Amazon Prime streaming video dead after Sept. 15. (On Certain BD Players ) *

Amazon Prime is an amazing deal, IMHO.

It includes:

Two Day Shipping
Amazon Prime Instant Video - with quite a few exclusive HBO shows - I've loved watching the first two seasons of Newsroom that was just recently added.
Amazon Prime Music - I've listened to and downloaded for free a ton of music that I would have never listened to otherwise, it has really broadened my listening experience.

 

As far devices go, I think that ones built into a TV suck. But they aren't mean to be good. They are meant to be an added value to buying whatever brand of tv.
My older Sony works well, but you're locked with whatever apps. I go a ROKU2 earlier this summer to catch on Game of Thrones (because early ones not on demand and other devices don't have HBOGO) and wanted the opportunity to add other services. The fast forwarding and rewinding are much faster and smoother on the ROKU compared to my old Sony Blu Ray player and certainly better than my TV streaming functionality.

ROKU has to be really good because that's their product and I have to say that I'm impressed with it.

 

I'm thrilled you find it amazing...

 

Roku (or other preferred standalone streaming device) is the way to go. Doesn't matter whether it's a "smart" TV or a Blu-ray player, having the apps built into the devices means your devices just got a lot less useful and a lot closer to premature forced obsolescence as soon the manufacturer decided to stop supporting/updating those apps. It's a lot less painful to have to replace a sub-$100 streaming device than it is to buy a new TV.

My TV is a plasma set with no extra bells, whistles, or apps, and only 2 HDMI inputs. The cable box goes into one of the inputs, and everything else goes into the AV receiver, which then performs the source switching and video scaling as needed. Simple and relatively foolproof.

 

Glad you agree!

 

I do! I do! I do!

 

Oh crap, I think we might be married now?

 

OK, where's the honeymoon? On the Amazon prime train!

 

I'm buying your wedding gifts on Amazon so I get free shipping.

 

LOL! HAHAHAHAH! that was great...I'll put up my wishlist.

 

For those of you who are getting (or got) the Roku 3, there are two models. The 2015 model has the voice search feature but the 2013 model does not.

 

The Roku player and the Western Digital player are cheap and very easy to use. I'm very curious as to why they had to stop supporting this specific Blu-ray player.

 

Apple does this a lot. They move on with technology and have no issues with rendering their older hardware useless to new applications in the interest of putting out a better product. It sucks sometimes but if companies were too concerned with making sure our older stuff was compatible, new technology would evolve awfully slowly. I would probably be okay with that, but it isn't the world we live in.

 

That does bring up another point...just be glad it is relatively cheap to replace this type of hardware. No, you shouldn't have to, but that is why I try and buy dvd players to be used only for that purpose, while buying a Roku for my streaming. I find everything seems to be useable for a longer period of time. LG has no incentive to insure their DVD players remain relevant as streaming devices, imo. Roku is probably going to make darn sure their streaming devices continue to work via updates for a long time.

 

It makes sense if you buy a lot from them. I get your point, but I order twice a week for my business and that $99 is ridiculous cheap for me! I bought a very big amd heavy HP laser printer and the shipping saved on that one item paid for most of my annual fee and on top of that I get streaming and loaner Kindlebooks. It is an incredible deal if you use the services.

 

I'm curious whose fault this is: did Amazon change something fundamentally in their streaming, or did something break in the LG player? You wonder if it's LG's fault or Amazon's fault. It would be to Amazon's advantage to make sure their streaming videos are compatible with everything, but LG won't make any money on Amazon's software.

 

Huh. They discontinued the instant video option this year so I assumed nothing Amazon-related worked with the Premiere. I need to look into it.
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=527741

dan c

 

Who sent you that email---LG or Amazon? How did Amazon know how you stream video?

 

and I get yours!
BUT, I would feel the need to purchase items just to make up for the membership...

 

I bought the membership because I was already buying a lot of items and paying an arm and a leg for shipping. If I didn't buy things very often then I wouldn't find the Prime membership useful.

 

Not sure what the deal is with Amazon, but when the same thing happened with my Sony BD player and YouTube several months back, there was some explanation out there as to why. I think it had something to do with YouTube finally doing away completely with flash video, but I may be garbling some other technical explanation.

But in that case it was YouTube making things non-compatible with these BD players (from 2011 and earlier if I’m recalling correctly), and the BD player’s main screen notifying me over a month ahead of time that it would stop functioning on a specific date. It further instructed me to go to a website, which featured YouTube/Google’s explanation for why they were dropping compatibility.

I had actually bought the Sony BD player I did more for Netflix, but then ended up using YouTube quite a bit.
Whether a coincidence or not, it is interesting that NO advertisements ever came up when using YouTube on my Sony BD player. Now with the Roku, I get ads all the time just like on a web browser. Very annoying after being spoiled with circumventing that on the Sony BD player.

 

I picked up the newer Roku 3 a few months ago and enjoy it. Using it for YouTube more than anything these days.

But if anyone is looking into it, it’s worth noting that the “voice search” function only works from the home menu. It doesn’t work within the apps. That is, you can search for a movie across *all* apps. That is indeed a useful feature; it’ll tell you whether various services have a movie streaming for free, for free with subscription, and then all the paid rent/purchase options. But it has no voice activation if, for instance, you are typing a long search into YouTube or something. I didn’t catch this aspect when shopping for a Roku box; I’m usually pretty good about looking into this stuff but I’ll assume I just didn’t read that portion of the specs enough times. It wasn’t a big selling point for me, but I remember finding it a bit wonky that the thing has voice recognition, but can only apply it at the home screen.

 

I'm waiting to finally get an APPLE TV box in the Fall when the new ones ship around October... Love their interface

 

That is exactly the scenario one should be experiencing before buying.

 

I buy lots of stuff on Amazon and have never paid a shipping fee (aside from Amazon Marketplace purchases) or paid $99 to get "free" shipping either.

If someone really spends "thousands" on stuff, how difficult is it to get to the $35 free shipping limit?