Burned by the "good hard drive list"

I just picked up a Tablo and got it installed yesterday.  After it crashing a few times during the setup process and learning that there was not a mobile app as implied on the web site (only a tablet app), I quickly learned this product is not ready for prime time. I then went to format my hard drive.  By some lucky accident I read the forums before purchasing on Amazon, so I actually picked a hard drive off the list Seagate Backup Plus Slim (3rd one in the list). To my surprise it did not work!  There are multiple model numbers for the same product and the one amazon sent me does not work with the Tablo due to the tablo’s bug with 4k sector sizes.  So I’m calling you out tablosupport, you need to get that hard drive information organized and out of the forums and at least in the FAQ of the web site.  No normal consumer is ever going to read the forum for a product before buying it.  Really this info needs to be referenced somewhere people will see it at the point of purchase AND it needs to call out details like the same external usb drive having multiple model numbers.  It also needs to be organized by Tablo folks not a bunch of messages in the forum.  I’m trying real hard to like this product, but I shouldn’t have to spend hours reading about it to get it to actually work…  If I wanted that I would have built something myself.

Its In the FAQ with a link to a blog post that has a link to the exact hard drive you need to order from Seagate. It also says you need a tablet or a PC. I bought mine and it worked out of the box with no issues.


Loving it BTW.

https://www.tablotv.com/faq/

To use Tablo you need the following things:

If you’d like to watch programming on your big screen TV, you’ll also need an HDMI device such as Apple TV (which uses AirPlay from an iPad), Roku or a Chromecast dongle. You can also use the Tablo web app with an HDMI-enabled computer connected to your TV. This video explains How Tablo OTA DVR works.

Ahh, no where on the Tablo FAQ does it list Tablos requirement for 2k sector size. (Misleading)

No where on the Seagate site does it list the sector size of any of the Backup Plus Slim line. (Meaning Seagate isn’t obligated to limit themselves)

The advice Tablo gives on compatable manufactures and makes, is just a snapshot in time, of when that make of hard drive, ‘reliably’ had 2k sectors. (Shortsighted)

A bulk purchase for resale would have been a money maker for Tablo… And assured hard drive compatibility.

Some effort by Tablo to research who’s makes are guaranteed compatible with Tablo… Would go a long way in assuring customer goodwill.

Responsibility for this mess doesn’t lie with the customer and forum contributors.

Endless delays on rolling out 4k support doesn’t excuse this matter either.

Tablo is simply lacking responsibly for this matter.
It’s clearly not Seagates or Amazon’s… Or the uninformed consumer. Come on!

It’s 512 byte sectors that work, and 4k sectors that don’t.

The Tablo folks are trying to give the consumer maximum flexibility. They don’t force you to buy a certain antenna, since each consumer has different needs. And they don’t force you to buy a certain hard drive, since there are so many out there.

I do agree that compatibility needs to be better, but the flexibility also needs to be there since new models are introduced each year.

I am still surprised that the 1 TB drive that I recommended didn’t work for the OP.

Hard drive compatibility is a tricky issue and a weak spot for TabloTV until they get the 4k sector drive compatibility resolved.   My best advice is get an inexpensive Syba SY-ENC35026 USB storage controller and an AV hard drive from Seagate or Western Digital 

The antenna analogy does not work.  Any valid HD antenna works.  This is more akin to finding out the a 52" antenna works fine with the device but a 60" antenna doesn’t work. Assuming that the consumer should do hours of research on forums to figure this out is ridiculous.  After hooking up an old 120gb hard drive to the tablo to get it to work and seeing how many problems it has, I’m just returning it.  Issues I have noted:


*Chromecast support is missing from ipad app
*Chromecast support on android app is actually streaming from the tablet not from the tablo so your tablet must remain on for the stream to keep working
*Android tablet streaming live to an older tablet (asus transformer) is too slow apparently and it drops frames (although hulu, netflix, and amazon all work fine on it)
*Chromecast support on android phone through web app works 1 out of 5 tries and takes forever to finish buffering, it also skips (note my intention was to use this through chromecast)
*ipad phone app does not support chromecast at all
*Roku 2 streaming skips and buffers every few seconds and the UI is hideous and incomplete compared to the pictures of the mobile apps

Where did it work:
*Working in Chrome under WIndows 8.1, looks great and really shows what the experience could be
*Working on ipad displaying on the ipad, app looks good, but takes forever to start a show

This is a great product idea, I sure wish you guys had finished it, but I’m returning mine, and getting something that works.  Watching TV has never been so complicated.

Mine’s pretty simple…  Works absolutely fantastic especially coupled with plex since I can watch it flawlessly on my google tv, xperia tablet z, amazon fire tv, roku3, and desktop pc…  Absolutely awesome product… it’s not perfect and does still need some tweaking but there ain’t no way you could take my four tuner tablo from me.

Mine's pretty simple...  Works absolutely fantastic especially coupled with plex since I can watch it flawlessly on my google tv, xperia tablet z, amazon fire tv, roku3, and desktop pc...  Absolutely awesome product... it's not perfect and does still need some tweaking but there ain't no way you could take my four tuner tablo from me.

Same here. My 4 tuner works flawlessly. My family loves it.

Where did it work:
*Working in Chrome under WIndows 8.1, looks great and really shows what the experience could be
*Working on ipad displaying on the ipad, app looks good, but takes forever to start a show

This is a great product idea, I sure wish you guys had finished it, but I'm returning mine, and getting something that works.  Watching TV has never been so complicated.

Thanks for sharing your user experience @Cameron
Hopefully Tablo folks are listening and planning to take the user experience more seriously in the future.

Give it a year, then maybe Tablo will focus on android and Chromecast. I personally don’t use the Tablo “out of the box” experienced on anything except Roku. I have to use ‘external players’ on tablets and phones due to the performance and interface issues with the native Tablo players… And I avoid the web app experience on win 8 all together, due to the hideous issues with touch controls within the current interface. It’s rough right now if you don’t Roku.

Glad to hear the Tablo/Plex users are still happy.

I’m glad some of you have had some success with the product.  I’ll probably give it a try again if the company survives long enough to make a Tablo 2, but I have non technical people using the TV And they expect TV watching to just work.  My wife just loves it on her iPad (the one spot it almost works completely.) but the only way I could figure out for her to get it to stream to the tv was to tell her to turn on her computer, open a chrome browser, go to the web site, wait while it syncs, find the show you want, press the google chromecast button and then wait while it buffers and it will work.  Her expectation (and mine too really) is that I pick up a remote control and enter 18.1 and press the enter key and that channel appears.  We were imaging with this product our new remote would be our phones or tablets. 


I’ll check out plex before I send it back after reading the above, thanks for the suggestion.  If that could work cleanly maybe we could still see this product live up to its potential.

Have the developers thought about open sourcing the software?  Seems like a bunch of us could dive on and fix all the problems…


 My wife just loves it on her iPad (the one spot it almost works completely.) but the only way I could figure out for her to get it to stream to the tv was to tell her to turn on her computer, open a chrome browser, go to the web site, wait while it syncs, find the show you want, press the google chromecast button and then wait while it buffers and it will work. 

For your information, I works flawlessly with an iPad and an Apple TV via airplay @1080P (I am also using an iPod touch to airplay to the ATV).

As replacement for whole home DVR, I don’t think Tablo is quite there yet.  Without an EPG, long delay to tune to a live channel and many basic DVR features missing, most non-technical people are not going say “awesome.”   That being said, if you split you antenna signal so the TV can be used for live viewing and the Tablo for recordings, the experience is similar to using Netflix which is fine for most people.    

Yes split the OTA signal and go with the HDTV for live viewing and the Tablo just for recordings. The interface on the Roku 3 is not great but it is functional. No lagging or buffering problems watching recordings.

Yes split the OTA signal and go with the HDTV for live viewing and the Tablo just for recordings. The interface on the Roku 3 is not great but it is functional. No lagging or buffering problems watching recordings.

This is what we do. We very rarely watch live TV, so if we do we just watch it via the tuner on the TV. Airplay via the iPad or Plex via Apple TV works perfect.

I spit the signal too…  But what I REALLY like about the plex app is I can go to the Tablo channel and click on recent recording so my news from earlier is there waiting as well as any other recent show.  Also… I have to say that I like the Amazon Fire TV running Plex MUCH better than Roku3.



 My wife just loves it on her iPad (the one spot it almost works completely.) but the only way I could figure out for her to get it to stream to the tv was to tell her to turn on her computer, open a chrome browser, go to the web site, wait while it syncs, find the show you want, press the google chromecast button and then wait while it buffers and it will work. 

For your information, I works flawlessly with an iPad and an Apple TV via airplay @1080P (I am also using an iPod touch to airplay to the ATV).

Yeah I’ve got my whole house working with Chromecast already, i don’t want to add more pieces of hardware to every tv in the house.


But good to know that scenario works.  Someone should just put an honest list of what actually works and doesn’t together, the info on the actual web site is very deceptive.  It implied so much would work that doesn’t…

I tried out plex tonight, and that actually works really well…  I’m going to give things a try for a bit with plex before sending it back, seems like whoever wrote the plex plugin really knew what they were doing…

I watch everything on my Roku 3 now including live TV. I have a Roku 3 on each TV so this does the job of whole house DVR for me now. I agree the Roku UI needs some work but it is usable and Tablo is working on an update. My wife likes the fact that she longer has to change inputs. The TV’s are permanently on the Roku and she finds this simpler to use.

@Cameron 


We recognize that the 4K sector size is a big point of friction. We’ve been working on a new kernel build for a while now - this will allow the Tablo to function with these types of drives, format them faster, and support larger sizes.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing stating that manufacturer’s need to disclose the sector size of the drive anywhere on the packaging. Even with a recommended drive - we’ve had some unlucky folks run into this problem. This remains a huge priority for us to fix, and I’m confident the changes will smooth out your experience.

@Cameron support for phone (iPhone and Android) are now available.  see https://www.tablotv.com/blog/now-available-tablo-web-apps-smartphones/ for compatibility