Participant Observations 8/12/20 - Kayo subscription renewed

 On Friday night, I renewed my subscription with Kayo streaming service, and there were a few things to take away from the decision behind it, and the performance of the service since I last had it.

Firstly, having exclusive ownership over rights works! I wanted to watch the T20 between Australian and India on Friday night, and the only way to (legally) watch the game was via Kayo, as there is no free-to-air coverage of the T20 or ODIs, thanks Cricket Australia's last rights agreement. So I signed up, and now have it back on.

Secondly, the performance of the app still has not improved much since I last had it. Chromecasting from the app on my iPad is ok for about 5-10 minutes, before becoming almost unwatchable. The signal is more stable when I watch it throguh the gaming PC, which is connected to the big TV, but when the signal fails, the whole stream collapses, requiring a refresh of the stream.

All my other apps stream fine from the iPad - Netflix, Amazon, and all the FTA apps, even when they are 'live' streams from the FTA channels.

Perhaps the Kayo app is still trying to deliver the picture in a higher resolution than those other linear apps, or perhaps the app is just rubbish.

Another alternative reason for the poor performance may be the fact that I am using an older Chromecast dongle, and I think a friends newer version ran much smoother with the newer version. Actually, that's exactly what they say on the Kayo Help page:

For the optimal streaming experience, Kayo recommends Chromecast Ultra models or later (including Chromecast with Google and Chromecast 3rd Generation) and similar capability Android TVs.

Note: Chromecast 1st Generation is no longer supported by Kayo. 

Anyways, it's good to have it back, and I will almost definitely get it back for next AFL season. However, I may drop it for a few months over the summer, as I probably won't need it after the T20 series is over, as most of the other games are Tests, which means they will be on FTA.

They do have a lot of good docos and other similar content that could come in handy over the summer, however!!