Emissary35 wrote:

The last two times I watched movies on Netflix in about 30 to 60 seconds I was booted to the home screen....

I agree with Mike. I think all of us have experienced this type of crash from the beginning. In many cases, I have to cycle the Roku power supply. Although not specifically related to this thread, I'll add that I only have the problem on Netflix. Never on PBS or any other Roku channel, So it seems to me this is a Netflix issue, or at least an issue with the Netflix-Roku interface, not the Roku platform per se.

ginahoy wrote:

I have Roku HD (1) and Roku 2 XD, and both do it. Previous comments suggests this behavior also occurs with Roku 3, indeed all models.

The only way I can imagine your friends Roku isn't affected is if its being used mostly for Plex. As noted in previous comments, Plex implements a 'stay alive' script (for other reasons) that interferes with Roku's new return-to-home script.

Bummer. I did read the comments, I hoped something had changed since I just talked to my friend a day ago. I have no idea why I can't seem to get used to this. If only a few other people don't like it, it will definitely stay for good.

mikebdoss wrote:

Emissary35 wrote:

The last two times I watched movies on Netflix in about 30 to 60 seconds I was booted to the home screen. My Roku was not idle, it just ended the streaming and brought me back to the Netflix movie menu and without even being allowed to sit long enough to enter screensaver mode it kicks me back to the menu. It does not do this on Plex however as mentioned here because when watching that I don't have this problem. Whatever jerk programmer put this into the Roku updates deserves a boot to the face, why is Roku ignoring our complaints on this? Oh that's right, they wanted to do this for their own nefarious reasons. Roku is really starting to suck, leave my player in the app until I decide to back out!

That's a totally different issue. We're talking about being kicked back to the homescreen when idle; your problem usually happens when there's a streaming problem, and the app crashes.

It's not a totally different issue, being booted back to the homes screen is the problem here, the app did not crash it simply finishes my movie then kicks me out to the home screen, it did this twice after watching movies that were over 2 1/2 hours. Roku is deliberately changing the code to do this for their own reasons and it's majorly annoying.

Emissary35 wrote:

It's not a totally different issue, being booted back to the homes screen is the problem here, the app did not crash it simply finishes my movie then kicks me out to the home screen, it did this twice after watching movies that were over 2 1/2 hours. Roku is deliberately changing the code to do this for their own reasons and it's majorly annoying.

Kicking you back to the home screen when idle is a "feature" (there on purpose). If you're getting immediately kicked back to the home screen during or immediately after a movie in a channel, that's a bug (not there on purpose). They MAY be related, but given that the bug behavior has been around for years, there's a good chance they're not.

mikebdoss wrote:

Emissary35 wrote:

It's not a totally different issue, being booted back to the homes screen is the problem here, the app did not crash it simply finishes my movie then kicks me out to the home screen, it did this twice after watching movies that were over 2 1/2 hours. Roku is deliberately changing the code to do this for their own reasons and it's majorly annoying.

Kicking you back to the home screen when idle is a "feature" (there on purpose). If you're getting immediately kicked back to the home screen during or immediately after a movie in a channel, that's a bug (not there on purpose). They MAY be related, but given that the bug behavior has been around for years, there's a good chance they're not.

You may have a good point there, however I've never experienced this 'bug' before of immediately getting kicked out of Netflix right after a movie ends, it has always allowed me to stay in the app until the screensaver came on. So to me this was odd behavior and I think it could be linked to the idle boot out problem, whether on purpose or not this activity of kicking us out of our apps needs to stop, it serves no purpose to the user and I don't care what Roku has to gain out of it.

Well, it looks like those of us who expressed displeasure with this latest change have been heard. Since yesterday, neither of my Rokus (Roku HD and Roku 2 XD) have returned to the home screen. Thank you!

ginahoy wrote:

Well, it looks like those of us who expressed displeasure with this latest change have been heard. Since yesterday, neither of my Rokus (Roku HD and Roku 2 XD) have returned to the home screen. Thank you!

Today was the third day I turned on my tv and found myself on the same episode as the night before. Pretty happy about this, yay Roku.

But here's the thing...

It still returns to Home Screen after idle time (approximately 2 hours) in certain channels. Amazon doesn't return, for instance, but Shout Factory TV does. I haven't done a lot of testing on this, since my normal process is to exit to Home Screen when I'm done (meaning this issue doesn't impact me to any great degree). However, I did an overnight test on Amazon, and it remained in the app. A test of Shout Factory TV this morning exited after two hours. I may check other apps later, but that's enough to let me know it's an app by app thing.

I suspect a change in 7.2 makes the default behavior to exit after two hours, but certain functions in the app can prevent it. Plex, of course, being one (from what I read) that was determined early on to not exist. Amazon, too.

So, for those that say it's "fixed," you might want to ensure you are checking on the same app as you were when you previously experienced it. The issue never impacted all apps, so a valid test/confirmation would be on individual apps.

Basil wrote:

for those that say it's "fixed," you might want to ensure you are checking on the same app as you were when you previously experienced it.

My previous comment was specific to Netflix. I just checked and my Roku's are all still on v7.1, which was push out last April. So clearly this welcome change isn't related to a Roku update but rather it would seem that Netflix modified its app so it will stay alive. Good for them.

I'm restarting this thread because I started having the problem again of Roku returning to the Home screen once it's been on idle for a while or when I turn the TV off. I lost power for a few hours and when I rebooted the Roku the problem was back. I've rebooted the box again and I've deleted and re-added Netflix which is the channel I want it to stay on. Nothing works. Any suggestions?

Yes, after about 9 months my Roku started going back to the home screen after 2 hours. This behavior started after a power outage. It started a couple weeks ago for me, and I kept hoping it would stop like it did before, but it's not. Booo.

I read, with dismay, many of the replies here (mainly due to the many apologists for this "feature").

I use Plex and it happens for Plex.  And Amazon.  And Netflix.  All of them that I've used.

It was implemented for ONE reason: ad money.

To the misguided person that claims Roku is a company... uh, dude, I paid for the 2 Roku's I have, thank you, and they didn't have this feature when I purchased them.

I think we should all inundate @Roku and roku.com/support with requests that this be optional.  I will.

Every single night I fall asleep in front of a playing Roku.  I managed to get Netflix and Amazon to stop auto-playing episodes, so I could pick up where I left off and watch the last part of any episode I fell asleep on.  Now, with the Roku on the Home screen, I have no idea sometime what I was watching.

Roku, shame on you for doing this to your users.  I can tell you, if you don't change this, I will switch to something else.  The Shield looks like a very nice device that is more highly rated than yours.  And I will not sell my Roku 3 on craig's list.  I will take a hammer to it so no one ever uses it.

envoy510 wrote:

I read, with dismay, many of the replies here (mainly due to the many apologists for this "feature").

I use Plex and it happens for Plex.  And Amazon.  And Netflix.  All of them that I've used.

It was implemented for ONE reason: ad money.

To the misguided person that claims Roku is a company... uh, dude, I paid for the 2 Roku's I have, thank you, and they didn't have this feature when I purchased them.

I think we should all inundate @Roku and roku.com/support with requests that this be optional.  I will.

Every single night I fall asleep in front of a playing Roku.  I managed to get Netflix and Amazon to stop auto-playing episodes, so I could pick up where I left off and watch the last part of any episode I fell asleep on.  Now, with the Roku on the Home screen, I have no idea sometime what I was watching.

Roku, shame on you for doing this to your users.  I can tell you, if you don't change this, I will switch to something else.  The Shield looks like a very nice device that is more highly rated than yours.  And I will not sell my Roku 3 on craig's list.  I will take a hammer to it so no one ever uses it.

I too use Plex and I have noticed that it does return to the home screen after two or three hours but it does not return to the home screen when playing anything or when Plex is in the post play screen.
 
I think this behavior, while not really ideal, is at least OK. I have many issues with Roku and the way they have begun, a few years back, to screw over their customers pretty thoroughly but, in this case, I do not see any real problem. 
 
However I REALLY think that threatening to smash your Roku is excessively extreme and totally ineffective.
 
As far as moving to the Shield or the Fire TV I would say, "Good luck." I have Rokus, a Shield TV and a Fore TV as well as a Raspberry PI that I use for Plex only. My experience with all the alternative devices is that, for Plex, they are all inferior to my Roku except for the Raspberry PI and the PI only can be used for Plex. 
 
I do not really use my Shield much as its only advantages are the superior number of codecs supported and te fact that the Phield Pro (which is the one I have) makes a pretty good Plex server which gives me a solid backup Plex server.
 
But do as you wish but it does seem a bit immature to make meaningless threats and rant like you have based on a feature that only returns you to the home screen after some time and never interrupts active playback.

Elijah_Baley wrote:

envoy510 wrote:

I read, with dismay, many of the replies here (mainly due to the many apologists for this "feature").

I use Plex and it happens for Plex.  And Amazon.  And Netflix.  All of them that I've used.

It was implemented for ONE reason: ad money.

To the misguided person that claims Roku is a company... uh, dude, I paid for the 2 Roku's I have, thank you, and they didn't have this feature when I purchased them.

I think we should all inundate @Roku and roku.com/support with requests that this be optional.  I will.

Every single night I fall asleep in front of a playing Roku.  I managed to get Netflix and Amazon to stop auto-playing episodes, so I could pick up where I left off and watch the last part of any episode I fell asleep on.  Now, with the Roku on the Home screen, I have no idea sometime what I was watching.

Roku, shame on you for doing this to your users.  I can tell you, if you don't change this, I will switch to something else.  The Shield looks like a very nice device that is more highly rated than yours.  And I will not sell my Roku 3 on craig's list.  I will take a hammer to it so no one ever uses it.

I too use Plex and I have noticed that it does return to the home screen after two or three hours but it does not return to the home screen when playing anything or when Plex is in the post play screen.

Mine shoots back Home just fine from the Plex Post-Play screen.

I can attest to that condition because many 'The Cosmos' episodes are employed as cures to insomnia and while I wouldn't normally allow myself to even see the HATED Plex Post-Play Screen (for very long, at least) it ends up there when my Cosmos Sleeping Pill kicks in and I awake to LED Clock with Time and Weather - so I know it's gotten there from Plex's Hated Post-Play Screen.

I hate that Post Play Screen so much I'd like to request my Roku Blast me back Home the moment it sees the Plex Post Play Screen. It takes about as many clicks to resume Plex Operations either way - so it really wouldn't matter.

Emissary35 wrote:

No need to force this feature that is unwanted by a lot of people, I too like to come back and resume whatever show I am watching on any app. There is no need to boot me to the home screen just because some designer made this change. I'm really sick and tired of things like this being forced and no option to disable, just check out all the nonsense on the Netflix app that you can't shut off, streaming is starting to develop a lot of annoyances. It seems as though just because some feature can be added it must be, and without choice.

I want the feature! He's not the only one! After 3 hrs of watching a TV show marathon, why should I get back into Sling and find my channel again??!! How ignominious! There is not even a work around. By the way, if you do not survey all of the ROKU owners all over the world, regarding this feature, how can you express to us that the feature is "unwanted by allot of people?" Just like TV news telling me they show stories I want to see... They never asked, so they don't know what I want to see.

The word schmegegge comes to mind, when a company does not give it's consumers a choice on how to run their own device. There should be an option to disable "going to home screen" in any channel. I could also not find it in any "secret menu" or "secret screens."