SnapStream asleep at the wheel?

[koan00]

I wonder what is going on with snapstream these days. Development seems to have slowed to a crawl?

Years ago when I decided to take the DVR plunge, BeyondTV was the clear winner over what I considered to be it's closest competitor at the time: SageTV.

Since then I have become extremely frustrated with how BeyondTV has progressed, so much so that I just took another look at SageTV and it seems to be much more advanced that BeyondTV now. In fact the only place where I think BeyondTV still has the edge is in user interface, but even they are closer now.

The biggest features I see Sage has are:

1) Clear QAM support (out of the box) for multiple types of tuners with no jumping through hoops
2) Fully integrated media browsing.
3) Linux, windows, macos support
4) many more customization options

What do you guys think? Anyone tried them both lately?

[merrypig]

I think we just did this conversation already...

[mikem]

Yep Several times. Still you think it might get us somewhere

[queonda]

Nope. Sound like a broken record. Same conversation, different day.

[itsnotme]

The day everybody stops complaining is the day we'll all be dead. Let the complainers complain, it reminds you that you're still alive and there's still people to look at with pity because they've got nothing better to do but complain.

[gumby1]

It might be a different day and the same complaints, but why you ask? Maybe it is because the natives are getting restless. I am a relatively new user to HTPC software, but I have complained myself. I liked all of the features of BTV, but I have a Hauppage 1600 and an OnAir GT and I really want to use the QAM tuners in each. Right now I am stuck with the software that comes with the OnAir GT, at least it is better than the software that comes with the Hauppage. I have not had much time lately to use my HTPC, but I will be buying software by Christmas. I preferred the BTV until the Sage offered the QAM support for my cards. I was still hoping BTV will do it soon, but from what I have read, many features that people have requested in thepast have not been added to the software. It is true that people bitchin in the forums might not get anything resolved, but maybe they(BTV) take a look here every now and then and realize what features the people really want. I have not purchased yet, but I check the forums almost every day hoping I will see some good news. I would much rather be raving about all of the new features and stability of the software instead of griping about what features it is lacking.

Brian

[nanook105]

While I try to stay out of the must have or I will bail conversations, I have to agree that Snapstream's focus on their Enterprise product has reached the point where their consumer product is falling behind the competition on many fronts. The next major consumer release had better start addressing some of these issues or I'm guessing that their consumer market share is going to drop significantly.

[koan00]

FWIW, I just went through HDHomeRun setup on both BTV and Sage.

In comparison, the setup routine for SageTV was not as easy as expected, and BeyondTV's was a bit easier than I expected. Both were too difficult for it to be considered "out of the box" or seamless.

Overall, I'd say they were about equal in ease of use.

Sage sore points:
1) You had to manually enter in all of the remapped channels and enable them one by one - tedious and error prone.

BeyondTV sore points:
1) snapstream.net interface could be streamlined a lot. Once you merge the digital cable lineup with the HomeRun XML file, you will most likely have orphans (Channels the HomeRun can tune but aren't in your linueup(?), and of course channels in your digital linueup the HomeRun can't tune because of 68 channel limit or encryption).

If you try to save at this point you will get an error unless you delete each orphan. Instead of a check box were you can check them all at the same time, you have to hit 'delete' and wait for the not so fast snapstream servers to reload the whole page (100 times or more in my case).

2) When assigning the tuners to the lineup in the setup wizard, you have to check each box by hand instead of just a "check all" link.

The problems are small and easy to fix, but pretty annoying.

Result: no clear winner. I'll be sticking it out with BeyondTV a bit longer.

[Khris]

Originally Posted by merrypig

I think we just did this conversation already...

And yet you continue to drone away without adding any useful information.

[paxtten]

Having moved from TIVO to BTV, and having never tried Sage ... my experience has been realitvely positive. I started with 4.6 and now 4.7, so my time has been short.
BTV has a number of minor problems compared to Tivo. But in general, BTV has more features than Tivo and therefore the more features, the more complaints.

I think some of the features could be streamlined a little better as they are in Tivo ... but then if they were that important, I could go back to my Tivo . I think I'll just enjoy BTV as inexpensive feature rich PVR and if new features come along ... great.

P.S. anyone wana buy a Tivo ?

[hvymetal]

After seeing SageTv has a network Encoder and native clear-QAM there is no reason to stick with BeyondTV. I was one of the first supporters of BeyondTV all the way back to version 2. Snapstream really pissed me off when they didn't intergrate BeyondMedia into BeyondTV. Its silly to have two different products. BeyondTv used to be the best PVR software out there. Now I'm beginning to think SageTV has beaten them. Yes the GUI looks better then Sage but who cares what the GUI looks like when you watchTV. Right now I want features that should have been but in the software over two years ago. Instead they developed useless plugins like DVD burner and H.264 which should be included anyway. Honestly if I want to encode a DVD or use H.264 there are much better software than BeyondTV. Yes its convenient but how often did I use them, never. I closely monitor the PVR software seen and played with them all. I originally went with BeyondTV because of its features but I can tell you right now I'm not spending another dime with SnapStream the way it is right now. I can honestly say that most of the PVR softwares have matched or surpassed BeyondTV features.

Pissed of BeyondTV user,

hvymetal

[psionic]

Originally Posted by hvymetal

After seeing SageTv has a network Encoder and native clear-QAM there is no reason to stick with BeyondTV. I was one of the first supporters of BeyondTV all the way back to version 2. Snapstream really pissed me off when they didn't intergrate BeyondMedia into BeyondTV. Its silly to have two different products. BeyondTv used to be the best PVR software out there. Now I'm beginning to think SageTV has beaten them. Yes the GUI looks better then Sage but who cares what the GUI looks like when you watchTV. Right now I want features that should have been but in the software over two years ago. Instead they developed useless plugins like DVD burner and H.264 which should be included anyway. Honestly if I want to encode a DVD or use H.264 there are much better software than BeyondTV. Yes its convenient but how often did I use them, never. I closely monitor the PVR software seen and played with them all. I originally went with BeyondTV because of its features but I can tell you right now I'm not spending another dime with SnapStream the way it is right now. I can honestly say that most of the PVR softwares have matched or surpassed BeyondTV features.

Pissed of BeyondTV user,

hvymetal

You're not hurting SnapStream by leaving ... you've already paid. They give you free EPG updates forever and free upgrades 'till version 5.0. What's in it for them?

They're trying to attract more customers. More customers = more income = more resources to make more and better products.

If you want to make them feel your pain or listen to your rant, hit them where it counts ... new customers.

My personal view is that SnapStream is a small shop -- we're not dealing with Microsoft. Their developers are going to be assigned to projects that keep the company running, not to projects inspired by a pissed off forum post. I personally recommend SnapStream every chance I get because I believe as they get more consumer-level customers, they'll improve their consumer-level product.

[ZetaVu]

I think all the htpc companies other than DRMicrosoft(tm) are small shops, and honestly bitching about them in forums won't impact new customers and impacting new customers won't do anything to help get our voices heard. Only way to do that is to integrate our efforts into one common cause. Sadly, we each have our preferences and cannot seem to agree on a common source of action.

If we could, and could get enough people to back it, then SS might focus on it. Sadly however, their main focus now is enterprise customers, and us pesky consumers are a second notion. We'll have to wait that out, and if they are not able to get barrellfuls of cash (or they are and can afford to hire more developers) then they might start focusing again as they should on an integrated full pvr/htpc solution.

Sadly I see that future requiring a linux backbone, but that's just me...

Anyway, I would propose this as a set of priorities for the MAJOR overhauls of btv, in my list of urgency

1. HD recording from satellite/cable. Right now only foreseeable near term solution is using an R5000 modded Dishnetwork box, no solution for Directv and not sure about cable. This requires network recording, Fonceur is working on this but SS needs to get heavily involved. If they setup a working interface and network tuner, then they can match and improve on what Sage already offers, and let us hanfle anything gray. OTA HD SS is the best, and I see no value in QAM other than for people without good OTA signals.

2. INTEGRATION, yes, I rate this as number 2 to HD recording. I see a new viewscape, one where you can buy SS modules like DVD plugin or get community created modules and add them like you can in BM. This is what is standard on Media Portal, Sage, Mythtv, MCE, why is it so hard to understand for SS?

3. Cross Platform, again I see this as a priority for link rather than the server at this time, but long term, a Linux based server that can be installed with a stripped down xubuntu on prebuilt systems and sold at reasonable prices will destroy TIVO and all the competition. I think Btv is superior to myth (once it is properly integrated) and people will pay for the software or prebuilt hardware with BTV installed to get the performance, the convenience, the guide data etc. Of course this is a harrowing task since BTV is so dependent on m$, but if they start now and start slowly, I think by version 6 they could have a platform independent product (by which time vista would be a memory, WIndows 7 will be a hybrid between windows and linux, and all that mac hype would have long since faded, (yet again)

Feel free to integrate your other priorities, although I think these three would make a great start if we could all agree on that (or at least discuss what they should be)

[MarcP]

Originally Posted by psionic

What's in it for them?

Current customers sticking around for version 5.0? There's more money to be made if they make a good product to upgrade to... unless their user-base keeps on shrinking and they don't take care of it...

[nanook105]

Originally Posted by ZetaVu

1. HD recording from satellite/cable. Right now only foreseeable near term solution is using an R5000 modded Dishnetwork box, no solution for Directv and not sure about cable. This requires network recording, Fonceur is working on this but SS needs to get heavily involved. If they setup a working interface and network tuner, then they can match and improve on what Sage already offers, and let us hanfle anything gray. OTA HD SS is the best, and I see no value in QAM other than for people without good OTA signals.

I agree with your baseline/overall approach, but disagree on your statement on QAM for a couple of reasons. I'm sure that there are may people like me that can't get good enough OTA reception (and I'm only 26 miles away) to effectively use OTA, and for mainstream TV viewers that covers the majority of the recording. Also, QAM gives us the ability to record HD straight from cable without any devices/boxes/cards from the cable company or microsoft. A more generic approach to QAM that supports more tuners would be a good step forward in fully supporting HD recording.