Roku Update Deployed, 1080p for XR

Looks like the good folks at Roku aren’t phoning it in this holiday season as they’ve pushed a modest update to their media streamer lineup ($60 and up). Highlights include the promised 1080p support for prior generation XR units and a variety of Hulu Plus optimizations for everyone. The complete 2.9-b1509 changelog can be found on their forum, or you can just run with my excerpt:

  • Enabled 1080P support for XR units.
  • Hulu application optimizations for quicker trick play navigation and start of playback.
  • Fixed playback of poorly interleaved video streams which resulted in rebuffers around the 25 minute mark in Roku Newscaster programs.
  • Fixed a remaining case of playback at the incorrect aspect ratio.
  • Fixed a subtle audio playback issue in UFC streaming.

6 thoughts on “Roku Update Deployed, 1080p for XR”

  1. Got the update and switched to 1080p in the display settings, but I can’t seem to find any 1080p content. Is there any?

  2. I tried YouTube and Vimeo (videos marked 1080P) and neither was in 1080p on my XR HD connected to an Onkyo receiver via HDMI to a Sony Bravia 1080P set. I haven’t tried USB though.

    Has anyone confirmed that Vimeo and YouTube actually work in 1080p?

  3. @Morac,

    I can confirm that Vimeo does work in 1080p. However, I am using a LG Blu-Ray Networked player to access Vimeo, not a Roku device.

  4. Roku Newscaster programs still have major problems. I can’t get past the 30 minute mark on “Meet the Press” – it rebuffers and gets stuck around 3/4 of the bar. When I discovered the PodTV channel and saw the same programs, I tried there – while it still rebuffers, it actually continues playing eventually.

  5. I have a ROKU XDS and unlike what Roku advertises, it cannot play 1080p content. I have tried this in Sony Bravia TVs and Samsung TVs. You get a blank screen when playing 1080p content in Roku.

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