# Amazon VOD takes too long!



## eaglestvo (Dec 27, 2008)

At home I watch Amazon VOD movies on Sony Bluray. The movies stream, and you can watch them instantly with awesome video quality.

I am at my vacation house now where I watch Amazon VOD movies on Tivo. An hour ago I ordered a movie. It is telling me to check back in 13 hours and 28 minutes! I have 15mb+ internet speed. This is a typical AVOD experience on Tivo.

So what is the point of downloading vs. streaming if I can stream it in real time with great video quality? Why am I better off waiting for the download?? 

Tivo, it is time to update your apps. Amazon VOD is a substandard app on Tivo. Stream the movies, or even give the choice. Netflix on Tivo is substandard. Tivo, please watch a Netflix movie on Apple TV or PS3 and then tell us why Tivo is good. Please stop rolling out new apps, like Hulu, until you can make your core apps good. 

BTW, nice job with Pandora on Tivo. I love it.


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

I wouldn't hold your breath...

TiVo could surprise us, but I doubt it. They have too much on their plate as it is (IMO).


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## djwilso (Dec 23, 2006)

The best and cheapest solution for streaming Amazon Video on Demand is to get a Roku box.

It streams AVOD in HD and 5.1 surround sound.

Roku's AVOD app also allows you to view your purchased videos in Amazon's "Your Video Library".

For this purpose, Roku blows TiVo out of the water.


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## dwgsp (Aug 28, 2005)

eaglestvo said:


> I am at my vacation house now where I watch Amazon VOD movies on Tivo. An hour ago I ordered a movie. It is telling me to check back in 13 hours and 28 minutes! I have 15mb+ internet speed. This is a typical AVOD experience on Tivo.


My AVOD download speeds on a TivoHD are much faster than what you report here, so I suspect that the problem that you are experiencing is not Tivo's fault.

I'm curious... how did you measure the download speed at your vacation house? Did you use your ISP's speed test site, or an independent one (such as www.speedtest.net)? Many ISPs have fast speeds within their own networks, but when you go off their net things really slow down. That may be what is happening to you.


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## TiVoStephen (Jun 27, 2000)

eaglestvo said:


> I am at my vacation house now where I watch Amazon VOD movies on Tivo. An hour ago I ordered a movie. It is telling me to check back in 13 hours and 28 minutes! I have 15mb+ internet speed. This is a typical AVOD experience on Tivo.


Eaglestvo, sorry to hear about your experience. It's not typical. The majority of our customers can begin playback of downloaded Amazon content within a few minutes (a "near-streaming" experience for most).

Can you please e-mail me ([email protected]) your TiVo Service Number and details of what you rented and when? I suspect either a wireless configuration problem or throttling on the part of your ISP.

Best,
Stephen


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## tootal2 (Oct 14, 2005)

It only takes me about 2 to 3 hours to download a hd moive.

What kind of router are you using? your router might not be fast enough for your internet. I hope you dont have a d-link.



eaglestvo said:


> At home I watch Amazon VOD movies on Sony Bluray. The movies stream, and you can watch them instantly with awesome video quality.
> 
> I am at my vacation house now where I watch Amazon VOD movies on Tivo. An hour ago I ordered a movie. It is telling me to check back in 13 hours and 28 minutes! I have 15mb+ internet speed. This is a typical AVOD experience on Tivo.
> 
> ...


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## eaglestvo (Dec 27, 2008)

TiVoStephen said:


> Eaglestvo, sorry to hear about your experience. It's not typical. The majority of our customers can begin playback of downloaded Amazon content within a few minutes (a "near-streaming" experience for most).
> 
> Can you please e-mail me ([email protected]) your TiVo Service Number and details of what you rented and when? I suspect either a wireless configuration problem or throttling on the part of your ISP.
> 
> ...


Hi Stephen, thanks so much for your reply. It is great to actually get help directly from Tivo. In the past, we were able to begin playback within about 10-15 minutes, but in the past 6 months or so, it has taken over 12 hours. I will email you the service id and the movies I selected in the past week.

I am back home and at this moment I am watching, "The Last Airbender" on Sony Blu-Ray which started streaming instantly, without a skip. Have you considered a streaming Amazon VOD app? I would rather get my Internet video apps from Tivo instead of adding a bunch of other boxes like Roku, Apple, Boxee, etc.

Thanks,
Paul


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## eaglestvo (Dec 27, 2008)

tootal2 said:


> It only takes me about 2 to 3 hours to download a hd moive.
> 
> What kind of router are you using? your router might not be fast enough for your internet. I hope you dont have a d-link.


At the time of my last download, I was using a Linksys router. It is connected to the Tivo by Actiontec powerline Ethernet and then an Ethernet connection to the Tivo. The Netflix streaming with this configuration is virtually flawless. On my last day at the house, I upgrade the router to a new Netgear N Band router. I did not try AVOD because that would likely result in delivery of the movies after my departure. But I will try again on my next trip, later in January.


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## TiVo Fool (Dec 17, 2001)

My Amazon VOD download speed is spotty on TiVo. Sometimes it's a few minutes, most of the time it's 15 mins before I can start watching, sometimes it's several hours.

I have a Samsung TV that supports Amazon VOD plugged into the same network switch as the TiVo. It consistently serves up movies in seconds, so I don't think it's my local network or the ISP that's the problem.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

I rented a few movies lately via Amazon using the computer. Downloaded the movies to the Premiere. It worked. And was fairly timely. 

Both movies were ready to watch in 15-30 minutes at most. Maybe less, but I didn't push it. Don't remember seeing a waiting time either so maybe they were ready much quicker.

Good thing about Amazon VOD on Tivo is you can quickly ff/rw through the movie (if the part in question is already downloaded.) MOvies these days, well, the sound effects are too loud and the conversation often too soft. I find myself rewinding quite a bit to hear things if i'm watching a movie while the kids and wife are sleeping.

Would generally prefer to watch Amazon VOD on my new ATV if it was possible. But it's not.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

I've seen issues with slow downloads from Amazon in the past. In almost all cases it was a problem with Amazon's CDN provider, Limelight Networks. In my Comcast area the DNS is set to point to Limelight's Virginia servers which tend to suck a lot, more so in the evenings.

Without knowing your ISP and geographic area though I can't say if that was your problem or not.


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## eaglestvo (Dec 27, 2008)

trip1eX said:


> I rented a few movies lately via Amazon using the computer. Downloaded the movies to the Premiere. It worked. And was fairly timely.
> 
> Both movies were ready to watch in 15-30 minutes at most. Maybe less, but I didn't push it. Don't remember seeing a waiting time either so maybe they were ready much quicker.
> 
> ...


I could live with 15-30 minutes, and that used to be my experience for VOD. It is usually about 10-15 minutes before i see the blue light on the Tivo HD.

Good point about the ff/rw on Tivo. I had not thought about that. Also, I am getting Dolby Digital 5.1 audio on my Tivo which feeds into my Bose Lifestyle. I am not sure if that is possible with streaming AVOD.


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## eaglestvo (Dec 27, 2008)

morac said:


> I've seen issues with slow downloads from Amazon in the past. In almost all cases it was a problem with Amazon's CDN provider, Limelight Networks. In my Comcast area the DNS is set to point to Limelight's Virginia servers which tend to suck a lot, more so in the evenings.
> 
> Without knowing your ISP and geographic area though I can't say if that was your problem or not.


I am on Charter Cable Outer Banks in Corolla, NC.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

eaglestvo said:


> I am on Charter Cable Outer Banks in Corolla, NC.


NC is pretty close to Virginia so it's possible that could be the problem, but if it was you'd likely also see problems streaming Amazon (TV and web site).


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## richsadams (Jan 4, 2003)

TiVoStephen said:


> The majority of our customers can begin playback of downloaded Amazon content within a few minutes (a "near-streaming" experience for most).


That's always been our experience. However sometimes it does take Amazon a little while to begin the download but it's usually never more than 15 minutes or so and more often it takes no more than about five minutes after we place our order.

FWIW we began watching Amazon "Unboxed" videos when they first offered the service several years ago and although it wasn't bad back then they've come lightyears forward with their service, PQ and audio since those early days. :up:


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## TiVo Fool (Dec 17, 2001)

trip1eX said:


> Good thing about Amazon VOD on Tivo is you can quickly ff/rw through the movie (if the part in question is already downloaded.)


AVOD FF/RW is instantaneous on my Samsung TV. I have three speeds in each direction and the show starts playing immediately after I hit play.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

I just took a look at a HD episode of 24 on Amazon's web site. For the TiVo download it said the file size was 1.7 GB and would have a bit rate of 5000 kbps and would be available in 30 minutes if you had a 1.5 Mbits/sec connection. 

For a connected streaming device it said it would be available instantly and available at 720p if you had a 2.5 Mbps connection. For the streaming device the quality would be auto reduced if you connection was less than 2.5 Mbps. 

So it seems to me that to some extent Amazon is controlling how fast the show will be available on our TiVos. However I can see no reason it should take hours unless your Internet connection is sh**. I did order a show on a day that my Internet connection was sh** (web pages hanging 25-30% packet loss) and it took about 1.5 hours before I could watch it. 

Thanks,


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

richsadams said:


> FWIW we began watching Amazon "Unboxed" videos when they first offered the service several years ago and although it wasn't bad back then they've come lightyears forward with their service, PQ and audio since those early days. :up:


Amazon is still hit or miss. I've seen some rentals that have had macroblocking in them which makes little sense. I've even seen a movie rental that was missing about 10 seconds of the video, the scene simply jumped.


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## ffitzgerald3 (Aug 17, 2007)

We are in the Chicago area with [email protected] DSL Pro which consistently runs at 3.0Mbps. We have never been able to watch Amazon movies the same day. This past Monday afternoon we downloaded the new Wall Street film and it took 6 hours. The quality was excellent but we had to watch it the next day. We have a 3 year old Tivo HD with a Comcast M Card and OTA. If anything happens to the Tivo We will probably get a Sony Blu ray for downloads and switch to the Comcas DVR.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

It's hard to get exact numbers for Amazon since their numbers don't match up. For example a 45 minute HD TV show I purchased lists that it's 1.8 GB and has a bit rate of 5000 kbps. If the bit rate was a constant 5000 kbps, then the program size should be (45 * 60 * 5000 / 8 = ) 1687500 Kb or 1.6 GB (not 1.8 GB). Even a variable bit rate shouldn't be more than 1.6 GB.

In any case, taking that a 45 minute program is somewhere between 1.6 and 1.8 GB, an the new Wall Street movie is 133 minutes, assuming you get constant 3 Mbps speeds, it should be somewhere between 4.73 GB and 5.32 GB. At 3 Mbps, that would take between 3 hours 35 minutes and 4 hours 2 minutes to completely download. That means you should be able to watch it somewhere between 1 hour 45 minutes to 2 hours after the download starts.

For what it's worth, during the day I can normally get download speeds of at least 15 Mbps from Amazon on a 20 Mbps connection. That's fast enough to watch nearly instantly. Sometimes in the evening the speeds drop down to around 3 Mbps or slower, but by tweaking my DNS to point to Limelight Network's LGA (New York) servers as opposed to the IAD (Virginia) servers, I've gotten around that and get fairly constant 15+ Mbps speeds with Amazon.

I'll mention that changing your DNS to use something like Google's DNS server or OpenDNS can have a noticeable negative impact on download speeds from services that use a CDN like Amazon, Netflix, iTunes, etc and sometimes makes streaming impossible. So if you are using one of these services and see speed issues with Amazon, try switching to your ISP's DNS server (or vice-versa).


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## Rick Auricchio (Feb 7, 2002)

morac said:


> So if you are using one of these services and see speed issues with Amazon, try switching to your ISP's DNS server.


+1. I was just going to mention this. The big streaming services are using a hack to deduce your location via your DNS lookups. It apparently works fairly well to help them balance the streaming load.


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## richsadams (Jan 4, 2003)

morac said:


> I'll mention that changing your DNS to use something like Google's DNS server or OpenDNS can have a noticeable negative impact on download speeds from services that use a CDN like Amazon, Netflix, iTunes, etc and sometimes makes streaming impossible. So if you are using one of these services and see speed issues with Amazon, try switching to your ISP's DNS server (or vice-versa).


That's very good advice, particularly about staying away from OpenDNS and GoogleDNS for streaming audio/video.

Using Namebench is an excellent, free way to find out which DNS servers are the fastest for your specific situation...

Macintosh: http://code.google.com/p/namebench/

Windows: http://code.google.com/p/namebench/downloads/detail?name=namebench-1.3.1-Windows.exe&can=2&q


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## MichaelK (Jan 10, 2002)

we dont rent all that often but most times we can start watching - even HD- very soon. Usually we order just before we sit down for dinner and when dinner is over we can watch.

But on rare occasions we get the case were it's umpteen hours and we have to wait till the next day. (recently happened on an SD movie of all things). 

can't figure out what the issue is when it happens but we just watch the next day and find something else to watch that night. 

luckily it's rare enough not to drive us insane.


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## jsmeeker (Apr 2, 2001)

I love Amazon VOD on my TiVo. My internet access isn't fast enough to stream video. Not HD. Not even SD. So, even if it takes hours to download a one hour TV show, at least I can still buy and watch on-line content since it has a place to save the video If it were streaming only like it was on my Sony BluRay player or with Netflix, then I wouldn't be able to use it at all.

Honestly, I thought maybe this was normal and was supposed to be this way BECAUSE there is a place to actually store and save the content.


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## TiVo Fool (Dec 17, 2001)

jsmeeker said:


> I love Amazon VOD on my TiVo. My internet access isn't fast enough to stream video. Not HD. Not even SD. So, even if it takes hours to download a one hour TV show, at least I can still buy and watch on-line content since it has a place to save the video If it were streaming only like it was on my Sony BluRay player or with Netflix, then I wouldn't be able to use it at all.
> 
> Honestly, I thought maybe this was normal and was supposed to be this way BECAUSE there is a place to actually store and save the content.


So keep the download option for those who are bandwidth challenged and add streaming for those who can take advantage of it. You can't seriously call it "On Demand" when it takes hours before you can watch it.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

TiVo Fool said:


> So keep the download option for those who are bandwidth challenged and add streaming for those who can take advantage of it. You can't seriously call it "On Demand" when it takes hours before you can watch it.


There's no reason for a streaming option since if your Internet connection is fast enough you can already watch it nearly instantly now (or at most a few minutes after purchasing). If your connection isn't fast enough you wouldn't be able to stream anyway.

Note that Amazon downloads on TiVo are 1080i or 1080/24p. Streaming on other devices are 720p, so the quality is better on TiVo.

The thing I wish was available was the ability to download already purchased videos directly from the TiVo without the need of a computer.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

eaglestvo said:


> I could live with 15-30 minutes, and that used to be my experience for VOD. It is usually about 10-15 minutes before i see the blue light on the Tivo HD.
> 
> Good point about the ff/rw on Tivo. I had not thought about that. Also, I am getting Dolby Digital 5.1 audio on my Tivo which feeds into my Bose Lifestyle. I am not sure if that is possible with streaming AVOD.


My blue light comes on instantly. Just ordered another $.99 movie Deal of the Day from Amazon and, light came on seconds after.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

TiVo Fool said:


> AVOD FF/RW is instantaneous on my Samsung TV. I have three speeds in each direction and the show starts playing immediately after I hit play.


Interesting. As a rule of thumb I actually ignore these built-into-the-tv services.

I figure they aren't as well done as you can get in 3rd party boxes nor as well-supported. And if you want new tech you need a whole new tv.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

trip1eX said:


> My blue light comes on instantly. Just ordered another $.99 movie Deal of the Day from Amazon and, light came on seconds after.


I don't think I've ever seen the light come on in a few seconds, except for web videos. Normally it's a minute or two. Sometimes the light never comes on and I need to call Amazon and have them push the download again.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

morac said:


> Note that Amazon downloads on TiVo are 1080i or 1080/24p. Streaming on other devices are 720p, so the quality is better on TiVo.


I wouldn't say 1080p means higher quality.

Resolution is but one variable of a good picture and not even the most important one especially if are already at 720p to begin with.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

trip1eX said:


> I wouldn't say 1080p means higher quality.
> 
> Resolution is but one variable of a good picture and not even the most important one especially if are already at 720p to begin with.


Most Amazon videos start out at 1080i/p to begin with and must be downscaled to 720p for streaming.

As for quality, the downloaded HD videos have a bit rate of 5000 Kbps on the TiVo. That's nearly double what the highest streaming bit rate is.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

morac said:


> Most Amazon videos start out at 1080i/p to begin with and must be downscaled to 720p for streaming.
> 
> As for quality, the downloaded HD videos have a bit rate of 5000 Kbps on the TiVo. That's nearly double what the highest streaming bit rate is.


Yeah not that I didn't agree with you about how AVOD on Tivo looks. IT's just that I don't agree with this notion that if it's 1080p then it wonderous. If it's not then it's sht. 

A tangent though.

And bit rate doesn't even tell all. I think DVD has a higher rate bit rate than my H.264 copies on my computer. But I really can't tell them apart.


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## morac (Mar 14, 2003)

trip1eX said:


> Yeah not that I didn't agree with you about how AVOD on Tivo looks. IT's just that I don't agree with this notion that if it's 1080p then it wonderous. If it's not then it's sht.
> 
> A tangent though.
> 
> And bit rate doesn't even tell all. I think DVD has a higher rate bit rate than my H.264 copies on my computer. But I really can't tell them apart.


That's because DVD is MPEG-2 which is an inferior codec to H.264. It's also why Amazon VOD SD downloads (MPEG-2) are nearly the same size as Amazon VOD HD downloads (H.264).

Kind of makes me wish all TV broadcasts and cable used H.264 instead of MPEG-2.


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