Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

Free is great especially if you've never watched before and want to check it out before committing to buying. Great that Lucas Oil is trying to reach out and let as many people as possible tune in. When I try and watch anything on Facebook live, my picture quality is just OK. Definitely grainy. Is that just something on my end or is that normal? For Lucas Oil, I bite the bullet and pay for a monthly subscription since it's so cheap and the picture quality is so much better.  I don't mind giving them a few bucks hoping they keep these broadcasts coming and hopefully add more. 

I'm going to apologize up front because I'm sure I'm going to offend you but as I said in my last post I work with streaming TV so I have worked with lots of Android devices, Apple IOS devices (iPhone and iPad only) and Rokus.  Here's what I've learned, Rokus suck.  My favorite device so far has been the nvidia shield followed by the Firestick.  So my question is, if you have a firestick that does what you want why even mess with the Roku?

I'll never claim to be very tech savy so bear with me but you appear to be so I'll ask you the question. Currently when I watch anything that has a Roku app, that's what I use. I watched Lucas Oil TV last night and my Roku works great. It's actually an older Roku that we got for my son's TV that isn't a smart TV. He doesn't use it much so we just hooked it up to our Samsung TV in the living room. When I watch Dirtvision, I use my Samsung S9 phone. I bought an adapter the goes from the phone into the TV. I can also screen mirror my S9 onto the Samsung. Doesn't really matter. While the picture using my phone in either scenario is acceptable, the picture using the Roku is far better and the whole process is just easier since the Roku is always hooked up.  I don't have to plug and unplug things to the TV. For this reason I was hoping Dirtvision would get a Roku app. Over my current set up, is there and advantage to switching over to the firestick and using it for everything?   Picture quality?    

I'll never claim to be very tech savy so bear with me but you appear to be so I'll ask you the question. Currently when I watch anything that has a Roku app, that's what I use. I watched Lucas Oil TV last night and my Roku works great. It's actually an older Roku that we got for my son's TV that isn't a smart TV. He doesn't use it much so we just hooked it up to our Samsung TV in the living room. When I watch Dirtvision, I use my Samsung S9 phone. I bought an adapter the goes from the phone into the TV. I can also screen mirror my S9 onto the Samsung. Doesn't really matter. While the picture using my phone in either scenario is acceptable, the picture using the Roku is far better and the whole process is just easier since the Roku is always hooked up.  I don't have to plug and unplug things to the TV. For this reason I was hoping Dirtvision would get a Roku app. Over my current set up, is there and advantage to switching over to the firestick and using it for everything?   Picture quality?    

I am not desperate but it would be nice if they offered apps for Roku and Apple which is another one that isn't being shown enough love by the PPV providers.  

As far as developing the app I like to listen to podcasts on my MP3 player when I tinker around the house and haven't seen amy new episodes of Open Red.  I don't know but I'm just speculating that they might have furloughed some of their staff.  Just speculation on my part but there is a lot to report on with the schedule in flux so the lack of new episodes has me wondering.

The main thing the firestick has is a native web browser app (2 of them actually Silk & Firefox).  Having a native browser allows you to go to their website & login & pull up the videos in the same way you would if sitting at your computer.  I use this for Dirtvision & other sites that don't have their own app.  Lucas & Flo both have apps now & both work great.

I don't have a Roku but from what I understand, they don't support or allow native web browser apps which then forces you to either cast or plug in to the TV from another device as you mentioned. 

I have in the past used an app on a smart tv called TV Cast.  They make versions for Roku I think.  In short, with that, you put the app on both the streaming device and on your phone or ipad that you are streaming from.  On your phone, it is a web browser where you log into the dirtvision site & pull up the video.  Once the video starts, you sync it to the streaming device.  Been a while since I used this but when I did it worked pretty well.

My Roku TV is hard wired to Ethernet and the Fire Stick is wifi.  I get a rock solid fast connection hard wired and have struggled with wifi signal booster in the lower level at times.  I stream all of my television through Roku and I'm not sure where you're coming from when you say it sucks.  I turn it on and it just works great all the time for AT&T now which were changing at the end of the month, Hulu, Netflix, Amazon, Floracing and a ton of other apps.  No problems ever.

I have added some of the "unofficial" Roku apps but if I told you what they were it might hurt my already bad reputation.  

The main thing the firestick has is a native web browser app (2 of them actually Silk & Firefox).  Having a native browser allows you to go to their website & login & pull up the videos in the same way you would if sitting at your computer.  I use this for Dirtvision & other sites that don't have their own app.  Lucas & Flo both have apps now & both work great.

I don't have a Roku but from what I understand, they don't support or allow native web browser apps which then forces you to either cast or plug in to the TV from another device as you mentioned. 

I have in the past used an app on a smart tv called TV Cast.  They make versions for Roku I think.  In short, with that, you put the app on both the streaming device and on your phone or ipad that you are streaming from.  On your phone, it is a web browser where you log into the dirtvision site & pull up the video.  Once the video starts, you sync it to the streaming device.  Been a while since I used this but when I did it worked pretty well.

Well the most important thing is that you're happy with it.  I'm aware there are a lot of Roku users out there who are happy with them and they work great for them.  Here's some things I don't like about Roku.  First is the remote, it connects with wi-fi direct.  The Firestick, Shield and most other streaming boxes use bluetooth.  The remote loses sync with the Roku much more often than other devices.  Another thing I've seen them struggle with is wi-fi band steering and it will never move to the 5ghz radio, which can be an issue with streaming live TV.  They also seem to be more prone to HDCP errors which basically thinks you are trying to record the video with something inline and will give you a black screen telling you this making things unwatchable.  It also seems like everytime there's an update it breaks something, like the last update broke the TV control for some people (power and volume).  Other stupid things like when the time change happened made some apps inoperable for a time.

40 years ago there was probably people out there that would defend a Ford Pinto because they never had any problem with theirs.  There was probably lots of Pintos that didn't have problems or burst into flames when rear ended but I think we can all agree they were more prone to starting on fire after a rear collision and are generally not a great car.  I'm just saying in my experience the Roku seems more prone to problems than other media streaming boxes.  

Other things that annoy me (not making them a bad device) is their marketing, setup and activation.  As for their marketing, lots of people think a Roku is a Roku, they don't understand there is a difference between an Express and an Ultra.  I had an Express for all of 10 minutes before it went back to the store.  If you buy a Shield, you're getting a damn good device, they don't make a junk one.  Same thing with the Firestick, I don't think they make a bad one of those either.  I don't like the setup portion of the Roku either.  First off, you have to enter a credit card to setup a new account, at least that's what the want you to think, there's no skip button or add later or anything, however when you get to that step you can just go to roku.com in your web browser and you are logged in and can then activate a device.  To me the activation of the device could be much quicker, lots of stupid questions in there.

The Roku also has a lot less to offer when compared to the firestick and shield in my opinion.  There's a lot less apps available on Roku when compared to the others.  With the firestick and shield you can also sideload an app if it's not available on there.  There's a USB port on the Ultra that can only be used to watch videos from a USB flash drive or external hard drive.  On the Shield you can use that port for pretty much whatever you want (mouse and keyboard, game controller, usb tuner).  To my knowledge you can't hook a bluetooth remote up to the Roku either, and from my understanding you can hook up most bluetooth remotes and controllers to the other streaming players.  You also can't set static addresses with the Roku.

Also a heads up on using the wi-fi booster.  I'm assuming you're talking about an extender, that are in the neighborhood of $20-$50 and not a mesh system?  They work fine for browsing and probably for things like watching Netflix but for watching live video, they're not going to work very well.

I use the Stitcher app for podcasts,  it downloaded a new Open Red episode (#191-Return to Racing) on Tuesday 5/19.   Before that was April 22nd and before that was March 2.   The host explained in the 4/22 podcast that he had a sore throat and couldn't speak for a week or so.   I have not listened to the 5/21 show yet to see what else they had to say about it.   

Rip the Fence downloaded a new episode around noon today, Winged Nation is putting out 2 shows a week. 

I download them manually because some episodes don't interest me.  I saw that Open Red finally did release a new episode and already listened to it.  I'm in the upper Midwest and am most interested in subjects and guests that I'm familiar with.  I have never listened to Rip The Fence, just Winged Nation, Open Red, The Dirt Show out of southern Minnesota and Dale Jr's show.  I listen to mostly non racing related content.  I am enough of a racing fan to listen to a few podcasts, get two PPV channels and go to a handful of races but not so focused on racing that it's my only form of entertainment when I turn on the Tele.

Thank you DirtVision !!

My PPV wish just came true.    I just got up on a Saturday morning and watched the entire WoO replay from the feature last night.

Starting this weekend, DirtVision now offers full replays within a few hours of the race.  

From the main page,  select "Exclusive" and you will see the previous nights race.

Thank you DirtVision !!