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RoyB
Legend

Making Subtitles Permanent

I’ve just bought a Stick today, so I can get subtitles, as the NowTV App on my TV doesn’t support them.

And I can get subtitles just fine now, on an individual episode, e.g. True Detective on my Entertainment Pass, but when I go to the next episode, I have to set them again.

The Help says I can turn them on permanently in the Subtitles option of my Main Menu, but there is no Subtitles option there (see screenshot). Captions is the nearest thing, but this doesn’t work to do what I want.

i have just been on Chat, twice, but it seems very hard to make them understand the above issue; they keep telling me how to get subtitles (which I can perfectly well do, episode by episode) but not how to make it permanent so we always get subtitles, for programmes that have them, without having to set this episode by episode. And both chat sessions timed out before we got anywhere, and the first agents attempt to email me went nowhere.

An oddity I have noticed, if oddity it be, and if it is relevant, is that System Info/NOW TV account says ‘Not available’ - is that usual?

But otherwise, is my Main Menu wrong, or am I looking in the wrong place, or is the Help wrong about there being a Subtitles option in the Main Menu, or what?

 

 

 

 

 

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16 REPLIES 16
schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @RoyB 

I don't use a Now TV stick in my setup, but just tested subtitles on my Now TV smart box with the "Captions always set to on" in the box menu settings.

Then using True Detective S3 episodes 4 & 5 for example and once I selected English in the bubble speech icon on episode 4, then when episode 5 started to play the subtitles automatically came on screen for me without my input.

RoyB
Legend

Hi @schnapps 

Thanks for that - I have tried it, and it works, but only when you go to the next episode directly before the credits on the previous episode have finished rolling.

But let the episode end, so you go back to the episode list, or even just pick up the next episode from the link on the otherwise empty screen after the credits have rolled, and you will find the subtitles have reverted to Off.

As they do when you go to some other programme, and as they do when you first switch the stick on from the powered-down state.

Throughout all this, ‘Captions always set to on’ is persistent, showing the stick is holding its configuration.

But you can turn this setting to ‘off’, and everything described above will operate in exactly the same way, showing that ‘Captions’ isn’t the ‘Subtitles’ menu option described in the Help:-

https://help.nowtv.com/article/can-i-watch-now-tv-with-subtitles#panelcollapse3

Some devices have a setting to turn on subtitles to display automatically whenever they’re available.

On a NOW TV Box or NOW TV Smart Stick

  1. Go to your homescreen and select Settings from the main menu.
  2. Select Subtitles, and then select On
  3. You’ll see a tick to indicate subtitles are now turned on for all available movies and shows.

And the box I got this device out of says ‘Smart Stick’ in big bold letters... Smiley Sad

 

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schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @RoyB 

You are absolutely right, where i have just checked my nowtv smart box and subtitles only remain without my input on the next episode when selecting the pop up message to watch the next episode at the start of the end credits.

Like you have rightly pointed out, subtitles don't seem to automatically return to the TV screen if you don't watch the next episode straight away from the pop up.

I don't use subtitles myself, but my understanding with the captions set to " Always On" in the box or stick menu settings, then any TV shows that supports subtitles should automatically appear on screen without reaching for your remote.

One thing i noticed which doesn't seem right to me and could be a software bug is that when after playing an episode with subtitles switched on then going back into my smart box menu settings the caption has changed without my input from "Always On" to "Off" which doesn't seem correct to me which might be the reason why the subtitles feature doesn't remain permanently on Smiley Mad

I also checked my Roku Stick Plus and it's doing the same has my nowtv smart box Smiley Sad.

The information that you copied & pasted from the subtitles help guide article is out dated which was applicable on an older OS software version on the boxes & stick and needs updating by NowTV.

I will tag somebody from the NowTV Team to draw this thread to their attention that this needs looking into further.

RoyB
Legend

Hi again @schnapps 

Many thanks for running this past the NowTV Team - let’s hope it’s just a small bug and they can fix it.

A bit more info - it looks like ‘Captions’ is indeed the new ‘Subtitles’, as when I set a range of non-default attributes for the other settings under Captions, these altered how the subtitles appeared when I played a programme that had them, and I turned them on.

I also discovered that with Captions set to Off, selecting subtitles on a programme would change it to On. That’s probably wrong, and would certainly be wrong if somebody just wanted subtitles on one programme by exception, and Captions On/Off worked like we think it should.

I never found it had set itself to Off spontaneously though - for me it stays set On even when I lose the actual subtitles when leaving a programme.

But I think it might do that if you are watching a programme and actively turn subtitles off.

Might that explain what you saw there?

I will test further tomorrow, but I think we are homing in on the problem.

 

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RoyB
Legend

Tested the hypothesis that Captions mode can be toggled between On Always and Off by altering the subtitles setting on an individual programme, and this does indeed seem to be the case.

So it seems that subtitles on programmes is driving Captions mode, rather than the other way round.

Could be as simple as one or two ‘if A then do B’ constructs in the code, where the variables for these two things have been accidentally transposed. Or maybe it’s more complex, but that is the sort of thing I’d be looking for.

Should we be worried that your Roku Stick does this, @schnapps ? Maybe makes it more generic and far-reaching than just the NowTV code on the NowTV Stick?

And can I really be the first person to notice this? Smiley Surprised

RoyB

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schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @RoyB 

Found this help artice under the Roku support section which is applicable to the Roku full blown players.

https://support.roku.com/en-gb/article/208756848-how-to-enable-closed-captioning

I am sure before a recent firmware update on my nowtv smart box that when i set captions to "always on" then subtitles would appear on screen permanently on TV shows and movies that supported subtitles without messing around with the remote every time you watched nowtv.

Other forum members have mentioned issues about viewing subtitles on other devices such has Samsung & LG smart TV's etc which i don't own & therefore can't check out.

I have tagged two senior staff members from NowTV, where hopefully they have passed this  thread over to their relevant Tech Team to investigate further.

 

 

RoyB
Legend

Just to bump this first thread I ever posted (when I went serious about the Now Community) as the issue described is still not fixed. 

Now, you should be ashamed of yourselves for this,

Set a Payment PIN on your account so that no-one but you can buy memberships on it. Check your bank accounts monthly for any other unexpected payments to Now. That way you can at least nip them in the bud, while you and Now figure out whose fault they are.
RoyB
Legend

@schnapps   @Simon-J 

Just to report that another 20 months have gone by since I bumped this thread, with no observable progress on this issue whatsoever 😢

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RokuSky
Mentor

Hi @RoyB - sorry to hear you've been struggling with getting subtitles to be enabled reliably. There was an app update recently (v8.x.x) - from your recent post it seems this hasn't helped? 

Do I understand that if you let an episode finish (rather than binge watching the next from the prompt) then subtitles seem to get disabled?

Sounds like you've set the subtitle (captions) mode at the device level in the Settings menu so that should apply to all apps on the device. In the NOW app you can access that same device setting by pressing * during playback.

To slightly confuse things, the NOW app has its own subtitles button during playback when you press OK to bring up the playback controls. This *should* be in sync with the device wide setting.