Comments on: Confessions of a SnapStream Tester

By: Jim

Jim — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 09:50:27 +0000

I am a newbee with Snapstream. I have always wanted to have the ability to stream live tv through the internet (i.e. like sling box) and also have the ability to change the channels withouth having to vpn. I am still learning and probably have not found it due to the complicated menus of having to flip back and forth with webadmin and the regular gui.

I believe for those who want to watch tv anywhere in the world and have control of the channels would be greatfull. Imagine being able to rewind and fastforward as well.

By: Andy

Andy — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 01:57:51 +0000

Where is ClearQAM support i do not care about iTunes.?

By: Frank

Frank — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 17:23:07 +0000

I have a video iPod and look forward to Snapstream getting things more stable in the Vista platform. Currently, it crashes (perhaps due Drm) for re-compression as well as smart chapters. There is no way I am un-installing the media player 11 for sake of this feature (i.e. TV on the iPod.)

Those who do not see future in the rss video feed, probably do not travel much or take public transportation where large blocks of time could be spent watching TV!

By: Jeff Moore

Jeff Moore — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 01:54:12 +0000

I actually bought BeyondTV specifically for the H.264 support. I bought an HDHomeRun at the same time and expected to be able to encode those programs to H.264 and watch them on my AppleTV. Unfortunately, the audio and video are unwatchably out of sync if you do this (although H.264 works fine from my standard def recordings). The only thing that was worse than this expected feature not working was my experience with tech support. To say they were slow to respond would be a compliment.

By: drfred79

drfred79 — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 05:34:09 +0000

I’m not a small media player owner, nor will I ever be a small media player owner. This update is useless when you could have been focusing on something good like better HD QAM features, such as the ones all your customers want. Stop playing with your iphones and do something that people are begging for before you lose more customers.

By: Brian

Brian — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 19:41:17 +0000

When the integration feature came out, I didn’t think much of it. I didn’t own an iPod (or any type of portable video player). But for Christmas I received a nice shiny new Zune 80. I love it. Now the thing I dislike most about the integration feature is the name. It works perfectly for my Zune (check the forums, a great little tutorial briefly explains which settings to use). There’s a few quircks in the naming process and the shows converted for podcasting show up next to the original show listing. I hope they find a way to keep this clean, but its not a big deal to me. I have a long commute and for days when I take the bus, I can catch up on my shows.

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 06:00:51 +0000

Hello all,

I’ve been reading many of these posts. I’ve very supprised to yet see an integraded product for the MVP or their own variation, as a simple extender. Much less HD version. I’m supprised and disapointed Snapstream is totally relies on 3rd party individuals to create such a product. Even Sage gets it with their Java thin client for the MVP.

Building a compelte computer system for BeyondTV Link as an extender is expensive. Wake up and retake your market back!

Common Snamstream. Wakeup and look to consumer demand. At LEAST look at your competition. Microsofts Vista Premium now has new extenders taking advantage of Blu-ray and HD and after the initiall release they are expected to come down under $300 or less each.

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 04:32:46 +0000

I would concur with most of the comments posted here. I have run multiple licensed copies of BTV from back in the early 3.X days.

I very much appreciate the emphasis placed on platform stability. I also make frequent use of show squeeze, smart-skip, and the DVD plug-in. The fact that I have a significant number of configuration options and the ability to record and transcode in a variety of formats is a significant plus.

I am also concerned that there have been some opportunity costs for the current development path.

I also run Vista/MCE on one box and it obviously has very good integration between photos, DVDs, TV, etc.

I would hope that Snapstream hits my top four issues for the product:

1. Integration between Beyond TV and Beyond Media

2. QAM support without significant workarounds

3. Better technical support from Snapstream directly

4. Significant enhancements to allow all settings to be configured/adjusted from within the program rather than the webadmin

Best wishes for the new year all and happy recording,

Luke

By: Jeff

Jeff — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 04:11:51 +0000

I don’t have an Ivid either, and probably will not buy one for awhile. I want BTV to focus on the core system and improve it. Setup and configuration needs tons of work – tuner setup should be plug and play. BTVLink is way to heavy weight. How about supporting native firewire channel changing on STB’s? There is a long list of core issues that need work. I’m not taking my recordings on an Ipod. I do want more HD content. I want cable card integration and firewire support. Ipod BTV is for folks that live in Japan. Do they use BTV? I doubt it. DVD recording is slow as a dog. But that doesn’t matter, soon Sandisk digital film will replace DVD/HDDVD/BLUERAY disks.

By: Dan Bell

Dan Bell — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 08:04:27 +0000

I’ve been a loyal BeyondTV customer for many years. I upgraded to BeyondTV 4 and Beyond Media as integration was mentioned as a feature. The only “integration” I can see is that I can switch BETWEEN the two products more easily now. It’s terrible. The sound levels are different when switching between products, the skins are different. It’s just lousy.I used to be able to brag about my BeyondMedia Movielink integration. I could rent movies from my couch for just a dollar or two. Unfortunately, that hasn’t worked for almost a year as Movielink has updated their website. No more renting videos from my couch…

I upgraded to a new computer this week. Which lead me to look at HD tuners ( I use two analog tuners from avermedia currently). BeyondTV claims to support QAM but instead they really just have a kludge workaround for using a separate $150 box that does the QAM for them. I downloaded and installed a copy of SageTV and purchased a HD tuner. I had QAM up and running in about 30 minutes. Not too mention SageTV has Beyond Media functions built-in for free! Also they integrated tons of web content like youtube, video podcasts and tons of videos from networks like HBO and Comedy central. It’s very slick.
I even played with free MythTV. It does QAM too!

SNAPSTREAM, We don’t want to switch. We like your product. We want to stay with you, but we need reasons to stay. QAM is crucial. BeyondMedia integration is crucial. Your competitiors are already doing both of these better for less money…