Anyone using TVpad?

[Sakuya]

Since this is an Asian drama forum, I'm curious if anyone is using this Chinese TV box similar to Roku called TVpad. It relies on third-party apps that gives you the ability to live stream TV shows in Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Japan, and Korea as well as on-demand dramas and movies (includes American dramas and movies too). The latest version, TVpad2, includes Wii-like motion sensor games, VOIP, and karaoke functions, too. You only pay a one-time fee of $229 and after that, you get everything free including VOD!

I want to get it but not sure if it's worth it or if the TV shows are reliable. I read the wifi only plays nice if you have a wireless-N router. And does anyone know if the karaoke function include veteran Chinese singers from the '90s?

[charbydis]

Hiya! I got TVPad2. I think it is quite worth buying it as you said, because it is a one-off payment. It is easy to install, connect and use. I have access to HK's ATV & TVB (all channels) as well as CCTV and some Mainland broadcasting companies. The good thing about it is that for TVB, it saves like the last fifteen episodes of currently broadcasting episodes so you can watch it all in one go if you miss a night cos you had to go out. But the movies selection is not to my taste.

However, the programs sometimes do not get recorded at the right intervals, It could be a totally different program or half of it is missing. I think this is due to time difference between different locations. You can use the youtube function too to watch youtube clips on your TV, but the onscreen keypad is annoying because you can only use the arrows to move. It is good to use if you connect via a real cable, but if you are using wifi like me because the TV is too far from the modem, it is annoying when the uploading gets interference. This is super annoying when pixels appear, the sound is lagging and this sucks when you are in the middle of a song in karaoke. The karaoke songs are OK, not of a large range but I don't really sing karaoke at home that much with TVPad. There are classics songs from both the 80's and 90's.

Anyway, I think it is useful when you have nothing to watch on normal TV. But is better if you watch it live than watched the recorded version.

[Sakuya]

Hehe, thanks for your reply. I got it already and have been using it since August. It's pretty good as you say. I do have some irks with some things such as sometimes the interface is non-responsive when I click enter and when the show's name is too long in the TVB app and only shows the sponsor's name instead of the show's name. Not to mention sometimes there are some apps that lists over 1000 shows and you have to go through each one, I find it's much easier to just click the Page Down button to go to next page, instead of clicking down down down down...

I mainly use the TVB drama VOD app 港粤快看 to watch dramas. Do you know if that app saves all the dramas forever? Or is that the 15-day one that you mentioned?

But either way, yes, $229 is a bargain considering the amount of stuff you get to watch here.

[charbydis]

I mainly use the TVB drama VOD app 港粤快看 to watch dramas. Do you know if that app saves all the dramas forever? Or is that the 15-day one that you mentioned?

I think only the 15 day period though sometimes I have noticed it goes up to 20eps. I know this because my dad was watching a 30 ep series from scratch at ep 1, then noticed that 5 eps had gone by day 3. So you better watch it quickly after it broadcasted or you will never see it again. You have to be even quicker for the Mainland Chinese series as they air like 3 eps in the same day and don't get saved after the 12 hour period.

I have thought of another thing that TVPad 2 is bad for. If you put the black box too close to the TV wires, it gets interference when you try to use the remote.