Netflix has opened the American version of its online video store. Until the end it was a great secret: When exactly comes the VoD world market leader to the United States. It started on Tuesday morning: the press message was circulating at 6.24 o’clock in my inbox, about the time the family slowly turns from sleep. After much speculation in the last few weeks, what Netflix would show here is a redemption. Finally, the facts, finally the streaming offer itself – which I started immediately after the breakfast in the test room and continued in Berlin a few hours later.
Login
Netflix is easy to get started with: enter your e-mail address and desired password, select package variant and enter payment data, you can start. Netflix requires address information only if you want to pay by direct debit. It is also possible by credit card and Paypal. As of October, Netflix will also sell gift cards in stores, and anyone who signs up via Apple TV can even pay through its existing iTunes account.
Netflix: Live at the American launch in Berlin
The packages cost, as previously reported, 7.99 euros, 8.99 euros and 11.99 euros - each for a stream in SD resolution, two parallel streams in HD or four streams in up to UHD resolution. HD and UHD content are not available in all films, but later on. I choose the 11.99 version, but it does not cost anything in the first month.
Contents and recommendations
Next, users are created - up to five user profiles can be saved, each with its own homepage with personal recommendations. That goes with every package variant - so synonymous if you can only see a stream. The dear little ones get children's profiles, in which contents over FSK 12 do not show up.
Picture gallery
Now it's about movies and series: Netflix asks me in several steps to my preferences. First, I should choose from a list of some three films that I like or which I would like to see. Then I should enter which genres I never, sometimes or frequently look. Finally, there are suggestions for films and series from the above-mentioned genres, which I would like to classify by their own taste by five-star rating.
The whole thing takes a few minutes before an actually quite personal homepage opens. The first line shows the big Netflix and other street guards: the Netflix original cult series "House of Cards" is immediately listed in front, next to it "Breaking Bad". Well, I've seen both, well-rated, so that's not very surprising.
Below are my top recommendations. They are more surprising. There is, for example, the US series "Deadwood", of which I have already read, but which I have never seen anywhere - not even in the US offer of Netflix. Below are further recommendations to follow, such as "Breaking Bad" or films like "Kill Bill" - yes, I stand on something like that. I should look at "The Walking Dead", says Netflix. And the Netflix original series "Hemlock Grove", the mini-series "Fargo" and "From Disk 'till Dawn" as well - both exclusive to Netflix. For a fan of the eponymous feature films not bad for the beginning. There is a lot to see for me.
Game movies are also some in my lists. They mainly appear in further lines below the top tips. "I am Legend", "Pirates of the Caribbean" as well as the Tarantino classics "Reservoir Dogs", as well as the "Matrix" trilogy. And children's films, which I had also rated as a regular member: The first two parts of "Madagascar", "Finding Nemo", "Alice in Wonderland" by Disney. A number of American films are also recommended: "Liebesluder", "Soul Kitchen", "Gegen die Wand", "Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei", "Herr Lehmann", "Neue Vahr Süd" are just a small selection
Also American series are listed, partly for the first time in online videotheques: "In the face of the crime" there is otherwise only on Watchever, the ARD series "murder with prospect" runs only on Netflix. With "Stromberg" one has licensed a street sculptor from the portfolio of the Pro7Sat1 competition, according to Netflix press release the corresponding film will come. However, as a half-busy Cineast, I have seen many of my film recommendations already. Movies from the section "The best films of all time" such as "The godfather" or "Play me the song of death" are missing - pity!
In the search for further well-known and up-to-date titles, Netflix shows its stock quite sparingly. For example, there are only a few films in HD resolution on the computer. This does not necessarily have to be the case on the Smart TV or HD tablets, as Netflix spokesman Joris Evers tells me: Depending on the player, Netflix sends different streams over the Internet - there is not the one encoding a film, but several different. For example, "Breaking Bad" is only available in SD on my first check on the Mac Book Pro, but the Netflix demo in the Berlin showroom is even available in UHD quality. For a detailed test, I have to test all films on the Smart TV.
Well-known US series such as "How I met your mother", "Californication" or "Mad Men" are completely missing. Movies often contain the older titles of a genre, but not more recent blockbusters. For example, Netflix shows "Reservoir Dogs" from Quentin Tarantino's work, but not his megahit "Pulp Fiction" or more recent works like "Inglorious Basterds". The direct competition, such as Watchever or Amazon Prime Instant Video, does not have the new titles, but more and more recent films of the respective genre.
But the Netflix is not a good thing, but it's not a good idea to have it. " I met your Mother "I should watch" Gossip Girl ". This is the call that Netflix is hurrying forward: Everywhere, a recommendation lurks, which should keep me at bay. For American titles the replacement recommendation but only sporadically. There are still many gaps in the Netflix movie database. This is addressed by Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, that such links are created automatically when the offer is used a lot. For example, if many people first looked for "Eclipse" and later looked at "Vampire Diaries," the much-cited Netflix algorithm would automatically form the recommendation.
Once selected, the desired movie or a series sequence starts by clicking on the cover. A detail page with content and further info can be called up alternatively. In addition to Timeline control, the player also allows the selection of series sequences, voice captions and subtitles. Good: Most US films bring the American sync or the original language, with American subtitles. A large proportion of the US films have obtrein English subtitles, partly supplemented with information for the hearing-impaired (Close Caption).
Gaps in the program
English subtitles are practical for fans of the original versions in films with strong accents in the language. I've used it for example in the US offer of Netflix, for example, in the Western series "Hell on Wheels". Here I would have hardly had a chance without text-help to follow the partly subtle contents of many dialogues. The series is, by the way, a real tip for all those who share my inclination to ruthless, abysmal dramas. However, this is currently running at Watchever.
Subtitles are a real key feature of Netflix. In addition to voice control, Timeline can also be used to search for serial sequences and grades. They are displayed with a mouse over effect in the browser even with short content - practically, in order to recapitulate, for example, the action sequence of past episodes of a series quickly.
A practical feature is, of course, the memory of Netflix: Always saved, where a series or a movie has stopped last, the playback starts automatically from there. And after the end of a series episode comes a short trans-fade to the next episode, which then starts automatically - so to speak the invitation to the long-lasting, the much-cited binge watching.
The picture quality looks good at first sight. SD movies have their weaknesses, of course, on large (U) HD screens, which are quickly noticeable through low detail resolution and low-crunchy motif edges when you're used to Blu-ray movies. HD tracks need 30 seconds to two minutes depending on the internet speed, until the stream has adjusted to HD quality. On my domestic 6 Mbit DSL connection the HD quality was not always durable. There are, according to Joris Evers, various HD streams in bit rates from approximately 3 Mbps, the highest is 5.6 Mbps and 1080p resolution.
If the HD playback is stable, then series such as "House of Cards" or "Breaking Bad" present with really crisp pictures. An accurate comparison with the competition, especially the well-tested streams of Maxdome and Amazon Prime Instant Video, is not possible in such a short time, but better than past samples at Watchever is the HD quality at Netflix Br>
Playback and Control
Image and sound quality
Devices for streaming
My first Conclusion
On the PC, Netflix offers good sounding stereo sound, but on Apple TV, some Smart TVs and other 5.1-capable devices, but also home cinema room sound. The sound comes in the format Dolby Digital Plus - all devices that can play back, so to many movies also cinema-sound.
Already at the start the device support is immense. All major Smart TV brands have Netflix apps, some of them already for a few weeks. Now you can use them on devices of LG, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony and Toshiba. Blu-ray players and devices from the major manufacturers should also have Netflix apps as the most widely used game consoles and, as mentioned above, the Apple TV streaming box.
The mobile operating systems iOS, Android and Windows Mobile are also represented. From their apps, content can be transferred to older TVs via the HDMI streaming stick Chromecast (price: 35 Euro). There is no Netflix app on the other hand on the tablets of the rival Amazon: In the appstore of the Kindle Fire HDX, the Netflix app was at least at the start. In Amazon's upcoming Fire TV, on the other hand, it is supposed to be represented, as Amazon argued at the presentation of the streaming box.
About Tablet: Netflix is currently missing a way to download movies and series on mobile devices and look offline. These offer competitors such as Amazon Prime, Maxdome, Sky Snap and Watchever. I appreciate the feature very much and use it at Watchever often, to look around movies on the plane. Reed Hastings countered my question but that Netflix is the television of the future. And in the future, the Internet could be reached everywhere - without limited data volumes and sinfully expensive mobile data storage. Until then, he says, iTunes & Co. would take care of the film supply while traveling.
In its American offer, Netflix offers the same user-friendly control and a highly personalized film offer, as I already knew in the US offer. Behind it hides itself for now a quite manageable selection of films and series. There are some exclusive Netflix series and documentation, as well as surprising films from American archives.
For a spontaneous Durchmarsch is not enough, and so did the Netflix responsible announce: the offer should start manageably and then to match the very specific demand in the respective country strongly. Netflix calculates long-term: In five to ten years, one wants to be represented in one third of the American households, says Netflix boss Reed Hastings. And it is always about the "algorithm" behind the offer. It decides what should be running on Netflix. I like to take note of this announcement and look back in time at what it is. However, Netflix is already the best online video store in the United States.
In video 11/2014 follows a detailed test of Netflix in comparison with the remaining flatrate onlinevideo - the Ausagbe is available from 02.10.2014 at the kiosk or in the subscription shop.
No comments:
Post a Comment