We've been waiting a long, long time for the BBC iPlayer - Auntie's online, on-demand downloading system - and today's the day when it arrives.
I looked briefly at setting the system up on my Windows box at home last night (a few of us were given slightly early access), but without any success. So today in the office the job was farmed out to our IT department, who didn't find it easy at all. Thanks to the highly specific demands of the player - for a start it's only compatible with Windows XP and Internet Explorer - it took them a good portion of the morning to set it up. But eventually we were up and running.
So what is it like? Carry on reading to find out.
Finding shows
Visiting the iPlayer website, you're presented with a login screen. Get through that and you have to browse the catalogue and find a programme that you want to watch. There's not a huge amount there - the entire drama category, for example, contained 30 episodes of about a dozen shows, and there's almost nothing in the news section. Most of the shows listed have been broadcast in the past week, but there are a few extras in there such as Doctor Who.
You can search by day of broadcast (eg "I missed that thing on Wednesday night", or by category (factual, drama, entertainment and so on) or look at an A-Z list. You do have the option to browse by BBC channel - but only when you've already narrowed the list down: you can't simply click to say "I want to see what I missed on BBC2 last night".
The software
With a black and pink interface, it's stylish and clean. But navigation, awkwardly, switches between several different windows: the web pages for browsing the catalogue and downloading, your desktop-based library for looking through the programmes you've downloaded and a pop-up window when you actually watch.
Once you've overcome the fact that you must create another login to actually download the shows (the first one simply let me access the iPlayer website) downloading was pretty fast - but then we have a huge pipeline here at Guardian towers. An hour-long show weighed in at around 200MB, so if you know your broadband speed you can probably work out how long it will take you to fetch it. You can't start watching until the download is complete.
Picture and sound quality was good: the same as your TV screen (and you can also switch subtitles on, which is handy). A word of warning, though - if you press the "full screen" button on the player it probably won't look that great; the chances are that your computer monitor has a much higher resolution than a telly screen.
Shows stay on the website list for seven days after broadcast - once you choose to download it, the programme stays in your library for a maximum of 30 days. But once you actually start watching, its lifespan is reduced to a week.
First impressions
Given that the software is still in development, it's slightly difficult to judge whether it's a success or not. Using it the software isn't too tough and there's plenty that is right... but there are also some missed opportunities, and it's far too finnicky and awkward to set up in the first place. If the average person on the street wants to use it, they're going to need to make some changes.
The beta version is now open, so you should be able to go to the website and apply to test it. Let us know if you try it, and what you think.
