SSMEX

I stayed in 11914, which is the exact same room as 12916 but one floor down, back in Jan of this year. Can confirm that it has a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the boardwalk. I recently posted a picture of the view from that room in another thread if you're curious.

1 hour ago, sarahs06790 said:

Did you happen to have any pictures of the cabin/view from the cabin?

Here's the view from the room. The room is otherwise very standard.

1 hour ago, rockmom said:

@Ourusualbeach or anyone else--do we have any reports yet as to whether the cabins next to the new card room, old DL have windows. I see some on the current deckplan show as interior, but the ones just to either side of the card room say 'promendade view interior' category 2T  12918 is the one I was looking at, but 11916 shows the same.  

We were in 11914. Can confirm there's a floor to ceiling window with a view of the boardwalk. The main downside is that I think our room was smaller than then typical interior room. There was only enough room for a one-person armchair, versus a two-person sofa that I believe is standard.

1 hour ago, Host Clarea said:

 

Yep, that's one of the bad parts.  If you miss your reservation, then you have to use the standby line for antother performance.

True, strictly speaking, but guest services has always been willing to rebook me for another time (if it's available, of course).

1 minute ago, John&LaLa said:

 

Studio B on day 5 has the RED nightclub party.

 

BTW, does anyone here know why they named the ice rink venue Studio B?

Yes! That was what they called it. It was on day 7 on the Jan 5 sailing though.

We're only occasional cruisers but were on Caribbean Princess last year and just got off Oasis last week. Here are some differences that we care about:

1. Princess doesn't track pool towels. You can take as many as you want from a pile by the pool deck, or near the gangway when docked. It's a small thing, but it removes one hassle and is oddly exhilarating.
2. Speaking of towels, Princess doesn't do towel animals.
3. In the MDR, dessert is on a separate menu, delivered after the main course. Again, this is a small thing, but I frequently misjudge how much room I'll have after appetizers and entrees, so being able to decide later is a big plus.
4. Princess opens one MDR for an embarkation luncheon for all passengers.
5. Staterooms are unlocked on embarkation day, so you can go in and drop off your bags in your room while it's still being prepped. For us, this is the difference that lets us skip giving our bags to the porter altogether and not having to wait for them to be delivered.
6. Princess does an afternoon tea event in the MDR on sea days, involving tea and pastries.
7. We only got to watch One Sky and Cats on Oasis of the Seas and the Princess shows were vastly better. On Caribbean Princess, the flagship show was called Fantastic Journey and it was a pretty good show overall.
8. Room service is completely free, except for late night deliveries I think.
9. Princess offers a soda package that allows you to get almost all non-alcoholic drinks (e.g. pina coladas, etc) for something like $8/day. This same package is $30+ on RCCL, which significantly changes the calculus for occasional drinkers like us.

If this sounds like an RCCL bashing, in some ways it is, but at the end of the day, these are small things. We enjoyed the sheer volume of activities and entertainment on Oasis immensely, and those benefits can easily outweigh all of these nitpicks.

11 hours ago, CP3o said:

Does the hush party do anything like music changes depending on what part of the floor you are on?  

 

Any outdoor deck party dancing late at night or converting the ice rink into dance club?  Thanks.

I was on the Jan 5 sailing. There are two music channels, which you select using the same switch you use to turn it on/off. The headphones change color between green and blue depending on which channel you're on. AFAIK, the two channels are not synced in any way in terms of beat, so you'll get people dancing to two different songs.

No outdoor deck party late at night, other than in the solarium. Studio B does convert into a dance club, but I think that was only on the last night during an event. Other nights, Studio B is used for the ice show, laser tag, or some other game shows. 

10 hours ago, twangster said:

 

Every other ship made it in safely.  Oasis reversed in just fine and we have much more side to act as a sail.  

 

Not to be that person, and of course this depends on a million other factors, but all else being equal, a larger ship like Oasis is actually less prone to wind forces than a smaller ship. It all has to do with the scaling of surface area vs volume.

Imagine two cubes, one 2 ft on each edge, and the other 3 ft on each edge. The smaller cube has a volume of 8 cubic feet and a maximum surface area of 4 square feet exposed to the wind. The larger cube has a volume of 27 cubic feet, but only a maximum of 9 square feet exposed to the wind. Thus the larger cube has much more area to act as a sail, but a proportionally even larger amount of volume. Assuming cubes/ships are of similar density, this means that the larger cube/ship experiences less acceleration due to wind.

5 hours ago, jgoodm said:

It does try to lock you out of the HDMI ports but if you mess around in the settings area enough (with your third party remote), there is an option a few levels deep that allows you to manually select another source.  I will see if I can find the exact path but so far I have stumbled across it each time.  Also, it does mess up the TV if you try to switch back to the RCI channels.  You have to pull the plug on the TV and disconnect the network cable for a couple of minutes to reset the system.

I'd be very interested in seeing the exact path!

6 hours ago, RG306 said:

Were you able to UDP for lunch on embarkation?

 

Would like to know this as well. Additionally, is Hibachi included in the UDP? I've always read that it, Chef's Table, and other experiences weren't.

17 hours ago, KansCocoa said:

We are usually so stuffed from our appetizers and entree, that we routinely ask for our dessert to go - it’s delicious later at night in our cabin! 🙂

How is dessert to go packaged?

On 6/18/2019 at 5:41 AM, Host Clarea said:

 

No specifics from the cruise line yet.

On 6/18/2019 at 5:36 AM, Tee & Chilli said:

Is Wonderland being added?

According to this link, it's not:

http://creative.rccl.com/Sales/Royal/Oasis/19067356_OA_Amplified_Trade_Flyer.pdf

Thanks for the feedback everyone! Oasis is actually going into dry dock this November and is getting Playmaker's and the Abyss slide, so I've been looking at images from Symphony to get a sense of the sight lines and what's visible. It looks like that from 7321, the awning of Playmaker's and the cover of Abyss do obstruct a large part of the boardwalk, but at least there is a view of the Aqua Theater and there's definitely daylight, so that's a big plus. 

I've been looking at a cruise on Oasis of the Seas for January 2020 and there appeared to be some phantom availability for Promenade View Interiors, where it showed up as an option when selecting the room but no rooms were available. After repeatedly checking over a few days, I managed to snag room 7321.

I normally would not care for a view of the promenade, but according to deck plans, there are eight rooms on Deck 7 of every Oasis-class ship that overlook the boardwalk (and are below Boardwalk View Balcony cabins). They're located directly above where Johnny Rockets or Playmakers are, on either side. Oddly, these are sold as Promenade View cabins, but they definitely don't have a view of the promenade.

If anyone has experienced one of these cabins, I have a few questions:

• Does the room get a meaningful amount of daylight?
• Is the view of the boardwalk interesting enough to justify a small premium over a windowless room? Any overall impressions of this room specifically?
• What does the window area of the room look like from the interior? Typical Promenade View cabins have a large bay window with built-in seating but based on photos of the boardwalk, these windows are round porthole-style.

If anyone has any pictures of these cabins, that would be extremely helpful. Thanks!

Good to know. Thanks.

My movie device also has an ethernet output but I'll pick up a A/B switch so I don't have crawl behind the set to change cables.

I'm almost certain this won't work. I did a lot more digging and discovered that these new TVs connect to the set top box or server through a protocol called b-LAN, which is why you only see an Ethernet cable coming out of the TV. The TV themselves have a built in set top box-like device (which you control with the Princess remote), and receives video over IP. Some of these TVs still have an external set-top box, though, but they still connect upstream via Ethernet, so it's functionally the same.

The simplified version of what I'm trying to explain is that a cable either carries video (e.g. HDMI) or data (e.g. USB or Ethernet). All laptops, iPads, DVD players, etc. only output a video signal (if your device has ethernet, that's likely so it can connect to the internet). The OceanView TVs have their own set top box built in, and the Ethernet connection is for them to receive data from the on-ship intranet—it's not a video input and no passenger device will work with it.

In the past trips on the Royal, I replaced their HDMI input with my cable & didn't have to worry about changing the TV's input with the remote.

Although this worked OK, it was a real hassle having to constantly change cables back & forth.

pablo222 suggested using a directional switch which he found works well.

See below

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showpost.php?p=57077515&postcount=5

The new OceanView TVs on Caribbean Princess don't have an existing HDMI cable attached to them, only an ethernet cable between the set top box and the TV.

Thank You SO much SSMEX for the detailed instructions!!

Did you have to remove the white cover first? (pic in link below)

 

https://www.snapfish.com/photo-gift/share?via=link&token=2gWs9cGgPwKLsC2vV6etqQ/SFO/27948145168060/SNAPFISH

Oh gosh that's a different TV that what we had. I bet the same or a similar procedure works though. The idea is that you need to plug directly into one of the HDMI ports on the TV (it may be behind that white box, or on the other side of the TV) and change the output using the on-TV controller, as the remote provided doesn't allow for input switching. The trick that I figured out, at least on our TV, is that you need to switch to a live TV channel on the Princess box before you can switch to your own input.

Let us know how it goes!

Thanks from me, too. But this won’t help me with video I have downloaded to my iPad, correct?

You can buy a Lightning to HDMI adapter. AFAIK, all modern iPads have full 1080p HDMI output, and since the connection is fully digital to the TV, you shouldn't have issues with HDCP.

Enjoying your review! Is there a charge to ride the chairlift to the beach at Mahogany Bay?

It’s $5.

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It's the Log of the Cruise, and everyone gets one on the last day, instead of a Patter (you get it the night before). If you didn't see it, probably someone on your Roll Call still has it.

I'm back from my roll call and have found out that at least on the Caribbean Princess, the log is no longer provided, as confirmed by someone still on the ship who asked the HGM.

 

And add 'the log of the voyage' received towards the end of the cruise.

 

Not to hijack this thread, but I just got off a sailing and this was one of the things in the back of my mind to get but of course forgot to. I can't seem to find any mention of this anywhere on the internet. Does anyone know what it's officially called? I might ask my roll call to see if someone snatched one. Thanks!

For those of you that have done the a Stingray City Excursion, about how many people were on your boat? Did you enjoy it? Pros and Cons, thank you!

I took a cursory look around last week and just as a data point, Moby Dick and Acquarius were decent, Anchor tours was unbelievably packed, and Red Sail was amazingly empty.

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what would you use that for?

 

was your room one of the ***** rooms

 

what kind of internet plan did you have?

I'm not a fan of MUTS (low audio and visual quality + too humid outside), and the selection from Princess on demand is limited. I have an ever-growing queue of movies I want to watch so this is the perfect way to watch them on a cruise.

***** was only on Lido deck for our sailing.

We didn't get internet. Unplugging for the week was fantastic, but if you needed it, it's $10 per device per day, or free for some elite tiers I think.

While your kluge may work, there may be a potential problem w it. What happens if the changes you make stick. That means that when the new person on the cruise comes into your cabin, the TV will not work properly. This will create a real workload for cruise staff who have to set the TVs back to their proper settings.

No chance of this. Everything resets itself after you turn the TV off.

Just got off the Aug 11 sailing on the Caribbean Princess to the western Caribbean. Will likely write up a complete review later, but for reference, it is possible to connect your HDMI device to the new TVs that are part of OceanView/Ocean Medallion on Caribbean Princess. Our room had new 4K LG TVs that were roughly 40-45 inches.

The procedure is a bit tricky and unintuitive, but here is the procedure:

• Connect your HDMI device to the HDMI port on the left side of the TV. Use the open HDMI above the ethernet port that the OceanView box uses.
  
• Using the remote, launch one of the live TV channels. The bridge camera or the ship information channel usually work, but you may have to try one of the live TV channels (e.g. MSNBC).
  
• Reach under the middle of the TV to find the on-TV directional jogger. Press in once to open the circular four-way menu, then toggle left and select the input selector. A menu will open on the right side of the TV. There should be a red dot next to "Live TV" (if the dot is next to HDMI, you didn't do step two correctly). Toggle down to HDMI and select it. This should successfully switch the input to your HDMI device.
  

Audio carries over HDMI like it should, but do note that at least on our TV, the edge calibration was a little off and I lost about 2% of the edges.

Let me know if you have any questions about this or anything else on the Caribbean Princess.

Full ship wide? I hope so!

 

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Definitely not. We’re on Emerald deck and we didn’t get any medallions. The sensors are everywhere though.

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