Going Blu-ray rant

[carlgo]

Good grief, two days out of my life trying to rent a movie and then to watch it on my ATV. Read a thousand threads, hundreds of answers. Seems it simply does not work. Went to Netflix. Cannot connect, and then, well they say the quality depending on the download speeds and this and that anyway, so s...w that. And maybe changing ISP numbers...no, no, no. Oooh, rip with this or that and use this software and that and jailbreak this or that and....No, no, no.

Thanks, Steve. I will go down to the video store and rent a glorious Blu-ray. I will put it in the player and get perfect audio visual results, immediately. It will not disappear from the player, or start from the beginning if I pause it so we can freaking pee. People will not go away because I am messing around with some stupid streaming download garbage. We will not see dialogue boxes about how you cannot do this or that and passwords, passwords to watch my own F ATV with a movie I bought. I must have entered my password a hundred times. What garbage. This is the future Apple envisions, thin and worthless? And they are going to sell a TV that works off of apps and downloads and...no, no, no.

You know, when this sort of c...p is promoted by Apple one has to wonder what they are doing. "Just works"...? No, it doesn't just work at all. In fact, iTunes owes me $3.99 for Zero Dark Thirty because it disappeared after so many hours or whatever and I could never watch the thing on the TV.

I am going down to the video store now and get me the Blu-ray version of Zero. Then, tonight I will watch it and drink, since I don't have a clear mind to play Space Engineer Sam in order to manipulate devices all night. It just works.

 

[mic j]

Wow!!!! That was helpful!!!! Can we hear more???????

 

[thejadedmonkey]

While the rant was hard to read, I couldn't agree more. The lack of a blu-ray drive was what kept me from upgrading, and the lack of being able to update components is what will keep me from upgrading.

 

[Mrbobb]

LOL. Sometimes, low tech is best.

 

[Omne666]

Dont'cha just love a good rant!

Ohhh...and just to join in....no, no no!

 

[rx7dude]

I feel your pain man.
Blu Ray is not that easy either. It me 30 mins over the phone to troubleshoot my father in law's blu ray player. Thanks to Sony he had to d/l firmware etc...
He gave up and went back to the store and got the DVD version.

 

[burne]

I am going down to the video store now and get me the Blu-ray version of Zero.

Over here the largest chain selling Blu Ray just went into receivership. Better hurry buying what you want before Blu Ray-stores goes Blockbuster.

 

[btbrossard]

TL : DR - Why doesn't this stupid crap just work, damn it?

 

[kswalker75]

I have 2 ATV's (2nd gen & 3rd gen) and never have any issues with them. My in-laws have 2 - 3rd gen ATV's and they don't have any issues either.

My wife and I use Netflix thru ATV almost every night and our 2.5 year old loves the cartoons and kid shows.

I have a blu-ray player, I think it may have played 3 movies in the past 3 years.

Each to his/her own though!!

 

[Michael CM1]

I rented Zero Dark Thirty about a month ago without the slightest problem. I found it much easier than actually finding a "video store" that isn't shuttered or a copy in a RedBox machine.

If you want a fair fight, go ask anybody who owned one of those $500 Blu-ray Disc players a few years ago how perfectly awesome they weren't. They took FOREVER to load and had limited upgradability for firmware. Then over a couple of years the manufacturers got better and for the most part BDs work as well as DVDs. But my dad got one of those $500 BD players, and it was slow as molasses.

I honestly can't figure out what problem you had, but technology will have problems. My mom was complaining about their new printer not printing yesterday. I go over there and they had accidentally unplugged the wireless router -- her computer connects via WiFi. So yeah, stuff happens. That doesn't mean wireless printing is doomed.

Don't get me wrong, I love a good rant. You probably would've had tons more company during the first-generation Apple TV. That thing was buggy. The revision was such a huge improvement.

 

[JAT]

Sounds like you got a bum ATV.

 

[carlgo]

No, the ATV is fine, the connections are fine. It is great for my photos and iTunes, just not for playing a rented movie streaming from the computer. Look on line. There are vast numbers of complaints about this. Some say you just have to have a really fast connection and download straight to the ATV, but others complain about that as well.

Apple did a bad job here and people have been complaining about it for a very long time, and they complain about Apple not doing anything about it.

BTW, Zero Dark Thirty on BR is just wonderful. Never had a BR problem.

 

[StinDaWg]

It's funny that torrents still offer the best viewing experience. lol

 

[chambord]

No, the ATV is fine, the connections are fine. It is great for my photos and iTunes, just not for playing a rented movie streaming from the computer. Look on line. There are vast numbers of complaints about this. Some say you just have to have a really fast connection and download straight to the ATV, but others complain about that as well.

Apple did a bad job here and people have been complaining about it for a very long time, and they complain about Apple not doing anything about it.

BTW, Zero Dark Thirty on BR is just wonderful. Never had a BR problem.

No offenses but the technology works just fine. It's apparently you that is having the issue. My entire house is based around AppleTVs streaming from an iTunes-running Mac, and I don't have a single issue. Instead of blaming Apple, perhaps a diligent exploration of your own system is warranted.

 

[Omne666]

Hey I'm with you! Had my issues, solved them, and haven't bought a disk in at least 18months, Never going back to physical media. And yes, never is a long time.

But I did love the rant!

 

[Nightarchaon]

This is why my PS3 gets more use as a Bluray player than a games console.

dont get me wrong, i have 3+ TB of movies that i stream to my apple TV, for but films i really like, and want to watch in quality, the BluRays 1080p makes apples 1080p look blocky and colourless in comparison .

Just because your download is outputting at 1080p resolution, doesn't mean its the same quality as the 1080p from the bluray, Compression takes a lot of quality out of the download, id rather have a 10Gb movie on a bluray and keep the quality, both visually and audibly, than a crippled over-compressed download or stream at two or three GB.

 

[jtrenthacker]

Though I have very few problems with my ATV's, I did enjoy you're rant. I still buy bluray movies that are important to me. There is nothing out there yet that can compete with the audio/video quality of bluray. This, of course, assumes that you would have a proper A/V system to take advantage of what bluray has to offer. As far as price, check out Amazon. Tons of deals. If it's a movie I know the kids will watch often, I'll rip it to iTunes so we have the best of both worlds.

 

[JAT]

It's funny that torrents still offer the best viewing experience. lol

I don't find that to be true. BD is best.

 

[old-wiz]

I feel your pain man.
Blu Ray is not that easy either. It me 30 mins over the phone to troubleshoot my father in law's blu ray player. Thanks to Sony he had to d/l firmware etc...
He gave up and went back to the store and got the DVD version.

The Blu-ray specs allow the studios to tweak the player for DRM - they do it regularly to block the people who have somehow managed to break the encryption and put the movies on their HDDs - oh the horror!!

The blu-ray players need an internet connection to download regular updates and sometimes the updates brick the device and then you are stuck with a dead device.

It's especially bad with the popular new movies - they are the ones with the newer encryption.

 

[Irishman]

Good grief, two days out of my life trying to rent a movie and then to watch it on my ATV. Read a thousand threads, hundreds of answers. Seems it simply does not work. Went to Netflix. Cannot connect, and then, well they say the quality depending on the download speeds and this and that anyway, so s...w that. And maybe changing ISP numbers...no, no, no. Oooh, rip with this or that and use this software and that and jailbreak this or that and....No, no, no.

Thanks, Steve. I will go down to the video store and rent a glorious Blu-ray. I will put it in the player and get perfect audio visual results, immediately. It will not disappear from the player, or start from the beginning if I pause it so we can freaking pee. People will not go away because I am messing around with some stupid streaming download garbage. We will not see dialogue boxes about how you cannot do this or that and passwords, passwords to watch my own F ATV with a movie I bought. I must have entered my password a hundred times. What garbage. This is the future Apple envisions, thin and worthless? And they are going to sell a TV that works off of apps and downloads and...no, no, no.

You know, when this sort of c...p is promoted by Apple one has to wonder what they are doing. "Just works"...? No, it doesn't just work at all. In fact, iTunes owes me $3.99 for Zero Dark Thirty because it disappeared after so many hours or whatever and I could never watch the thing on the TV.

I am going down to the video store now and get me the Blu-ray version of Zero. Then, tonight I will watch it and drink, since I don't have a clear mind to play Space Engineer Sam in order to manipulate devices all night. It just works.

As much as video streaming is good to have as a piece of our media consumption habits, we certainly would not rely upon it above all else.

For when picture quality and sound quality matters, we watch Blu-ray. It's simply better than streaming.

----------

I feel your pain man.
Blu Ray is not that easy either. It me 30 mins over the phone to troubleshoot my father in law's blu ray player. Thanks to Sony he had to d/l firmware etc...
He gave up and went back to the store and got the DVD version.

Come on. If you're used to computers, you should not be flummoxed by something as trivial as a firmware update!

Are you new to Blu-ray, or is it just your father-in-law that is?

----------

This is why my PS3 gets more use as a Bluray player than a games console.

dont get me wrong, i have 3+ TB of movies that i stream to my apple TV, for but films i really like, and want to watch in quality, the BluRays 1080p makes apples 1080p look blocky and colourless in comparison .

Just because your download is outputting at 1080p resolution, doesn't mean its the same quality as the 1080p from the bluray, Compression takes a lot of quality out of the download, id rather have a 10Gb movie on a bluray and keep the quality, both visually and audibly, than a crippled over-compressed download or stream at two or three GB.

It's also why MS is putting a blu-ray drive into the next XBox.

 

[nOw2]

just not for playing a rented movie streaming from the computer.

You can only play on the device you rent from, renting on one and playing on another is explicitly not supported for legal (not technical) reasons.

Some say you just have to have a really fast connection and download straight to the ATV,

The speed required to download to ATV is the same as to a computer, it does not need to be faster in any way unless you wish to stream immediately rather than download first. But that would be the same on the computer.

 

[CHI3F117]

Good grief, two days out of my life trying to rent a movie and then to watch it on my ATV. Read a thousand threads, hundreds of answers. Seems it simply does not work. Went to Netflix. Cannot connect, and then, well they say the quality depending on the download speeds and this and that anyway, so s...w that. And maybe changing ISP numbers...no, no, no. Oooh, rip with this or that and use this software and that and jailbreak this or that and....No, no, no.

Thanks, Steve. I will go down to the video store and rent a glorious Blu-ray. I will put it in the player and get perfect audio visual results, immediately. It will not disappear from the player, or start from the beginning if I pause it so we can freaking pee. People will not go away because I am messing around with some stupid streaming download garbage. We will not see dialogue boxes about how you cannot do this or that and passwords, passwords to watch my own F ATV with a movie I bought. I must have entered my password a hundred times. What garbage. This is the future Apple envisions, thin and worthless? And they are going to sell a TV that works off of apps and downloads and...no, no, no.

You know, when this sort of c...p is promoted by Apple one has to wonder what they are doing. "Just works"...? No, it doesn't just work at all. In fact, iTunes owes me $3.99 for Zero Dark Thirty because it disappeared after so many hours or whatever and I could never watch the thing on the TV.

I am going down to the video store now and get me the Blu-ray version of Zero. Then, tonight I will watch it and drink, since I don't have a clear mind to play Space Engineer Sam in order to manipulate devices all night. It just works.

OP, I'm sorry that you had problems and a good rant is always great. I hope you feel better!

That being said I wouldn't necessarily go blaming Apple. You knew up front that the device didn't have a BluRay player and you were told before you rented the movie that it would only last 24 hours. They even offer a network test in settings! (not that I think it works that well).

 

[phoenixsan]

I am.....

totally symphatetic about this post, rant or no. Apple not always make or made good choices about tech to support/implement. Not all the people have ultrafast Internet or space to download all the media. And seeing a movie must be fun, no a living Hell in Earth.

Maybe if BR tech lows prices and the masses promote a revolt demanding it, Apple hears....or if losses a significant chunk of pie ($$) for not having it.....

 

[Primejimbo]

My Apple TV set up is not normal and I use 2 routers because of the lay layout here. I had issues about 2-3 times a week streaming. I turned off the pass code to log into the computer and so far no issues.

 

[blueroom]

No problems whatsoever with my ATV3 and rentals or Netflix. I use wired Ethernet and have good switches and an ISP with decent speed.