We tried Netflix's Watch Now option a while back, but it was kindof clunky and getting the PC wired into the TV was always a hassle (the Xbox 360 is the only way we pull Media Center into the living room).
So I ordered the Netflix Player a few days ago and it's set to arrive tomorrow. I've used other Roku units in the past and I expect good things.
How many movies do you have out at one time? I had the 2 at a time for a long time, and then recently switched to 3 at a time... but now all of a sudden we stopped watching movies. I was actually thinking about switching back to 2 at a time... i dont know.
3 at the moment.
I find there are actually a lot of incredibly awesome television series available for rent (e.g., The Wire). So we usually keep a disc or two of the TV series du jour, and that leaves 1 or 2 discs of films.
It's much easier to watch a 40-minute episode of something than to sit through 90-120 minutes of full-length film.
--D
I didn't even know that a Netflix Player existed. Pretty cool. Do you know if it has to stream everything as it goes or does it buffer up? I'm just wondering how it deals with network latency, esp. if it's put on a wireless network.
A lot of that is addressed on the FAQ on the Roku site--apparently it buffers for a few seconds and then streams the content.
The service was fairly solid when running it from my laptop months ago, and it only dropped out a couple of times. The bigger problems all had to do with the screen blanking every few minutes, and the huge pain in the ass that is using a mouse and keyboard from the couch.
Kind of a moot point now, but there are several plugins (or AddIns as they are officially called) for Vista Media Center that allow people to watch Netflix Watch Now stuff. The latest version of them also works on Extender.
Here's the link on LH about one of them: http://lifehacker.com/392999/vmcnetflix-streams-watch-now-videos-to-your-xbox-360
That being said, I haven't tried out the Extender functionality, because my 360 is connected to the same TV as my Vista Media Center/ Gaming PC.