Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

SEE UPDATE FOLLOWING MY INITIAL REVIEW I think Acorn TV hosts some of the finest TV available anywhere (primarily British TV) ranging from the likes of Marple and Poirot to Doc Martin. For $4.99 per month, I do not find anything that can compare. However, I have issues with Amazon's presentation of the subscription and its Acorn TV app. In the first place, one can go to Acorn TV online and sign up for a 30-day free trial; sign up on Amazon via Fire TV/Stick yields a 7-day free trial. Simply signup online, then install the Amazon Acron TV app and access the subscription on the Fire TV/Stick and log in with your online username (email address)/password and you are in. More importantly, the Amazon Acorn TV app functions very poorly, either often failing to connect to Acorn TV at all or, once connected, continuously dropping the connection yielding a "lost network connection" error. I do not have a "smart" TV so I connect my laptop to my TV's analog port and watch without incident. It is my understanding that the Amazon Acorn TV app is a fairly recent inception and I have every confidence that Amazon will eventually create a reliable app. In the interim, accessing Acorn TV via a PC/Mac works flawlessly. Bottom line: Acron TV is an outstanding source of exceptional programming at a very low monthly cost; the Amazon Acorn TV app is an upgrade waiting to happen. UPDATE: February 10, 2017 As I mentioned, the app is an issue. But signing up via Amazon (instead of Acorn TV) overcomes the app issues. What I finally did was to canceled my subscription with Acorn and resubscribe directly with Amazon, bypassing the Acorn app; no issues to date. Curiously though, I am still able to access Acorn via the app (a good thing since Amazon distributes Acorn programming over the entire site and one has to hunt to find it all) and, if I select a program from within the app, I also have no issues. It is as if Amazon direct-plays the program instead of playing it through the app. Regardless, if one is interested in a five-week trial, sign up via the Acorn on the web for a one-month trial and then cancel the subscription while still enjoying the programming until the 30-day trial is up (cancel whenever but the trial continues for 30 days). Then, sign up for Amazon's one-week Acorn trial (for an additional free week) and verify that the app problems are not manifest. UPDATE 06/19/2017 Acorn has now changed from a one month to a one-week trial, as it is with Amazon; still a good deal though. Based on my experiences, If you scroll down to the 7th comment, below, I explain why I now prefer the somewhat dodgy Acorn TV app, rather than signing up via Amazon. I do not fast-forward often so the lost connection issue is not a major issue: annoying but not major. A plus for the app is the fact that ALL of Acron TV's programs are listed within the app, whereas with Amazon, some - but not all - of the programs are listed under an Acron heading or banner. For example, let's suppose that Doc Martin (an outstanding Acron series) is not listed under Amazon's Acorn heading or banner - and - you never heard of Doc Martin, you'll not know it exists: you won't see it. But with the Acorn TV app, all of the available programs are present and sorted by genre (mystery, drama, comedy, documentary) and, therefore, as you scroll through the listings, you will come upon Doc Martin. Thus, if Amazon does not highlight Doc Martin, the only way you can find it is if you know it by name and do an Alexa search. Bottom line for me: since Amazon does not highlight all of Acron TV's programs under one heading or banner, I prefer the Acorn TV app access by signing up at the Acorn TV website, as I outlined in the 7th comment, below. Ed