Spark Sport
-
Well so far I haven't paid Spark and haven't needed to. I'm in the 'wait until I see if I need it' camp and so far haven't needed it.
Had to go out on Saturday so the delayed coverage was fine for me. Had some of the earlier games running on VPN to ITV with smooth stream, then as many predicted Spark fell over and yesterday was free for everyone.
I'm not being tight or smug, just practical. I was tempted to sign up late last week and thought I would test how prepared they were with a simple question to the help line (not covered by FAQs) on whether I could cast from iOS device via AirPlay to a non Gen4 Apple TV. They had no idea and wanted me to sign up and test it myself. Seemed like a pretty basic test for them to have run so they could advise owners of older ATVs but no. -
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
whether I could cast from iOS device via AirPlay to a non Gen4 Apple TV
They really should know that - and that they have an Apple TB app so that you don't have to cast anyway.
-
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
Well so far I haven't paid Spark and haven't needed to. I'm in the 'wait until I see if I need it' camp and so far haven't needed it.
Had to go out on Saturday so the delayed coverage was fine for me. Had some of the earlier games running on VPN to ITV with smooth stream, then as many predicted Spark fell over and yesterday was free for everyone.
I'm not being tight or smug, just practical. I was tempted to sign up late last week and thought I would test how prepared they were with a simple question to the help line (not covered by FAQs) on whether I could cast from iOS device via AirPlay to a non Gen4 Apple TV. They had no idea and wanted me to sign up and test it myself. Seemed like a pretty basic test for them to have run so they could advise owners of older ATVs but no.That was my attitude too until I got home on Friday night and true-love had gone and purchased it for me.
While I am grateful she has been so thoughtful I wanted to boycott Spark and this way of televising it
-
@Snowy said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
whether I could cast from iOS device via AirPlay to a non Gen4 Apple TV
They really should know that - and that they have an Apple TB app so that you don't have to cast anyway.
ATV app is only for Gen4 onwards ATVs.
In theory though older ATVs should still be able to function like a Chromecast using AirPlay. Considering the numbers of older ATV units still around you would think the answer as to whether it will work should be in the CRM notes for agents to respond to questions.
My main annoyance is the expectation that people will be happy to purchase another piece of kit if they don't have the ones Spark have chosen to focus on.
I already have an ATV and a firestick and don't want a chromecast or a new TV just for them. -
-
Not NZ but Kayo which up until weekend was bloody brilliant now has all sorts of issues just in time for the world cup.
The app is fine on my smart phone only however mirroring to my TV leads to it erroring out after about 5 mins. I had previously been running it from my Chromebook via hdmi to the tele, something has changed where if I run it from the chrome browser it crashes after about 10 mins. If I run it via the kayo app it also crashes after about 5 mins.It took 9 attempts to watch the 2nd half of the Aussie Fiji game which left me pretty close to seeing how far I can throw my devices. Fortunately I had my work laptop at home and I was able to run the AB game with only the one crash via Chrome and an hdmi.
Seems to suggest an issue with a chromebook update.
@Nepia or anyone else with Kayo how has yours been performing? I'm debating purchasing a chromecast as that might be more stable than my TV's inbuilt mirroring.
-
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@Snowy said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
whether I could cast from iOS device via AirPlay to a non Gen4 Apple TV
They really should know that - and that they have an Apple TB app so that you don't have to cast anyway.
ATV app is only for Gen4 onwards ATVs.
In theory though older ATVs should still be able to function like a Chromecast using AirPlay. Considering the numbers of older ATV units still around you would think the answer as to whether it will work should be in the CRM notes for agents to respond to questions.
My main annoyance is the expectation that people will be happy to purchase another piece of kit if they don't have the ones Spark have chosen to focus on.
I already have an ATV and a firestick and don't want a chromecast or a new TV just for them.TBF this would be the same with similar streaming products wouldn’t it? This is the same with Kayo - they only properly support the latest version of devices they support and don’t support all devices.
I have to buy a new Apple tb to get the best benefits even though I have a chrome cast, smart tv and PS4.
-
@Rembrandt Mine is mostly good, the odd crash or drop down to SD.
I’m getting an Apple TV this week as I’m sick of chrome cast* and want to just turn my tv on and hit a remote. I’ve resigned myself to them never providing the PS4 app they promised me would be available in a couple of months when I joined.
- it is fine if you don’t mind casting from a phone or a iPad and a cheaper option than Apple TV.
-
-
@dogmeat that is really interesting - not sure if was saltiness but I could swear the HD signal on Duke wasn't as good as Sky's usual HD. Noted that we aren't on fibre but can stream multiple HD sources with no issues on at least two devices. I plugged our laptop to the router rather than use wifi connection, and that seemed to make an improvement when we first were testing out the replayed (fiji) match. We definitely hit solid patches where the streamed signal was mint, but that just made the lag or drop in qual stick out.
On a biggish tangent has anyone caught school's talking about wanting to drop the BYOD approach? I can see some similarities with all this streaming guff about how well you can cater for hundreds of combos of hardware, OS, apps, connections, not to mention the user end of things!!
-
@dogmeat said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
I had no issues at all - better picture than I get on Sky. I do get very good download speeds though
Yeah same for me. We are on fibre and TV and apple TV are hardwired so assuming why we had no issues. I was also streaming to NRL to one ipad and had racing.com on another at the same time and it was all good. Actually, the rugby did appear to drop out of HD to SD for a moment or so but not a major.
-
@Bovidae said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
Update on Spark Sport streaming issue
Following technical investigations overnight and this morning, Spark Sport is making configuration changes to the way the video stream comes into New Zealand. We believe this will resolve the video quality issues experienced by some customers intermittently during the All Blacks v South Africa match last night. These configuration changes will be implemented prior to today’s matches, which commence with Italy v Namibia from 4.45pm.
I dont understand this. If this was the case then wouldnt everyone in NZ be impact rather than just some people?
-
-
@Bovidae said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@JK I agree. I think Spark isn't telling the whole story which leads to speculation for the cause of the problems, which were not just restricted to the rugby stream. Those watching F1 also had issues I read.
They've said it was delivery to the CDN's
It was mostly sent to 1 instead of 6. People's experience would vary depending on how well they connected to that 1 CDN
-
@Rembrandt said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@Nepia Cheers yeah I'd prefer a remote, I had it on the Telstra TV at my previous apartment and that ran well. Have looked at appleTV but bit pricey for my liking. Might see if I can pick up a cheap TelstraTV
Oh, I didn't realise you could use Telstra TV without having Telstra account. I don't think Telstra TV supports split view so not an option for me as I love split view, probably use it at least half the time I'm watching Kayo.
I'm going to grab the Apple TV now as it comes with a free 12 months of Apple TV + (the streaming service at $7.99 a month).
-
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@Snowy said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
@Crucial said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
whether I could cast from iOS device via AirPlay to a non Gen4 Apple TV
They really should know that - and that they have an Apple TB app so that you don't have to cast anyway.
ATV app is only for Gen4 onwards ATVs.
In theory though older ATVs should still be able to function like a Chromecast using AirPlay. Considering the numbers of older ATV units still around you would think the answer as to whether it will work should be in the CRM notes for agents to respond to questions.
My main annoyance is the expectation that people will be happy to purchase another piece of kit if they don't have the ones Spark have chosen to focus on.
I already have an ATV and a firestick and don't want a chromecast or a new TV just for them.In case you’re still wondering I just dug out an old Gen2 ATV and cast via airplay from my iPad with no issues at all. Funnily though I couldn’t locate any way to release the cast from within the iPad app. Usually the have an icon you can press and bring up an airplay menu but couldn’t see one.
