Roku Rising, Stocks Continue to Rise throughout 2019

Peter_Brosdahl

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Roku has enjoyed a lucrative year in 2019. Markets Business Insider, via Needham, has stated that their stock has nearly tripled in 2019. Now add that Needham’s Laura Martin raised her price target to $200 per share from the previous $136 and it gained another 7% on Tuesday December 3rd. This however also occurred a day after Morgan Stanley downgraded the company which dropped it by around 16%.

With everybody, their cousin, and their dog, coming out with a new streaming service it would seem that Roku is poised for even greater success. Regardless of if, or when, the bubble bursts streaming services look like they’re here to stay and continue growing. Roku continues to drive streaming technology forward by constantly adding features such as microphones, speakers, headphones, and added controls, to their product lines. Some of these may seem trivial but keeping it simple and streamlined has helped them gain a 40% installed base foothold in the U.S. As long as they can stay on top of evolving tech such as HDMI 2.1 and adding new services as they’re released it appear the train will not be slowing down any time soon.
 
That is really interesting, because just based on the amount of buzz I've been hearing I would have thought things were not going well.

In the early years of streaming I used to always hear people talking about Roku this, and Roku that, but I feel like I haven't heard as much at all in the last five years or so...
 
Zarathustra said:
That is really interesting, because just based on the amount of buzz I've been hearing I would have thought things were not going well.

In the early years of streaming I used to always hear people talking about Roku this, and Roku that, but I feel like I haven't heard as much at all in the last five years or so...
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I agree. I actually came across this randomly last night while looking to see if they've got an updated 2020 model coming out with HDMI 2.1. Didn't find anything but did see this on a number of stock related sites.
 
the reason you don't hear everyone talking about them is that they are no longer new to a lot of people. Everyone I know uses Roku, so there's no need to mention it any more.

Over on [H] cord cutters section Roku is still brought up frequently though.

Point is it's still one of the fastest, easiest to use streaming devices on the market. And their market share continues to outpace competitors.
 
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Their market share outpaces competitors because it's coming pre-installed on a lot of tvs. Whether everyone is actually using the Roku service or not is the better metric.
 
lostin3d said:
I agree. I actually came across this randomly last night while looking to see if they've got an updated 2020 model coming out with HDMI 2.1. Didn't find anything but did see this on a number of stock related sites.
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My fiance used to have one of their first gen devices. It was slow and awkward. It eventually died about a half a year ago. We never used it.

I had Netflix for a while, but I canceled a few years back, as increasingly I found they had fewer and fewer things I wanted to watch on it. (This was before they started releasing original content though)

I still maintain a movie library on my NAS, which I play back on my TV's using LibreElec/Kodi running on small form factor desktop hardware. The source of most of it is ripped BluRays You know, buy BluRay used or on sale (there is no way a movie, any move, is worth $40) do an exact rip using makemkv, and save in the media library folder. I've been happy with this solution, but every now and then we see rumors about BluRay going away, and I have no idea what to replace it with.

I don't really want any streaming service. I prefer my content to be stored locally in as gloriously high bitrate as possible.
 
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Zarathustra said:
I still maintain a movie library on my NAS, which I play back on my TV's using LibreElec/Kodi running on small form factor desktop hardware. The source of most of it is ripped BluRays You know, buy BluRay used or on sale (there is no way a movie, any move, is worth $40) do an exact rip using makemkv, and save in the media library folder. I've been happy with this solution, but every now and then we see rumors about BluRay going away, and I have no idea what to replace it with.

I don't really want any streaming service. I prefer my content to be stored locally in as gloriously high bitrate as possible.
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I've got a KDlinks/kodi box in our bedroom that I dropped an 8TB WD Red into for pretty much the same thing. I doubt BD will be going anywhere anytime soon. Eventually I could see physical disappearing but at least not for another 10 years or so and even then I doubt it but streaming is slowly catching up to bit rates of physical.

Presently we've got a Roku Streaming + Stick that travels between two rooms and overall it's awesome. My only real complaint is some periodic messages about it overheating which makes no sense since I make sure all my equipment has room to breath and generally speaking our house never gets above 74f-75f. Usually happens when we watch 4k stuff from DC Universe-go figure?
 
Riccochet said:
the reason you don't hear everyone talking about them is that they are no longer new to a lot of people. Everyone I know uses Roku, so there's no need to mention it any more.

Over on [H] cord cutters section Roku is still brought up frequently though.

Point is it's still one of the fastest, easiest to use streaming devices on the market. And their market share continues to outpace competitors.
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Yep, this is the most likely reason people don't hear about it as much. It's no longer new so it doesn't need to be explained and mentioned to everyone anymore. Even my parents know about it since that and OTA channels are all they have since they dropped Dish almost two years ago. If memory serves they have two Roku TVs and three or four of the cheaper Roku Express boxes. They work perfectly for what they want.

Riccochet said:
Roku's are worth it for the Plex interface alone. Best Plex interface out there.
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Definitely agreed. It's dead simple to set it up on the devices once the server is up and running. They have access to my movies, TV shows and music through my Plex server and it's very easy to use for the most part.

I had just gotten the email about the new service today and made sure to mention it to them. I haven't yet tried it out myself but there are at least a few movies on it I wouldn't mind watching again and at least a little something for them as well.
 
Riccochet said:
Roku's are worth it for the Plex interface alone. Best Plex interface out there.
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I've never quite understood why people use Plex. It just seems needlessly complicated and resource intensive when you can just put all your files on a NAS, mount a network folder and play them natively.

I'm generally a proponent of the philosophy the the simplest solution is the best solution.
 
Zarathustra said:
I've never quite understood why people use Plex. It just seems needlessly complicated and resource intensive when you can just put all your files on a NAS, mount a network folder and play them natively.

I'm generally a proponent of the philosophy the the simplest solution is the best solution.
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I don't understand where you're getting this resource intensive stuff from. I have it running on a Q6600 with 6 gig o' RAM on an openSUSE install and there is absolutely no real resource usage. The vast majority of the RAM isn't in use and I could probably get by with 2 gig except for the WCG distributed computing I've fired up on it for now.

It was extremely easy to setup. I installed the RPM and logged in with my credentials, set up the directories for Movies, TV Shows and Music and I was effectively done with the setup. All I had to do after that is go to each Roku (and an XBox) to install/update the Plex client, login on them through my local network and set up the devices with a simple passcode the first time to authorize them. That's it.

On the client end it's dead simple to use. Browse the movies or TV shows (or search) and start one up.

One of the biggest advantages to Plex is also the ability to transcode on the fly if needed (which it isn't in my case). That way devices which may not support something like a 4k stream can have the server transcode to something it can handle and this is all done seamlessly assuming the processor or GPU is up to the transcoding. Obviously I'm not going to be doing any transcoding of 4k to 1080p on a Q6600 but as I said, it's not needed with any of the movies or shows I have.
 
Exactly. Plex is stupid simple to setup. I have it running on my gaming PC which has no problem transcoding on the fly. Which I do from time to time when watching something on my phone away from home.
 
Zarathustra said:
I've never quite understood why people use Plex. It just seems needlessly complicated and resource intensive when you can just put all your files on a NAS, mount a network folder and play them natively.

I'm generally a proponent of the philosophy the the simplest solution is the best solution.
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It is quite simple to set up, but to me it's more about having a consistent UI to do stuff throughout the house. I can go to any TV in my house, turn it on, use the Roku remote to start Plex and have the same experience and content. Speaking of experience, I mean one that a non tech person can easily navigate and consume content.

I tried to do this with an htpc for a decade. I had things like a Meedio front end for movies and Beyond TV on the back end for TV/DVR functions. It broke often and didn't work intuitively. Now I can do all of that on a Roku with Plex being one of the components.
 
Zarathustra said:
I still maintain a movie library on my NAS...
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That's how a lot of my friends roll. Keep TV shows and movies on their NASes. One day I'll get around to doing that too. For now I keep such media on external drives and internal drives. I've always preferred to watch videos running from local storage. Never cared to do streaming over the Internet.
Zarathustra said:
I don't really want any streaming service. I prefer my content to be stored locally in as gloriously high bitrate as possible.
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Haha yupz. Just saw you said this too.
Zarathustra said:
...just put all your files on a NAS, mount a network folder and play them natively.
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That's how all my buddies do it. From any PC in their homes, you just browse the network folder and directly run the video files in whatever player you like to use. Got my mom used to watching local or network video files on her laptop, and if she wants to use the HDTV she knows she can just grab an HDMI cable, plug it into her laptop and the TV, and be good to go. I can't say anything about Plex cuz never used it personally, but I see it gets mad love.
 
I guess I don't want PC's all over my house any more when a $50-80 device the size of a 5 port switch does everything perfectly.
 
David_Schroth said:
It is quite simple to set up, but to me it's more about having a consistent UI to do stuff throughout the house. I can go to any TV in my house, turn it on, use the Roku remote to start Plex and have the same experience and content. Speaking of experience, I mean one that a non tech person can easily navigate and consume content.

I tried to do this with an htpc for a decade. I had things like a Meedio front end for movies and Beyond TV on the back end for TV/DVR functions. It broke often and didn't work intuitively. Now I can do all of that on a Roku with Plex being one of the components.
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Now I'm really going to have to look at this. Tried doing HTPC solutions for over decade as well and was never really satisfied with a simple UI/experience my wife or family could enjoy. Our KDlink kodi box is as close to a solution as I've used yet but that's not w/o some issues.
 
lostin3d said:
Now I'm really going to have to look at this. Tried doing HTPC solutions for over decade as well and was never really satisfied with a simple UI/experience my wife or family could enjoy. Our KDlink kodi box is as close to a solution as I've used yet but that's not w/o some issues.
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Remotes were another blight. I have a drawer full of PC remotes accumulated over the years. A handful of wireless keyboards and mice too, none of which provide ease of use to the people who are not me.
 
David_Schroth said:
Remotes were another blight. I have a drawer full of PC remotes accumulated over the years. A handful of wireless keyboards and mice too, none of which provide ease of use to the people who are not me.
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That's also been an issue. Even the KDlinks remote is a bit of a hassle for some things. Roku's is pretty trouble free and we haven't experienced any GUI issues with it either, unlike the KDlinks. I'll have some time off during the holiday so will definitely look into it.
 
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