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Darci Carlton
My parents have a Smart TV and use Direct TV. They use closed captioning, as, at 87 years old, sometimes they have difficulty hearing. They are able to change the font size in the regular TV shows they watch and on Netflix, but we are having a hard time changing font size on Amazon Prime. Have followed Amazon directions but the font size is still the same size on TV.
As someone who sometimes has trouble hearing what characters in my favorite shows are saying, I get where ssmtmb's parents are coming from. So I was happy to try helping myself, using Amazon's posted instructions to figure out the solution to the problem. That's when I ran into a technical roadblock of my own.
I do most of my Amazon Prime Video watching on my 4th-generation Apple TV. And those instructions in the link above don't work with Apple's set-top box, as an Amazon spokesperson told me when I contacted the company to ask what I was doing wrong. (The relationship between Apple and Amazon when it comes to streaming video is ... complex.)
Fortunately, that same Amazon spokesperson provided some more detailed steps on how to adjust the closed-caption sizes for Amazon Prime Video that, hopefully, will help ssmtmb's parents set the text to their liking:
1. On a computer that's signed in to your Amazon Prime account, go to the Subtitles Settings page, and customize the look of the captions. You can change the color, font and opacity for up to four presets.
If that doesn't work, and you're viewing Amazon Prime through an app built into your smart TV, you'll want to look through the settings on your TV. Here are instructions from LG, Sony, Hisense, TCL/Roku for finding the closed-captioning settings on their smart TVs.
But what about Apple TV users like me? (Remember, those steps won't work for us.) Apple offers closed-captioning customization features of its own that work across apps like Amazon Prime Video and Netflix:
4. You can make sure closed-captioning is turned on here, but you can also click on Style, which lets you select from four presets or edit your own. However, if you just want bigger closed captions, the Large Text preset will do the trick.
As ssmtmb's parents discovered, adjusting the closed-captioning is much more straightforward on Netflix. The streaming service has a dedicated page outlining how to turn on subtitles for just about every device you can imagine. There are also instructions for customizing those captions depending on your device.
Hulu offers instructions for both its on-demand and live TV services. On connected devices, swipe up for info and settings when you're watching a show, and go to the Subtitles/Caption section to turn them on; you can customize the captions on most connected devices by going to the Account menu from Hulu's homepage, choosing Settings and then selecting Subtitles & Captions. On phones and tablets, Hulu suggests you change the caption size through your device's accessibility settings.
To get answers to your burning tech questions,head to the Tom's Guide Forum for the latest tips from our resident experts and fellow members. You can also comment on this article or email us directly at hel...@tomsguide.com.
Philip Michaels is a Managing Editor at Tom's Guide. He's been covering personal technology since 1999 and was in the building when Steve Jobs showed off the iPhone for the first time. He's been evaluating smartphones since that first iPhone debuted in 2007, and he's been following phone carriers and smartphone plans since 2015. He has strong opinions about Apple, the Oakland Athletics, old movies and proper butchery techniques. Follow him at @PhilipMichaels."}), " -0-11/js/authorBio.js"); } else console.error('%c FTE ','background: #9306F9; color: #ffffff','no lazy slice hydration function available'); Philip MichaelsSocial Links NavigationPhilip Michaels is a Managing Editor at Tom's Guide. He's been covering personal technology since 1999 and was in the building when Steve Jobs showed off the iPhone for the first time. He's been evaluating smartphones since that first iPhone debuted in 2007, and he's been following phone carriers and smartphone plans since 2015. He has strong opinions about Apple, the Oakland Athletics, old movies and proper butchery techniques. Follow him at @PhilipMichaels.
VLC, a cross-platform media player, is well-compatible with the high-resolution playback of regular media files of most mainstream formats. Moreover, this powerful player also supports online video streaming from popular platforms like YouTube. However, it is a pity that VLC has not yet been compatible with Netflix streaming video playback.
To make it possible to play Netflix through VLC, you are required to convert the streaming videos from Netflix to MP4, decrypt the encryption on them, and then watch Netflix videos offline with VLC player. This blog will guide you through the details on how to play Netflix videos on VLC Media Player in original quality with ease. Let's check it now.
To enable Netflix video playback on VLC Media Player, the most essential process to make it work is to decrypt the protection applied to Netflix videos and convert them to regular video files that are compatible with VLC. Here, you will require help from a professional Netflix video downloader, MovPilot.
MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader empowers the powerful functionality to rip Netflix videos to MP4/MKV, with the best HD 1080p resolution preserved and maintaining the original video streaming experience offline. With the embedded search feature, users can browse and access Netflix video resources simply by typing in keywords.
Meanwhile, MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader allows users to select language for preserving the original audio tracks and subtitles as desired. Hence, users can grasp the 100% original experience after downloading Netflix videos to MP4 for streaming in VLC Media Player.
Launch MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader. You are required to log in to the downloader via your personal Netflix account. After that, you are able to enter the main interface and directly use the search feature to browse the Netflix videos you desire to download for streaming through VLC Media Player.
Before processing the video download, you are able to hit the gear icon on the upper-right corner to enter "Settings" for customizing the video parameters (format and codec), audio/subtitle languages, and subtitle type based on your requirements.
Once the settings are completed, simply by hitting the provided download icon for each Netflix video result, then MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader will process to download the selected videos for you. Check the downloading progress to track the download condition at any time you desire.
When MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader completes the video download, you are able to access the downloaded MP4 Netflix video in the "History" section. Hit the 'open file' folder and you can check the downloads. Then, simply open VLC Media Player, then drag and drop it to VLC and you can enjoy the video offline on VLC.
Whether you are able to change the subtitle languages for streaming downloaded Netflix video on VLC depends on if you have selected to download the video with multiple language options using MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader.
When you have selected more than one language, and customize the downloading subtitle types as "Embedded subtitles" or "Independent subtitles", you are able to select language for the subtitle in VLC by navigating to "Subtitle" > "Sub Track" on the menu bar.
Likewise, when you have selected to download multiple audio tracks with different languages while processing the Netflix video download in MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader, you are able to select your preferred language option under "Audio" > "Audio Track" while playing it through VLC Media Player.
When VLC Media Player fails to support Netflix video streaming directly, you are required to download Netflix to MP4 and decrypt the protection from the videos using MovPilot Netflix Video Downloader in advance. This powerful video downloader is able to preserve the original language and video quality to deliver the best streaming experience for you to watch Netflix videos offline. With an intuitive design, it also enables everyone to grasp the usage with ease. Now, why not give it a try?
Netflix is undoubtedly the most widely used streaming service in the US. Most of the consumers looking to purchase the Roku 2 are probably looking for just a Netflix streamer. Keeping this in mind, we have a whole section devoted to the Netflix streaming experience.
An important feature of the Netflix app is the adaptive bitrate streaming aspect. In layman's terms, the app seamlessly shifts to a lower bitrate stream if it recognizes that the bandwidth available is not enough to sustain the current playback bitrate. In a similar manner, it moves on to a higher quality stream as soon as the device is provided with more bandwidth.
I set up an interesting system to test the effectiveness of this scheme. Using an ASRock CoreHT 252B, I connected the wired Ethernet port of the Roku 2 to the PC, which was acting as a router. This port was bridged with the PC's wireless connection to enable access to the Internet for the Roku 2 XS. Wireshark was used to track the network characteristics of the Roku 2. NetBalancer Pro was also used to artificially limit the available bandwidth for the wired Ethernet port (and by extension, the Roku 2).
Our Netflix test stream was the 41 minute long documentary, National Geographic: Lewis and Clark: Great Journey West. I was connected to the Internet with a Comcast 20 Mbps plan, and in the first experiment, I made sure to give the Roku 2 unfettered access to all the available bandwidth. In the other experiments, I set the available bandwidth at 6 Mbps, 3 Mbps and 1 Mbps respectively. The graphs with the instantaneous data rates from WireShark are presented below.
Back in June, DSLReports indicated that the 1080p streams with 5.1 audio came in at 4.8 Mbps for the video and 384 kbps for the audio. Sure enough, we see that the default and 6 Mbps graphs show values around that mark. The anomalous value of the average bit rate (and by extension, amount of data downloaded) in the default graph are due to inaccuracies in the start and stop timestamps for bandwidth measurement. The intent of the graphs is to convey that adaptive bitrate streaming works, and indicate the bitrate which a consumer might end up with depending on their connection speed.
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