Vapefrog is Canadian iptv reseller of multiple iptv service through various plans. I subscribed OKTV on 22nd Aug and it took 4 days from them to activate after doing interact transfer. this is extremely bad service that I never received in my lifetime. Some channels took 5 mins to connect after buffering. Last whole week service never worked and there is absolutely no technical support provided. All emails to support@vapefrog.com are conveniently ignored
BACKROUND
This review is based solely on the use of US and sports channels over a one month period. That's all I watch or personally care about, and didn't bother either using or testing any of the other language content that may be offered. So as always, anything below is a direct reflection on that specific experience. For general reference purposes, my main targeted areas of interest include sport talk shows on ESPNs/Fox Sports, UFC, MLB, NFL, WWE Wrestling programs, and random movie surfing.
SupTV was tested on the APK, Perfect Player Pro, and a fresh install of Kodi 17.6 with no back round addons other then using Ares Wizard to set my advanced settings. Internet speeds generally tested out at 95-100mbps+ and on a wired connection through my 2017 Nvidia Shield. While I don't consider myself Mr. Tech or anything, I am confident in my researching/tinkering ability enough that any trouble shooting done was both accurate and with every possibility exhausted to best isolate any non-SupTV issue. All in all I'd estimate that this review is based on roughly 50 hours of use.
SETUP/CUSTOMER SERVICE
Setup was extremely basic, with a Smarter APK install (that required an extra install step) and provided m3u addresses to input directly into Perfect Player or Kodi's simple client. With no extra fluff features (more on that latter) weighing down the install I'll also note it's one the faster loading Kodi setups you'll find as well.
Customer service is handled directly through the seller, and to my knowledge unfortunately doesn't include a more extensive discord or telegram chat platform. That said, I've found the reseller to be both extremely responsive and helpful.
Going to go ahead and list con #1 here too, since it might be a pretty big and immediate deal breaker variety to some of you out there. As a provider focusing on offering a multi connection options at an extremely low rate, SupTV apparently went the anti account sharing route of not allowing VPN use with their service. Or at least that was my direct experience with IPVanish/PIA, and both of which would block connection anytime either was turned on. Granted I guess I should stress this for being very subjective type of con though, since to be blunt I actually never recommend a VPN to anybody that even has to ask if they need one. If you are only wanting it for IPTV use and live in the US...chances are you don't and regardless of the massive amount of cop-out to buffering claims of "it's your internet provider throttling your connection" suggesting otherwise (which 99% of the time isn't actually the case outside it's convenient finger pointing aspect). But yeah, I for one do want to have a VPN constantly running in the back round (for non-IPTV related stuff), and having to turn it off every single time to watch one of my IPTV providers is certainly going down as a notably annoying con here.
EPG
A definite weak point to provider. I'll stop short of labeling it terrible here due to the US listings being a *majority* full, but there are some pretty glaring exclusions. ESPN as a flagship channel being an example of one. I mean c'mon....how do you miss populating that one? Selective sports listing sections such as MLB/NFL were indeed flat out terrible though, generally offering a completely empty list that requires you to blindly click through and play each channel until finding the game you seek. Which granted isn't actually all that unusual to see with sports from most providers not named Vader or Gears, but combined with the exclusions in the regular US section still makes up for a below standard whole.
QUALITY/CHANNELS
Let me start off by stating that this was shaping up to be a high point of this review, and something which initially had me excited to share my experience here. As up until a couple days before my account expired there was a small but notably select amount of 60fps offerings on some of the more mainstream channels, and which also included the entire MLB Extra Innings package. Alas as I logged in to do my last minute check/tests...with the exception of just ESPN2 they were all gone and replaced by 30fps feeds. Was a total downer, and while for all I know atm (been over a week fwiw since I just took a small vacation since finishing up) that might have just been temporary and latter fixed...in all fairness I have to go ahead on any potential recommendation here of that being an "as is" factor.
So that aside, I'd still rate picture quality as being pretty dang solid for a cheaper provider. All the channels I regularly watched were 1080 and 720 feeds (which I was told actually get sourced out to some of the more popular providers on reddit) , and if there were some SD feeds mixed in I don't recall running in to any offhand. Channel grouping is broken up into the standard format you'd expect, and all the US based channels/sports typically being offered are of course present.
STABILITY
With the exception of maybe 2-3 days in the middle of the month I'd give it an overall thumbs up on stability. Not the very best I've seen, but as whole buffering wasn't common and it performed more then adequate when I needed it to. Which in itself also says something about it's stability, since I find myself bailing out of half my review attempts here when I don't find stability to be adequate. On that note and has typically been the case in every provider I use nowadays...expect a small tick up in stability when using Perfect Player Pro's base player over Kodi or the APK though.
Never saw the servers crash or get taken down during my sub, which obviously goes down as a plus.. Tested one UFC PPV (227) during that time as well, which had 2 feeds up and played without flaw in 720/30fps on the one I choose to use.
FEATURES/VALUE
No extra features of note. SupTV is your no-nonsense and stick to simply offering what should be every provider/user's primary and always above all else concern...Live TV. After having a second and even third separate IPTV provider dev recently confirm to me that VOD can and does impact the overall stability of their live TV streams...I'm going to start giving a small bonus in these reviews to providers who *don't* offer VOD at that. If you've read one of my reviews before then you know the next part: at the minimum there are plenty of completely free and easy to use/install APKs out there for your always updated VOD needs.....get over the 5 minute learning curve and use one.
From a value standpoint SupTV actually comes in as the cheapest "stable" provider I've come across. Base price is $4.99/month for one connection, with the option to upgrade to 3 total connections for $6.99. With the twist that if you happen to be a current customer of another one of the services being offered on the website (which is one of the more unique and value oriented reseller sites I've seen btw. Offering 12 different providers including some of the more popular ones, and an option to combo package them for a noteworthy discount) you can then add the 3 connections of SupTV for a notably low $3.99/month.
CONCLUSSION
As stated earlier, writing this section would of been a lot easier and resulted in a slam dunk recommendation for the price (even with the no VPN factor) had those 60fps feeds remained intact. Just throwing that out there again ;)
Anyway, my main review goal for last month was to test out and uncover another viable option in the growing $5 value bracket, and in that respect I have to give SupTV a passing grade here. While it wouldn't get my straight comparative recommendation over something like EternalTV or TNT Media, which top the list (imo) while bringing more overall polish to that specific table, it still offers another alternative worth checking out. Especially in relationship to those of us out there (myself included) who are finding better bang for our buck reliability (*cough* upcoming NFL coverage on super traffic Sundays *cough*) in having three $5 provider options instead paying that same $15/mo amount on a single "all-your-eggs-in-one-basket" provider. Or if you happen to be interested in one of the other providers being offered on his site, then yeah...really can't beat 3 connections for $4 on a backup option I always recommend everybody have anyway.
The above said, the lacking EPG and no VPN aspect ultimately earns it a *PASS* from me as far as any primary or stand alone provider appeal goes. Again, there are just better options out there I'd recommend first. Same obviously goes for those with run multiple services with a VPN always running in the backround. For people looking for a backup/extra, or for those that fall into the extreme save every last dollar cheapskate category, I'd put it down as a *YMMV* buy.
Where to buy and see channel list - https://tvservice.club/
So back in July i tried a trial from Vaders.store (vaderstreams reseller)... As it would of course the trial went smoothly. Of course I signed up for 3 months to keep up with the sports action. From day 1 of the subscription the problems started, Channels buffering channels not working, VOD offline all the time and daily at least 1 hour of downtime (more than this typically when there was something I really wanted to watch). I contacted support on several occasions who were really unhelpful. Always just got fobbed off that, It would be "back online soon", or "we're working on it expect it fixed within minutes". It got so bad i just disputed the transaction with PayPal to try to get a refund. (Oh guess what!!! They never offer refunds and PayPal who are supposed to protect you against stuff like this never favour the buyer with these guys!)
My service at this point was temporarily deactivated by the reseller until the dispute completed.
Waited 7 days and many more correspondence with the reseller (vaders.store) to find yes, PayPal didn't uphold my claim and these guys have robbed me of the $44 3 months subscription.
This is a big warning to everyone, the Vader streams service is awful nowadays and there's no chance of you getting a refund for the awful IPTV service, definitely avoid vaders store!!!
Here is my 1 month review of Gears TV. The IPTV service that is $15 a month.
It Just Works...most of the time. The channels were fine and PPV ran without issues. They did drop the ball on preseason football, but that isn't a huge blow. Did they have channels down? Yes. Was it a lot of channels? No. They posted them on FB each day, but some seem to listed daily. Also, channels would go down here and there, but I wouldn't say it was more/less than my $5 provider.
Customer Service: They have a FB and Discord; however, it seems like they just had one mod the whole time and some questions and help topics would go untouched for a day or so. Customer service wasn't the best, but I've tried IPTV with worse.
Channels/Video: Like I said earlier...they were fine. I only have a 36" 1080p TV, so the picture was fine on mine. Obviously, the picture may look different on a 60" 4k...I can't answer that. The UFC and Boxing PPV were fine. I just checked them for a few minutes, but they seemed to working well (not really into either). Channels would occasionally go down, but nothing different than a normal IPTV service.
Website/Resellers: The official GearsTV site is hard to find. Typing in "Gears Tv" in google gives you a ton of resellers, some with higher prices. Just watching TargetIn1080p on Youtube, seems like they keep going back and forth between self selling and resellers only; Gears vs Reloaded ; I'm selling Gears/not selling Gears/just help Gears out/buying Gears back; and just confusing people with the two services and APK. If you want to try Gears, the official link is: https://omarsvideos.com/acc/ I can't remember if this is the one I used, but the official one TargetIn1080p gave on Youtube.
Overall, it is ok. Personally, I think you can find similar services and better support for the price. $15 for one connection is extremely high. $15 for 2 or 3 connections a month makes a little more sense. For the channels I mostly watch, I could not tell a huge difference between the $5 provider and Gears. Your mileage may vary though.
Well, Yesterday I announced on r/iptvresellers I wanted 5 connections from european channels. I test his streams and they seemd okay but out of the blue they stopped working and he doesn't asnwer my messages on skype.
His name is Mohammed Marouane El-Jai
His skype is brosiptv
His e-mail on skrill rreze10@hotmail.com
His profile on reddit is https://www.reddit.com/user/brosiptv
Does anyone know how do I proceed to get my refund? Check his name on Google and you will see how many people he scammed.
I've been meaning to do this update for a while now, but to be honest had been putting off until I felt comfortable that I wouldn't essentially come across as isolating in on any certain bad stretch period. Or more specifically in this case...end up basically kicking Vader when it was down (**spoiler** there will be some kicking done below, so resellers can probably just safely stop reading here and get their down vote in already). Fast forward to yesterday morning, when I finally felt the service was both safely enough distanced enough from the last meltdown and I had the free time to start writing this review. Then yesterday's meltdown drama happened. At which point I was tempted to put it on hold for a few more days at least, but with the NFL season fast approaching, an extremely notable recent change in regards to picture quality offered in their sports feeds, and with so many IPTV noobies seemingly popping in lately shop for that...it's going up anyway. If for no other reason then to at least give them a current outlook perspective to find, and one that isn't just lining up to take their money in the process.
Anyway, for reference this is a follow up review to the one i did here: https://www.reddit.com/r/IPTVReviews/comments/85qebd/the_rise_and_somewhat_fall_of_vader_streams_1/ ,and latter deleted the summary of in light of a lot of post-review changes. All testing practices and surrounding viewing variables have remained the same. Sole focus on US channels remains as well. Although to note, my player preferences (I'm a strictly an android and mostly Nvidia Shield user btw) over hundreds of additional hours have changed since then and expanded to include additional player options that have since upgraded their software.
SETUP/CUSTOMER SERVICE
Nothing of note has changed with the setup, which is all still fairly standard stuff depending on your device choice. Again with their Kodi install being a pro point exception in giving users an easy option to sort in/out channels groups and VOD while doing the initial install (basically if you don't want a bunch of extra crap seriously slowing down the simple client load time every time you open kodi or SPMC, which pretty much no IPTV providers nowadays make the extra effort at offering, Vader isn't telling you to go learn how to do it yourself with notepad++).
Customer service on the other hand has changed quite bit since. The addition of a Telegram chat has probably vaulted them up to the top of the food chain in this area imo, with great around-the-clock technical help and update details. All in all I honestly can't say enough good things about it here in terms of being helpful and getting updated information out....which is actually pretty important in the overall scheme of things since as a customer you should be expecting to have to spend a very regular amount of time popping in there to find out what specifically is going on (more on that below).
As far as fixing down channels goes I'd rate them as average overall. Not the fastest and/or most efficient I've seen, but not nearly the worst either.
EPG
Outside the short term hiccups that happen every time the service goes down I'll still rate Vader to have one of the best and most accurate EPGs out there. Which also translates over well to whatever app/player you choose to use, and now even including the APK. In fact, and outside maybe GearsTV I guess, I don't think I've tested one with a better overall population factor.
On top of that, this time I'm going to make the extra effort to give Vader a huge thumbs up on how it handles it's sport listing with the Matchcenter feature. Which makes finding specific sports related things a breeze, and pretty much the polar opposite experience of almost every other provider out there using the same generic layout that usually leaves you guessing though a bunch of empty channel listings to find the specific game/content you want to watch. It's one of Vader's defining features, and certainly wayyyy more worthy of note then I gave it last time.
CHANNELS/QUALITY
Other them offering a couple more total movie channels, Vader's US channel selection is pretty par from the course and what you'd expect out of any IPTV service nowadays.
Picture quality of non-sports channels is one of the better ones out there. Lots of 60 fps streams scattered about, especially on the more popular channels. Most offerings are in HD, although you will find your random SD feed here and there. Sports channels are also mostly offered in solid HD, but notably just took a huge hit the other day with the loss of the Smoothstreams sourced channels. Which had been Vader's primary source on most their 60fps feeds. As a result, matchcenter has now only been offering a single feed for every sporting event I've tested since (none of which were 60fps), and the bigger mainstream channels like ESPN and FS1 have also now been downgraded to 30fps. It's a **HUGE** and noteworthy change in the service for the min/max crowd, and one i expect to see a lot more widespread complaining about in the upcoming days as the transition becomes more commonly apparent.
*Edited in note* - It appears they've re-added a 60fps feed on ESPN.
RELIABILITY/STABILITY
For starters, the common and rightfully aimed standard claim that "every services has issues" and IPTV should never be expected to be perfect doesn't really apply here. The consistent amount of issues one can expect to see with Vader goes way freaking beyond that. A lot more so then any other of the more popular providers out there Vader Streams is a pure Beta atm, and continues to be so to this day since completely ripping up the old back end way of doing things post- overselling their servers. B-E-T-A. Period. This can't be hammered home enough to potential buyers. From server crashes, to too many people creating heavy server traffic, to certain player application support going down, to bugs with the APK, ect ect - these things happen a lot more with Vader then your regular quality provider. In fact and with no exaggeration here, in all my extensive testing of at least decent provider qualifiers, I've probably run into less total problems in the entire whole of all of them then I have in one less then ideal week of Vader. The people telling you differently and that "oh Vader has been issue free for so and so long before today" are either extreme fanboys, those with a financially invested interest, or somebody who just doesn't spend much time watching live TV. Basically, and with all due respect to those out there hustling a buck or trying to be "loyal"... they are all FOS. It's been a constant stream of back end struggles in one variety or another, granted not always as annoying as others, since the resellers oversold the servers last year. If you purchase a Vader account...you need to go in expecting this non-sugar coated reality.
The above all said, from a strictly buffering aspect when things are up and working I honestly have found Vader to be pretty solid as a whole over the last couple weeks. Not quite where it was in it's heyday for heavy primetime coverage and before there were 10 million resellers out there hawking it, but it still remains a consistent choice in my daily rotation of providers.
On that note, figuring out which player is going to perform best on any given day can also be somewhat of a chore. As a general rule of thumb though I've found the very latest versions of Perfect Player Pro to be the most consistently reliable, followed by SPMC (set to HLS instead of TS), and with the APK being the least stable. In fact, a lot of the time you can get rid of the buffering/drops you'll see using the APK by simply switching over to one of the other two, and which tend to play through those "rough spots" better then the APK's base player can. ProgTv can also be an extremely solid choice as well btw...but didn't make the above cut due to my personally hating the UI.
FEATURES/VALUE
*VOD* - Been up and down for some time now, but one of the more extensive offerings when it is working. Personally would prefer they just get rid of it altogether, especially after multiple direct dev references now that it has had a negative impact on live TV streaming stability, but whatever. As always I'll just point out there are other easy ways to get a better VOD selection then any IPTV provider can offer for free, and without paying them out a dime for it's inclusion as a noteworthy feature.
*CATCHUP* - So I tore them up for it's constantly broken state in my last review, and to their infinite credit it made a complete turn around to regain it's spot as **THE** noteworthy feature aspect Vader has to offer. While most providers nowadays shy away from offering a catchup feature to begin with (the legality is a lot more muddy then re-streaming live TV), Vader offers the most extensive one you'll find out there. Which as a whole has been fairly reliable since a couple weeks after my last review, and unlike anything else I've found even includes UFC PPV's. Basically it's a huge freaking selling point other providers can't offer, and enough so that for some (including myself) it's inclusion alone is worth enough to ultimately overlook the service's other flawed areas.
That said, there is currently a random bug where the playback will reset back to the beginning, and the "what player is best" issue again pops up here as well. For catchup I strongly advise using the APK or Kodi, as Perfect Player tends to see this bug a lot more then the others in my experiences.
*APK* - A constant work in progress, which in turn means it's constantly buggy. Definitely doesn't get my recommendation as a primary plug and play player option. That said, a lot of effort has obviously gone in to it and it certainly shows in some aspects. One of of only 2 total APK's out there I'll even bothering using the EPG to surf around on, and offers the additional pro of having a well implanted matchcenter separated for your sport listings.
Really wish they hadn't recently doubled down on the Eco player it's built on top of though. Which in my own comparative testing of players was a poor design pick. The lack of the option to change that in the settings, such as offered in the more stable but far less visually appealing Smarter APK, also notably stands out and continues to hamper the overall long term potential it could/would otherwise have.
*ADDITIONAL CONNECTIONS/VALUE* - Once the undisputed king of this, and what basically put it on the popularity map, Vader has lost a lot of comparative base ground here lately. Depending on how big a factor having the catchup feature is, of course. Lot of competing providers out there nowadays that offer multiple streams, and some (with more virgin servers that haven't loaded their servers to their limits yet) even costing less. Including a link to such btw since I already know I'll get a buch of PM's asking if I don't: https://www.reddit.com/r/IPTV/comments/8zym1a/multiple_connection_provider_list/
Still a solid all around value, but at $15 while factoring in the surrounding stability issues and recent loss of the 60fps sports feeds...it ain't what it used to be.
CONCLUSSION
I'll start off here by stating that I'm basically a tech guy who ultimately appreciates Vader Streams even being the beta that it is. I like being given new shiny feature to play with, testing different things without an expectation that it's even going to be as good as what I was already using, and generally just messing with things to mess with things. Heck, even trying to break something that should otherwise work is fun to me. I also like different sometimes just because it's different. On the other hand sometimes I like things being easy, and appreciate the simple things like logging into an app to watch my daily Red Sox game without it being a clicking around chore to find the channel it's playing on. I also run no less then 3 completely different provider subscriptions at any given time lately, so when Vader craps the bed I simply click over to the next app when needed and it doesn't ruin my day. So for somebody like me...the extra features and things I find in Vader that I don't find elsewhere tips the scale to an overall **BUY** when viewing it as an individual piece in a multiple part puzzle. To me people with a similar interest is the true target audience Vader should most appeal and be marketed to.
Of course I also get that I'm in the minority there, and that a lot of other people go into this simply checking off a surface feature list and make their purchase decision strictly from there. They don't expect to essentially sign up to a beta test, acknowledge but don't really hear the advice people give them to always have a backup provider, never give a thought to potential server load issues or the bandwith that is going to be needed to reliably run the best HD picture they can find, and generally just operate under some misplaced "all things being equal" assumption that pretty much goes to crap when one actually factors in what it is they are buying here. None of which is being backed by big corporation money btw, a fancy office building somewhere, or exists as a mom/pop shop they intend to hand off to his kids one day. By and large it's a shady and rather cash grabby business, and one that essentially caters to tech challenged people's tendency to make bad decisions.
So yeah, if you are one of those latter people that think you going to save yourself some money buying a single IPTV sub with Vader, slapping it on every TV in the house for the family, and walking into Sunday football server traffic this fall without any real surrounding concern that Vader's loaded up servers aren't going to crap the bed...**you** are that next bad decision waiting to happen atm. For as much credit as i like to give Vader in it's effort to push the development needle, there is also something to be said for sticking with something that has a much stronger track record of consistently working. Which a lot of other provider options out there can offer where Vader isn't. For single provider needs, or even in a combo consideration where the total cost is a consideration and the catchup feature isn't a must, there are better overall deals out there to be had and Vader should be viewed a fairly hard **PASS**.
- Channel list (googled what I could find. I'll update if it's changed since then) - http://www.vaderstream.net/channellist.html
- Official Website - https://minihosts.org
- Reseller website I can personally vouch for - http://rajtv.stream/
- Telegram invites - Request from your seller