Netflix, Blockbuster (and others) Online/Kiosk Discussion Thread

The Netflix movies are usually just like retail disks. But sometimes movies are sold on two disks: one for movies and one for special features. In those cases, since with Netflix one queue slot is one disk, you have to rent them separately. I personally have been very happy with Netlflix. Others have been happy with BB. BB gives you rental coupons for your local Brick and Mortar store so that may be of some value. On the other hand, Netflix has a good selection of obscure and foreign and old films which might be important. I've always had rapid turnaround with Netflix but then again, I'm not renting 50 DVDs a month, ripping them, and sending them back each night, so I am not a candidate for account throttling.

1) Are the dvd's just like the actual retail dvd's that you would buy at the store or are they those cheap rental dvd's with the cheesy menus and no bonus features?

The discs are the same as if you were to buy them at any retail store. Like was said earlier though, you have to rent the movie and bonus features seperately, unless the bonus features and movie are on one disc.

2) Is netflix the best mail rental service available or is Blockbuster or someone else better?

Thats all a matter of opinion. I personally have had a great experience so far with netflix. I have been with them for roughly 2 years. I rent around 10 to 14 discs per month and have a turnaround time of only 3 days.(The time it leaves my mail to the time I have another disc.)

I agree with the above two posters. I have had a netflix account for over 5 years now and have been very happy with them.

As far as which is better. I think BB is probably better at having a large quantity of the most current movies while Netflix is good at having older movies, classics etc. Basically Netflix does have ALL the movies, but not as many of the current ones so you may have to wait longer for those.

In addition, BB lets you come into their store for those times when you just have to have it now.

I'm guessing that Blockbuster might be better for those who want to see the latest movies and Netflix for those that enjoy foreign, classics etc. and are willing to wait a bit (sometimes a couple of months) for the limited supply of current releases to make their rounds.

My 2 cents:

Both services start out nicely but if you expect to get a decent quantity/volume of DVD's per month you will end up disappointed.

I had Blockbuster. At the beginning they were fine. Then it took longer and longer to get DVD's. I switched to NetFlix. Again fine at first then it took longer and longer. It now takes 10 days to turn around 3X DVDs and we watch them the night we get them and send them back the next day.

Perhaps you should search on the recent debacle of a lawsuit / faux settlement with Netflix.

I just wish the FTC would force them to drop the "unlimited" from their advertising. I don't have a problem with them not wishing to loose money on high volume customers, but either say that they have limits or not. Otherwise it is false advertising to say that their service "unlimited".

b2b

A friend used BB for a while but got broken discs quite frequently, so he quit and signed on with Netflix. I have received maybe 1% broken with Netflix but overall I have been happy despite some account throttling, mainly manifested by the "Very Long Wait" status message for most new releases in the queue. Still, the overall number of choices are good and I'm not impatient to see most of the newer releases anyway.

Dan

HD-DVD discs will soon be available on Net Flix, which means the entire "HD format crisis" can be resolved in practical terms for typical Hi def movie viewers basically for the price of one extra HD dvd player, e.g. less than 500 dollars for Toshiba players - assuming for example they were planning to bet on Blu-ray anyways

I just canceled BB and signed up with Netflix. As said before BB start great then
slowly took longer to get moves, and would not send movies in my order even
though it was shown available. Also movies were sent and the next day showed
back up at BB as returned. We will see if Netflix turns out to be the same.

I have had the service for 2 years now and although this has happened in the past, it has just lately starting happening repeatedly, and often (for the record I have over 100 movies in my queue so they should always have something that is available and ready to ship):

I return a movie, Netflix gets it the next day or the day after that. About midway through the day they receive it, they show a message on the screen of "Your next movie will be shipping today". I check back later in the day and that message is replaced with the specific movie, except it now says it is shipping tomorrow - "Star Wars Ep IV is ready and we expect to ship it to you tomorrow".

Sometimes it does get shipped tomorrow, but other times I go back the next day to check and the movie is now pushed back yet another day.

I find this very frustrating. I have emailed Netflix customer support but they do not give any help whatsoever. I guess my only option is probably to vote with my $$$ and go elsewhere. The trouble is I really like Netflix...when they are efficient about mailing stuff out.

Anybody else experience this and if so, did you find any solution?

Just you, me and anyone else who wants more than 10-12 movies a month on the the 3 at a time plan

That starting happening to me alot and it annoyed the hell out of me. My solution was to switch to BB. Its not perfect. I hate when then ship random stuff from the middle of my queue, but it doesn't annoy me nearly as much as the netflix throttling. Its also nice to have the two free in store rentals a month and now for $7 more a month I also get two movie tickets -- still a few dollars less than I'd pay for a matinee. If throttling becomes a problem with BB, I will probably switch back to Netflix.

I mailed in two yesterday, and they had to get them both today. One new movie shows up as "Shipping Wednesday". They may be starting to throttle me, it's tough to say. I'm on the 4-out plan, so I'm assuming they'll be keeping me at about 4 per week - which is what I want.

larry

All it took was one walk into a Blockbuster to see they sanitize the movie selection for Joe Mainstream and that was the end of them for me.

Netflix has been fantastic the year I've had it and they truly cover a lot of ground with their library. They have more obscure titles than the best of my local stores and other than a no p0rn policy, they don't censor the selections. I don't want Disney or other bible thumpers to decide what I can and can't watch and Netflix has anything I've looked for so far.

With the 3 disc subscription, I can easily turn around 3 a week, if I was more efficient I could probably avg 4-5.

Please try to do 4-5 per week. I doubt you'd get very far, but it would be interesting to see what happens. That would put you under the $1.50 per disc threshold that seems to be what they shoot for as a minimum.

larry

netflix is better than anyone else, imho. they need pron though.

The last 2 or 3 weeks, I've been getting the shipments the next day after receiving my returns. Frustrating, but at least I still get the new releases. This week I will be getting Dune: Extended Edition and Corpse Bride. I might switch to BB so I can go to the store to pick up new editions. I really wanted to see Flightplan, but I missed that one and now it is a very long wait.

I really like netflix for the most part. However, they tend to stick with the original release of most movies. They don't have any superbit versions of most movies and when a movie is re-released as a "special edition" they don't always get them in.
I've been hoping to get Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and some other older movies in widescreen for my son to watch, but they only have the fullscreen version. I emailed them but I got a canned response about original releases only. I know that's not entirely true, because some of their dvd's are special editions. It's just really hit and miss.

With all of that said, however, I couldn't be happier as far as turnaround time goes. I almost always have something to watch when there is crap on TV and I only have to walk to my mailbox. How cool is that!

I've been with Netflix since 2000, and couldn't be more pleased. I live in a rural area, and there are no video rental stores within 25 miles. So Netflix is extremely convenient for me.

And even though I live in a rural area, I get unbelievable turnaround. I put one in the mailbox at home yesterday morning. Netflix had it back today, and shipped the next one in my queue today. I'll have it back by Thursday at the latest. I commend them for their service, but I also have to say kudos to the USPS...and No, I don't work for the post office.

It would last about 2-3 weeks and then they will slow you down.
I just stopped Netflixs because of exactly that.

And I don't want to be limited to whatever crap the fashionable elite in Hollywood wants to ram down our throats. Netflix makes us both happy.

I've been with Netflix since last May.
I was on 3 a month over the summer, switched to 2 a month once the new TV season started. This month I've had two times where I would send a movie back, they would get it the next day, but not ship my next DVD till the day after that. The first time it happened, my queue said it would ship that day, then when I checked in the afternoon, it said it was shipping the next day. The second time was this week. I sent a movie back on Monday, it got there Tuesday, and my queue said my next film would be shipping Wednesday. I sent a feedback reply about the first one.

But the pop-up info window says:



Last year I had Season 1 of Battlestar Galactica in my queue even before it was released. The first disc was "very long wait" for maybe 6-8 weeks, so I left feedback about them needing to get more copies if people had to wait 2 months just to see something. I also threatened to cancel my subscription, IIRC, because it was ridiculous having to wait that long for something. Disc 1 changed to Long Wait soon after, and I got disc 1 very soon after that. Maybe they listened, maybe it was a coincidence.

I think inventory and when you get DVDs depends on your local distributor and whatever they have and when. I know there is a new Netflix dist center in my area, because it popped up late last year two buildings down from where I work (about 15 min from home).

Other than a few issues, and having to wait a long time for a few things (finally am getting Wedding Crashers this week, still waiting on Serenity), usually if I put a DVD in the mail on Friday or Saturday, it arrives there on Monday and I can get a new Tuesday release delivered on Tuesday. If I miss getting something in on Monday, that's when I have to wait extra long to get it. But I looked at my rental history, and I returned 10 DVDs in January, on a 2-at-a-time plan. $1.50 a rental. Not bad. But I like the selection as well. They have a lot of independent, foreign and documentaries that aren't as widely available. I wouldn't have enough to rent/watch with just the major releases if it weren't for the smaller, indie, foreign, documentaries and all the back catalog stuff they have.

Where are you going to rent DVDs for cheaper than $1.50-$1.75 a disc and have the same selection? Out of curiosity, what are you doing now? Blockbuster?

larry

Long time netflix user - switched to Blockbuster as soon as I learned thay had a distribution center in my town. A bonus has been the 2 instore rentals / mo.

Well, I am in the 12th day of my two week trial with the three out plan and have only received four movies thus far. I am not real impressed. I watch the movies the same day I receive them and return them promptly at a post office early the next morning on my way to work.
I had envisioned being able to rent five movies per week. Perhaps I had my sights set to high.
I sent Netflix an e-mail asking if 5 movies per week is too high of an expectation for the three and out plan. I also asked them if there was anything else I could do to speed up the process.
I guess we shall see what happens.
I didn't think 20 movies per month on the three and out plan was too high of an expectation.

Craig

Before the postal increase, the x-out plan seems to correspond to x-out-per-week. We'll have to see if Netflix does anything wrt the extra postal costs. Less than $1 per disc is not going to happen. Ask your local rental places to rent you discs at $2.50 per disc and to keep them as long as you want (don't forget to mention you want them to order discs that Netflix has and they don't) - and see what they say. Don't forget to add in gas and time. I'm not picking on anybody - just trying to point out that Netflix isn't that bad a deal.

larry

20 movies out - you are never going to get that

I just checked my complete rental history going back to 2003 (its stored under preferences on Netflix.com)

The most I was ever able to rent in a month (I should say the most Netflix ever sent me in a month, because the slowdowns have always been on their end) was 13. The least I ever was able to rent in a month was 9. There were only a couple 9 months, just about every month was 12 or 13 total and this is on the 3 out plan.

That puts it at $1.53 per disc my cost. I guess that is fair considering I dont have travel time or gas cost to get to the video store. Someone else here mentioned that Netflix will slow you down on purpose if your per disc cost starts to get below $1.50, and I believe them.

I haven't been a member very long, but if I can average $1.50 per disc with the 4-out plan I'll be ecstatic. So far, $1.50 seems to be what's happening once I got past the 2 week promo love affair.

larry

I've definitely turned over the 3 within a week for 6 in 7 days, though I've only done it maybe twice when I first subscribed.

I wouldn't be surprised if they throttle them if you are a 'regular', hadn't thought about it.

I've got a distribution center locally (next county), could that have an impact? I do know when they send them from the out of state centers it slows down the pace a lot, some of the more oddball movies have come cross country. "Last House on the Left" hung me up for a week as it was coming in and out of TN and I'm in NJ.

When the distribution center near me opened, I noticed a nice decrease in turn around time. I went from a 5-6 day turn around to a 3 day turn around. In just a couple of weeks time and some severe throttling it took my disks just as long to travel 8 miles as it did for the disk to travel 800 miles. That's when I decided to switch to BB.