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zaphod

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    Must Have Hardware

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    6 hours ago, ajd123 said:

    What are some after market hardware components you consider to be "must haves" for your control4 system?

    I really like well integrated voice control with Alexa.  Walking into my basement when it is dark and saying "Alexa, basement on" is very helpful.

    All the streaming boxes suck now

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    On 3/9/2023 at 11:00 AM, eggzlot said:

    If you are paying $22/month for Netflix I bet you don't watch 90% or more of the content.  Same with a million cable channels and only watching 10. 

    Get 5 apps and all the sudden you are paying n ear $100/month in subscription fees, then add in your ISP fees and are you any better off then when you had 300 cable channels?  The content on the these streaming apps would have made it to HBO, Showtime, etc like Sopranos, or Sex in the City, etc.  So for those who say well what I watch is on Netflix or Hulu, I guess I assume if the content was good, it would have found a home on cable too.

    for years my brother in law ranted, wanted to get rid of cable, was the first I knew to cut the cord because he wanted to save money.  Now he agrees, he is paying more per month for all the apps versus his old cable bill (and not paying more because of inflation, just because he needs all these apps to get what he wants).

    But there is a difference - you can rotate among the different services - each month subscribe to one and cancel the others.  But once people start doing this they will likely make you subscribe for a minimum of six months.

    All the streaming boxes suck now

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    58 minutes ago, Cyknight said:

    The bigger ones want you to not think about what's out there, but only what's on THEM. So if Netflix isnt searchable - they assume (and not without reason, at least for now) that the VAST majority of people will then just open the netflix app - and stay there. And no nothing against netflix as such - it's no different for the others.

    This is really the point - they want you in their UI as much as possible.

    Think of how much better music streaming is vs video streaming.  With music you can get almost all of the music you would ever desire from one service for one monthly fee.  You can search in one app/UI and put together playlists to your heart's content.

    In the streaming video world everything is a walled garden, and some of the most desired content, such as live sports, is still only on cable.  Or the sports leagues streaming apps don't let you watch your own team as they want to protect their local TV revenue.

    All the streaming boxes suck now

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    Article on The Verge.  It rings very true to me, everyone is putting a wall up around their own content and not designing what is in the end users best interest.

    Quote

    But the perfect streaming box doesn’t exist. Who’s to blame for that? Everybody. But it starts with the streaming services themselves. For a streaming box to truly serve its cable-box purpose, it would need to index and access all the content available on every service, so users could search and organize as they like. But by and large, streaming services have decided it’s in their best interest to adopt a smartphone-style app model, making the app more important than the content — you don’t say, “I want to watch MythBusters” anymore, so much as you open up the Netflix app and see what it shows you. 
     

    Many services thus withhold their data from aggregators and search engines, and so while many companies have tried to build a universal search system, nobody’s gotten even close. (Even the most successful ones are mostly manually created, which is why you might get four near-identical results for the same movie search.) Our TV viewing is stuck in an old-internet paradigm, where you have to navigate through an endless series of aggregators and folders to find what you’re looking for.

    https://www.theverge.com/23621907/streaming-tv-boxes-roku-amazon-google-apple-nvidia

    Music Options

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    I like the Spotify connect solution because I like to use the Spotify UI to find and start my music.  I FAR prefer the Spotify UI to the Tidal UI within the C4 app.  The thing that is a pain is if you want to join other zones into the music session then you have to start the C4 app and use it to add the other zones so you are needing to use two apps on your phone.  But you can also start Spotify playback from wholly within the C4 world.  For example, I can press a button in my bedroom that starts playback of my Spotify Daily Mix 1 in my Master Bedroom and ensuite.

    I use the Spotify app in my car and on my phone on my train ride while commuting to work.  I can start playback in my car and then pick it back up when I get home on my ceiling speakers.  This is particularly convenient for podcasts.

    And speaking of podcasts, I don't think Tidal has podcasts.  Not sure about the other "native" C4 music playback options.  That may not matter to you.

    Integrators; Whats your go to "standard" network setup?

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    3 hours ago, Cyknight said:

    Well, it depends. Shaw/Rogers using the Xfinity style boxes will SAY they don't support anything but their own router - but will work flawlessly when it's in bridge mode (or even DMZ, or honestly even not DMZ) and the boxes are hardwired (wireless is possible but the boxes can be picky so results vary). So for those, they go on the main network. They may not support it....we just do and make sure the client contacts us not Shaw if there's issue with the signal (our count is at ZERO calls jut FYI out of over a hundred that weren't area outages). And yes there's IP control available.

    Thanks.  I am on Rogers in Toronto, but I am still on legacy cable (non-IPTV) and my modem/gateway is in bridge mode.  My network is a mainly Unifi with some unmanaged switches.  But I worry that Rogers will sooner or later shut down legacy cable and I will have to deal with this.

    I have read that if Rogers does firmware upgrades it can cause issues - is that the case?

    TCL Roku TV IP driver available?

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    I have four Roku TVs in my house and the driver is rock solid.  I used to use a third party driver for my Roku TVs, but then moved to the "free" one from Control4.  My only complaint is that the input switching is a bit slow - they seem to have built in a several second delay for some reason.

    I have had the odd network issue but that was my own fault for not creating DHCP reservations.  And the Roku network test seems to not like being behind a PiHole, but those have nothing to do with the driver.

    Touchscreen Usage

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    I don't use a TS but I think this will always depend on the user.  If they are used to using their phones for music then that can be easier than using the TS.  And it can depend on what music service you use.  I use Spotify and although it is not fully integrated into C4 that is fine since I prefer using the Spotify UI to find and launch music rather than the C4 app.  I have tried using fully integrated sources, like Tidal, but still prefer Spotify, especially for use outside of home or in my car where my car (Tesla) has Spotify integration.

    Outdoor TV with Audio for Pool Area

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    4 hours ago, ekohn00 said:

    Funny, I have a vizio too right now. It's holding up with the weather, and I also leave it out during the winter (much warmer in VA than in Toronto). I'm just getting tired of the crappy viewing with the sunlight.

    Yes, but is it really worth paying something like $3K for something like a Sunbrite TV, compared to $400 for a Vizio or TCL or whatever?  Do they look that much better in the sunlight?

    Outdoor TV with Audio for Pool Area

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    I just got a cheapo Vizio TV.  I crank up brightness to max.  It isn't great during direct sunlight but I will move my viewing position to deal with that, as best I can.  I have had that TV for about 9 years and it is still going strong.  I used to bring my TV in for the winter, but I no longer do that and it seems fine - I live in Toronto so it can get cold here.  Occasionally in the summer it will get some rainfall if I don't notice that I left it out.

    I have also put a TV under my deck so that is viewable from the hot tub.  The only shelter that this gets is a deck, but it can be subject to blowing snow at times but the deck shields it from the rain.  Again I have something like a cheap TCL Roku TV for this as they are only $200 and if it dies then it isn't too much coin to replace.

    Best way to make YouTube TV like traditional Cable

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    I am not sure about Apple TV but depending on the App you may be able to do this by automating a few button presses.  I do something similar on my Roku

    Here is an example - in my wake up routine  I set the TV in my Bedroom to come on playing Bloomberg TV from the Bloomberg App.  To do this I need to start the Bloomberg app, wait a few seconds, press Down and then Select.  So I have a macro that sets the Watch activity to the Bloomberg TV mini-app, then wait 10 seconds, send the Down button press and then the Select button press.  When it is all done the current live TV show will come on.

    Assuming that Youtube TV has a consistent app interface you should be able to something similar.

    So now that Control4 end users are allowed to add Halo remotes to their system...

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    Is C4 going to open up and allow end users to start adding more hardware?

    Is this an admission that being reliant on dealers to add any little thing to the system is a hindrance for some users?

    Can we add SR-260s or other remotes to the system?  If not, why not? Is there a technical limitation?

    What other hardware should we be able to add?   Presumably if there are other devices that don't need connections we should be able to add those as well, shouldn't we?

    New Halo and Halo Touch Remotes

    in General Control4 Discussion

    Posted

    5 hours ago, RyanE said:

    What settings are you referring to?

    Control4 remotes in general don't have many settings, and directly read / respond to the project state.

    They don't typically require a 'download' of the project, or anything like that.

    So to clarify, I'd say that there's no setup of the remote other than adding it to the WiFi, then to the Control4 project in the remote's default room.  Any room / device settings are pulled from the project automatically, and pulled again when things change and/or you change rooms on the remote.

    There are a bunch of settings on an SR-260, like Color, Backlight Keypad Brightness, Display Brightness, Motion Detect.

    I wish that you could control these settings from Composer HE.  It would be nice to change Text Color based on Watch Activity, etc.

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