite I haven't had a single issue.

If I use HDMI, however, I have the problem with the audio being very high pitched and echoed.

It's not ideal, but it works OK for now.

[DaGhost]

Series 3 connected over component. No issues whatsoever. My Xbox360 and my S3 both benefit from a fast net connection which I am sure helps quite a bit.

[urwathrtz]

My first TiVo died while using it. The RMA one I got is having issues too. Hopefully there's a hot fix soon.

[ZeoTiVo]

People's tales of woe with Netflix streaming vary so greatly that I'm curious to know how many people are having what degree of difficulty. (I fall into the "Have had a few problems with it, but nothing too discouraging" bin). It's difficult to pick a good set of responses for these thing, so if I haven't quite described your situation, forgive me.
Why is the poll slanted to such a negative degree?
I had nop desire to answer the poll after looking over the choices, not even an other option.

So I had a few bounces out to main menu and some times the movie paused many times but overall I had a positive experience that "Have had a few problems with it, but nothing too discouraging" is just too negatively worded to make me want to pick. I have not used the service a lot - like maybe once a week instead.

[DAccardi]

This poll is ridiculous. There are a pile of negative choices and only one positive, which stipulates "lots" of problem-free use of the feature. There can be no objective conclusion from this.

I have used it a few times and it worked fine each time, but can't claim to have used it a "lot" yet. I would bet the majority of S3 owners who have tried it have had similar experiences.

I would also lay odds that most who have not tried it are not "scared," but simply haven't had the urge to use it yet.

HOLY HELL AND HIGH WATER!@#!@#$@ relax jimbo. Like he said its hard to put together a poll for this. I find it hilarious how personal some of you are taking a poll.... Did the poll choices hurt your TiVo's feelings. gimme a break.

[ZeoTiVo]

.. Did the poll choices hurt your TiVo's feelings. gimme a break.
nope. Did not hurt my feelings either. My reply was more about how the poll is rendered useless by poor wording and lack of overall choices. No biggie as I do not expect accurate and scientific polls in here, but I will comment if I see one that has problems that cause a bias in results.

Well, it is useful in one regard. If you used Netflix and had problems then the poll will gauge your reaction to that.

[gear]

I put my series3 through head to head comparison with my Samsung Blue Ray player and the Samsung player looks better and the delivery of Netflix's "watch instantly" movies is fairly flawless.

I wish I could say the same for Netfix's delivery of Blue Ray discs. I used to get two or three discs a week from Netflix but since moving to Blue Ray I'm lucky if I get one a week. Nice business model though, charge more and send the customer less movies.

[mikeyts]

So I had a few bounces out to main menu and some times the movie paused many times but overall I had a positive experience that "Have had a few problems with it, but nothing too discouraging" is just too negatively worded to make me want to pick.And yet, IMHO, it paraphrases what you described precisely. You've experience a few problems, but nothing that stops you from using it.

The responses describe, to me, what I've heard various people who are really interested in using the feature say. Some have had their TiVo freeze while using Netflix streaming to the point where they had to return it for repair. Some folks have never been able to make it work in many attempts. Some have tried repeatedly and determinedly to use Netflix streaming, and have had some tantalizing success, but overall have had so many problems that they finally quit out of frustration. Some have seen a few problem, but nothing which has stopped them from using it or wanting to use it, and some have been happily using it without seeing any problems at all. To my mind, there are no shades of "I haven't had any problems". I added the phrase "used it a lot" because I feel that the experience of folks who are essentially indifferent to the service as it stands (given the PQ and/or limited content) and have consequently only used it a few times aren't interesting data points--they haven't used it enough to prove anything. I myself used TiVo to stream several hours of stuff on the first day it was available and had no problems--trouble only cropped up later.

Perhaps I should have entitled the thread, "How much trouble have you had using Netflix? (Frequent users or wannabes only)" :rolleyes:. Sorry.

[ZeoTiVo]

And yet, IMHO, it paraphrases what you described precisely. You've experience a few problems, but nothing that stops you from using it.

The responses describe, to me, what I've heard various people who are really interested in using the feature say. Some have had their TiVo freeze while using Netflix streaming to the point where they had to return it for repair. Some folks have never been able to make it work in many attempts. Some have tried repeatedly and determinedly to use Netflix streaming, and have had some tantalizing success, but overall have had so many problems that they finally quit out of frustration. Some have seen a few problem, but nothing which has stopped them from using it or wanting to use it, and some have been happily using it without seeing any problems at all. To my mind, there are no shades of "I haven't had any problems". I added the phrase "used it a lot" because I feel that the experience of folks who are essentially indifferent to the service as it stands (given the PQ and/or limited content) and have consequently only used it a few times aren't interesting data points--they haven't used it enough to prove anything. I myself used TiVo to stream several hours of stuff on the first day it was available and had no problems--trouble only cropped up later.

Perhaps I should have entitled the thread, "How much trouble have you had using Netflix? (Frequent users or wannabes only)" :rolleyes:. Sorry.

OK - now you have admitted you wanted a negative bias in you poll. No problem for me since it is your poll but it is negative and thus will have a majorly skewed inaccuracy in it. Have fun with it.

[jburvant]

overall, i've been pleased with netflix streaming on my tivo. i've also had no problem streaming in HD, so thats really nice. the only bug i've noticed is that the bandwith goes way down on Sunday evenings, making the shows unwatchable since it pauses to get a signal every minute. i'm not sure if that problem is on my end, or it just means there is a lot of traffic on netflix during that primetime slot.

[ffujita]

Well, I found the poll informative. It tells me that most people are having fewer problems than me, but a couple have it worse than I do.

Series 3 -- hardwired. Refuses to play about half the titles. Plays some flawlessly. Occasionally it locks up my box. I have a Roku box that plays everything. So when I want to stream Netflix, I go to the TV with the Roku box -- until I hear the all clear on these forums.

[Brainiac 5]

OK - now you have admitted you wanted a negative bias in you poll. No problem for me since it is your poll but it is negative and thus will have a majorly skewed inaccuracy in it.What exactly is wrong with "have had a few problems with it, but nothing too discouraging?" How would you phrase it?

Note that despite this "majorly skewed inaccuracy" due to "negative bias," the majority of answers so far fall into what I'd call the positive categories, "few problems" or "not had any problems."

[mikeyts]

OK - now you have admitted you wanted a negative bias in you poll. No problem for me since it is your poll but it is negative and thus will have a majorly skewed inaccuracy in it. Have fun with it.What was giving me an impression skewed to the negative was the plethora of posts from frustrated people complaining about Netflix streaming not working well enough to use, up to and including accusing it of breaking their TiVo. I've seen a few posts from people chiming in to say that they're using it successfully, but their voices are drowned out by the people who aren't getting any joy from their attempts to use it, who post again and again, describing their continued efforts and failures (people who bother to post to say that it's working okay for them almost never post to say that it's still working okay). After reading the Netflix threads in this forum, you'd think that the feature was a total failure, an extremely buggy piece of software that only a few have had any success with. At this writing, the poll results would indicate that it's actually working well enough for a little over 80% of respondents who've tried it (76 of 94 people) that they haven't been discouraged from continuing to use it, and that nearly 30% are actively using it without having ever had a problem.

I wish that I'd worded things a bit differently, but I always do after launching one of these. The change that I would make if I did it over would be to stress my interest in hearing mainly from people who've attempted to use it frequently (i.e., "Have tried repeatedly and never gotten it to work", "In many attempts, have occasionally gotten it to work", "Have used it a lot and had a few problems"). I'd probably drop "Too scared to use it," mostly to make the percentages all about people who've been using it (or trying to).

[Scyber]

No option for "I occasionally use it, and have yet to experience issues with it".

Same here.

[ZeoTiVo]

What was giving me an impression skewed to the negative was the plethora of posts from frustrated people complaining about Netflix streaming not working well enough to use, up to and including accusing it of breaking their TiVo.

OK - I certainly never said there were no problems ;)
I think a more useful breakout on a poll really intended to find out how bad the problems are for those having problems is to find out the % on original S3 versus TiVo HD.


oh, and I understand seeing the poll with fresh eyes just a second after committing it to the forum and not being able to edit anymore. Somehow the filter drops and I think, Why did I word it that way :)

PS - since it was asked
"have had a few problems with it, but nothing too discouraging?"
is not a neutral wording at all.

something more neutral would be worded like
"have had a few problems with it, but intend to keep using it"

[Scyber]

I'm really interested in finding out who's been cruising along using it, or who've made repeated attempts to use it and failed. That some people have tried it once or twice without a problem or once or twice and failed really aren't significant data points--the next time they tried it could have worked for the first time and never failed again, or stopped working altogether after working a couple of times. The responses that I chose typify what I've seen people post in the other Netflix threads.


If that is what you were going for, then how come there were no frequency of use clauses on the negative options? The simple fact is that you only applied a frequency of use clause to the "no problems" response.

Someone could use it once and have had issues, which would cause them to choose the 2nd option. While someone that has used it once with no issues doesn't have a valid poll option.

[pdhenry]

(people who bother to post to say that it's working okay for them almost never post to say that it's still working okay)FWIW, it's still working OK. In fact I was thinking it was running better since the Saturday night lockout.

My own conjecture is that S3 owners are having more difficulty than TiVo HD owners, although some HD owners have reported trouble (and I haven't noticed whether S3 owners are posting that things are OK).

[BiggieSmalls]

Here's my vote:

"I occasionally use it, and have yet to experience issues with it"

So far been pleased with it, although the interface is lacking, but it does what its advertised to do.

My displeasure's are:
- cant search NetFlix to add more items to my queue, requires me to use computer.
- interface is slow, but so are the rest of the tivo menu's
-Too many "clicks" to play a movie in my queue from tivo. Why can't they be in the Now playing menu??


PS: Add some positive options on this poll...

[ciper]

I see no issue with the poll. The positive response of "Have used it a lot and not had any problems with it " is not negatively worded.

The poll represents the communities average feeling towards it. There are numerous threads about issues with Netflix and the OP is just trying to see what level of problems the app has.

The complainers in this thread smell like fanboys...

[yunlin12]

Have used it heavily without issue 4 times, and got (re)booted once besides those 4.

[Mr Flippant]

I have two Tivo HDs. I have watched at least 12+ titles. I have not had a Tivo problem that have prevented me from watching an entire title. I have had 3 lockups that required re-boots. I think they are part my problem and part Tivo. The interface seems quite fragile, do not do anything it is not expecting. Each of my reboots occurred because I pressed the Instant Replay button twice and it seemed to lock up the stream and the Tivo. The other time I was trying to leave the stram and pressed the left direction twice in quick succession.

My other problems appear to be from Netflix. Tried to watch "This Christmas" and the audio and video was so ut of sync it was impossible to watch. Same with some Alfred Hitchcock Presents episodes, these were almost 20 seconds out of sync. This happened in each episode I tried and days apart. Most titles are ok but there are a few stinkers. They had the same sync difference on multiple attempts to watch even when other title work before and after. I conclude it is from the Netflix side. These are far worse than the Tivo problems as the titles are unwatchable.

One other possible issue may be pushing the Tivo to its limits. I had one occurrence where I was recording a show, transferring a video and trying to start Netflix. The box (on ethernet) locked and I have since been more careful of loading things up, especially after cutting out a chunk of the recording the DW wanted to see..

I love the ability to stream videos from Netflix and will work through these things to continue enjoying content I might not ordinarily watch.

[kgro]

If you are using a wireless internet connection, there may be problems with the speed the video can be downloaded (mine kept pausing to get data). However, I tried a wired internet connection, and it worked fine for me. So, I just switch over to wired when I watch netflix.

hope this helps some people!

[ZeoTiVo]

fanboys...
your use of the word displays your bias quite clearly

[rdoherty2]

I've watched about a dozen movies and TV episodes and only had problems with two. In both cases (Strange Brew and one of the Campion mysteries) the video was unwatchable because the audio and video were 1 to 5 seconds out of synch.

In the case of Strange Brew, I successfully watched it on my PC with no synch problems. I made attempts to watch it on TiVO both before and after watching it on my PC, and it failed identically each time.

For me,NetFlix is a worthwhile addition to my TiVO.

S3 with 1TB external Seagate.

[roby1]

My 8 month old Tivo HD died as well while watching a netflix movie. Tivo support could not revive it. Waiting on my RMA which is en route... this whole thing is a lousy situation. Now I got to probably deal with my cable company again to get my cable card to work with the new unit when it arrives. I am planning to stay away from Netflix streaming on Tivo for a while though.

My first TiVo died while using it. The RMA one I got is having issues too. Hopefully there's a hot fix soon.

:mad:

[mikeyts]

At this writing, there've been 158 poll respondents who weren't too scared to try it :). 127 (81% of the 158) are using it successfully, 78 (60% of the 127) have encountered a few problems, like me, and I've used the hell out of it. I now feel pretty certain that things aren't nearly as bad as the many "problems using Netflix" threads would make them seem.

[magnus]

Did you try to use the kickstart codes on it? Or boot without the network adapter?

My 8 month old Tivo HD died as well while watching a netflix movie. Tivo support could not revive it. Waiting on my RMA which is en route... this whole thing is a lousy situation. Now I got to probably deal with my cable company again to get my cable card to work with the new unit when it arrives. I am planning to stay away from Netflix streaming on Tivo for a while though.



:mad:

[roby1]

Did you try to use the kickstart codes on it? Or boot without the network adapter?
Yes. The tivo tech support had me power cycle the unit few time with and without the tivo network adapter. My internet and wireless network was available during startup as well. Tech support guy had me try one of the Kickstart numbers (40?? -i don't remember) but my Tivo did not respond to it. After a while he offered the RMA process.

[pdhenry]

In the case of Strange Brew, I successfully watched it on my PC with no synch problems. I made attempts to watch it on TiVO both before and after watching it on my PC, and it failed identically each time.The TiVo programs stream from different file sets than the PC programs. Your problem could be a bad file set.

[ciper]

your use of the word displays your bias quite clearly

It does. My bias means I have little loyalty towards a specific company if they continue to make mistakes.

A good chunk of the forum members are like parents with bad children. They can't see how their child could ever make a mistake and if the indisputable facts are presented to them they find away to excuse it or ignore it completely.

[dtplink]

I had some serious problems with streaming to the TV. This included corrupt pixels in diagonal lines across the screen, no audio, freeze on video. I had one HD stream that stopped to catch up every 6 minutes.

Since I've switched to watching on the PC with Silverlight 2.o in the Firefox browser window, I have only had a few stuttering episodes that I was able to clean up by turning off the other windows in the browser. Some of them were continually running flash animations and competing for bandwidth with the show. Once I closed those windows all went just fine.

[Scyber]

I see no issue with the poll. The positive response of "Have used it a lot and not had any problems with it " is not negatively worded.

The poll represents the communities average feeling towards it. There are numerous threads about issues with Netflix and the OP is just trying to see what level of problems the app has.

The complainers in this thread smell like fanboys...

Not sure if this was directed at my criticisms of the poll or not, but I do find if funny to be called a TiVo fanboy. The last time I was called a fanboy was by a TiVo user concerning my preference for ReplayTV.

There are issues with the poll. My issues don't concern the negativeness (or lack there of in the options), but rather the fact that the frequency of use clause was only applied to the "no issues" choice. Basically the options in this poll break down into 2 main categories:

1) If you have ever had any issues with the service.
2) If you use the service frequently and never had an issue.

So if User A used the service a few times and had some issues there are plenty of responses to describe User A's experience. However if User B used the service a few times and never had an issue, there is no response that describes User B's experience.

The OP later said that he was interested in people that have used the service frequently and not those that have used it a few times. Unfortunately, he never put any qualifiers on the negative options to make that clear. So someone with 1 negative experience out of their 1 use of the service would most likely respond, while someone that has 1 positive experience might not.

[borabora]

Initially Netflix worked fine for me during non-prime time but was erratic during prime time. After doing some measurements I found that my DSL bandwidth dropped to sub 1mbps levels during prime time. So I bit the bullet and signed up for cable service (Comcast Blast) which yields 20/3 mbps! Ever since the switch Netflix streaming has been perfect.

HD quality is great and responsiveness is quite good now. I have not had any gray screens or lock-ups since switching ISPs. I think the new Netflix enabled firmware is more sluggish overall but that applies to everything and not just Netflix.

My only complaint for the service would be that I'd like to see more content choices even though since I like documentaries and obscure material there is plenty for me to choose from right now.

I am particularly impressed with the service since I once worked on a project that was trying to enable a similar IPTV capabilty. That was for a rather large microprocessor company that couldn't engineer itself out of a brown paper bag when it came to consumer products and services. In contrast tivo and Netflix have done a very good job even if there is plenty of room for improvement. I expect the next FW to deal with many of the current issues.

How much would this service be worth to people if it offered the entire Netflix DVD library? Maybe $60 for me. How about if they started archiving all of relevant TV and making it available immediately. For example, Australian Open Tennis is happening right now. If I could access every match broadcast by ESPN this would easily become a $150 service since I could drop my $100 cable service (keep broadband).

[mikeyts]

The OP later said that he was interested in people that have used the service frequently and not those that have used it a few times. Unfortunately, he never put any qualifiers on the negative options to make that clear. So someone with 1 negative experience out of their 1 use of the service would most likely respond, while someone that has 1 positive experience might not.Yeah, I realize that the poll was deeply flawed (and your objections have been discussed in other posts), but since the flaws in the wording of the questions would tend to increase the number of negative responses and I'm still getting vastly more positive responses, it more or less served the purpose that I posted it for. I'd have preferred to elicit negative responses only from those who'd tried hard to use it and either failed or acheived so little success that they gave up in frustration, but that's just life in the big city :rolleyes:.

Since there was no frequency-of-use qualifier on "I've used it, seen a few problems but nothing that will stop me from using it", I've probably gotten that response from people who haven't used it enough to give their experience much weight, but no BFD. It's not as if the results of this poll were going to be used to support big-money business decisions--it was only intended to give me some idea of how much trouble people were having with the feature.

[ZeoTiVo]

It does. My bias means I have little loyalty towards a specific company if they continue to make mistakes.

A good chunk of the forum members are like parents with bad children. They can't see how their child could ever make a mistake and if the indisputable facts are presented to them they find away to excuse it or ignore it completely.


which is not me though you implied as much in your post about fanboy.

Use of that word typically denotes that you discount anyone that dares to see things from TiVo inc.'s perspective. I have usually seen a much larger bias in posters who do not take into account the perspective that TiVo might have.
In this case I was criticizing a poll as being biased. You, ciper, however saw it as defense of Tivo somehow when it was not. The Netflix streaming is a new app that has some pretty critical bugs in it still. Being an occasional user of streaming and not having the bugs - I had no place to post and saw the poll(correctly) as being one of trying to find out about the bugs among other users versus an actual overall experience of the app. How that was some fanboy defense escapes me.


PS - I love the irony of the former replay poster who was called a replay fanboy and is now implied as being a TiVo fanboy :rolleyes:

[keenanSR]

I responded "Have occasionally gotten it to work, but it's too buggy to be worthwhile".

The thing is, it's like a bad LSD trip, after having the S3 crash and boot up to the green serious error screen, it's something I'm not likely to even consider trying again without some sort a assurance that the app has been "fixed".

As a data point, I've never had any trouble whatsoever with my S3 since the day I got it which was 3 days after it was introduced, and that includes a flawless CableCARD install.

I can't tell you the dread I felt upon seeing that error message 4 hrs before "Lost" was set to be recorded. :D

[fishinjim]

I initially used the Roku device for Netflix then received my tivo HD. Although I have the wireless adapter for the Tivo HD, I connected up an ethernet cable in an effort to reduce my perceived Netflix issues. My kids use the Netflix Video On Demand on the Tivo every day and they have never had one of their shows mess up. They have watched movies, tv shows, and cartoons via Netflix Tivo.

On the Tivo HD, I have had one adult show where the video would stutter and skip (audio was fine, however) - Bleak House. On my Roku device, the same show series plays without incident. Outside of the Bleak House stutter I have not experienced any issues with the Tivo HD and Netflix combination.

For a bandwidth test, I have done the following:
played MP3's via my home computer to my Roku M500 - wireless G, streamed jpg's to my Picture Frame that connects wireless G to a different home computer, and also streamed Netflix on my Tivo HD. At that time, I did NOT have any issues with any of the 3 devices. We also have Cable Phone and no issues on the telephone either.

I am satisfied with the Netflix experience, both on the Tivo HD and also on the Roku Netflix device.

Personally, I think the Roku device is easier to use with the way it lists the video selections by image as the primary display whereas the Tivo HD lists the video selection by Name as primary but that's a fairly trivial complaint.

[StevesWeb]

My TiVoHD locked up once while I was watching a Netflix movie, and because of extremely poor error recovery, a sure sign of a bad programmer, it locked up tight and required a hard boot. This kind of Mickey Mouse programming is inexcusable, if I wanted crapware I could be using a Windows Media Center PC.

And of course we all got to enjoy a 48 hour TiVo server video on demand outage this week, which seems to suggest there is no backup strategy in place at TiVo. This would be another indication of a Mickey Mouse approach to designing a server/client environment.

As far as the Netflix part of streaming movies is concerned they are generally doing a good job. If the problems with bad TiVo code not recovering from a very typical problem of network connectivity loss is not soon corrected I may bail on TiVo and buy a Roku set top box. This would solve the problem of having an incompetent firm poised between the movies I want to watch and my TV.

I'm willing to be patient a while and give TiVo a chance to correct their extremely poor VOD client programming, but if this continues for months on end my TiVoHD will be on eBay and I'll be forced to rely on other methods of recording TV.

I find streaming movies much more interesting than network TV, so when I'm using the TiVo it is usually to watch a Netflix movie.

Right now I'd give TiVo Netflix a 75, if they fix their error recovery and keep their servers online that might go up to a 95. It beats iTunes and Amazon Unbox because of the Netflix all you can watch pricing strategy, a brilliant move on their part IMHO.

[dazed74]

Used it. Love it except for picture distortion that started in February. Netflix appears to be streaming correctly. Netflix customer service says to contact Tivo. Anyone have any similar issues?

[Larry in TN]

Not me. My Netflix picture is fine.

[nguyej1]

Not me. My Netflix picture is fine.

My NETFLIX pictures were fine last night (Saturday). The HD pictures were great.