[talentedmonkey]

I subscribe to Lovefilm, and have never used the streaming service as it is very poor quality. Along come Netflix, stream from my Wii, free trial, superb quality for a stream. Lovefilm now heavily advertising to compete with Netflix, noted they had upgraded player to silverlight, so decided to see if there was a difference, to my surprise the quality has greatly improved, which it has to in order to be competitive.

SO the dilema is do i still keep netflix, it has a good selection of TV series which Lovefilm dosnt offer yet. I hope Lovefilm will also expand the onine catalogue. Either way love Netflix as it finally forced Lovefilm to provide a decent streaming service at last.

[justjax]

Quote:

Originally Posted by talentedmonkey

I subscribe to Lovefilm, and have never used the streaming service as it is very poor quality. Along come Netflix, stream from my Wii, free trial, superb quality for a stream. Lovefilm now heavily advertising to compete with Netflix, noted they had upgraded player to silverlight, so decided to see if there was a difference, to my surprise the quality has greatly improved, which it has to in order to be competitive.

SO the dilema is do i still keep netflix, it has a good selection of TV series which Lovefilm dosnt offer yet. I hope Lovefilm will also expand the onine catalogue. Either way love Netflix as it finally forced Lovefilm to provide a decent streaming service at last.

Sad that it took Netflix's arrival to get LoveFilm to step up their game both in terms of content and possibly quality of streaming, etc. As to which to go with, why not both? Not sure what your budget is, but for £11 a month you can have both (assuming you take the LoveFilm streaming only £4.99 package). I have both on trial and I think i'll keep both just to have the variety of both packages.

[Daveoc64]

As far as I can tell, Lovefilm hasn't actually changed the quality of their streaming video with the switch to Silverlight.

It's still below SD quality.

[talentedmonkey]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Daveoc64

As far as I can tell, Lovefilm hasn't actually changed the quality of their streaming video with the switch to Silverlight.

It's still below SD quality.

I did not say it was perfect HD, its still miles off that I agree, however I I have noticed a significantly improved quality, I tried to watch a few older tv series such as Jeeves and Wooster, where the quality was no better than an original video from the 80s which had been played to death, but now it is watchable,

[BigFoot87]

Quote:

Originally Posted by talentedmonkey

I subscribe to Lovefilm, and have never used the streaming service as it is very poor quality. Along come Netflix, stream from my Wii, free trial, superb quality for a stream. Lovefilm now heavily advertising to compete with Netflix, noted they had upgraded player to silverlight, so decided to see if there was a difference, to my surprise the quality has greatly improved, which it has to in order to be competitive.

Nope, nothing to do with Netflix - everything to do with the movie studios who viewed Flash streaming as not secure enough and who told Lovefilm to switch to Silverlight or else be denied rights to stream:

http://blog.lovefilm.com/uncategoriz...lverlight.html

Quote:

We’ve been asked to make this change by the Studios who provide us with the films in the first place, because they’re insisting – understandably – that we use robust security to protect their films from piracy, and they see the Silverlight software as more secure than Flash.

Simply put: without meeting their requirements, we’d suddenly have next-to-no films to stream online.

The fact that Sliverlight potentially offers a better quality of picture is a nice side-effect.

[BigFoot87]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Daveoc64

As far as I can tell, Lovefilm hasn't actually changed the quality of their streaming video with the switch to Silverlight.

It's still below SD quality.

I agree, and I streamed a Lovefilm movie last weekend on my Xbox 360, which (since the last software update) has Sliverlight inside.

I guess it doesn't really matter what the motivation for Lovefilm to stream HD is, as long as they do it, quickly. If I was Netflix I'd be shouting "HD! HD!!!!" from the rooftops in their adverts.

[ThriceShy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by talentedmonkey

I subscribe to Lovefilm, and have never used the streaming service as it is very poor quality. Along come Netflix, stream from my Wii, free trial, superb quality for a stream. Lovefilm now heavily advertising to compete with Netflix, noted they had upgraded player to silverlight, so decided to see if there was a difference, to my surprise the quality has greatly improved, which it has to in order to be competitive.

SO the dilema is do i still keep netflix, it has a good selection of TV series which Lovefilm dosnt offer yet. I hope Lovefilm will also expand the onine catalogue. Either way love Netflix as it finally forced Lovefilm to provide a decent streaming service at last.

I have free trials of both lovefilm and netflix and the moment and loving them both. Lovefilms picture quality for SD I find fine on a ps3 but of course they don't do HD.

There is some good stuff on lovefilm now like all series of Lost etc. The competition from netflix has forced them to improve their service. A stream war like this can only benefit us.

[daleski75]

Lovefilm's streaming quality is sub-par in my opinion to say the least and the fact that when I was on a 'lowly' 20mb adsl connection (19mb sync) it was buffering like crazy and that with the crap quality has put me off for a very long time.

[alanwarwic]

Lovefilm has the movies, Netflix the TV series. And they are both at the mercy of the vagaries of your ISP

[tghe-retford]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigFoot87

The fact that Sliverlight potentially offers a better quality of picture is a nice side-effect.

And to stuff Linux users too.

[Derekb108]

lovefilm streaming hurts my eyes trying netflix and my eyes dont hurt.

[Lyricalis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tghe-retford

And to stuff Linux users too.

It was forced on them by the studios. It was either Silverlight or get no shows. The studios probably think that Linux = communist thieving scum anyway...

[azimo]

Lovefilm on my digitalstream is smooth and good quality, Netflix on my Wii is good quality put suffers from bad stutter, I've tried both services on the 360 and get the same results, Netflix stutter is very irritating, maybe to irritating I've not decided yet

[vinceben]

I am watching Lovefilm via a Sony S370 bluray on a Philips 42'' plasma. Picture quality for me ok and equal or slightly better to normal SD broadcasts . I do beleive the quality has improved. I am on AOL 8 meg and receive average 6 meg downlods. I receive Netflix via Wii, so not HD and quality seems equal to Wii. I must admit that Lovefilm needs to start introducing HD, even a section with just a selection of HD films would be a start. Its only early days since Netflix launch and Lovefilm has vastly improved so hopefuly we will see HD soon.

[Nailz]

Lovefilm have added a lot of TV to stream the last 2 weeks. More to come hopefully.

[alcockell]

And how much of their (the studios) infrastructure probably runs Red Hat now? But of course the legal ******* wouldn't know that...

Oh - also, wasn't Shrek, titanic, happy Feet etc etc rendered on Linux farms?

Oh - BTW - found out that Netflix uses Amazon's CDN, so might be an idea to ask your ISPs if an Amazon edge server is within the local ISP cloud...
Or they have a direct peering connection...

[advid]

Quote:

Originally Posted by talentedmonkey

I subscribe to Lovefilm, and have never used the streaming service as it is very poor quality. Along come Netflix, stream from my Wii, free trial, superb quality for a stream. Lovefilm now heavily advertising to compete with Netflix, noted they had upgraded player to silverlight, so decided to see if there was a difference, to my surprise the quality has greatly improved, which it has to in order to be competitive.

SO the dilema is do i still keep netflix, it has a good selection of TV series which Lovefilm dosnt offer yet. I hope Lovefilm will also expand the onine catalogue. Either way love Netflix as it finally forced Lovefilm to provide a decent streaming service at last.

yes you're right.just been over to LOVE Film and a definite improvement in streaming quality...Try it youself....see their selection of films and make up your mind...

[gonefishin]

Dunno about streaming quality but until very recently I've found the range of titles available in the Lovefilm streaming catalogue to be wanting. Browsing through the guide has been as rewarding as all the visits I used to make to Blockbuster, only to return empty handed.

I didn't find Netflix much better, tbh, and have ended my subscription on the last day of the free trial. Am sure it'll satisfy some, but I'm not terribly interested in US TV shows.

[-GONZO-]

I signed up to Lovefilm Instant 30 day free trial last night on my Sony Blu Ray player and I'm not too sure what to make of it.
I've seen a couple of things I would like to see, but not much so far to make me want to ditch Netflix apart from not having to view through the Wii.
I'm also left a little confused as according to the site you can view TV shows like Doctor Who and Torchwood on Instant, but ive been unable to find in the menus and using the search. I can see the likes of Lost, but not much else like what's on the site. http://www.lovefilm.com/browse/film/...v-collections/
Am I missing something?

[Matt D]

Quote:

Originally Posted by advid

yes you're right.just been over to LOVE Film and a definite improvement in streaming quality...Try it youself....see their selection of films and make up your mind...

Is it only the streaming quality via the website which has improved, thanks to Silverlight?

I thought that Lovefilm's streaming quality via PS3, Xbox 360, etc. etc. was still meant to be just as crap as before.

[gonefishin]

I watched Almodovar's Broken Embraces at about 9pm last night. Picture quality was great and no buffering.

[wakey]

Quote:

Originally Posted by -GONZO-

I signed up to Lovefilm Instant 30 day free trial last night on my Sony Blu Ray player and I'm not too sure what to make of it.
I've seen a couple of things I would like to see, but not much so far to make me want to ditch Netflix apart from not having to view through the Wii.
I'm also left a little confused as according to the site you can view TV shows like Doctor Who and Torchwood on Instant, but ive been unable to find in the menus and using the search. I can see the likes of Lost, but not much else like what's on the site. http://www.lovefilm.com/browse/film/...v-collections/
Am I missing something?

Content deals are primarly for streaming with a Computer with streaming rights to other Devices such as Bluray players and tablets needing to be negotiated seperatly so the titles on offer will differ from the computer based version and the other devices Version.

It's also the reason why SkyGo offers access to more content on the computer version than then the iPad one

[alcockell]

Quote:

Originally Posted by wakey

Content deals are primarly for streaming with a Computer with streaming rights to other Devices such as Bluray players and tablets needing to be negotiated seperatly so the titles on offer will differ from the computer based version and the other devices Version.

It's also the reason why SkyGo offers access to more content on the computer version than then the iPad one

... and it's one of the most annoying aspects of rights negotiations as it's just holding back the whole media-convergence thing.

And every time tech has advanced, it's held back unexpected-but-actually-beneficial use cases, with people screaming about "piracy" and YET ANOTHER bloody arms race... MORE CPU thrown at DRM etc...

Don't you just LOVE luddite non-technical lawyers screwing it up for everyone?

[noise747]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tghe-retford

And to stuff Linux users too.

Get used to it, you are a minority.

[MooWow!]

is love film HD on xbox?