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Per Radioman:

 

"seemingly continuous need to update and maintain the thing as apps disappeared or broke, either that or content that they advertised simply didn't seem to exist in reality."

 

As requested, I'll give my experience here, in the technology thread, in case any 'decider's of content', have an issue with a tech reply, in the movies thread :tuxedo:

 

​I've found KODI to be a boon, as I simply cannot afford the prices Apple and Netfilix and co are gouging.

 

As Radioman notes, KODI is imperfect, and what with a learning curve, if you've not used it before, if you're not a tech, it can be 'just not worth the bother'.

 

​I initially came across KODI on a TV box which was an Android thing, basically like an Apple TV, then when KODI went to version 17.x, lo and behold the Android, in my little plastic box was of an inferior version and wonderfully, not able to be upgraded.

 

As none of the addons for KODI got maintained after that, for KODI v16.x, into the bin it went.

 

Then I discovered that KODI runs on Mac and IOS et al. So I've got v17.6 on a Mac Laptop with an HDMI cable into the TV, luverly.

 

​Now, to the addons and the need to constantly cultivate them. Of all the addons I've got, perhaps 30% of them and 30% of the individual add-on's content actually work as promised.

 

​1 Addon breaks, and is never fixed as the budding dev gives up on it.

​2 Addon works, but loses it's links and cannot find the stuff it's offering.

3 The big movie suppliers figure out a way to prevent an addon getting the stuff.

 

These seem to be the main problems.

 

But I find, spending a bit of time on this KODI installation gives results. I do have a bit of time. And once every few months I'll go through and weed out every thing that's defunct.

 

I'll list some of the addons I use and have confidence in below: and YMMV:

 

​Exodus - for streaming Movies and TV series, others in this vein are Genesis Reborn, Bob Unleashed, FlixNet et al

 

YouTube - not from Youtube but for, yes you guessed it, YouTube.

 

​XXXodus - not sure what that's for.... ahem

 

​There are other ones for Documentaries, Fishing, etc etc

 

Also it must be noted some of these addons list playlists of various live TV, like Sky News, Sports, Fox, MSNBC, BBC channels etc etc. Sometimes only one or two channels work.

 

This is where KODI's favourites feature is invaluable, rather that trying to find one that works each time I want to see it, I keep the ones that interest me and do work, in the favourites section in KODI, saving all sorts of time negotiating the navigation of each individual add-on. Some channels are the only one of hundreds, that work, but once found they are kept and the add-on is kept.

 

​When I do my clean outs, I just google 'top 10 addons for KODI' and take it from there. Though Exodus is a perennial. If you need to figure out how to install these things, there're plenty of links in Google.

 

As a media server, I have my extensive photo library and all my music and all the movies I downloaded, when downloading was a thing, on an external HDD.

 

Hope this is of some help.

 

And in answer to the downloading question, no I no longer download any thing, it's all streaming.

 

So addons come and go all the time, some never return, some do and some are perpetual. But to get a good experience I guess a bit of curation is required.

 

 

Kodi.tv is the place and there're heaps of addons available there too, though not of course, cough cough, for any pirated stuff...

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Also - KODI can be skinned - In Settings/Interface/Skin or thereabouts

 

The default skin is one I personally abhor and a lot of the ones you can download and install, are young dev's wet dreams, but one I use and recommend is 'confluence 1080' if you can find it. Confluence is the default for KODI 16.x and the 'confluence 1080' is someone's hack for KODI 17.x.

 

Again Google and Youtube are great for 'how-to's.

 

And as a screen saver there's an add-on called Aerial which I believe is Apple's one from Apple TV, stunning Drone Flyovers of some of the world's interesting places. Also available on OS x for the mac.

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Many thanks for that.

 

Yes, it seems it might be much as before. I've got a few options, hardware wise to try it on so I might give it another go. That "too much time" thing.

 

I hadn't previously investigated the favourites thing, seems that might make it a little more lightweight and useable. I found that with all the Repo's and addons it can become quite cumbersome very quickly. I'm keen to see if I can find reliable TV streaming, particularly BBC, F1 and NBA. tvcatchup.com is good for UK tv channels but it is very UK centric and doesn't include their world news channel just the BBC news channel.

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Well it's not a cure all but it gives me about 90 % of what I want, for free.

 

It can be a pain, trying to find something like a live feed of the All Blacks playing in Britain, but as I say, 90% of the time it'll deliver, just gotta put the time in.

 

And Sky NZ can get F*cked if they want me to pay a zillion bucks for the privilege.

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And Sky NZ can get F*cked if they want me to pay a zillion bucks for the privilege.

 

I know a lot of people complain about the cost but I think Sky isn't such a bad deal for rugby fans - there's A LOT of home-grown rugby programs from the rugby talk shows to the first XV matches to really excellent coverage of all local rugby.

 

Many complain about the price of Sky TV but I think in terms of the big picture it's not *that* expensive. The main problem in NZ is not the prices of things like Sky, but the cost of housing which is now at levels so high that you don't have a lot of money left over for other stuff - which makes it seem expensive. If you'd paid half what you did for your house, your mortgage would be much less and all these other things wouldn't seem so expensive.

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I know a lot of people complain about the cost but I think Sky isn't such a bad deal for rugby fans - there's A LOT of home-grown rugby programs from the rugby talk shows to the first XV matches to really excellent coverage of all local rugby.

 

Many complain about the price of Sky TV but I think in terms of the big picture it's not *that* expensive. The main problem in NZ is not the prices of things like Sky, but the cost of housing which is now at levels so high that you don't have a lot of money left over for other stuff - which makes it seem expensive. If you'd paid half what you did for your house, your mortgage would be much less and all these other things wouldn't seem so expensive.

 

Stick - you are of course right.

 

However, I come from a time when Sky was first introduced to us unsophisticated Kiwis and the offering was quite good and with no advertising. The whole Idea was to 'pay' for premium content with no ads. We all thought that was good. Then they started sneaking ads in. Now they have as many if not more ads than ad supported broadcasting. But they've still got premium content right?

 

Well TVNZ and Spark have sewn up the Rugby World Cup https://www.stuff.co...orld-cup-rights

 

So IMHO Sky in NZ is dead.

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  • 2 years later...

For anyone that is using Kodi, I've found that an add-on "indigo" from "TVAddons" is not playing nice and disabling other addons, resulting in lots of them not working.

Have a read here

https://www.videoconverterfactory.com/kodi/how-to-uninstall-indigo.html

and here

https://www.videoconverterfactory.com/kodi/resolveurl.html

If you're interested.

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