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Hustler Review

Fri, 29 Oct 2010 06:14:07 PDT

Hustler (2)

10-29-10 06:14am

REVIEW = 67 by RustyJ (116)

Pros:
-Quite large collection of Hustler's DVD's available for download
-Streaming is clearly taken care of. Scenes have up to 12 different choices of video format and bitrate available which is clearly excessive
-Photography is very professional in the picture sets taken from Hustler's magazines
-Some old DVD's are really good content wise, for example those directed by Pierre Woodman during his Hustler days
-No download limits
-No DRM anymore
-Decent download speeds even overseas

Cons:
-Some scenes not downloadable with no explanation
-Many DVD's have only few scenes available even though the DVD is listed as released on the site. Sometimes scenes appear later but as there is no clear update calendar, it's hard to tell when
-Photosets are small and not downloadable as zip files. To furtheer complicate the matter, all the images are behind two clicks from the thumbnail gallery view and all images within a set have the same name forcing you to manually rename them if you want to save them on your HD. Photos older than few years are small messy scans
-Where is the rest of the magazine content? That's the first think one'd expect when joining Hustler site
-Video quality ranges from mediocre to poor. The later pseudo HD scenes have blocky compression artifacts although some are actually decent
-Some scenes are only downloadable at lower quality compared to stream
-Models are mostly average looking with some bigger stars in between

Bottom Line:
Cons continued:

-Slow update rate compared to other, cheaper DVD sites
-Scenes lack contrast, are poorly lit, not crisp etc.
-Regional pricing. They try to charge you more just because you are outside US. There's a workaround for that but then you lose your TBP special price
-They try to trick you into buying something you did not ask for. It's quite sneaky actually that there is a pre checked sale for another sites trial that is quite cheap so you wont probably notice it at the checkout but it rebills after few days at full price
-No real subsites despite the advertising. The "sites" are just scene categories
-Wmv as the only download format. Limiting what can be used to view the clips

I had high hopes despite the reviews, when joining Hustler's site. After all, Larry Flynt and Hustler are like #1 hard porn company in the world, quite the same as Playboy is to the softcore. However the site was a big disappointment to me.

Everyone's probably seen a Hustler DVD or two and knows that they are your run of the mill generic American porn (nothing wrong with that) with some parody thrown in between. They also have a long backlog with more interesting stuff (Woodman etc.) I was interested to see. However, all but the latest DVD's are ruined by miseraable presentation. When browsing deeper into the past DVD's you soon find yourself staring at a grainy video aize of a postage stamp. Come on Larry and guys, you have the DVD's! Hire some kid to re-rip them into something viewable. Generally I'd say that the older material seems better here also but I cannot really enjoy it in that form.

Same applies to photos. The photography is good but the presentation fails after few last years. They've obviously made it nearly impossible to download them on purpose.

Downloading is another issue. There is no full DVD download but you can only download individual scenes. Sometimes you cannot download the scenes at all with no explanation but they have the nerve to give you a link to buy that DVD (for example the Avatar parody I read they are sueing people over the net for pirating). WTF? Didn't I join the site to not have to buy them? Sometimes you can download only lower quality cleap even though the streaming version is available with better image.

That brings me to the "HD" content. Some of the newer scenes are available in 720p format that is quite ok but from time to time you feel like you are watchin lego porn when some freaky, blocky compression artifacts take the resolution away. Could these be just DVD resolution that's been upscaled?

Take my review again with a grain of salt. I found I do not like Hustler DVD's. They seem too basic and cheaply produced. Scenes are poorly lit, low in saturation and blurry. I don't know the word but they are the opposite of crisp and vibrant.

NOT recommended as it is. If they fixed the download issues and brought the existing content to a good DVD quality level, it wouldn't be half bad site.

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Hustler Review

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:51:13 PST

Hustler (2)

02-18-10 08:51pm

REVIEW = 84 by slutty (92)

Pros:
-Huge archive of videos
-Many videos actually have stories, albeit most are pretty stupid, it is nice to see this amongst all the drop your pants and fuck kind of sites.
-Many attractive women
-Pretty good download speeds, although somewhat variable given time of day (1MB/sec max, 700KB/sec average)
-Download managers work
-Pictures are pretty decent quality, newer photos are about 1500x1000
-No DRM anymore
-Access to barelylegal.com as well, although a lot of the content on barelylegal is also on Hustler.
-Good quality photography and videography
-Good price with TBP discount

Cons:
-Navigation is mediocre. You can sort by star, dvd title, and other things, but with an archive this large it would be nice to have more sorting options and a search ability.
-Navigating for photosets is particularly annoying, very difficult to just browse.
-Video quality is mediocre to poor. The best I downloaded was 640x360 1700kbps. They even commically call some of the videos of this ilk "HD".
-Video quality for older DVDs is poor, as low as 700kbps in highest quality.
-No zips for photosets
-While download managers work, they can be a bit glitchy as the path to files change, so you can only really queue up a few files
-Some videos aren't available for download, most are, it seemed like most of the videos that couldn't be downloaded were newer additions
-Some videos were a bit glitchy - 2 scenes in one, the ending missing, etc.

Bottom Line:
I think this site gets somewhat of a bad rap, as historically it was a horrible site with streaming only options and terrible navigation. I think it is much better now than it was in the past (even though the only change I noticed was getting rid of DRM). Maybe I just have a soft spot for Hustler since the first DVDs I ever bought were Barely Legal DVDs.

If they improved the video quality, added some better navigation, and provided zip downloads of photosets this would probably be one of my highest rated sites.

The archive is quite large, 830 DVDs on Hustler, and 346 on barelylegal. Even with some overlap, that is a nice sized archive.

I particularly enjoy the style of many of Hustler's videos and enjoy that many of them have a story - which seems less and less common these days. They appear to also have a large magazine archive, although I didn't have the patience to sort through it.

I would definitely recommend the site for a month, especially for $20/month. Even with the mediocre video quality, I still enjoy a lot of the scenes I downloaded here more than HD content on other sites. I'd be surprised if anyone couldn't find some material they like on this site. However, if you are a fan of photos, this probably isn't the best site to join.

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Hustler Review

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:57:12 PDT

Hustler (2)

08-24-09 02:57pm

REVIEW = 50 by Nick Nxn (4)

Pros:
Great Content.
Some Exclusive Content.
Navigation was decent.

Cons:
Slow download speeds.
Poor customer service.
Downloads didn't work 80% of the time.

Bottom Line:
The downloads on this site were slow, and for the most part JUST DIDN'T WORK. It would take 40 minutes to download a video if I was lucky enough for it to finish. Most downloads would get to 90% and just stop. I submitted 3 complaints, but never received a response. I had the 3 month membership and managed to save a total of 26 scenes. Maybe there was something wrong with the settings on my computer, but they never bothered to help me find out. I have several other memberships and never have a problem. I was very disappointed, because if the downloads would have worked (like Videobox) I would probably still be a member.

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Hustler Review

Sat, 24 Jan 2009 16:57:02 PST

Hustler (2)

01-24-09 04:57pm

REVIEW = 70 by TrashMan (103)

Pros:
+Site interface has been improved over time
+Higher availability of studio movies than other studios make available on their sites (e.g. Vivid, DevilsFilm, etc.)
+Multiple formats, WMV, RM and QT (Quicktime is actually just MPG with the QT player)
+Three qualities, low, med and high (128, 384 and 768kbps)
+Videos provide download links, but...(see cons)
+Includes images sets from Hustler magazine issues, including centerfolds.
+$15/mo promo for Dvdbox, although TBP gives you this too
+Bonus Hustler3D game - based on Thrixxx's Jenna Jameson game
+Update schedule decent, but... (see cons)
+Newer movies list entire cast but...(see cons)
+Pornstar list, but...(see cons)
+List of all movies SERIES available (key word: series). They do a darn good job of adding all the movies to a certain series. Yes, they do miss one here and there, but they do a better job of SERIES completion than VideoBox or the sort.
+Movies are categorized by type as well

Cons:
-Downloads do not work with download managers
-Downloads have DRM
-They disable right-click in certain areas of the page.
-Image sets not available as ZIPs
-No updates for 2009 yet. Last movie update was Dec 26.
-A lot of the older movies do not have cast lists
-Pornstar list is just that, a list. No headshot gallery or anything, no letter-by-letter list.
-Updates page only go back a month or two at most.
-Only 14 movies added per month - compare against 150 for videobox, 180 for videosz, etc. However that number will be going down for a bit as there have been no updates for 2009 yet.
-The newer movies label the scenes with the girl names, but the majority of the content (because it was added long ago) is not labeled, rather with a generic scene title - meaning you have to stream every scene to find the one you want.
-Newer movies have HQ at 720x480, but older movies, which make up most of the content, have HQ at 320x240, same as med quality.
-No preview images for ANY movie or scene

Bottom Line:
Overall it is an OK site. I put it on the same level as Ten.com (a site I reviewed previously). It feels the same, but that is just my opinion. However Ten.com is better in the sense that they remastered their ENTIRE archive and removed DRM. It is a joke that there are still sites out there which use DRM, and Hustler is one of them.

Now, it is important to point out that the downloads are the only thing with DRM. The streams are not DRM - mind you that RM and MPG (the Quicktime option is straight up MPG) can't be DRM'd - so thats good. But what really irks me is that they are HIDING the non-DRM WMV downloads. The download links for the DRM WMV's are something like (these aren't actual links, just a generic example to make a point):
www.hustler.com/drm/movie.wmv
And if you just change the link to
www.hustler.com/wmv/movie.wmv
you get the non-DRM WMV.

I can't stand when sites blatantly hide content from the users. DRM is an abomination, and porn sites which used to use it have removed it (e.g. VideosZ, Ten.com, etc.). Hustler continues to use it while hiding the real goods without DRM. So where you have sites like Ten.com which went out of their way to remaster their content and remove the DRM, Hustler does not have to do any work but make their non-DRM content available to users. Just takes a few clicks of the mouse, no extra encoding (or de-DRM'ing) required.
I was ready to give this site an 80, but I docked 10 points for the DRM and for hiding the non-DRM content.

Some of the other major rating decreases come from:
*Lack of update history - yes, you can see the last 1-2 months of updates but if you don't visit the site for more than 2 months you are shit outta luck.
*The older movies, which make up the majority of the content, have no cast list, do not label the scenes with the girl names, and have no preview images (no movies have preview images for that matter), so you have to use other sites like IAFD to determine what movie and what scene you are looking for. This is unacceptable for a DVD site.
*Image sets not available as ZIPs.

The regular price is $35/mo, but the TBP price is $20/mo. $20 is still rather expensive, especially for a site continuing to use DRM. Must miss? Eh, no other site leases Hustler content, so in essence, no. Just be aware of what you are getting when you sign up...DRM'd, low quality downloads.

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Hustler Review

Tue, 09 Oct 2007 13:39:45 PDT

Hustler (2)

10-09-07 01:39pm

REVIEW = 65 by Denner (227)

Pros:
Large amount of centent
Nice/swell US and european models
Good 3-days trial price

Cons:
Average/poor quality for videos
DRM for the best quality videos
Strange navigation
Hopeless way of watching and downloading videos.
Photos in average/low solution
No zip (could not find it, anyway)

Bottom Line:
This is a strange site.
Hustler is a wellknown name even for us europeans and Larry Flint too.
Still I do not understand why a coorporation this size make such a poor web-site - compared to content amount and other qualities. (well, and again I do - like Playboy and Penthouse sites that never seems to be able to hit the top, it's still strange).
I go for videos - and it takes almost a day or two to get to know the strange way of viewing and especially downloading videos - and there's no preview, apart from a small thumbnail of the front-cover. You have to "preview-stream" first to find the scenes you MAY like.
I found a way to download some videos in "the best quality". But when I opened the videos, the quality were miles away from what is just average for newer clips.
The streams are certainly not better.
The content - models, sex-scenes and what not -is generally not better than the average videos at VideoBox - just worse in quality.
I gave up trying to download photos...
Well, there might be a lot of extras here like Hustler Humor, Hustler Mobile, Live chat and so on, but that's not my kind of game (site)

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Hustler Review

Sat, 23 Jun 2007 10:21:24 PDT

Hustler (2)

06-23-07 10:21am

REVIEW = 85 by DigglerFL (17)

Pros:
- Tons of Content
- Hot Girls, and not the same ones over and over
- Entire Barely Legal Library

Cons:
- Search could be better. When searching for a girl it only returns the video and you won't know which scene she is in
- no previews or clips
- not many updates
- quality is only medium
- downloads are medium speed
- can't sort videos so browsing can be tedious
- downloads have DRM if you use the provided download links

Bottom Line:
IMO, Barely Legal is the best porn series ever devised, so most of my points are for access to the 250+ scenes in this series. I also have a tool which allows me to save them without the DRM, so if you dont' have one of those then you might be disappointed. There's about 4 updates a week, thats 4 full videos so 16-20 scenes, but Barely legal updates are only about 1 per month, if that. Quality is watchable but not what you'd hope for from a site in 2007. Searching can be a pain, and there are no previews so you have to start watching each scene to see if its of interest. It could be a lot better, but the content is excellent. Mr Beaver is a hoot.

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Hustler Review

Sun, 20 May 2007 10:26:37 PDT

Hustler (2)

05-20-07 10:26am

REVIEW = 80 by exotics4me (431)

Pros:
- Ah the memories of opening my first Hustler!
- I'm downloading the clips from the site, someone else mentioned this and how TBP lists the videos as streaming or in browser only.
- Some of the best models in the world on here!
- Tons of pictures available
- 3 Updates per week
- Cheaper than renting them!

Cons:
- Higher prices than most sites, especially considering the smaller library when compared to videobox, vixeo, pornstarxs.
- I am almost positive that I joined this site last year for $9.95, now it is $34.95. Maybe the trade off is being able to keep the videos?
- Too many anal movies

Bottom Line:
I like the way Hustler has pushed the envelope over the years and for once, actually mean it when I say that when it was magazines instead of online, I really did read the articles and jokes!

The videos are downloading just fine for me, and the majority are of average quality. I'm really thinking the raise in price and not great quality is because they are letting us download and keep the videos.

The preview section of the site is another great one, as it lets you see how the site works, navigation on here is top-notch. I really like the site, but it isn't going to be one that I visit often. Even with 3 updates per week, I can download a full DVD in probably 15-20 minutes, so it isn't worth much more than a join, download everything you want, come back 6 months later.

The big question for me is, is the site worth that high price? Yes, if it is your first time joining it. Upwards of 200 full DVDs from Hustler would cost thousands of dollars to buy. After that, I don't think it would be worth anything more than stopping by once a year.

I'm not really into anal, they have loads of anal, nearly every scene ends in anal and they have full series' with the word anal in the title. This would be another negative for me when considering joining. I've heard a lot of the porn models these days are more into the anal than vaginal because it pays more.

Bottom line, if you haven't been a member, I recommend it for one month, otherwise, can't say I recommend it.

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Hustler Review

Wed, 14 Mar 2007 18:35:03 PDT

Hustler (2)

03-14-07 06:35pm

REVIEW = 86 by Woodruff (37)

Pros:
* Excellent videos such as Barely Legal series
* Array of video options (format, bandwidth) - and I'm not sure TBP's claim of DRM is correct
* Pretty good choice of contract girls (Memphis Monroe, Joey Hart, etc) - even though I disapprove of contract girls on principle :)
* Bunch of content beside videos - I haven't really gone through the other stuff

Cons:
* Each movie's scenes are not necessarily labeled for which girl is in which scene
* No explicit download option - although it's easy to download
* Must download whole scenes - no partial clips
* Search engine by girl/title/etc is not always accurate - sometimes misses scenes or generates false results

Bottom Line:
Hustler has some great video content - in addition to the magazine and other stuff I haven't checked out much. Movies like the Barely Legal series are awesome. The only problem is that, like other [non-Internet] production company sites, they just stick the movies up there, so it's not as flexible and easy to navigate as the Internet-focused networks.

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