Please use this thread for any problems getting Netflix to appear within Media Center or any bug related to the application.

(Moved from old thread, regarding dymanic bandwidth in Silverlight)

Ntr0s:

Problems:
1. Frame rate is really really poor.
...

When I mean the frame is poor, I mean its BAD - extremely choppy.  Everything else in VMC, standard def tv, high def channels, dvd playback, recording...everything is smooth as silk.
...

I found a way to fix the quality issue, temporarily.  I'm still searching for a more permanent solution ...

After the video starts streaming, press and hold CTRL+ALT+SHIFT, then S.  This will let you set the stream rate.  Force it to 1500 or 2200 (I've only seen 1500 so far) and wait a few seconds.  The quality should improve immensely.  For whatever reason, it's only doing 500Kbps for me, even though the bandwidth (CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+B) is a constant 2.8Mbps.

I'm hopeful there is a registry setting or something we can set to always force the high stream rate.  I'd MUCH rather wait a few seconds for the video to start than have to deal with the horrid image quality.  At 1500, it still doesn't look quite as good as I remember MyNetflix looking, but it's a great deal better.  A great deal.

anpark:

@djp952 - This plugin uses the Silverlight player from Netflix which performs adaptive streaming.  This means that the player should automatically adjust the bitrate during playback as your bandwidth changes.  In addition, the player starts out at a low bitrate and gradually ramps up to the higher bitrate streams.

Out of curiosity...  did you wait for the player to automatically ramp up the bitrate?

@anpark - After my initial dismay wore off (as in "got over it"), I did let it run for a while untouched and it does eventually ramp up to 1500 on it's own.  It takes a LONG time, though, like 3-4 minutes.  The bandwidth used remains relatively constant at around 2.8Mb/s, according to Silverlight, and confirmed with a network monitor.  If I manually set it to 1500 that will usually take effect in a couple seconds. Seems like a crazy amount of buffering when left to it's own devices.  I even tried Silverlight 3 beta on this desktop PC to see if that made any difference, it didn't. :(

I still haven't found any way to just force the player to always use the higher bandwidth, I assume that's not possible at this point.  Any tips?  When compared with MyNetflix (which was so awesome, by the way, I really wish it still worked, but many many propz to you for that software) the experience just isn't there. 

There is also an issue with just about everything I've tried (except South Park) where the video is stuttery and jumpy, even after forced to 1500.  Not a problem with the old player or with our Roku Netflix box.  Plenty of CPU and RAM overhead here (specs in sig), I can't think of any reason this should be happening.

The interface is stellar.  Everything that happens after you choose "Play" ... not so much in my opinion :-)  Needs work, or at a bare minimum a stream rate override and hardware acceleration for the video streams.

Ok, how DO we get it to appear? I've used MC Mender Menu, and one of it's options was to restore the default menu. I've even forced the automatic download, but still nothing... Thanks.

I'm currently getting this pop-up error:

INTERNET CONNECTION
There was a problem retrieving data.  Verify your Internet connection and try again.
[OK]

My Internet connection is up, and I can get in the Sports channel fine, as well as check my fantasy baseball stats in the Sports - Players section with no problem.  First time I saw this was right after stopping a playing movie, and it hasn't stopped since it started.  Quit Media Center and restarted, no change.

I haven't had an chance to reboot the whole box yet (shows are set to record) but if the error still lingers later on I will.

Thanks,
John

Edit:  Message went away on its own.  Hopefully it'll stay gone.

MRV:

Ok, how DO we get it to appear? I've used MC Mender Menu, and one of it's options was to restore the default menu. I've even forced the automatic download, but still nothing... Thanks.

I am in the same boat... It hasn't shown up yet and I have done the forced download. I have customized my menus as well with MC Mender, but shouldn't I at least be able to launch it manually from the program list? It isn't there...

My results/comments/questions:

Often I get a pop-up dialog that says the "Plug-in has stopped working" or something to that effect shortly after launching netflix ... however after I click "OK" to dismiss it it seems to work fine.

Is there a way to get subtitles?

I wish I could have all the categories across the top instead of just 4.

ehexthost.exe takes 60% of my CPU on one of my machines when watching something.

I always get the "your internet connection speed has slowed, we are automatically adjusting ..." message/delay at least twice in the first few minutes of watching, thereafter it seems to play ok.

I'm using a Pentium D 3.0ghz, 2gigs ram, NVidia 8500GT, VMC with TV Pack.

 

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, but for some reason the Netflix icon is not appearing on my media center. I'm using Vista 64-bit with SP1. I know the internet connection works fine. I do not have a tuner installed.

Any specific step that I am missing? I was under the impression the icon should appear under my "TV + Movies" menu item...

Thanks,
John

In another post, Microsoft said we were out of luck if we've modified the menu with MC Menu Mender or the like. So, can I just replace the files with the originals??? and where would I find them??? Can someone at MS just send me the files???

I was able to solve the missing netfix tile, but the solution is radcal:

http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/thread/362279.aspx

The is no way to get subtitles, it's on the to-do list.

The four primary genre lists are picked based on your taste preferences, and the two more specific lists are based on your viewing history. We are going to gather usage data and try out some different options here over the coming months to see what works best, so take this as a starting point....

We are also waiting for Silverlight 3, which should reduce CPU load and improve playback quality.

Adrian from Netflix

I installed netflix app but I cannot login.  I am able to login with my netflix account but not in the mce appl.  When installing I didn't install Silverlight because it was already installed.  I assumed if you had a choice you could choose not to install.  Help!

Thanks Adrian!  I appreciate the reponses and the work you guys are doing on this!

@kj_gb: Silverlight shouldn't be getting used until you start playback, so the failure to login should not be related to your not having installed it earlier. What error message do you see when you try to log in to the Netflix app? Can you try playing instant watch content on the Netflix site? I know that Netflix doesn't allow streaming on sub-accounts, but I believe that we give you an explicit error message in that case. Thanks,

Jeff

after installing and logging on successfully, I get an application error pop up saying: "there is a problem with the application dialog at this tim. try again later."

also, when i select to play a title, it just shows me the round, busy circle and doesn't play anything. after 30-60 seconds, the app just goes back to the previous screen.

The Netflix Plugin has been working great; however, this morning we started to experience problems. We noticed that after playing a video we were unable to play another video immediately following playback. Restarting the Media Center interface didn't seem to fix the issue. The only way to fix the problem was to restart Windows.

Now, we are having the problem of not being able to play any video on the machine using the plugin. When we hit "Play" or "Resume" the screen goes to the Media Center blue screen with the blue ring spinning. Then after a few seconds it goes back to the previous menu.

I tested Netflix using a browser on the same machine and it plays without a problem outside of the Media Center interface. Also, on another machine with Vista Media Center, we are experiencing the same problem as stated above. So, I'm assuming this is an issue on the Netflix side.