Netflix launches 3D and SuperHD through specific ISPs - Page 4

http://support.netflix.com/en/node/8731#gsc.tab=0

They state a headroom margin to prevent stops.

See the available video bitrates in the picture posted in the Netflix adds 3D and Super HD thread

Actually Netflix is great. It just takes a little time to get used to it. And first of all you wont find the latest stupid American blockbuster, but who cares? I watched countless great movies and TV series that I would normally never buy but that I now buy and collect after watching them on Netflix. All foreign movies. Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, French, British, Belgian, South African, Indian, Australian; from Sweden, Finland, Denmark.. The only thing is that I watch those movies and TV series on a 60" TV instead of my 8' screen with a projector because the picture is not that sharp. It is like streaming audio: you discover a lot of new stuff that you can buy later to watch on your big screen. I could not live anymore without Netflix and Pandora.

I recently got a Panny DMP-BDT220 Blu Ray player and I experienced that problem too, even if I have 20Mbps connection. In the video setup, I've changed the HDMI resolution from "auto" to "1080p". Since then, I did not see anymore drop or lesser resolution. It's like it's forced to 1080p now. Hope that could help.

Anyone have insight if Verizon Fios is joining open connect?

Eve though I am in Australia, Netflix says I am supported !

Yup you are right. I was oblivious to the fact that they are adding ~14% padding for protocol overhead.

+1000!
While I admit that Netflix is not perfect and doesn't have every great movie I'd like to see...............it DOES offer an incredible amount of content for a ridiculously low price. NOTHING even comes close. For the price of a couple of rentals you can watch thousands upon thousands of movies and TV shows at your leisure in, at least, good cable TV quality.
For instance, I never got around to seeing the original Monk series but through Netflix I saw all 100+ episodes over a month or so.
Right now I'm watching the more recent Batlestar Galactica series that I missed originally. LOVE IT! I've also watched a bunch of Woody Allen movies - some quite recent, along with lots of other miscellaneous movies.
Finally - I notice that there are a LOT of recent blockbusters available that were in theaters only a year or two ago.
People that criticize Netflix are missing the big picture. It is there to augment your TV viewing experience, not replace it. If all you want to watch is recent releases, you're not gonna get that for $8 a month. Get over it.
I LOVE NETFLIX AND SUPERHD WILL MAKE IT EVEN BETTER WITHOUT INCREASING THE PRICE!!!! WAY TO GO NETFLIX!!

Depends on the area. This is false in Ontario. Both Rogers and Bell have joined Open Connect in Toronto. Teksavvy too (a major independent ISP). So all of the 3 biggest ISP's in GTA supports SuperHD, provided you go into your Netflix preferences at netflix.com and change your Settings to maximum bitrate (this step is necessary in order to get SuperHD). Although I know most Canadians dislike seeing Toronto as the center of Canada, this automatically covers a massive chunk of Canada. It just seems that Quebec is a bit unlucky at the moment -- Videotron not participating with SuperHD (yet?)

I'm getting SuperHD over Bell FibeTV right now (Fibe16+ with the 25Mbps option when the Bell settop box is turned off)
Edited by Mark Rejhon - 1/18/13 at 4:04pm

Agreed! The high-end 150" home theaters deserve the very best in audio and video.
Netflix would not be there yet.
I have had a projector for a long time, though when I moved to a smaller condo a few years ago, I had to retire that and get a flat panel.
But, with Netflix exceeding cable/satellite quality, it's good enough for the kitchen and bedroom sized HDTV's. And 50" - 60" living room home theaters.

The picture quality of "SuperHD" streams (market term, I know) is blowing away Cogeco/Charter/Verizon/UVerse/FibeTV/Rogers/etc (if you manage to get the full bitrate) -- and the better Netflix 5.8Mbps streams look better than *some* OTA 19Mbps ATSC MPEG2 streams. Normally should only be a 2:1 ratio for H.264 versus MPEG2 but this attributed to encoder difference -- Netflix *seems* to be getting 4k masters for some material (at least for certain movies like "Hugo") and then doing very efficient Amazon-cloud supercomputed eyeIO-assisted, intensively multi-passed encodes of H.264 (Netflix has an economic incentive to use the best possible offline multipass encoding), versus a simple realtime single-pass MPEG2 encoder, especially one that encodes all 60 fields rather than just 24 frames, and especially if it's a re-encode (e.g. broadcasting from a Blu-Ray master) This apples-to-bananas "4k-direct-to-Netflix-using-a-supercomputed-encode" lopsided encoder advantage allows Netflix to get an advantage on top of the normal 2:1 H.264-vs-MPEG2 ratio, and this is what seems to makes a 5.8 Mbps H.264 "SuperHD" encode often look better a 19 Mbps ATSC stream (granted, many 19 Mbps ATSC OTA broadcasts look really good, and some better if they're offline multi-pass MPEG2 encodes rather than single-pass live realtime MPEG2 encoding). In fact, I can say I'm not able to use freely available H.264 software tools to make 5.8 Mbps H.264 bitstreams nearly as good as the 5.8 Mbps H.264 that's on Netflix "Super HD" today. So, obviously, Netflix is doing an incredible 5.8 stream (packing as much image quality in 5.8 Mbps) -- I'd say for certain movies, it looks roughly as good (or exceeds) most 10-12 Mbps home-made H.264 streams (e.g. HTPC server playback), since many of those are recompresses rather than encode-from-master. Case in point. Many satellite broadcasts and UVerse bitrates are worse, and they're often realtime re-encodes (recompress passes = more artifacts) rather than intensive offline direct-from-4k master encodes.

Therefore, one might argue: Picture-quality-wise, how can you watch cable/satellite, but avoid Netflix?
(Assuming you only watch Blu-Rays, and only in your projector home theater)
Edited by Mark Rejhon - 1/18/13 at 4:01pm

While I respect your well thought out and very technical argument, my answer is simple: content. I'm a movie fanatic and a sports nut. Just looking at this past month for movie title releases, as far as movies I want to own/watch. We have:

Dark Knight Rises
Bourne Legacy (None of the older Bourne movies are available)
Ted
Total Recall
Resident Evil: Retribution (None of the older Resident Evil movies are available)
Looper
Dredd 3D
Taken 2

None of which are yet available on Netflix. However they are available on OnDemand services. Not only are they not available on Netflix, but for movies like the Bourne and Resident Evil franchises NONE of the older movies are on Netflix either. What good is slightly improved picture quality if what I want to watch isn't available?

Personally, I prefer buying Blurays, but if that wasn't an option I'd be happy renting them on OnDemand the moment they're released rather than waiting months to see them on Netflix. $8 a month is cheap, so are 720p Westinghouse televisions. I don't mind paying more for a superior product. Not to mention Live sports that Cable/Satellite have that Netflix doesn't.

I prefer spending my $8 a month on Hulu Plus. As far as TV shows go, there's no comparison between Hulu and Netflix. Hulu also has every episode of Monk and Battlestar Gallactica, not to mention dozens of other full series. The way Hulu lets you track your favorite shows, automatically notifying you when a new episode is available to watch, beats the plain jane Netflix interface. In my opinion Hulu is a direct replacement and upgrade for cable providers' DVR service. It does a better job tracking, storing, displaying your favorite TV shows than their DVR's do. Netflix doesn't offer you anything an OnDemand service doesn't already offer you if you have cable already. A bunch of older miscellaneous titles to fake you into thinking they have a lot of content, with an occasional newer (18 month old) title. Basically a cheaper, watered down version of an OnDemand service.

Just my two cents.
Edited by tbris84 - 1/18/13 at 6:17pm

I have WIMAX 4G and Netflix HD works perfectly and I watch a few movies directly on my big screen with my front projector. Netflix is so great that I have caught myself skipping a lot of TV programs like 60 Minutes that I would never have missed before. I have watched entire TV series in 48 hours stretch stopping just to eat and take a leak. Wallander, The Forsyte Saga, Damages, Life. I was hooked!

Netflix SuperHD is what we are discussing not Netflix HD. SuperHD is a new launch and gives you a more true to blu ray picture.

I have been watching movies and television programs on Amazon Prime. They newer movies that you can watch for free and even recent movies available for pay.

Charter: Your Internet Provider is not configured for Super HD yet.

I love Netflix, never have problems with the feed. The selection is so huge I always have dozens of programs in my instant queue. I don't care if I have to watch Weeds a year after they originally show. I would drop cable entirely if it weren't for football and racing.

regular hd movies from Netflix streaming are only 720p

Has anyone in Canada (I'm on Rogers) seen any 3D content on Netflix? I'm particularly interested in trying this on my home PC which is setup for 3D (Nvidia 3D vision). I've searched for '3D' and the only movie that shows up is Jackass 3 but it doesn't stream in 3D from what I can see.

Thanks for the tip.
I hadn't thought of Hulu as I'm in Canada but since I'm now able to access the American content because of U.S. DNS settings courtesy of UnblockUS, I did have a chance to try it out through their free trial. What? They must be kidding!! Commercials? No friggin' way baby. I stopped watching them (with a few, of my choosing, exceptions) way back in the 80's when I bought my first VCR.
Content wise I was not too impressed either. Lots and lots of main network stuff - the stuff I've been avoiding the last few years since they've dumbed them down so much that I can't bear to watch them. Thank God for cable channels and programs like Mad Men, Homeland, Justified, Dexter, Damages, Game of Thrones, etc. etc.
Sorry, but I see no real comparison between Hulu and Netflix. I'll take Netflix any day with their huge 10,000+ list of programming - there's always something good to watch!

Netflix for blu ray that's about it !

How?? I use VyprVPN for anything US when I really need it. Be it Hulu, VUDU, Netflix, etc. But I just fired up a VPN to LA and checked the link page and Netflix says not supported via my ISP which is exactly what I expected when trying via VPN...And btw, what does a speed test screenshot have to do with it, you excited cause you're on the NBN or something with that download speed?

Edited by OzHDHT - 1/22/13 at 8:54pm

Ok, my rural/regional ISP says only the big ISPs can do it now, "they have asked". This isn't just from a random CSR drone, this is the response on their FB page. From the feeling in this thread, if they asked, they would have been sent a server. I hate getting smoke blown. Anybody have a link with the truth?

But how is this really any different than what ESPN has done with ESPN3? Or for that matter all these cable channels that every subscriber pays for but few watch (because of lack of a la carte options)? I'm not saying it is right, but it isn't new on either the programming or internet provider front.

So after catching up with this thread, I think my ISP could provide this to me at any time, they just don't want to. And their excuse of it not being available to them doesn't hold water.

So no chances of AT&T UVerse or Cox Communications to get this SuperHD anytime soon?

Does anybody know how to check what level of quality you are receiving when using the Netflix App on Windows8? When I previously used a browser window it would display HD in the bar at the bottom, now there is nothing.

Also, when streaming a SUPERHD title, what will it say?

We're in agreement then, there is no comparison between the two. We're both happy with what we're paying for. Netflix and Hulu are what they are. They both take aspects of cable and charge you for them. Hulu allows me to watch all the TV shows I enjoy watching and it informs me of when new episodes are on.

When I finally cut the cord I will be using a combination of Hulu Plus for my major network TV shows, streaming live sports from the web, and buying Blurays when they come out because I want to own my movie library. The part that I'm trying to work out, is getting my premium channels for Dexter, Homeland, Spartacus, etc. I wish HBO, Showtime, Starz offered a stream only service for a few bucks.

At least in the S.F. Bay Area, Comcast is not offering it. I asked Netflix about streaming 3D content, and the rep said the ISP had to provide not only a minimum 6 MPS speed, but also something he called "Open Connect", which he said C
Comcast did not. Here more info on it...Netflix 3D Open Connect. There is also Netflix 1080p Super HD being rolled out. You can check your ISP's participation here.