2011-12-04, 05:20 PM
I had tons of Best Buy points that were going bad and weren't going to be good after the end of the so I thought since I have an older TV in the upstairs bedroom, I'd try a Roku for the wife. If I don't like it, my friend said he'd buy it from me. So, with almost $50 off, I bought the XS model.
Very small and compact and I hooked it up via wireless to my network and using the yellow, red and white cables to my non HD TV. Surprisingly, the wireless is very good even for HD video but, knowing that it was made mostly for purchased online video, I thought I'd try some of the both free and cheap home network streaming software.
I've tried Plex (free) and the $10 Roksbox. No doubt the Plex is way easier to set up and use IMO. But, the video formats are basically limited to MKV and .H264 and for now, Plex doesn't work with audio files (will soon). Both are slow to 'boot' and have limited fast forwarding and rewinding capabilities and when you're use to the NMT, there is no comparison to me but for the price, I can see why it's getting lots of geek talk time.
I still don't know if I'll keep it as it really only cost me $50 but I see many future possibilities with this device especially if the ISP's don't push their caps too far in my area. I have much to learn and little time to fool with it may try to connect to my HDTV via ethernet and HDMI.
Finally, a friend has Apple TV and thinks the Roku may be better. The $79 model seems to do almost the same but I got Angry Birds (big deal) included.
Very small and compact and I hooked it up via wireless to my network and using the yellow, red and white cables to my non HD TV. Surprisingly, the wireless is very good even for HD video but, knowing that it was made mostly for purchased online video, I thought I'd try some of the both free and cheap home network streaming software.
I've tried Plex (free) and the $10 Roksbox. No doubt the Plex is way easier to set up and use IMO. But, the video formats are basically limited to MKV and .H264 and for now, Plex doesn't work with audio files (will soon). Both are slow to 'boot' and have limited fast forwarding and rewinding capabilities and when you're use to the NMT, there is no comparison to me but for the price, I can see why it's getting lots of geek talk time.
I still don't know if I'll keep it as it really only cost me $50 but I see many future possibilities with this device especially if the ISP's don't push their caps too far in my area. I have much to learn and little time to fool with it may try to connect to my HDTV via ethernet and HDMI.
Finally, a friend has Apple TV and thinks the Roku may be better. The $79 model seems to do almost the same but I got Angry Birds (big deal) included.
Paul
Custom ASUS Maximus X Hero, 16 GB Memory-ASUS GeForce 1050 Ti, H115i Pro AIO, 850W PS, CM H500P case, Corsair Vengeance RGB Ram, Samsung 970 EVO, HDHomerun Prime & Extend Tuners- running Windows 10 (and other goodies)
