# HBO NOW



## Rich (Feb 22, 2007)

We have HBO NOW activated on our two ATV4 boxes and our FTV boxes. I have an ATV4 on our 4K set. I ran into a buffering problem that forced me out of content and to get back I had to restart the various content choices. At first I thought the issue must be the internet connection to the one ATV4 box that had the problem, but I checked the Gigabit switch with my laptop and was getting the usual ~ 100 Mbps down. Tried other apps on the ATV4 in question and saw none of the buffering issues. 

I was gonna blame the ATV4 box and put one of my FTV boxes in its place. I asked my son if he had the same issue when he used HBO NOW on his ATV4. He said he hadn't seen any similar problems but hadn't used the app very much. He suggested deleting the HBO app and reinstalling it. Seemed like a sensible suggestion and, after spending a bit of time figuring out how to do that, we finally deleted it and reinstalled it. The buffering problem appears to be resolved. I've watched hours of content on it and haven't had anymore of the buffering problems.

Now that it is working properly the app seems like a good alternative to what I had originally intended to do, which was put HBO back on my D* account. With the app, I get a 1080p feed that upscales on the 4K set and I can't see any difference between the upscaled PQ on the app and what my TV's built in apps give me. What I do get is a much easier UI. The ATV4's interface is so good and easy to use in comparison to the TV's apps. I don't get Amazon on the ATV4, and still use the TV for that.

The things you can do with the ATV4's UI are rather amazing. You really have to use it to appreciate how easy it is to use. If it only had an Amazon app...

Rich


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

I believe the HBO now and go apps are the same layout on the appletvs.


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## mgavs (Jun 17, 2007)

We dropped HBO, Showtime, Starz and Cinemax 3 weeks ago after having them 20+ years on DirecTV. HBO Now and Showtime are much better on the Apple TV 4! We love just telling Siri to play Vinyl, etc. so much easier to use and....a lot cheaper than DirecTV and 1080P looks great on the Pioneer Kuros. Best change we made in years. Going to put Tablo in for OTA as soon as they release their Apple TV app, and drop DirecTV locals which we pay $6 mo. Little by little we will phase out DirecTV as much as possible, bill was $215 mo. We have 4 Apple TVs, 5 iPads, etc. in the house we use for cordless phones, AV remotes, control lights, cool, heat, etc.

Btw, we had HBO Go, Now is similar but seems to operate much smoother than Go.


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## Rich (Feb 22, 2007)

inkahauts said:


> I believe the HBO now and go apps are the same layout on the appletvs.


I tried GO when I had HBO on D* and I got a lot of jittery content. I don't see that at all using NOW. I've used it quite a bit lately and since we solved that one problem it's been very stable.

Rich


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## Rich (Feb 22, 2007)

mgavs said:


> We dropped HBO, Showtime, Starz and Cinemax 3 weeks ago after having them 20+ years on DirecTV. HBO Now and Showtime are much better on the Apple TV 4! We love just telling Siri to play Vinyl, etc. so much easier to use and....a lot cheaper than DirecTV and 1080P looks great on the Pioneer Kuros. Best change we made in years. Going to put Tablo in for OTA as soon as they release their Apple TV app, and drop DirecTV locals which we pay $6 mo. Little by little we will phase out DirecTV as much as possible, bill was $215 mo. We have 4 Apple TVs, 5 iPads, etc. in the house we use for cordless phones, AV remotes, control lights, cool, heat, etc.
> 
> Btw, we had HBO Go, Now is similar but seems to operate much smoother than Go.


Yeah, I've seen a lot of complaints about GO, not many about NOW. I did ask my son how he knew about trashing the app and reinstalling it to fix the problem with the annoying buffering and it was just a WAG. Every once in awhile, WAGs turn out to be a good thing.

Rich


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