New Roku Players Hitting the UK 18th October 2017

[schnapps]

According to this Engadget article, Roku will be officially offering to us in the UK two new players from the 18th of October 2017

There will be the Roku Streaming Stick + with 4K & HDR at RRP of £80, together with the Roku Express for a RRP of £30 

Not sure how accurate the article is, if so i might be purchasing a Roku Streaming Stick + to replace my ageing Roku stick 

https://www.engadget.com/2017/10/11/roku-uk-4k-streaming-stick/

[ukbobboy]

@chilli2 @caseyb1993 @schnapps

Hi Chilli

You said, "The remote buttons are a little odd, Yupp TV which is an indian TV channel ( i think) , Red bull TV - extreme sports, Rakuten TV , and Netflix.  I'm surprised that Now TV isn't up there......"

Well, you may not know this but, the TV channels pay Roku to place those buttons on their remote control, i.e. it's a way for Roku to make some extra money.

So, if Now TV want a button on Roku's RC they will have to pay for it.

UK Bob

[Anonymous User]

Had a play with the Express and was rather disapointed with it overall.

Plus points:

Easy to set up

Operating version 8 software

Slightly faster than my Now Black Box

Runns from TV USB socket

Negative points:

Will only output at 50fps

Remote slightly bigger than old one and has silly/ussless shortcut buttons

It defaults by pre-loading loads of channels which then need removing

The 50fps output for all content and the rubish remote means its in a cupboard and the Now boc reinstated.

[schnapps]

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@ukbobboy wrote:

@chilli2 @caseyb1993 @schnapps

Hi Chilli

You said, "The remote buttons are a little odd, Yupp TV which is an indian TV channel ( i think) , Red bull TV - extreme sports, Rakuten TV , and Netflix.  I'm surprised that Now TV isn't up there......"

Well, you may not know this but, the TV channels pay Roku to place those buttons on their remote control, i.e. it's a way for Roku to make some extra money.

So, if Now TV want a button on Roku's RC they will have to pay for it.

UK Bob

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Hi @ukbobboy, @caseyb1993 @chilli2

You would think with NowTV, Amazon, YouTube etc would have a bigger budget than Yupp TV to promote their services ?

Personally i would have preferred an A, B, C, B quick access button on the remote controller which you can programme and select the App service of your own choice.

[ukbobboy]

@schnapps @caseyb1993 @chilli2

Hi Schnapps

You mentioned the buttons on the Roku remote, well my Roku 3 RC does have Netflix, YouTube, Rdio (which is now defunct) and Google Play buttons, I guess Rdio paid for the facility before they went under.

As for changing the the functions of the buttons, to something more useful, I honestly don't think Roku are going to give up their extra revenue stream any time soon.

UK Bob

[Andy]

With Sky being a stakeholder in Roku I'd also have thought a NOW TV and/or Sky Store button would be there but then again businesses are very canny about how they promote themselves. By keeping off Roku branding as much as possible Sky might be thinking customers won't realise NOW TV is on the Roku device and be more likely to buy the NOW TV box on the next shelf instead.

[ukbobboy]

@Andy @schnapps @caseyb1993

Hi ANdy

You said, "By keeping off Roku branding as much as possible Sky might be thinking customers won't realise NOW TV is on the Roku device and be more likely to buy the NOW TV box on the next shelf instead".

You could be right, how many times have people bought a Now TV box thinking it was a bargain priced Roku, with the same facilities, only to be bitterly disappointed to find out they've been duped?

I can imagine Sky/Now TV have made lots of sales based on customer naivety, misinformation and being deliberately mislead by (certain) sales staff.

Yeah, I'm certain of it.

UK Bob

[chilli2]

Although the Now TV logo does appear on the Roku packaging

[chilli2]

more rtailers added, still th stick + is showing unavaialble

[caseyb1993]

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@chilli2 wrote:

more rtailers added, still th stick + is showing unavaialble

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Yet Tesco and Curry's are out of stock and Amazon within 2 to 5 weeks? 😮
(For express)

[commanda6]

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@caseyb1993 wrote:

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@chilli2 wrote:

more rtailers added, still th stick + is showing unavaialble

---

Yet Tesco and Curry's are out of stock and Amazon within 2 to 5 weeks? 😮
(For express)

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@caseyb1993 my Roku streaming stick plus has actually been delivered,  but I can't have it until Christmas, as it's a Christmas present  we chose to get it from Tesco's in the end, as Tesco's had it in stock at the time, so we cancelled the Amazon order. We must have been lucky and got in  there quickly enough

It appears that demand for these new Roku players in the UK is very high and Roku hasn't produced enough to meet demand. But to be honest Roku should have known that demand for the new players would be very high because the last time Roku launched something in the UK  prior to this was 2015, which means up until now, the hardware available in the UK has been old and a pale shadow of what's available in the US. So there's really no excuse for the lack of availability