WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

[bigblue_dl]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I paid the $40 for the OTA antenna adapter for the hopper to watch the MTU @ BSU games over the air

I was in Wisconsin that weekend, and those were the only games I'd care enough about to really try to figure something out.

[beaverhockeyfan]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I am not sure about Dish, but DirecTV has them on Channel 22 and on Channel 17.2.

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I am not sure about Dish, but DirecTV has them on Channel 22 and on Channel 17.2.

did BSU hockey used to be on the main tpt channel? THey are now on the Minnesota channel which is on the primary tpt channel...I think that might be the problem in the metro.

[beaverhockeyfan]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

did BSU hockey used to be on the main tpt channel? THey are now on the Minnesota channel which is on the primary tpt channel...I think that might be the problem in the metro.

I don't know for sure about the Twin Cities area. I live in the outstate (Alexandria area), so we are in the MSP metro market when it comes to DirecTV. But out here I can also get Lakeland's main feed and two other Public Television Feeds with a $10 set of Rabbit Ears. On the two other feeds, it is on an alternate channel (the Minnesota Channel). So, I really have access to BSU home games five different ways!

[gfmorris]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I just talked to Matt. Let me get things in chronological order:

1. The league knew nothing about the foreign transaction fee. When everyone rightly complained about that, they got the fee refunded.

2. Eversport didn't buy AmericaONE (or vice versa). AmericaONE partnered with Eversport this weekend on hockey only in an effort to improve things. The league liked it because they were able to embed the players on the site.

3. The league was truly embarrassed by the quality of the product for the first month. Matt said that at least three times, and it wasn't PR speak. I think that they felt really dumb about all of that. I think that we can understand that. But I think that we can also see where things are getting better.

4. One of the places that there was improvement on was indeed the bandwidth problem. Those of you who used AmericaONE (and B2 before that) in the past know that you had to use the Octoshape plugin to get broadcasts. That was a compression system that was designed to allow arenas with lower bandwidth to push out HD-quality feeds and have those feeds sent to users. However, for all sorts of technical and business reasons, Akamai was chosen as the Content Delivery Network (CDN) that supports Eversport. Akamai is pretty much a world leader (they are in my eyes). This change removed Octoshape as a variable, but that killed the bandwidth saturation.

5. They dropped some of the bells and whistles in the Akamai feed to push out the highest-quality product in the lowest bandwidth while that could be upgraded by member schools. That's why the feeds got to looking better even while league members were still working to get the upgrades in place.

6. (I didn't ask, but I'd love to know who hasn't upgraded. But you can make those inferences yourselves and start a whole new thread if you want.)

7. I described PIP to him, and while he wasn't familiar with it, he said that it sounded really cool. The league web guys are going to put a switcher the chrome of the member feeds to show time/score for all games that are available via WCHA TV (which will be most of them going forward).

I think that it's gotten better, and I think that it's going to get better going forward and become an even better value. He told me a couple of things that are remaining to add on for 2015, but I have to sit on those. I think that they'll be well-received.

"Please tell them that we're really sorry with how that first month went."

GFM

[gfmorris]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

Matt had a followup. For those of you who have had problems, would you give me a full breakdown of the hardware/software chain you use to watch games? Heck, that would be good for success.

As an example: I use Google Chrome (v.39) on a 2011 MacBook Air running OS 10.10.1. I use a Chromecast to take the video stream from my Air and push it to my TV over my local WiFi. I have very good success with this setup. I know that others of you are trying platforms like an iPad, Apple TV, Android tablet, and other avenues to watch games with varying success. If you'd peck out a brief example of what you use and what problems (if any) that you have, as well as where you're watching the games (for me, Huntsville), this will help the league go to Eversport and say, "You suck here and here and here."

Thanks.

Geof

[aparch]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

Geoff, thank you so much for taking the time to work through this thread and relay all this information. It sounds like it's been productive.

What I found frustrating was that when I logged a complaint via e-mail, I was given a canned response of "it's a known problem we're working on, so here's a free game voucher." And when I told them I just wanted to make the experience better for others and wasn't looking for a handout, I got a response of "here's another free game voucher."


Anyway, so far my setup has been an Apple iPad Mini iOS 7.0.4 air-playing video to an Apple TV iOS 8.1.2 (7.0.2 aTV version). Using stock Safari as the iPad browser.

Comcast Cable connection getting 6 to 15 Mbps on speed tests via WiFi. aTV is connected via Ethernet to the router to prevent WiFi bandwidth crowding.

Had dropped connection (had to refresh the website in the iPad to re-log in and play the video a few times along with the prior mentioned audio/video sync issue.

*edit* I'm in Naperville, IL, so it's not a UP problem.

[BGFan]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I generally plug my laptop directly in to my network and run an HDMI cable from my laptop to my entertainment system. Doing this, I avoid issues that can occur using a wireless connection for streaming. I have had pretty good success with this but, even so, there are times that buffering will occur. I also pay for high speed internet access (50 Mbps download) which also helps if you want to watch it in high def. I don't know if it's the case here, but a lot of times the software will detect the streaming data speed and adjust the picture quality accordingly to limit buffering issues; so the more downstream bandwidth that is available, the better.

[gfmorris]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

Welp, UAH was one of the two WCHA schools not ready for HD tonight. The broadcast itself was worse. Chris Davis is an embarrassment.

GFM

[GoalieEd]

I tuned in...haven't heard so many awkward silence moments and confused moments in a sports broadcast before. Reminds me of one of those fan events where the general public tries to do play by play and fails hilariously.
Do they give him a souvenir VHS tape of his commentary when he is done?

Welp, UAH was one of the two WCHA schools not ready for HD tonight. The broadcast itself was worse. Chris Davis is an embarrassment.

GFM

[gfmorris]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I tuned in...haven't heard so many awkward silence moments and confused moments in a sports broadcast before. Reminds me of one of those fan events where the general public tries to do play by play and fails hilariously.
Do they give him a souvenir VHS tape of his commentary when he is done?

The truly sad thing is that he has done this at UAH for years. I'm actually feeling bad about being vehement about not doing it, and that's a new feeling.

I saw enough of MSU-NMU to know that the Wildcat feed is good. I know that UAH was not, and I was told by a birdie that both teams failing to meet the standard would host games tonight (probably because they wanted me to know that so I could say, "No, we just got 'lucky' that UAH and UAF hosted tonight.").

GFM

GFM

[GoalieEd]

I saw enough of MSU-NMU to know that the Wildcat feed is good. I know that UAH was not, and I was told by a birdie that both teams failing to meet the standard would host games tonight (probably because they wanted me to know that so I could say, "No, we just got 'lucky' that UAH and UAF hosted tonight.").

GFM

GFM

I'm just happy to get a picture at all to watch the game,, but I know UAF upgraded their camera tech at start of the season.. My guess is a bad picture more has to do with the streaming capability. During the more still parts of the game the picture seems to improve dramatically.

[gfmorris]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

I'm just happy to get a picture at all to watch the game,, but I know UAF upgraded their camera tech at start of the season.. My guess is a bad picture more has to do with the streaming capability. During the more still parts of the game the picture seems to improve dramatically.

I'm pretty sure that it's a bandwidth issue for both schools. I don't know about the Carlson, but the VBC is old (1970s).

GFM

[Critical Thinker]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

Welp, UAH was one of the two WCHA schools not ready for HD tonight. The broadcast itself was worse. Chris Davis is an embarrassment.

GFM

Is Chris Davis the play-by-play broadcaster? Because I've been listening to whoever it is for 56 seconds and I'm already sick of him. He has no faith in UAH; he said the fans should be content with a 1-goal deficit and shouldn't even hope to score- UAH wasn't even killing a penalty at the time he said it.

[gfmorris]

Re: WCHA TV – Questions, Comments, Complaints, etc.

Is Chris Davis the play-by-play broadcaster? Because I've been listening to whoever it is for 56 seconds and I'm already sick of him. He has no faith in UAH; he said the fans should be content with a 1-goal deficit and shouldn't even hope to score- UAH wasn't even killing a penalty at the time he said it.

Yep.

GFM