I've been a Start internet customer since 2011/12. I haven't had a TV subscription from the incumbents since 2007. Over the past few years, I've tried various Android TV / Infomir Mag boxes. 2 weeks ago I decided to give Start TV a try, mainly for sports and news. Here are my observations after 2 weeks. I would rate my networking and overall computer knowledge as advanced.
The Good:
1) Great ordering experience. Pretty much made up my mind to order the service (premium + news), but the person on phone helped answer a few questions. Knowledgeable as usual.
2) Fast shipping of set top box. Ordered Sunday night, received in Ottawa on Wednesday.
3) Quality remote control. Had petty of cheap Android TV box remotes in the past. This remote is much better. It remains to be seen if it will hold up to years of use.
4) Setup of set top not bad. If you've setup any Android device or smart TV you should be ok. Remote is Bluetooth so has to be paired with set top box on setup. Instructions in box are minimal, and I wouldn't just give it grandma to setup on her own.
5) Audio quality. I know it's stereo (not 5.1), but I've used some cheap IVTP services that have highly compressed audio that sounded terrible.
6) No "hard" crashes of set-top box. I've used Android TV boxes and Infomir Mag boxes that had plenty of hard crashes, requiring a restart of the device.
7) Minimal buffering. Almost never.
8) Video resolution (not the same as viewing experience, see below). Seems to vary by channel, but 720p / 1080pish is typical on most channels (a few are SD).
8) Good YouTube integration in the set top box.
9) Set top box does not get too hot.
10) TSN and SportsNet are available from their respective websites and apps with your Start TV subscription. BNN and several other channels as well.
Needs work:
1) The set top box UI. The TV guide is ok except for the inability to filter out useless channels or set favourites. The PVR functionality is ok as well. However, everything else is a cluttered mess.
2) Occasional "soft" crashes (either a frozen picture or an error message) requiring me to change the channel or back out to the main menu and enter Start TV again.
The bad(ish):
1) Micro-stuttering / motion judder particularly visible on fast moving sports (hockey, basketball, american football, real football) and on news channel tickers scrolling along the bottom of the screen. There is a huge tread on this topic that seems to have sputtered out. This has nothing to do with buffering. I'm referring to brief pauses in the video (a stutter) while audio remains fine. I've seen this often on other live streaming services. This one is a big deal for me, as the stuttering takes me out of the game and reminds me I'm watching internet video. Will the R96 or R104 upgrades people are talking about fix this issue? I hope so.
2) Perhaps a small issue for some, but the largest financial news channel in the US, CNBC, is only available in a reduced picture SD resolution which looks horrible. Can we get that up to HD quality?
3) The Android app is of minimal value, as many of the best channels are not available. It works, but is nothing special. Occasional error message about not being on my home wifi network.
↧