Thursday, September 25, 2008

Update on Playon Hulu on PS3

Just a quick update on the "Playon" software that i blogged about earlier.
A quick refresher, Playon, by themediamall.com is a software program that you run on your pc to allow your xbox or ps3 watch netflix, youtube, hulu, and espn content right on your tv. The software is still very much in beta, so I just wanted to share my quick thoughts.
I have been using it for a couple weeks now, I probably have used it 10 times in total. The picture quality is still acceptable (not near as good as dvd quality or hd, but still good to just watch a show). The speed is very good, if you have a decent cable internet connection, you will experience zero problems or lag in watching a show. In fact, you can fast forward through the few commercials at 1.5 speed with no problems at all, so you can cut commercial time down to less than 30 seconds per commercial.
The bugs:
Just about every time I use the playon tool, it is broken for hulu. This means that you have to go re-download the application in its latest build from their site. To their credit though, every time hulu breaks and every time i download the software it is fixed. However, you will find that the "update" feature in the software does not work at all. If you manually update, it will tell you that you have the latest version, when in fact you dont. Just ignore the update button for now, and any time you have a problem, just go redownload and re-install the software. It is okay to install right over top of the existing software, no reason to remove it first.

for now:
  • Still no netflix, though they say coming soon "very soon"
  • Hulu works great, but like I said you almost have to update the software every time you want to use it.
  • They made improvements in the interface, so now when you access the media server from your ps3, you only see one option "playon" you click on that to get to all the sub channels that are supported, way better.
This is still in Beta, so I can't say anything negative. They give you 60 days to try it, I just hope that it is stable by the end of my trial period, so I will buy it. I cant see spending the money yet until it is stable however. Give it a shot, this is a great tool.

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