I opened an account with Twin Spires about a month ago, not because I wanted to but because I had to.
I reluctantly closed my account with Youbet which is slowly being choked to death in the ADW wars. The last straw for me was when I couldn't bet on Gulfstream on Youbet anymore.
In my opinion, Twin Spires' user software isn't any better than other ADW accounts I had have. Yes, you get free PPS and navigating through multiple programs isn't that complicated but viewing your betting history and current account balance always requires navigating away from the program screens and in short is a pain the ass. The results display is barebones with only the number of top finishers displayed, so once again you have to navigate back to the program pages to figure out what happened.
The wagering screens on my other ADW account, Philly Park's Phonebet which I have used for 12 years, while primitive always displays your last account balance without navigating away from the main screen, maybe Twin Spires should take a look at that.
And of course just before the running of the Donn Handicap today, Twin Spires multimillion dollar network of high-end servers couldn't handle the volume of betting and crashed. This was the second crash on a Saturday afternoon in the month since I opened the account.
Now if the handle on the Donn and maybe the Bob Lewis at Santa Anita is going to cause their servers to go down, what can I hope for on Derby Day???
Not much would be the answer to that question.
They were down for about fifteen minutes, luckily I left my Phonebet account open and I was able to get my wagers in, that was fortunate for me (I had Spring At Last in the Donn).
I will definitely be keeping my Phonebet account open, it's obvious Twin Spires still does not have their technical act together yet.
A horse racing blog written by an overly enthusiastic fan whose mantra is alternative content.
Saturday, February 02, 2008
Twin Spires Disappoints Again
Posted by John at Saturday, February 02, 2008
Labels: Twin Spires
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4 comments:
I'm 100% with you...it crashed just before the Donn (and Robert B. Lewis) so I didn't get a bet in for either race (which, actually, was probably for the best). Their interface is dull, lacks basic info (like pedigree) and doesn't always update with jock changes, etc. I'm not terribly impressed thus far...
On the other hand, I was moved to TwinSpires from WinTicket when they merged. I'm used to the layout of the screens and the way the software works. Certainly navigation could be improved.
If you want to keep your wagering screen up while going somewhere else, right click the link on put it in a new tab. Most browsers support tabs.
I've not experienced the server outages, but then I haven't been betting all that much on Saturday afternoons. That was never an issue with WinTicket/Americatab though.
For the most part, I've been pleased with the service and like the free BrisNet PPs.
Thanks for the suggestion Neal, I will try it.
And Valerie I anxiously await your assessment.
To me there seems to be a lot of "real estate" on Twin Spires screens that could be utilized much better without having to navigate away or open another browser window. If TS wants to be the industry standard, they should do better.
I think the free race replays at TwinSpires are pretty nifty too.
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