iplayer and Channel 4 on demand worked perfectly until I had to use roll back on my PC, now I am stuck with a DRM error message and can not use either program.

Jon, Wolverhampton,

I too, am besieged by problems. I wanted to watch Ashes to Ashes but cannot download the i-player programme. I followed their step-by-step guide re: installation. Yet, ironically I am able to download radio programmes effort-lessly. WHY????

Tina Jones, Swansea, West Glam

shame it does't like to stream! my computer is well over the apparent requirements and there is just no chance of getting a decent stream! which is a big upset, as the guys in the office were trying to tell me how good louis theroux was last night! guess i'll just have to wait a phew days for it to turn up on a proper streaming web site!!! BOOOOOOOOO to the BEEEEEEEB!!

Ross, Bournemouth, Engand

when i downloaded big cat diarys...the whole of series 8....from bbc iplayer...it worked....i watched it...3 days later...my bbc iplayer was not working and a bunch of error messages just came up and it ggave my computer a virus...it was the most rubbish thing in my life..jase

jade, london, england

Well i have a stonking bethere connection, i am 300 metres by cable from the exchange and get 23.1mb down and 2.49mb up. i work in IT and would consider myself pretty well versed in hardware and software.
i have also done many beta tests in my time.
all i can say to the BBC is this is ALPHA test material.
Also their DRM is EASILY over come. FLV's are notoriously easy to beat and the fairuse4wm will do the trick nicely.
all in all the BBC have opted for not only an apparent FLOP of a player that isn't exactly top quality picture wise they have also opted for the MS digital rights management that was cracked and is perpetually cracked every time they update it.
another multi million pond failure by the bbc!
Also anyone with a bit of moxy can use proxy servers if they live outside the UK to download/watch the streams. it's not exactly rocket science these days, all you have to do is go to a proxy browsing site or use an application like steganos and choose a uk proxy

Pax681, Edinburgh, Scotland

Its a great ideo-but it doesn't work! I live in central Scotland and it says I am outside the UK. I could understand that if I lived in places with weak internet connections but I live in an area of Scotland with the best connections.

Angus, Glasgow, Scotland

Have used 4OD with out any problems for months.
After many attemps got BBCIplayer to work for a few hours yesterday afternoon.(Worst problem was getting the latest Flash to install) But by late evening neither the BBCIplayer nor 4OD would open.
I uninstalled the BBCIplayer and am now able to open 4OD again. But if I install the latest Flash 4OD won't work.
I guess I will have to wait until next Christmas for the BBC to get things properly sorted out.

Bob, Eastington, Gloucestershire

had the same problem with 4od i.e.' delivery service manager has encountered 'etc. etc. have used Kclean to no avail, disabled firewall and so on will just have to keep trying

keith denham, darlington , durham

What is the BBC up to here? There have been solutions available which do not require installation and work on Windows and Macs (and Linux) offered to the BBC for five years. Yet they have gone ahead with their own solution which does not work on my home or work machines and requires an install even on those machines it works on.

Just imagine if every web site required its own download, install and technical issues!.

Anyway, a British alternative player (currently populated with home-made content) which works on Windows, Mac and Linux, without install or DRM issues, is available at http://clesh.com/videos/ - and there is a web-based video editing system to go with it.

Stephen B Streater, London, UK

Most of the problems so far seem to have been caused in one way or the other by the DRM. The DRM is massively complicating matters.

Louise Ferguson, London, UK

Continuing to be haunted by "Delivery management errors"! despite the metaphorical applicaton of garlic and crucifixes in the form of changes to my firewall/IE setings! Maybe need to wait till after dawn!

Dr A Craig Frame, Manchester, UK

Ludicrously convoluted downloading and installing process and after I had spent a couple of hours trying to get it to work, I got a message saying that I can't have it anyway because I don't live in the UK.. What on earth is the point of only making it available to people who can watch these programmes anyway on their TVs.?

Kevin McKenna, Lucca, Italy

The BBC service relies on the Kontiki peer-to-peer delivery software which has its own problems before being used by the BBC.

Because the service requires distribution of content to be carried out by users of the service, they have not included any options to stop the service or limit the upload/download bandwidth used. So, once you have managed to download last nights episode of Eastenders, you watch it and close the iPlayer...meanwhile in the background, the Kontiki delivery service is uploading chunks of the Eastenders episode to other users trying to download it.

You may be trying to play an online game, download something else etc, you may wonder why it's slow....Kservice.exe and Khost.exe will be running in the background and possibly maxing out the upload bandwidth which could be a problem over the month if you are on a limited bandwidth product from your ISP.

One of the solutions to run Kclean.exe is to clear out and remnants of the Kontiki service, allowing a reinstall.

Viran, London, UK

BBC's iplayer behaves pretty well for a beta release. The only problems I have encountered (so far) have been with the installation.

The installation completed correctly but made me very "nervous" due to the general lack of on-screen feedback while the installation was taking place. At one point an Explorer window did open up but only to display an error message to say it could not find a required page. However, disk activity led me to conclude the software had not yet "crashed" so I waited patiently and sure enough a few minutes later the installation completed successfully.

Following the "shakey" installation phase I soon regained my confidence in the iplayer package following a number of successful downloads.

I say "well done BBC", and I look forward to this new service developing and improving as time goes on.

Des. Kostryca.
Lincolnshire.

Des. Kostryca, Gainsborough, United Kingdom

As someone said, what's wrong with iTunes? And why on earth does it need DRM? And why 7 days? Doesn't the TV License give you longer than that to keep hold of your home recorded Videos? This is another stupid waste of time and money, just like the NHS software that has cost the tax payers over 12 billion pounds so far!

Bespoke software is not better than off the shelf software! If there are features that the BBC or NHS needed I'm sure that the off the shelf software would be willing to develop the features for slightly less than developing a whole new system, that doesn't work!

Apple would almost definately have jumped at the chance to offer UK users the ability to download TV Broadcasts, yet another great selling point for iPod, if the BCC needed different features then they could have been added, as they were for the Nike+ running system and for the iPhone.

Tom, Crewe, England

I am very pleased with the software so far although the
install wasn't that easy.
The only problem I have had is it refused to download the tv program panorama.
It would also be nice if you could watch a video stream as download times can be lengthy.

paul, wirral, UK

Its called BBC iPlayer BETA!! BETA!!

All those people who download it and then sit and complain saying..."its got problems!" shouldnt be BETA TESTING!

This is the whole reason why software developers test...to find the bugs only a large scale Beta test can accurately find and iron them out of the finished product.

Ive seen there are clashes with channel 4's on demand service, but i get the feeling from the posts ive seen that this has in some cases been due to an inferioirty in the 4OD package, although i havent used it myself.

Personally, i have been quite satisfied with the iPlayers performance, however id like to see more content...which im sure will come!

sharpz111, Lancs, UK

Why do you saddos even want to try this. Use a DVD recorder (or even a video) if you want to record a programme or see something transmitted while you were out!!

Get a life!!

Captain Sensible, London,

Sorry but whats with all the moaning??
Please people give the BEEb a chance
as with all betas there are bound to be issues and just because there are numerous errors doesnt mean that they are all separate and different types of problem. Im sure that by the time that the beta is finished they will all have been ironed out.

So please, a modicum of common sense if you will..

Javier, Shropshire,

The BBC cannot 'reproduce the world', as it tries to do with it's website. The sheer amount of work required to install/support/ protect a player universally will be a bottomless pit of expense.

steve, london,

It's a Beta after all, it's not going to be perfect. The BBC is limiting the number of users at the moment so as not to overload it's servers, a sensible move, this will change in the future. For my own experience it worked first time and I've had no problems at all. Don't all be so quick to put it down before it's even got going properly.

Kevin, Saffron Walden, UK

Once again, the BBC throws out a snow job of a hodge-podge copy of existing services. What a stinking waste of MY tax, I mean, MY Licence Fee. Eliminate the licence fee, force BBC to face the real world and not play around with my money on products that are better made by experts.

Simon E. Bode, Bath, UK

I have to contrast with most comments so far as I have successfully installed, downloaded and viewed lots of programs using the new iplayer. It has worked without a glitch, the only confusing moment was the multiple login/usernames required, but once solved, has been flawless. The quality is above what I had expected and the speed of download is surprisingly swift. My only disappointment is that more programs aren't yet available, although I understand this is being addressed ready for the official launch.

Ben King, Birmingham, West Midlands

The BBC thinks that I am outside the UK, too. (I can't install the beta anyway, since I use Macs, but their website just told me I was outside the UK while I happened to be browsing the informational pages about iPlayer....) Demon, while not the largest ISP around, is not exactly small, and a basic trawl of UK ISPs should have turned up the fact that my IP address lies with a block assigned to the UK.

Frankly, starting from now, as the BBC are, I can't see why any broadcaster wanting to do this would use any technology other than Flash Player. It has rights management and is portable across platforms.

Ian Kemmish, Biggleswade, UK

The technical term is 'live testing'. This is where a computer product has been pushed out to meet a deadline but there has been insufficient time to identify and fix all the faults and incompatibilities.

The product will then be exposed to a wide variety of real world events and factors. Each fault found will be dealt with when identified by the users.

What do you want for nothing? It's not as if we pay for this from our licence fee. Do we?

steve woods, tillyochie,

I've downloaded the IPLAYER software and it wouldn't even start. But it is BETAWARE and as such will be as flaky as a Cornish Pasty. My advice? Wait until all/most of the bugs have been worked.

MIke, Epworth, UK

I uninstalled it - not that I could get it to work that well anyway - when I found out that it the P2P part of it cannot be turned off, even if you exit the program. I am convinced that it must be the explanation for the large number of BSODs I have been getting of late, as well as the system hanging for several seconds at a time several times during the day.

Luckily, though, BBC TV is so dire these days that it will not be that much of a loss to me.

David Hadley, Cradley Heath, UK

Since everyone is forced to pay BBC TAX, i mean TV licence; why does the iPlayer need DRM? To help with the support why not open a phone line ... o yeah they can't coz they get sued.

Mike, Devon,

Why didn't they just use iTunes? As a platform it already exists and is proved, it has country specific controls (I don't approve of this but oh well) and you can watch the programmes on your TV with AppleTV.

What a waste of money...

Richard, Zaventem, Belgium

The beeb don't deserve a beating for this one. I have the same problem with the ITV version and using three different browsers hasn't been successful. This is the cold,grey hand of Microsoft at work. It's using ActiveX plugins where most security settings inhibit their use.

Sam Neill, Cardiff,

For those of us in the US, who have a pay service from Netflix, many of the same problems have been experienced.
Windows XP-only, using Windows DRM which is version dependent and flaky at the best of times.
The BBC software sounds like it integrates a bittorrent client for peer to peer file sharing.
Good luck configuring that correctly on your network if you are not a computer whiz!!!

Jonathan Watmough, Houston, Texas, USA

The BBC should not have assumed that its end users would know what "Beta Testing" is. Its not a common concept outside of the IT industry.

Andy, Reading, Berks

This is a beta product, what does that mean? It means it's being tested and tried out with us as the guinea pigs. If you didn't realise that you deserve what you are seeing.
There will always be problems with a Beta of this kind of product as it has to deal with '000s of different setups and configurations.
If you wanted a no hassle product then don't sign up for Beta's leave it to those who are capable of sorting out these type of typically minor problems.

fitaloon, Aberdeen,

'Closed' Beta trials? We're talking about a publicly funded body here, so comparisons with Google's semi-closed Gmail Beta are not valid. I like thousands of others have not been able to trial this software.

My license fee has funded this single platform, DRM'ed monstrosity. I want to see how my money is been wasted.

Tom, London, UK