5 ms·

Not to mention, I just can't be bothered to wait for my PS3 and/or <insert distributor> to shutdown one application to start the other. It's very annoying to si

Not to mention, I just can't be bothered to wait for my PS3 and/or <insert distributor> to shutdown one application to start the other. It's very annoying to sit in what feels like 3 minutes to, for example, stop Hulu and start Netflix. Add HBO, WB, and whoever else wants to run their own show, and we're back to having a better experience with pirating. Btw, can someone (Netflix?) chime in on the app performance? What's the deal with the start/stop time on a PS3? I can't decide if it could also be the Netflix app, as it seems to chug slightly when just browsing video thumbnails -- maybe this is related to some PS3 sandbox or resource allocation. I feel I shouldn't have to wait for thumbnails to load when scrolling left-right in a category -- the row should start pre-fetching. Likewise, selecting a thumbnail shouldn't take so long to load the preview panel.

jff 13y ago
It chugs on the 360 too. It's just slow in general and has only gotten slower/less usable since I started using it 2 years ago.
kbenson 13y ago
Meanwhile the Roku just rolled out a main menu search that searches many of the "channels" it has installed to find content, so you Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, HBO Go, etc and search within them. That said, I still just leave it in the Netflix channel all the time because the (young) kids use it and it's easiest, especially with the hundreds of recommendations it shows so they don't really have to search by name at all.
- thezilch 13y ago
  Search would be helpful, but I would also want a joined "recently" watched, "favorites," etc. I don't mind, much, having to open different applications; it's possible it would be cumbersome to do so, if I had more than just Hulu and Netflix -- HBO, WB, etc have their own apps. I just can't understand why it takes more than a second to open and close what is essentially a browser and webpage. Again, (Netflix?) is this partially due to the platform (PS3 or Xbox)? Does a Roku launch an app, or does it work faster by controlling the interface and merely making API calls? I should really fire up a sniffer when launching/browsing PS3-Netflix; it'd be curious what parts of the sluggishness might be explained by network trips having to, for example, going through the PS network, which I can imagine sucks.
  - kbenson 13y ago
    The Netflix channel loads fairly quickly, within a 3-4 seconds, but then the retriving of your instant queue list and the downloading of all the images for the items in your instant queue (and the suggested groups) takes a bit longer (and loads visible items first). If it's not the first launch since a boot (or some internally defined timeout), it's faster since the images are cached, yielding a total time of ~4-5 seconds until the Channel is fully usable with all show images shown. Then again, I'm almost never loading the channel, I just leave it in Netflix, since that's all I really use. The launch time is essentially NIL.

jff 13y ago

It chugs on the 360 too. It's just slow in general and has only gotten slower/less usable since I started using it 2 years ago.

kbenson 13y ago

Meanwhile the Roku just rolled out a main menu search that searches many of the "channels" it has installed to find content, so you Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, HBO Go, etc and search within them. That said, I still just leave it in the Netflix channel all the time because the (young) kids use it and it's easiest, especially with the hundreds of recommendations it shows so they don't really have to search by name at all.

thezilch 13y ago
Search would be helpful, but I would also want a joined "recently" watched, "favorites," etc. I don't mind, much, having to open different applications; it's possible it would be cumbersome to do so, if I had more than just Hulu and Netflix -- HBO, WB, etc have their own apps. I just can't understand why it takes more than a second to open and close what is essentially a browser and webpage. Again, (Netflix?) is this partially due to the platform (PS3 or Xbox)? Does a Roku launch an app, or does it work faster by controlling the interface and merely making API calls? I should really fire up a sniffer when launching/browsing PS3-Netflix; it'd be curious what parts of the sluggishness might be explained by network trips having to, for example, going through the PS network, which I can imagine sucks.
- kbenson 13y ago
  The Netflix channel loads fairly quickly, within a 3-4 seconds, but then the retriving of your instant queue list and the downloading of all the images for the items in your instant queue (and the suggested groups) takes a bit longer (and loads visible items first). If it's not the first launch since a boot (or some internally defined timeout), it's faster since the images are cached, yielding a total time of ~4-5 seconds until the Channel is fully usable with all show images shown. Then again, I'm almost never loading the channel, I just leave it in Netflix, since that's all I really use. The launch time is essentially NIL.