The Criterion Channel -- Technical Issues and Questions

News on Criterion and Janus Films.
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mfunk9786
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#76 Post by mfunk9786 » Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:17 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 9:20 pm
Watching Mikey and Nicky now on a Roku and there's so much digital noise. So, so much. My first impression isn't a very positive one, never had image quality concerns like this with Filmstruck.
Aaaaaand the movie stopped on its own with 3 minutes to go and won't play for more than 5 seconds at a time now.

Great.

Yeah...... they're gonna have some kinks to work out.

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jwd5275
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#77 Post by jwd5275 » Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:38 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:17 pm
mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 9:20 pm
Watching Mikey and Nicky now on a Roku and there's so much digital noise. So, so much. My first impression isn't a very positive one, never had image quality concerns like this with Filmstruck.
Aaaaaand the movie stopped on its own with 3 minutes to go and won't play for more than 5 seconds at a time now.

Great.

Yeah...... they're gonna have some kinks to work out.
Had the exact same problem on Roku. Switched to Amazon Fire and it played fine.

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Drucker
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#78 Post by Drucker » Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:49 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 9:20 pm
Watching Mikey and Nicky now on a Roku and there's so much digital noise. So, so much. My first impression isn't a very positive one, never had image quality concerns like this with Filmstruck.
Have you watched the blu? Some of the heaviest grain I have ever seen. Noticably moves in screen.

backwater
Joined: Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:39 pm

Re: The Criterion Channel

#79 Post by backwater » Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:56 pm

fdm wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 1:40 pm
So Apple TV 4K still getting the same dropped frames every few seconds I was getting with FilmStruck. (On 1080p plasma.) Next stop: the Rokus... still waiting on the app.
Glad to read this (and the other comments) about the Apple TV 4K issue, because I was worried I was the only one. It's super frustrating and makes things unwatchable. So this is just an issue with VHX and Apple TV across the board? Any hope for a fix?

One of the reasons I got an Apple TV recently was because I'd heard it was the best device for FilmStruck, and figured that'd be the case for the Criterion Channel too. But you say you had the same issue with FilmStruck?

schugh
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#80 Post by schugh » Tue Apr 09, 2019 1:20 am

In case anyone else has a NVidia Shield or some other Android TV, I did get it to work just now after reading that some other people had got it to work on a reddit thread.
I went to the google play store on Chrome on my laptop. I had already installed it on my phone in the daytime to check it out.
I clicked the install button again and I was able to select different devices on which to install the app including all 3 of my NVidia Shields.
All of them are using the same gmail account.

And it's working just fine. Very cool.

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mfunk9786
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#81 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 1:21 am

Drucker wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:49 pm
mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 9:20 pm
Watching Mikey and Nicky now on a Roku and there's so much digital noise. So, so much. My first impression isn't a very positive one, never had image quality concerns like this with Filmstruck.
Have you watched the blu? Some of the heaviest grain I have ever seen. Noticably moves in screen.
I haven't, but there was a digital snow over the grain at times that was very distracting - not because the grain was moving, but because the movement of the grain was causing the stream to warp and pucker in unusual ways as it was happening.

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fdm
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#82 Post by fdm » Tue Apr 09, 2019 1:48 am

backwater wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:56 pm
One of the reasons I got an Apple TV recently was because I'd heard it was the best device for FilmStruck, and figured that'd be the case for the Criterion Channel too. But you say you had the same issue with FilmStruck?
Some have had success, probably where you got that idea (may have been where I got the idea...). I think a few times I got a film on FilmStruck to play all the way through on the Apple TV 4K without stuttering, but mostly my recollection was ending up reverting to my Roku (3) pretty quickly. (Just like today with CC.) Haven't really spent that much time with CC yet, so aside from the lack of stuttering with the Roku, don't know what other issues there may be.

(In terms of a fix for Apple TV, I tried some things, but nothing really had any effect.)

JakeStewart
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#83 Post by JakeStewart » Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:14 am

mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:17 pm
mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 9:20 pm
Watching Mikey and Nicky now on a Roku and there's so much digital noise. So, so much. My first impression isn't a very positive one, never had image quality concerns like this with Filmstruck.
Aaaaaand the movie stopped on its own with 3 minutes to go and won't play for more than 5 seconds at a time now.

Great.

Yeah...... they're gonna have some kinks to work out.
I just had the same problem watching Experiment in Terror. Had to power through the last few minutes. I watched two movies (Nightfall and Detour) prior to that with no issues at all, though.

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Jean-Luc Garbo
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#84 Post by Jean-Luc Garbo » Tue Apr 09, 2019 8:45 am

On my laptop the extras come up just fine but on my home tv through Roku the extras don't come up at all. The page for the film just shows the film. Is anyone else having this problem?

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Re: The Criterion Channel

#85 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 8:56 am

Sort of. On Amazon Fire, sometimes they show up, sometimes not. Depends how you pull up the film I guess.

Also it would seem that not every single extra is included with certain releases. The one for Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me is missing a segment that was produced originally for the CBS/Paramount box set.

That said I do like (for Fire TV anyway) that you can jump back into any video you were watching, even extras. Filmstruck did not have that option.

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mfunk9786
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The Criterion Channel -- Technical Issues and Questions

#86 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:12 pm

JakeStewart wrote:
Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:14 am
mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 11:17 pm
mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 9:20 pm
Watching Mikey and Nicky now on a Roku and there's so much digital noise. So, so much. My first impression isn't a very positive one, never had image quality concerns like this with Filmstruck.
Aaaaaand the movie stopped on its own with 3 minutes to go and won't play for more than 5 seconds at a time now.

Great.

Yeah...... they're gonna have some kinks to work out.
I just had the same problem watching Experiment in Terror. Had to power through the last few minutes. I watched two movies (Nightfall and Detour) prior to that with no issues at all, though.
I think it would be worthwhile if anyone who has had this occur on a Roku device sends an e-mail to tech support so they're aware it's a common issue. Really disappointed that I have Roku interfaces on all three televisions in my house and this app is so terrible while the others seem to be running very smoothly.

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aox
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#87 Post by aox » Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:34 pm

I bought a brand new Apple TV (mine was fine, but old, and not able to get the CC app) and just had it delivered today. Any issues so far?

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fdm
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#88 Post by fdm » Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:39 pm

One possible workaround for Rokus is to get out of the app if you can and restart the Roku. Or just pull its plug.

Old habit I picked up with Filmstruck was to reboot the Roku device each day before I started using it. I thought the problems were just because of the buggy Filmstruck app though as I really don't recall problems elsewhere (i.e., Prime).

Oh well I'll try and spend some time with mine tonight or tomorrow night and see whether it has same issues.

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fdm
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#89 Post by fdm » Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:39 pm

aox wrote:
Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:34 pm
I bought a brand new Apple TV (mine was fine, but old, and not able to get the CC app) and just had it delivered today. Any issues so far?
You might experience periodic dropped frames.

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mfunk9786
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#90 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:43 pm

fdm wrote:
Tue Apr 09, 2019 12:39 pm
One possible workaround for Rokus is to get out of the app if you can and restart the Roku. Or just pull its plug.

Old habit I picked up with Filmstruck was to reboot the Roku device each day before I started using it. I thought the problems were just because of the buggy Filmstruck app though as I really don't recall problems elsewhere (i.e., Prime).

Oh well I'll try and spend some time with mine tonight or tomorrow night and see whether it has same issues.
Thanks fdm! If there's a reliable workaround that would be great. I'm discouraged, though, because this is the first film we tried to watch and this happened. The ending of Mikey and Nicky is ultra impactful, too, so it was a shame that we had to finish it out on a cell phone after much frustration with the television.

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Re: The Criterion Channel

#91 Post by OldBobbyPeru » Tue Apr 09, 2019 1:05 pm

I thought my desktop was incompatible because I got the 'monitor not compliant with HDCP bla bla' message. I saw that the video card had an HDMI outlet so I used that, and now everything plays. My other desktop hooks up via DVI, and it works. Of course, your video card will have to be HDCP compliant. It won't work hooked up with a VGA cable.

Mainly I will be watching via my Apple TV on a TCL Roku TV. Here are my gripes, which I'm sure will get ironed out. Apple TV has no subtitles or closed captions on English content. Subtitles only show up on non-English films. All audio seems to be in stereo only.

Roku app on the TCL TV is a little flaky. Subtitles work, but the audio is also odd. Mullholland DR had 5.1, but Human Desire sounded as though the center channel was missing. Odd, because I don't imagine that it's a 5.1 mix. My AVR showed Dolby Digital, so it was getting something.

All in all, it's expected to be buggy--it's better now than Filmstruck was at the start. The search wasn't working yesterday on a chrome browser, on and on. All this stuff will get ironed out. It's nice to see it back.

albucat
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#92 Post by albucat » Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:06 pm

I was kinda annoyed that a rep for them claimed that you could just browse titles in the Decider interview with Peter Becker, "Later, a rep confirmed that subscribers will be able to browse a complete list of films when using the desktop version of the service." I get assuming that they'd have that feature, but I guess no one bothered to actually check?

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Re: The Criterion Channel

#93 Post by motefuzz » Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:29 pm

I would suggest for Roku users, especially if you have an older classic model, that you delete all the non-essential apps it comes with. There's 5 or more apps pre-loaded on there that might be taking up available RAM space which could be crashing things. I deleted everything I wasn't using on there and it seems to be running fine for me.

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mfunk9786
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#94 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 2:34 pm

I have maybe a dozen apps on the Roku (all of which I use), so that wasn't a factor.

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Re: The Criterion Channel

#95 Post by The Pachyderminator » Tue Apr 09, 2019 3:33 pm

I watched La Pointe Courte on the desktop site via an HDMI cable to my TV. There was a technical hiccup about 30 minutes in when the video froze a couple times, but fortunately the problem cleared up after that. Here's hoping it doesn't happen every time. (An entrancing film, by the way - Varda really brings out the beauty in swamped boats and dead cats!)

backwater
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#96 Post by backwater » Tue Apr 09, 2019 5:06 pm

mfunk9786 wrote:
Mon Apr 08, 2019 8:01 pm
Only real observation I have about the channel on the 4K Roku is how low-res the thumbnail images look when browsing, presumably because of the fact that the text and layout of the channel is 4K then the thumbnails have to be stretched in order to fit. It's kind of a bummer.
I pulled it up on my Roku stick (non-4k) and the thumbnails looked horrible on there too.

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Re: The Criterion Channel

#97 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 6:02 pm

I should have stated more specifically that you could not jump back into extras on Filmstruck, you could with movies. Never a problem there, except if I left it paused and the console would go into sleep mode. You had to go back to the Filmstruck menu so it could keep it's place where you left it. The Channel has solved that.

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mfunk9786
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#98 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 6:04 pm

Remember when Criterion was on Hulu? Man, those were the days.

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Re: The Criterion Channel

#99 Post by alexrinse » Tue Apr 09, 2019 6:14 pm

I think it would be worthwhile if anyone who has had this occur on a Roku device sends an e-mail to tech support so they're aware it's a common issue. Really disappointed that I have Roku interfaces on all three televisions in my house and this app is so terrible while the others seem to be running very smoothly.
After playing a couple of titles without incident, I've also encountered this issue while playing La tête d'un homme. Crashed out right at the dramatic climax then behaved as reported and kept doing so.

Will send a mail to their support, as your suggest, along with the other Roku issues I mentioned up-thread.

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mfunk9786
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Re: The Criterion Channel

#100 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 09, 2019 6:20 pm

Awesome, thank you for doing that. Roku community unite!

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