Comcast xFinity streaming... meh

[Markbnj]

So who watches xFinity on-demand streaming and is happy with the performance? I decided to give it a try tonight because we have a free week of premium channels, and I thought I'd watch the first season of Game of Thrones. Watched three episodes. As a long-time Netflix streaming customer Comcast's performance was pretty laughable to me. Glitching, decompression artifacts, pixellation, many episodes of significant IQ degradation, pauses, stuttering. I mean, this is the best they can do over their own proprietary network? I was kind of excited about maybe adding HBO for a few months and watching a few other shows on-demand, but meh, no way I would sit through that repeatedly. If others have had good experiences maybe I'll give it another try tomorrow.

 

[Sho'Nuff]

So who watches xFinity on-demand streaming and is happy with the performance? I decided to give it a try tonight because we have a free week of premium channels, and I thought I'd watch the first season of Game of Thrones. Watched three episodes. As a long-time Netflix streaming customer Comcast's performance was pretty laughable to me. Glitching, decompression artifacts, pixellation, many episodes of significant IQ degradation, pauses, stuttering. I mean, this is the best they can do over their own proprietary network? I was kind of excited about maybe adding HBO for a few months and watching a few other shows on-demand, but meh, no way I would sit through that repeatedly. If others have had good experiences maybe I'll give it another try tomorrow.

I'd call customer service <shudder>. I have Comcast and have not experienced any of the issues you identified with its VOD service.

 

[Markbnj]

I'd call customer service <shudder>. I have Comcast and have not experienced any of the issues you identified with its VOD service.

We're both talking about streaming to a browser or media application? Not to the set-top box? Our STB service is fine and we're largely happy with the quality.

 

[Kyle]

If you subscribe to HBO you can use their streaming site- think it's hbo to go or something? I used that for a couple months w/ no issues at all - good quality and all their programs/seasons are available. I've not tried xfinity's streaming yet.

 

[Rinaun]

Watched three episodes. As a long-time Netflix streaming customer Comcast's performance was pretty laughable to me. Glitching, decompression artifacts, pixellation, many episodes of significant IQ degradation, pauses, stuttering. I mean, this is the best they can do over their own proprietary network?

Yea, I've had the same issues. It's even worse when you record something on the DVR and it has this similar problem; pixel errors/banding, stuttering, lockups etc. For the DVR fix it was suggested that it's a HDD issue, but I get it with empty drives and even live shows rarely. Have fun with CS because every time I call them they make me feel like I'm wasting their time and are incredibly unhelpful but polite. I've had to call them now 3 weeks in a row to remind them their cable line is almost on the ground from a storm a month ago. I honestly CANNOT beg Google any harder to get service over here, granted they don't do cable. I'd be happy with just the internet at this point.

Good Luck!

 

[Markbnj]

Yea, I've had the same issues. It's even worse when you record something on the DVR and it has this similar problem; pixel errors/banding, stuttering, lockups etc. For the DVR fix it was suggested that it's a HDD issue, but I get it with empty drives and even live shows rarely. Have fun with CS because every time I call them they make me feel like I'm wasting their time and are incredibly unhelpful but polite. I've had to call them now 3 weeks in a row to remind them their cable line is almost on the ground from a storm a month ago. I honestly CANNOT beg Google any harder to get service over here, granted they don't do cable. I'd be happy with just the internet at this point.

Good Luck!

Are you referring to hurricane Sandy? We still have wires hanging down around here as well... although overall I give Comcast props for their recovery from the storm. By like the second day they had micro-generators running next to all their switches and when we finally had power back their network was already up.

But their streaming sucks. I watched another episode late last night, way outside primetime. The issues weren't as great but it was still dropping frames and overall just didn't perform well. It's not the kind of thing I will bother with customer service on, but I do think it's pretty lame. Netflix performs 10x better and they don't own the network from the content to my door.

 

[Sho'Nuff]

We're both talking about streaming to a browser or media application? Not to the set-top box? Our STB service is fine and we're largely happy with the quality.

I routinely use xfinity to stream to the following devices without any of the issues you mention:

1. STB

2. Iphone - xfinity app

3. Ipad 2 - xfinity app

4. Desktop (Windows based) - through Google Chrome

I do occasionally have issues with the STB, but they are unrelated to the VOD service (loss of menu, rebooting, poor image on certain normal cable channels, etc.).

 

[SheHateMe]

Half the time, I can't get the shit to work properly on Xbox Live. For a whole week, I kept being told that the xbox could not connect to the service. Before that there was about a 3 week period that I couldn't steam online through the browser because it wasn't working with the version of Flash I had after it TOLD me to update in order to watch the movie.