Concerned about purchasing

[carthur50]

I downloaded the demo, and was impressed. But now I'm not so sure...

Came home last night, had 17 days left on my demo, couldn't connect to get my listings. Also couldn't play any MPEG-2 shows that I recorded previously, received a message thath the files were corrupt or could not be found. Spent hours trying to fix things, ended up reinstalling the software, was able to play MPEG's, but still no guide.

I read that this has happened before, with no acknowledgement from Snapstream. Get up this AM, still no luck.

I was going to purchase BeyondTV in a week if the demo continued to work well, but I am not so sure now.

I need opinions; is Snapstream truly as bad with support as it appears on this board, or are the hassles worth it? Should I lay out my $59.99, or buy a Tivo?

[Cayars]

If you're impressed with the Demo then you should purchase it. At $60 it's dirt cheap anyway for what it does.

More then likely if you hadn't re-installed the software you wouldn't have lost the guide. A re-install with kill the guide and it will then need to reload. From time to time SS makes changes to snapstream.net (where the guide info comes from) and it is down for about a day. Normally this isn't a problem at all since you have 14 days worth of guide info. However, if you do a re-install then you will notice it.

If I were a betting man, I'd probably say that the downtime on snapstream.net has something to do with a change(s) to support added functionality in 3.5 which is approaching. This is just a guess however.

Carlo

[parkerbink]

In the future I suggest you post a question here before sending it to Snapstream, you will be answered very quickly here. I also wouldn't recommend reinstalling without asking here about your issue. The people here have most likely seen the issue you are having and can help.

[ultrajones]

I also had problems connecting to the service to schedule shows. I am not happy to see repeated failures of this system. Before spending the money, you may want to send an email to support and ask them what's up with the service during peak periods. The system is becoming unacceptably S L O W. They may be experiencing growing pains.

Regards,
Ultrajones

[Brett]

Originally posted by ultrajones
you may want to send an email to support and ask them what's up with the service during peak periods. The system is becoming unacceptably S L O W.

Actually doing this will likely only cause a backlog on the support side. They have enough technical questions to be concerned about that common issues such as server down time info is usually unoffiically available here.

From my minor understanding of the backend the servers have been undergoing some upgrades with 3.4 dealing with product key information. I believe this was the direct reason for that trial version bug and the couple of days throughout the months that the server was offline. As such, 3.5 is a *free* major overall on the system sides of things, the artecture that has slowly been changing for the last few revisions is suppose to come together with this build. I suspect some server down time from now and then as this build is implemented. As long as you have a registered version you will have 14 days advance guide info, so at most it will be day without remote recordings.

It should also be noted this board has 6,000 members most of the people though that come here, do so because they have problems with their system. So you do not see the other tens of thousands of happily paying customers.

---

As for your question about a TiVO, I can tell you that I was a loyal TiVO customer for 4+ years, sweared by the thing, but then found BeyondTV. I have since given my TiVO to my parents and only use BeyondTV. TiVO really is starting to lose what "little" advantages it had, and with the 3.5 release I do not see it even as comparable. The feature set by this point will strongly outweigh a standard TiVO and even one with the additional home media option kit.

One example? My 30 hour TiVO could record 30hrs ONLY ON THE LOWEST SETTING. On my PC I can record/archive 500+ hours with better quality.

Keep in mind though that BeyondTV stability is very dependent on what you put in the system. If you have a crappy motherboard or All-In-Wonder card you simply will not have the same results as thoughs with good motherboards and PVR250s

-Brett

[carthur50]

I went ahead and bought the program tonight. I cannot justify the expense of a Tivo and the monthly fees associated with it, when I could buy BeyondTV for $49.99.

Now I will wait for a sale on a PVR250, and replace my crappy WinTV card.

[ultrajones]

Originally posted by RadioActive
Actually doing this will likely only cause a backlog on the support side. They have enough technical questions to be concerned about that common issues such as server down time info is usually unoffiically available here.
...

Well, here we are again... 9:20 EST and the program guide WON'T DISPLAY. Where is this unofficial server status you were referring to?

[Brett]

Originally posted by ultrajones
Well, here we are again... 9:20 EST and the program guide WON'T DISPLAY. Where is this unofficial server status you were referring to?

I thought you were having issues with it downloading / updating, if thats the case the servers are working fine as of 9:31 EST, so either its a quick hiccup or perhaps something is wrong on your side of the network:

[3/9/2004 21:31:15] Guide Updater Service: Initializing...
[3/9/2004 21:31:15] Guide Updater Service: Downloading data from SnapStream.Net...
...
[3/9/2004 21:32:09] Guide Updater Service: New guide data loaded. Clean update complete.

However, I am not quite sure what you meant by "Won't Display"? Do you have the log file that might provide some hints?

-Brett

[ultrajones]

I upgraded at your recommendation which fixed my original issues... thanks by the way. I am (and have been) having problems connecting to the guide data during peak periods. I am having no other network connectivity issues. When connecting directly to http://www.snapstream.net/Grid.aspx, I receive the login prompt instantly, but it just hangs after logging in. It eventually displays, but it is very, very slow.

Regards,
Ultrajones