MLB TV

[Emo Oranges]

Since I'm an out of market guy I'm used to letting you guys be my eyes on the GZ forum.  I'm looking into an MLB TV subscription and wanted to find out if anyone else has any experience with it.  Are you subscribing to the premium or the standard?  Is it worth it?

Thanks in advance!

[BizidyDizidy]

Good thread - I'm kind of surprised no one has asked about this before.

[JimR]

i'm surprised you do not have it. you can see the games.

[Guinness]

I signed up for the Premium this season, and I'm pretty pleased with it.  Considering I'm overseas, I'm out of market for everything, and can watch all games, and it's pretty fun to hear other announcers, see other games.  It's worth it for just the Astros games though!

[OregonStrosFan]

MLB Premium Service vs. Extra Innings thread.

[Emo Oranges]

MLB Premium Service vs. Extra Innings thread.

Thanks OSF!

[Rebel Jew]

Good thread - I'm kind of surprised no one has asked about this before.

it's a new bizidy!  the sarcastic bizidy! 

[das]

Thanks OSF!

Here's another thread that deals with the internet streaming version from MLB / Astros.com, not TV.  I absolutely love it.

http://www.spikesnstars.com/forums/index.php?topic=105580.0

...and here's some offline comments that did not make it into the thread:

I love it.  Almost TV quality.  You have three choices, 400k, 800k and 1.2mb.  The 1.2mb stream using full screen (especially if you have a wide-aspect monitor since the video originates as HD) is just great.  It chops a couple of times per game for 5 seconds or so but certainly is not unbearable.  You gotta have a high-speed connections like cable or FIOS though.

If you choose the 1.2mb option, you'll be prompted to install the Silverlight viewer (~1.5mb) as well as the mlb NexDef add-on (6mb).  Both significantly help to improve quality.  If your viewer did not prompt you to perform these installs on first use, you can go here:

http://houston.astros.mlb.com/mediacenter/index.jsp?c_id=hou

…and rest your cursor over the “Audio & Video” tab.  You’ll see the app download links at bottom left in the drop-down.

[Ty in Tampa]

While 'Silverlight' did improve the quality of the picture, I was getting what looked like about 15 frames per second from the 800k and 1.2 Mb stream on my fairly fat desktop at home with FIOS 15 Mbps. For this reason alone, I uninstalled it and reverted to the 800k Windoze Media stream which still looks quite good.

[das]

While 'Silverlight' did improve the quality of the picture, I was getting what looked like about 15 frames per second from the 800k and 1.2 Mb stream on my fairly fat desktop at home with FIOS 15 Mbps. For this reason alone, I uninstalled it and reverted to the 800k Windoze Media stream which still looks quite good.

I saw that too but I think the "issue" is with NexDef add on, not Silverlight.  I found that if you let the stream run for 5 or 10 minutes, it *really* smooths out.  I would guess the stream algorithm in the NexDef add on takes a few minutes to internally optimize the stream.  It's based on Bit Torrents so, similarily, it can take a little time to find the many available threads through the internet that it can exploit.

Last night, when the St. Louis guys were analyzing Ankiel's throw to 3rd to try to nab Bourn, they showed the attempted tag in super slow mo.  I marveled at the clarity and then remembered that I was watching streaming video over the net.  Amazing. 

[Emo Oranges]

I streamed this into my HDTV from my laptop last night (via S-Video cable) and was very pleased with the outcome.  However, I didn't have Silverlight or NexDef installed (I was running 1.2MB) so I'm gonna download this and see if the picture gets better tonight. 

This is awesome.

[Noe]

I streamed this into my HDTV from my laptop last night (via S-Video cable) and was very pleased with the outcome.  However, I didn't have Silverlight or NexDef installed (I was running 1.2MB) so I'm gonna download this and see if the picture gets better tonight. 

This is awesome.

I personally think Silverlight is inferior quality and is a real RAM hog to boot.  I think the WVF stream is better with little push back on the RAM.  Of course, if you intend to push it through to an HDTV, then get a multi-media machine (or a MAC of course... good luck with the Microsoft product though).  Get the maximum MHz you can find (minimum of 2 gig of MHz to run video properly) and of course maximum RAM too.  2 Gig of Ram or better.

[Guinness]

I usually have to watch the 800k stream, as the 1.2 gets a bit choppy for me, but I'm on a laptop, 1.7GHz with only 512Mb RAM, but it still looks good.  I usually watch the games the next morning--I drop my wife off at the train station at 6am, and then come home and watch the ballgame (I "work" from home), so there's likely not much traffic on the MLB servers.  It's kind of weird, though, that at 6am my time there's usually one or two West Coast games still going on, so I caught some of the Astros/Giants games live, which is a rarity.
But, all in all, I'm very happy with MLB TV.

[Limey]

I saw that too but I think the "issue" is with NexDef add on, not Silverlight.  I found that if you let the stream run for 5 or 10 minutes, it *really* smooths out.  I would guess the stream algorithm in the NexDef add on takes a few minutes to internally optimize the stream.  It's based on Bit Torrents so, similarily, it can take a little time to find the many available threads through the internet that it can exploit.

So it's like our old TV, back in the 70's, when you had to turn it on 10 minutes before your show started to let it warm up.

[Limey]

I personally think Silverlight is inferior quality and is a real RAM hog to boot.  I think the WVF stream is better with little push back on the RAM.  Of course, if you intend to push it through to an HDTV, then get a multi-media machine (or a MAC of course... good luck with the Microsoft product though).  Get the maximum MHz you can find (minimum of 2 gig of MHz to run video properly) and of course maximum RAM too.  2 Gig of Ram or better.

Two words:  Apple Tee Vee

[MusicMan]

So it's like our old TV, back in the 70's, when you had to turn it on 10 minutes before your show started to let it warm up.

That's what she said.

[Noe]

Two words:  Apple Tee Vee

I would imagine that this sort of thing is ripe for Apple (pun intended) to latch onto.  But the bed made betwix Microangst and the MLB is tight.  I think they could've done better with this product, but as a stand-alone system (like Gizzmonic, I have a 2.0 Mhz, 512 RAM old laptop) it's not a bad stream.  I like to go back and watch certain plays, certain pitches and performances from some guys to see for myself what I missed in the actual game watching.  The archive system for mlb.tv (to me) is the benefit I derive from my subscription.  Watching a game realtime is not something I can do anyway since I am blacked out from games since this is Astros territory.

But for the use that others in other parts of country like Emo, well... you have to make sure you understand the drawbacks of live watching this product.  It's still not pristine a product in that regard.  It is, however, a nice little product to catch other games every once and awhile if you have the time during the day to stream it live while working on those reports or paperwork that gets in the way of life sometimes.  That works great!  I can run a small picture off the taskbar in WMP and look down every once and awhile to catch some great action in other games.  Especially if you want to catch a game from an upcoming opposing team for the Astros, it's fun to see how they're playing and stuff.

[Ty in Tampa]

Update: I have the MLB.TV premium package which is $19.95/mo. Went ahead and loaded Silverlight and Nextdef on my new 2.6 Ghz dual core laptop with a 512MB display card and 3GB RAM. Through Astros.com when I am just watching a game through the web interface, the 800k and 1.2 Mb stream is choppy, no matter how long I wait for it to smooth out. It basically looks like half the frame rate as a typical video feed. This is why I uninstalled Silverlight at the start of the season and reverted to Windows Media Player because although the resolution may not be as clear as Silverlight, the action was displayed much better at full frame rate through the WMP 800k stream.

For shits and giggles, before I uninstalled Silverlight again, I installed the MLB.TV Mosaic program to see how it performed. For those who don;t know, this is a stand-alone program that allows you to watch as many as 6 games at once and select any game to watch full screen interactively. I was very surpised to find that the resolution AND frame rate of the streams through Mosaic are incredible. Not at all choppy as they are through the web interface. So far, I'm very impressed and pleased that the extra money I am spending for the premium package is actually worth it.

[Sleepy]

Update: I have the MLB.TV premium package which is $19.95/mo. Went ahead and loaded Silverlight and Nextdef on my new 2.6 Ghz dual core laptop with a 512MB display card and 3GB RAM. Through Astros.com when I am just watching a game through the web interface, the 800k and 1.2 Mb stream is choppy, no matter how long I wait for it to smooth out. It basically looks like half the frame rate as a typical video feed. This is why I uninstalled Silverlight at the start of the season and reverted to Windows Media Player because although the resolution may not be as clear as Silverlight, the action was displayed much better at full frame rate through the WMP 800k stream.

For shits and giggles, before I uninstalled Silverlight again, I installed the MLB.TV Mosaic program to see how it performed. For those who don;t know, this is a stand-alone program that allows you to watch as many as 6 games at once and select any game to watch full screen interactively. I was very surpised to find that the resolution AND frame rate of the streams through Mosaic are incredible. Not at all choppy as they are through the web interface. So far, I'm very impressed and pleased that the extra money I am spending for the premium package is actually worth it.

Interesting, given the technology limitation of Mosaic is that it actually streams all 6 games at once (at least that's what MLB claimed as their limitation last year).  Sounds like something is set wrong for you.

[Ty in Tampa]

Interesting, given the technology limitation of Mosaic is that it actually streams all 6 games at once (at least that's what MLB claimed as their limitation last year).  Sounds like something is set wrong for you.

I don't know if it's new for this year but you can control the quality of the streams in Mosaic. When viewing all 6, the quality is set low to get all streams going. When you bring a single game full, you can set the quality to 'high' and it looks great.

I was wondering whether I had some setting wrong but I can't see any adjustments that I can control in Silverlight or Nextdef. It did the same thing to me on my desktop as well. Strange.

[offthelidge]

Has anyone else noticed the MLB.tv link on the Yahoo scoreboard?  I have watched a few archived games for free - live games are still subscriber only.  All I had to do was sign up for a free MLB.tv account.

[Noe]

Has anyone else noticed the MLB.tv link on the Yahoo scoreboard?  I have watched a few archived games for free - live games are still subscriber only.  All I had to do was sign up for a free MLB.tv account.

The NBA started doing this for the radio broadcast last year.  It was free, but that's the way to lure you into thier offering.  As it gets better, you'll want it.  And will pay for it.  Good marketing plan if you ask me.