I like to Watch - HBO Now

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Terri and I have become fans of HBO's Game of Thrones.  Season 5, episode 1 premiered last night and I had inconveniently cancelled our HBO subscription just two weeks ago.  We had been on a 3 month free demo from DirecTV that expired.  We have watched prior GoT seasons on bootleg web sites.  I have always been willing to pay for quality programming such as GoT and Homeland if an option was provided that did not include bundles or subscriptions.

We switched to DirecTV in December due to the cable company's confiscatory and increasing monthly rate.  DirecTV is more economical, but still requires you to bundle if you want the best price on premium services.  I refuse to pay $50 a month for all movie services, or $19 a month for HBO standalone.  I have been waiting for an option that allows a' la carte, economical and non-contracted subscriptions.

HBO brilliantly released HBO Now the same weekend that Game of Thrones began their new season.  I decided to trial this new risk-free option.  The first 30 days are free and a monthly rate of $15 follows for access to all past and new release HBO content.  I suspect I was one of millions who signed up over the past weekend.

I expected to be able to subscribe over Apple TV, but could not.  Instead, I found the simpliest way was to sign up by downloading the HBO Now app on an iDevice, and setting up an account.  You can then go to Apple TV and use your new credentials to sign into the HBO Now app already present on the Apple TV home screen.

Once you are in, you are presented with a slick Netflix-style navigation menu where content is grouped by series, documentaries, movies, watch lists, etc.  It looks like all the good stuff is there going back to The Sopranos, Oz, Band of Brothers and other classic HBO series.

I sort of expected an option to view HBO live, but that isn't how it works.  HBO Now is not HBO Go that allows HBO subscribers to watch living streaming HBO programming.  Instead, content is made available on HBO Now simultaneously with airing on commercial HBO.  GoT season 5, episode 1 became available for streaming on HBO Now at the same time the program was aired on cable TV.  I think I like it this way much better.  There are no series recordings.  The content just appears when released.  Accessing the latest episode of GoT is as simple and straightforward as accessing the first episode of Tombstone.

I suspected that video quality could have suffered if the GoT premiere had enticed millions to sign up for HBO Now, but was pleasantly surprised.  The video was delivered on time, in HD and there were no problems with buffering, stalling or pixelating.  HBO seems to have gotten it right the first time.