I don't want to be one of those Netflix bashers; the Netflix has been very good to me and my family, and it is easy to get spoiled when you don't get everything exactly your way. But a problem has come to my attention that is moderately irritating. I think (but am not sure) that I have at least figured out what the problem is, but I am wondering if anyone here knows of a solution.
The problem is (I think) related to a change Netflix made some months ago - TV series used to be indexed separately by each season, so that, for example, you would add "Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1" to your cue, and then also "Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 2", and so on. A while ago they started saving the entire series, so you would only add "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" once, and all seasons are in the cue. This did not happen all at once - I noticed that for a while some were saved the old way, and some the new. But a few months ago or so though, it looks like all shows are saved in the "whole series" method. I don't like this new method - it is more difficult for one thing to tell when you have gone from one season to the next. But that was a very minor irritation. Then I started watching SG-1, notable as the first show I streamed from Netflix since the changeover that contained a large number of episodes. I got a Vizio Blu Ray wireless device for Father's day, which is set up to stream Netflix (and other services). I like it. But apparently many non-PC devices (including my Vizio) have a limit on the number of episodes from any one show that can be displayed in memory. When I got around midway through the 5th season of SG-1 I came very close to going right to the first episode of Season 6 - but then noticed that there were only 2 episodes in Season 6, and that it then continued with Season 7. That seemed odd, so I went and looked at the Netflix listings on my computer (IMac) and sure enough not only were there a full 22 episodes for Season 6, but there were 22 for Season 5 as well, even though my Vizio only displayed I think 12. I googled around just a little and saw that others were having similar problems - and apparently the magic number is 100. Many non-pc devices will not display more than 100 episodes. The fix for this seems to be to disconnect the non-pc device from netflix, go to the computer, play the next episode (that does not display on the non-pc device) for 5 seconds, exit, then restart netflix on the device. That brings that episode up (and, in my experience so far, the very next one, so that the procedure recovers 2 episodes) though the cost is that the two preceding episodes get deleted from the non-pc device display. Netflix seems to think that this is the final solution to the problem, not the temporary patch that it feels like. Its not the end of the world - probably everyone who streams on non-pc devices also has access to a computer at least much of the time to work the fix. It is a limitation on the claim that you can watch Netflix content on your television just as easily as you can on your computer. It is a moderate pain, as if you are not careful you will start watching an episode from a season or two in the future, and have to go into the next room or wherever and repeat the procedure. I don't know why these devices have such a limit, but it is frustrating that there seems to be such an obvious, long term fix to the problem, which is to go back to packaging shows season by season. Since no show has more than 100 episodes in a season, this problem would never pop up. So, two questions I guess: 1) Aside from making the queues a little more tidy, what advantage to packaging all seasons together is there that outweighs the inconvenience do non-pc device users? and 2) has anyone found a better fix for this problem? -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
