Over the summer I visited with a friend of mine (who shall remain unnamed), and her high-tech household of gadgets.
Everything about my friend is large. Her house, her living room ceilings, her TV, her library of movies.
This is, of course, very comfortable when you are a guest. It was a nice experience to settle down into her large, comfy sofa and watch movie after movie, simply by selecting one from the large list of available movies, which played so nice on her very large flat screen.
Hoping to duplicate the experience on a (much tinier) budget, I promptly ordered myself a Roku, which is a small device that works with a Netflix subscription. Roku promises to enable a Netflix customer with high-speed Internet access to "stream" the movies on their television. You have to have an account that allows "unlimited" movies which I did have (my subscription costs about $9/month). I figured, I was good to go.
Here's what was positive about the experience of buying my Roku:
- It was cheap ( under $100).
- It was easy to set up.
Here's what was not so great:
- Viewing the movie on our "mid-level" DSL line. The picture quality was, frankly, horrible.
Although Netflix lists mid-level DSl as a viable viewing option, we found that it only provided the "basic" (read "low end") quality for watching streaming Netflix videos.
The quality was so low, in fact, I can't recommend it for most movie viewing - it's more like a reference video if you're a movie researcher and you really want to refresh your memory, or if you simply don't mind an incredibly grainy look in your home entertainment. Titles are unclear. Actors are just a tad on the fuzzy side.
What Netflix says in their FAQ about picture quality is this:
⁃ Your Netflix ready device automatically analyzes the speed of your Internet connection whenever you start a movie or TV show and chooses the optimal image quality for your connection. For fast connections (3 Mbps or more), picture quality is comparable to DVD quality.
What I say, is: Stay away from Roku unless you have a connection speed of 3 MBps or more. Until then, find your movie fare through a different channel.
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