Updated: Roku Users Say 10.5 Update Makes Device Useless
Hundreds of Roku owners are saying the company’s recent 10.5 software update has made it nearly impossible to watch anything on their streaming devices. The technical snafu seems to be affecting Roku Ultra owners the most but Roku TV and other Roku device owners are also complaining, according to posts on social media sites and Roku’s community page.
See an update to this story at the bottom of the page.
Roku last month began rolling out the 10.5 update which the company says improves several features including voice search and remote listening.
But since the rollout began, Roku device owners have begun posting messages saying they can no longer watch most channels in their menu. When they click on the channel in their menu, the channel will not begin streaming.
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“Yep, mine’s been mostly effed up since 10/28. Netflix is the only channel that doesn’t have issues or is slow. I think they seriously screwed up the network stack,” writes ‘Zathras’ on the Roku community page. “Disney+ and Hulu fail to load with couldn’t find network. Amazon loads, reports a network error in multiple languages and won’t play anything. Criterion channel and HBOMax load, but fail to play. Criterion throws an error, HBOMax just fails back to the last screen before play. It’s a total cluster.”
“@Rokusupport – Your updates destroy your product and your response is silence. Oh if that wasn’t enough you force these updates on us then won’t give us the option to rollback,” tweets ‘Kevin Kline’ on Twitter.
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“After the OS update I can stream AMC+ on my Roku Express but not on my Roku Ultra . Can you solve this problem. Both are upgraded to 10.5,” says another user on Twitter.
https://twitter.com/acpaulso/status/1461498811520540675?s=20
Roku has yet to offer an official comment, including a solution, other than to ask specific users on social media or the Roku community page to provide their device’s serial number in a direct message. After submitting the serial number, some users say they were able to use their devices after Roku issued a software rollback directly to their boxes or Roku TV.
Other users say they were able to resume using their device after taking the following steps:
1. Unplug your device
2. Disconnect your router
3. Reconnect your router
4. Plug your device back in.
5. Go to Settings and reset your system.
It’s unclear if this five-step solution will work for everyone affected.
The TV Answer Man has asked Roku for a comment on this issue and will report back here if we receive one.
Update: Roku today posted a response to the complaints at its web site:
“A small portion of users that have certain older Roku TV models or older Roku Ultra players are experiencing issues with the latest firmware update, OS 10.5.
We are actively investigating and working to resolve this as quickly as possible and will provide our customers with real-time updates here, and at http://support.roku.com.
We apologize for the inconvenience. You can subscribe to this thread to be notified of updates.
We expect to have an update on this issue later today.”
Later, Roku offered this update:
“UPDATE for Roku player models: 4660, 4661, 4662, and 4670.
“If you are experiencing channel playback issues on a Roku Ultra model 4660, 4661, 4662, and 4670, you may check for a manual update. To receive the update for Roku Ultra, navigate to Home > Settings > System > System Update > Check Now. “
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Both of my Roku Ultras have had problems since the latest 10.5 update — the resolution drops to 720P every time they wake up from sleep or are reconnected to the AC power. I’ve found that the work-around is to have the units powered on, unplug the HDMI cable, and then plug it back in. I’ve turned off the power-saving feature so the boxes are always on. This wastes electricity, but cures the problem. Hoping Roku patches this soon.
This is why I gave up on Roku support is not a long term thing with Roku devices.
they will roll it back to the 10.0.0 software level. you must send them your unit’s information on the ‘about ‘ tab… under the systems tab… and wait a few hours. You then can roll it back. I has worked for me on an Ultra model
I guess I’m fortunate in that I have yet to run into any problems with either of my Roku devices. Here’s to keeping my fingers crossed.
I had that problem with my Ultra. I went back to update and forced an update check. The box went through the checking for updates routine then restarted itself. After it came back, I did another update check and it updated a bunch of channels. After that finished, everything worked again.
THAT explains why my ROKU Express F-d up last week! Nothing worked until I rebooted my router THREE times! I was on the verge of cancelling my subscription and IF it screws up again I WILL!
i started having problems with my roku a few months ago, it suddenly would disconnect from the wifi, i had to reset it several times during the day, so i decided to go to Best Buy and buy me a roku tv, and to my surprise the employee told me that roku was on their way out, meaning that the company was not doing well, so i bought a google tv, now i am glad i bought the google tv.
I have an older 3d Vizio TV (but not 4k) and a Roku Ultra. After the update I was getting HDCP errors until I connected the Roku with a high speed cable to the TV’s designated “best” HDMI jack. Still, when I power the system on (but the Roku is always powered on) I get a “no signal” message until I press “home” on the Roku remote, and it’s very slow to react. I’m not trying to watch 4k or 3d content. Everything used to work fine before the update. Thanks Roku. BTW, because of the disputes Roku has had with content providers, I also have an AppleTV box for backup. It doesn’t offer as many apps but I’m also not worried about losing access to my subscriptions.