I purchased the quad tuner last year. I wanted to use it with my Apple Tv boxes. Even though I knew going in there was no app available yet. I connected it in the meantime to a firestick. I am presently using an OTA Tivo Roamio with two minis. With the Roamio I can only get roughly 16 OTA channels reliably. With Tablo I now get every channel in my area all with just an indoor flat antenna. The Tivo tuners are very inferior to Tablos so that is a major plus. The only one right now. Still no estimate about Apple or even Web os apps. Constant postings on Roku problems and now my firestick has trouble just connecting to the Tablo. I have to reset the firestick and then it is fine. I have no experience with earlier Tablos but I like to think they were more reliable and consistent. Also my units Ethernet port does not work but fortunately I have a strong wifi signal. I did not return it because Best Buy was out of the devices and I can exist with just wifi. Tablo is to quiet about their progress and does not seem to provide any consistent corrections to the existing problems. There are too many operating systems that they do not have an app and the ones they do have are not reliable…yet. Hard to understand why they released it way before the system was ready for all, or at least most, platforms. I want to replace my Tivos with this but I cannot see this happening for some time. Especially since Tablo is in radio silence.
Agreed, Roku user here, waiting for Apple TV platform. Roku has been fine for me functionally, no problems. However, I bought the Apple TV’s so that I can use them. I’m put off that when Tablo was heavily marketing the 4th Gen, Apple TV was “coming soon, in late Fall” last year. So I got the 4-tuner on the false assumption that Tablo would deliver this platform “real soon now”. Well, now it’s into winter, next year, and my patience is getting very thin. And the latest that I could find from Tablo is that Apple TV would be available in “several months”.
Kind of baity-and-switchy as far as I’m concerned. I guess now that my sale is in the Tablo books, it’s okay with them if I set this new Tablo aside until the Apple TV platform is available. I can still return the new Tablo until mid-January, and this is looking like a real possibility…re-buy it if the Apple TV platform ever appears. So while my sale is in the books, it’s only penciled in at this point. It may be that Tablo is waiting until mid-January to give us the bad news, or maybe not.
If there were a published and reliable way to move my recordings from the 4th Gen back to the Legacy I would have done it already. I feel like I’ve been hung out to dry by Tablo, especially now that they’ve taken on a silent profile. Like they did with the ATSC 3.0, once the DRM thing was added to the spec. Silence is not helpful, it would let me figure out if I want to go back to the Legacy Tablo, or forward to the HDhomerun if I could have an idea of what Tablo saw as their real time frame for deploying the Apple TV platform.
If there is no planned date for delivering the Apple TV platform, that tells me what I need to know. Just like it did for Tablo’s ATSC 3.0 product. I need to make a new plan. As it is, I’m just really frustrated.
My biggest worry at this point, is that with so many new users only opening their Tablo as a gift, they have no idea of its capabilities.
Tablo has only been able to support Roku, Android and FireOS right now. This is a huge issue for those just introduced to the product, expecting it to work on whatever they already own.
Many will find that they have to buy something else since their more expensive AppleTV cannot be used for the 4th gen. Others are experiencing the BS we’re dealing with on the Roku side of things. Mathematically, half of it’s availability doesn’t work. If you include AppleTV not currently supporting their latest product, that brings us to 2/3 of the ways users would normal watch it being completely useless.
This seemingly rushed release to get this product shipped to stores and available for wrapping by the holidays could have serious impact on the future of this company.
So, plainly put, I worry that this company will be bankrupt before its great product can fully be realized.
So is this behavior normal for Tablo or is it because of the new ownership?
It is owned by Scripps and they have deep pockets. My unsolicited opinion - the previous devices and similar ones (HD Homerun) appeared to be for the tech savvy. (I am tech savvy and like the 4th gen tuner as I see the simplicity of it’s use for someone like my mom who is always calling about a tech problem.) My instinct tells me that Tablo hasn’t switched from the tech mindset to a consumer mindset. Consumers just want it to work. More testing needs to happen on the app side before releasing it for this new generation of product.
I can run on iPhone and i heard that it works on iPad, although my iPad is so old that there aren’t many things that work on it anymore. There are some things that need fixing on the iPhone app but mostly works well. There are a couple of online streaming channels that when you tell iPhone to record a show or movie display as failed and can’t be viewed or deleted from iPhone but can be viewed and deleted from the fireTV. I’ve logged a ticket on this but i think this is a low priority for support right now.
Thank you for reminding me of the whole iOS side of this. I was looking more from the perspective of sitting on your sofa, catching up on the news. (I’m more of a laptop wanderer, less of a tablet one.)
And with this thinking in mind, any Android, FireOS or iOS can mirror or cast to a receiving device. But for those that just want it to work without the extra hassle, it’s likely too much.
Despite my distaste for Roku as a whole, I really do hope that they can find a quick remedy to the current issue of it returning to the home screen while watching live TV. Rokus are great for those with little technical know-how, which is likely a large chunk of Tablo’s latest user base.
I’m computer shy by no means, but there’s nothing wrong with someone wanting to lie back, watch some TV, and not have to troubleshoot their TV, Roku, or DVR every time they turn it on.
I’m a firm believer in vegetating and being a couch potato. I like the KISS method.
Exactly! It doesn’t matter if you “numba one nurd”. Sometimes you just want to get away from it all and let the AI take over. (Wait… Tablo barely seems to have any HI coded into into it…)
EW Scripts owns them now and I think is causing the problems. If EW Scripts did not buy Tablo I don’t think Tablo would have released it with all the problems. Jan 13 is coming up. Return to Best Buy. Rebuy when and if AppleTV is ever supported. Let’s see what Best Buy thinks with massive returns.
What streaming device is considered the most reliable to use the 4th Gen Tablo app? Roku has problems. I have some problems with the firestick and since I have an LG Tv I cannot use Webos. Does the Fire Tv cube work well or at least with fewer problems then the Firestick? Is there any device that comes close to working? I will assume that when/If they finally get app for Apple Tv it will come with a new set of problems>
To be fair we don’t know how much of the problems is the Tablo App and how much of it is a Roku problem. For example, Tablo could be doing everything correctly within Roku’s API and it just isn’t working correctly due to an error in the Roku code, documentation, etc. We know something was done right streaming wise because two releases ago people weren’t getting returned to the home screen.
I use multiple fireTV’s 16GB from different Samsung and Vizio TVs and although there is an occasional hiccup, I’d say that’s a very good about 99% of the time. I have found that the older 4k firesticks tend to run into issues but my firesticks only have about 1.5GB of available space and my 16GB fireTV’s have about 9GB of free space. Don’t know if that has anything to do with it or not. I also noticed that the older 4k firesticks OS is much older version of the OS even though it says it is current.
Saw this back in November and that might also be a reason for the difference.
“Last week, it was reported that Amazon is quietly developing its own operating system that will replace Android on its Fire TV devices …”
Yeah, I saw that notice somewhere a few days after connecting my 2nd gen 4k max. I was not a happy camper.
So many companies are splitting into their own OS and it’s just becoming a nightmare. I loved my LG when I bought it, but then I had to add another device because I couldn’t watch frndly tv. Then I bought a Tablo… I get that Android and iOS/TVOS owning most of the OS market share sucks, but overall, I think it’s harder for companies to write 10 apps for these different devices. We can’t even rely on the major three right now!
No problems with my Roku model 4630X Roku Premiere+. A few channels missing guide data but that is on all devices I have not tried favorites yet
I have the Roku in the living room waiting for “coming soon” AppleTV support"
Chrosmcast with GoogleTV works too.
No fire sticks so I can’t say anything one way or the other. I have used Fire stick in the past and didn’t like it.