Download the program last week. Had no problem downloading the shows but never got the episodes of NCIS to play in the Amazon Unbox player...I had to watch them in the Windows Media Player.

When I tried to watch my downloads with the Amazon player my cimputer would freeze and it would take up all 100% of system resourses...I have a brand new dell laptop!!!

I shut down on the files and processes running from this Unbox and still my computer was sluggish and unresponsive. Arhhh I hate programs that do this to me.

I tried to uninstall and it froze up during the uninstall that I had to pull the plug on my brand new laptop and then disconect the battery just to shut her down. GRRRRRR

Once rebooted..(sluggish by the way and very very long process atleast 15 minutes) I manually went in and deleted the program file by file. Still sluggish after that.

So I did a complete system restore back to the day before I installed the player. My computer is now running lightening fast like it did before I installed this god awful excuse for a program.

DONT DO IT.....avoid this program at all costs!!!!

by WeatherednBoston (See profile) - March 18, 2008 7:06 AM PDT

Amazon Unbox does not support captions or subtitles. Thus it is inaccessible for the millions of consumers who are deaf or hard of hearing. In an age when there is nearly 100% captioning of television programming and dvd movies as per the FCC regulations, Amazon's complete disregard for people with hearing loss is reprehensible.

Amazon Unbox was contacted after we downloaded a movie to TiVO and found out it had no caption capability. We were unable to get a refund and our complaint letter received a canned response which you can read online here: http://www.hearingexchange.com/blogs/?p=87

Numerous advocacy groups are working hard to ensure that Internet videos and television shows are broadcast with captions in the future. How long is it going to take for technology companies like Amazon to step up to the plate?

by HearingExchange (See profile) - December 4, 2007 5:49 AM PST

I've now rented two movies from Amazon Unbox. The first time it took me over half an hour to figure out how to get the movie to download. I downloaded their software, it wouldn't queue up! So I sat there, and finally after opening and closing their software enough times, it started to download. The second time I could never get it to download. Within 15 minutes of purchasing the movie, it said I had already download it! I sent an email to Amazon, and they said "No Refunds"!!!! I couldn't believe. I felt like I was robbed by Amazon.

by rrblondo (See profile) - November 25, 2007 3:57 AM PST

Vongo service is inexpensive (only 10 bucks a month) and you get a wide array of movie content, cufrent, classic, and old TV shows...works fine w my Toshiba Gigabeat, which also works w Rhapsody...Ive been having many problems w my Creative Zen (which is a shame, because I love it) but only Gigabeat works w Vongo...and Vongo is so good, it's worth having Gigabeat to enjoy it. I also own Ipod 80Gb Video, and agree w others, the limited content on ITunes limits the usefulness of the space...but the ease of use of ITunes is a definite plus, if ITunes had movies and music to go, there'd be no need to go anywhere else...when will they wake up to that? Bottom Line: Go Vongo, Go Gigabeat, if you wnat easy to download and inexpensive movie content for your commutes

by nycathleticdad (See profile) - September 1, 2007 9:13 PM PDT

I was so excited about being able to download movies home to a media player/computer that I went out and purchased a “Creative Zen Vision:M”. Please note, this is the player recommended by Amazon. In fact, they are offering $20 in free video downloads if you purchase it from Amazon.com (This fact will be important as you read my review).

So, my shinny new “Creative Zen Vision:M”. is on the list supported and my trusty Dell desktop more then exceeds the minimum system requirements. , yet installing the software took almost an hour. One I resolved the software conflict; I setup an account and purchased my first movie. Down load wind informed me that my movie would take about two hours so I cooked dinner, cleaned up the kitchen and settled in for a night of movies and TV classics –NOT!

As you may have guessed, the movie did not download as it said it would. So I call Amazon tech support. After about two hours on hold I’m that you have to tell the media player to down load your purchase movie. Ok, I thought this was a bit odd, you’d think that by forking over $15 of cold hard cash would cause for downloading to commence. Affter an additional 2 hours the movie downloaded, at this point it late and I'm too frustrated to watch the move so I head off to bed.

The next day I tried to move the move over to my “Creative Zen Vision:M” -the move won't transfer. This is the same player recommended by Amazon, the same player advertise prominently on Amazon.com with $20 of free video downloads. I check the specks on Amazon’s UnBox site a second time to make sure I have a supported player (who knows, maybe the marketing wiz kids screwed and put their push behinded the wrong player).

According to Amazon’s web site my player is supported. So I called Amazon and after a long wait I get another rep that says even though the device is listed on the site as supported it's not a guarantee that it will work. What?!?!

There might be a happy ending to my story; today I went to Best Buy and exchange my Zen player for an Apple iPod. I’m not happy about Apple’s DRM monopoly, but my desire to rent/purchase movies online, messured with Best But sales person’s push that iPods/iTunes just works convinced me. This is my first Apple product and I'm hoping it will work. Unfortunately iTunes offers few movies, and you can’t rent them either. However, iTunes work so I'll stick it out with Apple as I'm sure they'll get more movies.

by Doc-u-type (See profile) - September 15, 2006 11:16 AM PDT

This is official policy from Amazon. The following is a quote from the FAQ on the unbox site (go to unbox support and you'll see the FAQ link):

"You can only view the files using Amazon Unbox installed on the computer that originally received the downloads."

Getting a new PC for Vista in a couple of months? Better NOT pay for any movies from Amazon, or you won't be able to watch them on it! Got more than one PC? You can only pick ONE to watch the movies you paid for. Heck, care to guess what might happen if you install a new OS or new network card even on the same machine you originally installed on?

This is ultra-restrictive DRM, not to mention the unrequested formatting of portable devices like the previous poster mentions.

AVOID THIS PRODUCT. If you give Amazon your money for this, you will rue the day, because there will come a time when you can no longer view it, and neither Amazon nor the studios have any interest in helping you. They'll just tell you to pay again and again for the same movie. No thanks.

by commsoft (See profile) - September 9, 2006 10:05 AM PDT

Less than 24 hours after it was officially launched, I installed Amazon's Unbox video downloader/player application on my PC. Having just recently purchased a Toshiba Gigabeat S (the black 60 GB model) I have been spending about as much time searching for and installing new content to it as I have spent listening to it. Before trying to use the Unbox service I spent about an hour reading the installation instructions, FAQ, and TOS. Oddly, I found almost no discussion of portable devices, much less any list of compatible devices, support or instructions for sync'ing and use. There were passing references to portable devices, but no real nuts & bolts walk-thrus, etc. one might expect from a mass-market, user-friendly service such as Amazon.

Ultimately I decided to surrender to intuition. I launched the Unbox application and, after checking the Help file (in vain) I clicked on the "Devices" tab. There I found a message stating "Device not detected". I proceeded to connect my Gigabeat to my PC via USB cable, power it on and click the Unbox application's refresh button on the devices tab. The screen on my Gigabeat flickered to life but, instead of displaying the familiar "Connected" message (as is typical with Rhapsody, WMP 10, and Vongo connections) a previously unknown message to the effect of "Remove Media" briefly appeared and then disappeared. The Unbox application then showed my device as successfully recognized.

However, somewhat less encouraging was the display showing 57 GB of available storage space. In a nutshell, Amazon's Unbox software formatted my Gigabeat hard drive without any warning or request for permission. The entirety of my roughly 50 GB multimedia collection had been unexpectedly deleted in less than 20 seconds from the point I connected my device. This included MP3s ripped from my CD collection, purchased from online music stores and downloaded & licensed from my Rhapsody-to-Go subscription, several hundred digital photos, and video files including movies ripped from my DVD collection, tv programs transferred from Tivo-2-Go, and feature films downloaded and licensed from my Vongo subscription. Collectively these files had taken untold hours to download, convert, and upload to my Gigabeat. All that was left is a still-unresolved problem with my DMR licensing rights that were apparently scrambled by the Amazon software. Despite spending half of my afternoon on the phone with tech support for Rhapsody, as yet I am still unable to download anything from my Rhapsody-to-Go subscription to my Gigabeat.

I contacted Amazon's support department via e-mail and explained the sequence of events in detail. The response I received a day later apologized for any inconvenience and blamed the drive formatting episode on my having used a device not yet "thoroughly tested" or approved by Amazon. With that, they sent me a link to the "Approved Devices" page I was never able to find. I was suprised to find that only six (6) devices are currently supported and, thus, "guaranteed" to work with the Unbox software. I was even more suprised to see that my Toshiba Gigabeat S is, in fact, one of those approved devices. Notwithstanding the fact that I had mentioned the make and model of my portable device 5 or 6 times in my e-mail to Amazon support, they ignored this and, in effect, failed to offer any credible reason for problems occurring with one of their supposedly "tested" and "compatible" devices.

Unless and until Amazon can either explain or resolve the spontaneous formatting of a preferred portable device, I plan on holding off any further use of the Unbox product. Unfortunately, the unauthorized Internet access and spyware-like behavior described in CNET's 9/08/06 Buzz Out Loud podcast (titled "Stay Away From Amazon Unbox") only compounds my skepticism for the state of the software at present. I hope this post helps others to make an educated decision on whether to use the Amazon software, too.

by mike_lesak (See profile) - September 9, 2006 12:30 AM PDT