BACKROUND

My sub was run by itself and without any other paid service for the entire duration, with the exception of a few different free 1 day trials. Otherwise if it wasn't doing what I wanted/needed it to do free addons were the only fall back option. Vader was run exclusively on both Kodi 17.1 and the latest SPMC (16.6.81), on wired 60mbps internet, and through either my Nvidia Shield or 4k FireTV2. While I don't consider myself Mr. Tech or anything, I have done enough research/tinkering that I'm confident that any trouble shooting done was both accurate and with every possibility exhausted to best isolate the issue.

My viewing times/habits are as follows: Wed - Sat I'd watch maybe an hour or 2 of ESPNs/FOXSPORTSs/MLB/WWE channels in the afternoon before work, then another 3-4 hours afterwards (usually 11pm est on) with random movie channel surfing mixed in. Sun - Tues I have completely off, so it would probably be used or running in the backround most of those days. I watch all the UFC and WWE PPVs, and Red Sox/Celtic games. All in all I'd estimate that this review is based on roughly 300+ hours of testing.

Setup

Vader's setup was probably the quickest/easiest of anything I've tried. Which is also big plus for somebody such as myself who likes to constantly tinker around with fresh Kodi/SPMC builds. No long webpage and/or epg string to input on my keyboard'less remote...just a quick and easily memorized repo address. Basically add source - install - done.

EPG

This was actually a rough spot initially coming out the gate, as it wasn't accurate and the time was all out of whack. Then about a week in they did a patch that completely fixed the accuracy, and I figured out that i could get the right time by changing the matchcenter time zone to match my own. From that point on it morphed into my pick for the best EPG going atm. Channels are filled up and accurate, and it really shines on a custom kodi skin such as Metropolis that color codes each type of listing (red - sports - light brown - movies - green - entertainment, ectt).

The above said lately it's had it's late night and isolated moments where I click out to guide and it's only showing what is currently on. This usually clears up rather quickly, such as the next time I click out to check, but it's certainly worth noting and keeps me from really stressing atm how much better Vader's EPG is then most of the others you'll find out there.

CHANNELS/QUALITY/RELIABILITY

Channel offerings are extremely solid, offering a wide variety of English based offerings. I never once found it lacking. Instead of 1000's of channels you'll probably never watch anyway it keeps it down to a couple hundred total, which also obviously helps limit the initial load time upon entering Kodi to a reasonable 15 seconds or so (maybe a tiny bit faster on the Shield). Picture quality across the board was also solid, which was about par for the course in comparison to any of the better services out there. Lots of 720p feeds, ectt. Same goes for channel reliability, in that it wasn't ranking as the very best in keeping channels up that I've tried, but it wasn't really any worse then most in that regard either. MLB and WWE channel feeds went down every once in a while, although it's ESPN was the best I've seen and Red Sox coverage has been flawless with the exception of one single game that didn't come on until a few minutes after it started.

Their daily matchcenter listing setup has been my personal favorite to date, which simply puts all the day's sporting events on one easily accessible list. Simply scroll down to the time your game is one and click in. I've also recently become a big fan of their Beta Playback feature, which doesn't adequately cover every channel (such as CBS for my girl's soaps dang it), but I seemed to have lucked out greatly with right-after-it-airs updates in regards to the select content I'd want/use it for and which Kodi tends to make me wait on (PPV's, Ultimate Fighter, Raw/Smackdown after I finish watching my Red Sox games, ectt).

Where Vader really shines though is in overall channel stability. By that I mean more then your typical click on something, watch it for 30 seconds, and then claim it off as some "it just works" win too. By and large and in terms of providing me with hours of uninterrupted viewing, Vader is bar none the best out there for Kodi. No other service I've tried, and I've tried every popular one that gets pushed over in the IPTV section here, can touch them there imo. In fact the only service outside Kodi that has even matched up has been a month long experience with IPGuys on a Dreamlink T1. I mean I just spent the last 6 hours before Raw came on tonight watching US ESPN, which tends to be one of the trickest channels to get a consistently solid feed on. It never buffered once or kicked me to guide, and that has just continued on since I switched over. Outside the obvious advertisement claims and fanboy hype, no other service has actually delivered like that for me to date. As far as I'm concerned, and in terms of spending an entire day in front of the TV, Vader has no equal in best performance potential right now. When it works of course, which brings me to...

THE BIG BUT

While mindfully still being infinitely better in this regard then any freebie option you'll find out there, as far as paid IPTV providers and keeping their service up as a whole goes Vader has ranked among the worst I've tried thus far. Which isn't to say those downtimes tend to normally play out to be hours long or anything...but yeah, comparatively speaking it goes down a lot. Granted it was worse in the very beginning of my 45 days, in which it went down every night for the first 2 weeks of my first sub. Sometimes for hours. Granted this was usually in the middle of the graveyard night, but as somebody who watches a ton of late night TV this still stood out to me. The following 2 weeks were a completely different story, as it rarely went down. Since re-subbing it's pretty much settled into a once day thing the last 2 weeks though, usually for 30 minutes and at some random and fairly unpredictable day or night time.

The most glaring instance of this was it went down during the Wrestlemania pre-show of all things and left me scrambling to find a working replacement (props to Peace Country here btw, which was quick to oblige and filled in beautifully). It did come on before the main show started though, and I should note that I haven't had an issue with any of the various UFC/WWE PPVs since. Every other one was solid all around.

CONCLUSION

As referenced above, I ended up re-subbing to Vader for the exact opposite reason that I didn't re-sub to Smoothstreams. For my individual needs/tastes, what it lacks in floor potential it more then makes up for in it's ceiling. When it works it's just a really, really great experience, which I find to be a lot better then anything else out there. Not for a lack of trying either, as those downtimes can obviously be annoying.

Take yesterday for example. Vader went down again, so being annoyed and once again debating a replacement I immediately went out and did a trial of the most currently hyped up service that is mostly dominating the reviews in this section atm. Watched my Red Sox game NP, but when it comes time to sit down and watch prime time ESPN for a couple hours afterwards...completely different story. It's having trouble keeping the feed up and stable. Meanwhile I can hear Vader (which had come back up shortly after going down, but since I had pulled the trigger on the trial I just left it running unwatched in the other room out of principle) in the backround running flawlessly, all but whispering to me "sorry about earlier, but you know if you switch back over to me in here I won't buffer or kick you to guide atm, and can you watch the last couple of hours in relative peace!". I finally gave in, and then repeated the same exact process earlier today before my trial ran out. Push come to shove, I just can't give that up regardless how frustrating it might be at times.

So anyway, for a final recommendation I'm going to basically split this into two camps. If you are the type that runs multiple IPTV subs at once and are going to have a backup, at $15 it's a BUY as one of those options. If you are the type that is only going to pay for one service at a time then it really boils down to that individual preference/need factor. When it works Vader is going to do everything better and offer more then something like Smoothstreams on Kodi, but it ultimately isn't going to give you that same "it's there and waiting even if it isn't as good" security level that SS would. I've also found that all of the free backup IPTV options that used to be decent have kinda fallen off lately, so the safety net factor for random/casual use isn't what it used to be either. Which all in all sums up to a YMMV and proceed with caution on that latter i guess.