Anyone have any experience with these devices? I have TV Japan, but that only provides select NHK programming, which is really limited. I'd prefer to have more variety for myself, as well as for my fiancée, who will be moving to Seattle from Tokyo later this year.

http://www.shop.superiptv.com/product_in...ucts_id=49

Interesting but expensive. TV Japan looks cool, why doesn't it work for UK residents???!!!

Search for Uchi TV. You can get it as an apk to install on an Android tablet as well like I did. It has 7 day DVR playback. But I have a question about TV Japan. For programs like NHK news (News at 7 as an example), can you turn on Japanese captions or are they only in English? These iptv services don't provide japanese captions even if they are available on the program in Japan.

Looks interesting, but one of the upsides of TV Japan is that the times are shifted for US prime time. A lot of the prime time stuff in Japan will be on here at 6-7 in the morning Eastern Time.

But man, that channel lineup looks really good! If there was a DVR in there, I'd be REALLY tempted. My only question is about the quality of the real signal, since it's being routed from a Chinese company, also, how legit is it, how often will service be cut, and will parts of the news/other programming the Chinese government doesn't like be censored out?

It has all the programs automatically DVRed for a 7 day period. The signal is very good. It is probably not legit but companies like ihome and the like have been operating for years without being shut down. I don't think anything is censored. But I would like japanese captions (字幕) on programs like NHK news. That's why I asked if TV Japan provides them.

Thanks for the info. So it IS DVRed.. interesting. A direct shot right at my wallet! It comes out to about $33/month. With some judicious cord-cutting, it might be worth it. OMG tempting.

As for TV Japan, nope, no Japanese captions. At least not on Dish. You can get EN dubbing for some programs, like the news, and that's it.

rich_f Wrote:Thanks for the info. So it IS DVRed.. interesting. A direct shot right at my wallet! It comes out to about $33/month. With some judicious cord-cutting, it might be worth it. OMG tempting.

As for TV Japan, nope, no Japanese captions. At least not on Dish. You can get EN dubbing for some programs, like the news, and that's it.

By the way. I am referring to Uchi TV that has the 7 day playback and my comments that go with it and not the device linked in the first post.

Ah, okay. Do you run the Uchi TV on an Android TV box then? Or can you Chromecast it from your phone? That would be ideal, I think.

D'ya, the former Wist.tv, is still around, but they still only run the 7 OTA Tokyo channels for $30/month. PC only, but you can record on your computer, and Chromecast that, too.

I wish there was something for my Roku!

rich_f Wrote:Ah, okay. Do you run the Uchi TV on an Android TV box then? Or can you Chromecast it from your phone? That would be ideal, I think.

D'ya, the former Wist.tv, is still around, but they still only run the 7 OTA Tokyo channels for $30/month. PC only, but you can record on your computer, and Chromecast that, too.

I wish there was something for my Roku!

You can run Uchi TV on a tablet or on an Android box. If you use a tablet, and it has the ability to broadcast to a TV via Chromecast or the equivalent, that should work. But there is nothing built in to the Uchi TV app for it. You need to be able to mirror your tablet screen which I think you can do with Chromecast,

D'ya doesn't support 字幕 (Japanese captions), does it for like NHK news? I haven't found an internet streaming service yet that does. I think you would need a sling box in Japan able to get NHK in order to get the captions.

gaiaslastlaugh Wrote:Anyone have any experience with these devices? I have TV Japan, but that only provides select NHK programming, which is really limited. I'd prefer to have more variety for myself, as well as for my fiancée, who will be moving to Seattle from Tokyo later this year.

http://www.shop.superiptv.com/product_in...ucts_id=49

Does your fiancee's family have fast internet? Why don't you buy a slingbox and hook it up at their house and connect it to the TV. Thats basically all that IPTV thing is.

vix86 Wrote:

gaiaslastlaugh Wrote:Anyone have any experience with these devices? I have TV Japan, but that only provides select NHK programming, which is really limited. I'd prefer to have more variety for myself, as well as for my fiancée, who will be moving to Seattle from Tokyo later this year.

http://www.shop.superiptv.com/product_in...ucts_id=49

Does your fiancee's family have fast internet? Why don't you buy a slingbox and hook it up at their house and connect it to the TV. Thats basically all that IPTV thing is.

Probably a good idea. I want to do it myself for the 字幕 as I mentioned before but I don't have anyone to host it. I tried a service before but unfortunately they lost the right to land broadcasts like NHK so it is no good for me. Another service I saw that still has NHL has a high set up fee that is non-refundable even if it doesn't work well. I don't want to spend like $200 to find that the service doesn't work well.

vix86 - pretty sure they don't, so one of these devices and a subscription is likely the best option, unless one of my friends here is willing to allow the setup.

Unfortunately, it is, technically, illegal; Japan's high court ruled against place-shifting years ago. So there's a big risk of spending good money on a setup that might suddenly cease working.

rich_f, the tempting channel lineup is why I was considering it. I'm in Tokyo for the month, and I love having access to a full channel lineup.

@gaiaslastlaugh I'd take a look at this thread over at D-Addicts:
https://www.d-addicts.com/forums/viewtop...&start=825

In this thread there are lots of experience stories about a lot of different services, some of which even still exist.

And yeah, the Tokyo channel lineup is pretty amazing, isn't it? I totally understand why you want something like that. I just wonder if that's a real product that's going to work over time.

I worry as well about the longevity of such a service. It seems cheaper and less risky just to use a Chromebox in conjunction with one of the streaming Chinese services, though obviously the quality won't be as good.

It may seem dorky, but as a learner who really needs to buff up his listening, access to a full channel lineup is really beneficial. It means I can always find something interesting and engaging to watch.

Regarding Uchi TV / Raku TV: anyone who has used it, will it work properly with BlueStacks, Genymotion, or ARC Welder? I'd really rather not drop $100 extra for a box that I may or may not use for anything but one app that I may or may not continue using...
I could just use my phone, but I'd rather not.
And using my Pi (for which I don't have a remote anyway) wouldn't be ideal.

My computer is already connected to my TV, so emulating would be ideal, but I'm not sure if the app would run properly.

sholum Wrote:Regarding Uchi TV / Raku TV: anyone who has used it, will it work properly with BlueStacks, Genymotion, or ARC Welder? I'd really rather not drop $100 extra for a box that I may or may not use for anything but one app that I may or may not continue using...
I could just use my phone, but I'd rather not.
And using my Pi (for which I don't have a remote anyway) wouldn't be ideal.

My computer is already connected to my TV, so emulating would be ideal, but I'm not sure if the app would run properly.

I have Uchi TV on a tablet but it is tied to your MAC address so I can't try it on another device. But the software is very finicky. I doubt it would run good on an emulator. But most retailers have a trial so you can give it a go.

FYI - long-running, still active thread on this very subject at d-addicts: http://www.d-addicts.com/forums/viewtopi...start=1125

(EDIT: Oops - Rich_F beat me to this months ago. Guess it would help to read what other people post...)

If you don't want to get a device or don't need to record, check out http://jpplayer.com/. For a little more than JapanTV, you can get a full roster of Japanese TV channels on demand with high streaming quality. Seems like it's been around for years, and should it (*ahem*) disappear for some reason, your sunk cost will be low.

EDIT2: For a free alternative, this is apparently the new NIJI - http://tvapp.so/. Not as many Japanese channels, but it has NHK, 日テレ, Fuji, TBS, and some others. Using it now, and it works very well - great video and sound quality.

I also found that iHome has a PC desktop version, and you can get a three-day free trial to check it out. This is really palatable to me, as I just popped good money on a new Intel NUC and would rather leverage that than buy a brand new device. I'll give it a test drive and report back.

Worth going to Koreatown if where you live has one, because you can hands on with one of these there.

(It seems to be a requirement that every Korean store has these, and they all have them for sale as well.)

kapalama Wrote:Worth going to Koreatown if where you live has one, because you can hands on with one of these there.

(It seems to be a requirement that every Korean store has these, and they all have them for sale as well.)

I could probably find one here (Seattle). I'll probably be fine with the live feed through TVApp.so for now, though the wife might eventually like the multi-day playback capability that a good IPTV device provides.

TVApp looks nice... but no 関テレ (´・ω・｀)ｼｮﾎﾞｰﾝﾏｯｸｽ

@gaiaslastlaugh: Thanks a bunch for the recommendations! Checkin 'em out right now.....

@gaiaslastlaugh Woah TVApp looks awesome! I've been hoping to find a NIJI replacement for a while now. No NHK Education, but it has regular NHK and BS 1. Majorly happy right now! Thanks a ton for posting this!

Bokusenou Wrote:@gaiaslastlaugh Woah TVApp looks awesome! I've been hoping to find a NIJI replacement for a while now. No NHK Education, but it has regular NHK and BS 1. Majorly happy right now! Thanks a ton for posting this!

You're welcome. I'm using it for the second day now, and it's pretty amazing. High video and audio quality (the best of any such service I've seen). Again, not a lot of channels, but a good enough mix that if all you want is a stream of Japanese audio, you're apt to find something that you like. I woke up this morning and watched Kaneda Tomoko and Shiratori Kumiko get another talent drunk. Good times.

I stayed up way too late last night and took iHome TV Windows for a spin as well. (This is the Windows app version of their service - i.e., no separate IPTV device required.) A huge array of content - 42 Japanese channels, with the last seven days of each channel, broken down by show, accessible through a primitive DVR menu. I had at least one bad experience where the service seemed to break down completely (everything returned 電波が弱くなりました). Other than that, it was fine. The audio quality, however, is poor. Not static-y or anything, but everything sounds muffled. It sounds like they're reducing the size of the audio channel to conserve bandwidth. I think I'd want to sample some of the newer iptv devices, like the Uchi and the Maige HD3, before committing to this. For now, though, TVApp fits my needs just fine.

TVApp looks very nice, and I'm pleased to report that the PC version works flawlessly in Linux under Wine, though I'm not seeing any Japanese channels, only Chinese(?). Is there something you have to tweak to get Japanese channels? Sorry if it's a daft question.

BTW if that's Chinese, looks like it would be a piece of p*ss to learn having learnt Japanese. Can practically read it for meaning already.

anotherjohn Wrote:BTW if that's Chinese, looks like it would be a piece of p*ss to learn having learnt Japanese. Can practically read it for meaning already.

This seems to be true, for me so far, too. Get used to a couple of simplifications, learn some sentence markers like 吗, and the topics are easy to follow.