Are you using Silverlight, and if so would you tell us how your experience has been

Hello,
I have been reluctant to switch to the silverlight viewer for watch instantly, as I had heard of many problems with the initial release. Would love it if some people using it could post brief reviews, problems, good things, etc. To give us an update on their experience using silverlight. Cheers and thanks,
Scott

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by wowwee123 on January 29, 2009 at 8:21am: I for one don't use it for one reason- can't uninstall it.

Permalink Reply by ewd76 on January 29, 2009 at 8:28am: I have enjoyed it. There might be a few more glitches where the picture stops for a few seconds, but not enough to be a bother. I have heard some people complain that the sound and picture don't sync up, but I have not noticed this. Greatest thing for me is to be able to go to any scene immediately.

Permalink Reply by Pihk on January 29, 2009 at 8:31am: ditto

Permalink Reply by Spindaddydad on January 29, 2009 at 8:38am: I have not experienced any problems with it. Mac Verizon Fios 15/15.

Permalink Reply by Pihk on January 29, 2009 at 8:51am: Not even split second picture freezes? They occur even when there is plenty of buffer.

I ask because I have pretty much your set up: Verizon FIOS/MacBook Pro/FireFox3.0.4.

On my desktop PC that presumably runs on the old player since I never installed Silverlight (although I haven't used it in a month or longer) I never got those picture freezes.

Permalink Reply by Spindaddydad on January 29, 2009 at 9:06am: I mostly watch on my Roku, but since installing Silverlight I've watched 2 movies (well, 1 1/2) and did not notice any freezes. Are they so tiny I could have missed them or are they fairly noticeable?

Permalink Reply by Pihk on January 29, 2009 at 9:21am: They're noticeable enough to get annoying over time and I have yet to get through 5 minutes of viewing without several instances occuring. However, I don't observe the audio synch problems others have.

Permalink Reply by Terry Wyatt on May 16, 2009 at 2:47pm: I've looked at the Roku in the NF ads and followed the links to try and learn about installing it. I can't determine if there must be cables connected to the TV, or if it is wireless. Any help?

Permalink Reply by Knaldskalle on May 16, 2009 at 3:41pm: You must connect the Roku to your TV with cables, but you can use a wireless connection to hook your Roku up to the internet (or you can use Ethernet cable, whatever your connection allows). To hook the Roku up to the internet wirelessly you must first have a wireless router (I'm stating the obvious, just to make sure there's no misunderstanding).

To connect the Roku to the TV you can use either composite (red/white/yellow), S-video, component video (red/green/blue) or HDMI. Here you can download a pdf of a "quicksheet" from the Roku website.

Permalink Reply by Adrian on January 29, 2009 at 8:38am: The technical difference is that the old PC player needs less CPU and uses more hardware acceleration, but needs more network bandwidth. The Silverlight player doesn't play as well on older PC's but will give much better picture quality on low bandwidth connections. The Silverlight player is also far easier to install so people who try instant watching for the first time are more likely to succeed.

Permalink Reply by Big Sur Scott on January 29, 2009 at 9:24am: Thanks Adrian, that is very helpful information. I now understand Netflix push to switch end users to the Silverlight player. It presents an interesting dilemma for me, as I have a pc that is dedicated solely for use with NF WI. It is a decent mid price dell optiplex with duo core 2.2 ghz processor, but just 1gb of memory.

I live in a remote community that luckily became a test ground for ATT in providing DSL service over copper pair gain. So we should not really have DSL service here, but we do. The downside to it is that bandwidth varies greatly on usage by all of us with DSL. So there are times when my download speed is quite good 2.5mb ps and steady, other times it will drop down or will be spotty with momentary packet log jams.

So it would seem that my machine should have the power to run silverlight, though I should add 3 gb more memory priory to attempting, as I am sure the pauses folks mention are do to a combination of memory swapping between cpu, memory and hard drive and also other processes accessing the cpu, all that crap that is auto loaded with XP and that in my systems I remove or stop from loading is constantly accessing cpu. Also lack of resources would certainly account for reports of image audio synch issues.

However I hate the fact that once I opt in for this and if I find that it is not functioning well on my system etc. I can;t go back. Perhaps a way to test is to create a new two week free NF trial account, that way if I find I do not like it, I have made no changes to my real account and if I like it, I can switch. That may just be the answer. Thanks
Scott

Permalink Reply by Orion2012 on January 29, 2009 at 9:52am: duo core 2.2 ghz processor, but just 1gb of memory= good enough
just 1gb of memory= get at least 1 more gig. If its shared then 2 512 chips 1 dim just 1 chip 800 MHz is whats in your optiplex but the processor is capable of more, I think its @ 1333 MHz. Sometimes its the speed of the memory and not the amount that ='s quality
The graphics card in an optiplex is fair but not the best, the optiplex is sold more to businesses than to the average home user. Might consider nvidia or ATI. Sound cards are hit and miss.