My notes during the 22 hour process of testing this service, one I have been eagerly awaiting for the last few weeks:
Don't
want to testing using an old movie, don't want to pay for something I own.
I
thought I had read they would have Superman Returns and Batman Begins. Instead they have Batman Forever. I planned on Superman Returns being my test
movie. Now the only movie available that I *really* want to see is Chinatown but it is too old to be a good test subject so
I went with Three Kings. It isn't new
but it is from the same year as The Matrix.
I
checked the TV offerings but they were slim. Several CSI
titles, 4 UFC fights I have already and some other random things. The Adult
Swim selection is nice but they charge the same amount for 11 minute shows as
they charge for 22 minute shows. That
just doesn't seem right to me. *Not sure
what they charge for longer (44 minute?) shows.*
I bought
Three Kings. Around 7:45 (but quite
possibly earlier), it slowly began downloading the 1.26GB file. Eventually, the
screen went darker as the xbox went into powersaving mode. I turned off the
tv.
Checked
on progress an hour later, the Active Downloads tab was empty. The movie was
nowhere to be found. My only clue: I chose "clear storage" and, in
Videos, there was a 1.3Gb unnamed movie marked Incomplete. No way to resume.
I went
through the buying process again, it was scary, seemed like they might actually
make me buy it again but, at the very end, I was not charged, was given the
Download Again option. The download started over at 8:40 pm Wednesday
2006-11-22.
At
9:56pm, it is 4% downloaded.
At
~10:40pm, turned console off. 10%
12:22am
2006-11-23 : restarted console and download, jumped to 11% immediately. Then I went to bed.
Restarted
download again.
Woke up,
checked, restarted. 11:45am, immediately skipped to 15%. The download finished at 6pm, about 22 hours
after it began. The movie quality was
great. Rewind/Fast Forward didn’t really
work but the picture quality was better than the average BitTorrent DVD rip. About what you would expect for a 1.3GB
movie.
What a nightmare.
Wait until there is some good news on the Video Markeplace forum on Xbox.com before you waste your time.
They locked the thread where I added my problems to the long list of people with unacceptable problems with this far-from-ready-for-prime-time service with this lovely piece of advice: "I suggest all folks who have experienced an error message or did not receive a download they paid for to call customer support at 1-800-4MYXBOX. If you have called previously as I know some of you have, give this ago again."
My comment is here, if you want to save the time it'll take to find it on that page:
IndieGames wrote:
We added a new question this morning to the FAQ (part 2) to help address this.
Strange... I have had the opposite experience from what was stated in that FAQ update.
I
rented Three Kings around 8pm last night. The download failed and
there was no way for me to resume it other than go through the process
again as if I was renting it again. I got the "you have already
downloaded this content. Download again?" message (and did not have to
pay again) and I started the download again. This process repeated 3
times, then I gave up for the night.
This morning, as
expected, the download was not in my Active Downloads list but the
video was not in my Videos section. You guys REALLY need to have
persistant error messages when downloads fail and you REALLY need a way
to resume incomplete downloads. Free demos failing like this was
annoying but when I pay for a movie rental and this happens, it is
unacceptable.
I started the download yet again this morning but
this time, it jumped to 15% immediately, apparently starting where the
previous download failed. I hope that is the case, anyway.
3
hours later, I am at 38% downloaded. The file is 1.26GB total. During
one of the downtimes last night, I tested a Download-To-Burn DVD for
work and the entire process took 2 hours for a 4.xGB DVD to download
and burn so my network isn't the cause of these slow downloads. My
network *could* be the cause of the failed downloads but, if so, then
you guys need to work in some error handling that tries to resume
downloads automatically and/or at the very least allows you to manually
resume a download.
Anyway... just letting you know that your
FAQ is incorrect, I was only charged for my movie rental the first of
the 4 or 5 times I have attempted to download it.
(and
another bug in your system: you label downloads (movies, demos, etc)
that fail after 1% as content that I have already downloaded instead of
stating that it is a failed/incomplete download. I work in internet
video delivery, so I know that is a bug/missing feature)
I
look forward to the next dashboard update, I doubt I will attempt to
rent a movie from XBLM again until then. This is unacceptable.
If that isn't enough to scare you off (both that 'try calling us again' advice and the fact that they locked the thread, causing it to drop to the third page within hours), read any other post on that forum.
My first attempt at downloading a movie took 6 restarts (without me ever knowing when or why the download failed) and a total of 22 hours for a 1.26GB movie. Then, against my better judgment, I bought more points and attempted to rent a second movie. Bad idea. I left this comment on Major Nelson's blog after Customer Support's automated system hung up on me 3 times, but Major Nelson apparently deleted my comment.
It was here last night but is gone now.
Luckily, I kept a copy. Here it is:
NO, things are not fixed yet. I gave you guys the benefit of the doubt for some reason and just tried to rent V for Vendetta. WHY? WHY did I give you another chance?!?!
I only had 300 points in my account, less than the 340 required for the movie, so I bought more points, then purchased the rental.
Then I got this error message:
Points have been deducted from your account for this item, but media usage rights could not be downloaded. Please contact Xbox Customer Support.
Status code: 80153900
No customer service number, I had to come to your site to find out the number.
Then I went through your voice recognition system until I got to my endpoint: your computer system telling me "please call back during business hours. Thanks for calling. Goodbye" and then he HUNG UP ON ME.
So I called back again and tried a different route through the automated call avoidance system and again ended up with the same abrupt ending and your system hung up on my again.
And again, I tried to find a way to get an answer to my problems and was again told to call back during business hours, in spite of the fact that your xbox error message told me to call customer support, NOT "call customer support tomorrow during business hours", again I was told to call back later and once again, for the third time, I was hung up on.
As mad as I am at the XBLM team right now, I can't help but feel like it is my fault for trying to rent a movie from you when I knew how bad your system is broken. I knew better than to do this.
But I had no clue it was really this bad.
You say "potato" I say "but I ordered a tomato".
Let's call the whole thing off.
My advice: wait until you hear on CNN that Microsoft fixed all of this. I'll have an update soon with the results of my upcoming (4th) call to Xbox Customer Support.
[UPDATE] Customer Support said they refunded my points and that engineers were working to correct the problem and that I should probably wait a couple days before attempting to purchase or download the movie again.