Ever want to watch the big game but are caught away from hme and away from your TV? Well worry no more with the new SlingBox from Slingmedia http://www.slingmedia.com The Slingbox usually sells for about 249 CAN but I have seen it on sale (and picked my own up for 199.00).
How dows it work? You hook up your Slingbox to the device you wish (Cable, Satellite Dish Receiver, PVR or DVD player). In the box you will find a couple of the cables you need as well as the IR blaster that you attach over the IR port on the device to control it. For now I just have my box connected to a standard cable feed. You plug the device into your home network, load the software on a PC or laptop. Run the initial configuration and set up a free finder service account (necessary for Internet Connectivity) and away you go.
When you want to watch TV all you have to do is find an internet connection. Start the Slingplayer software select the device you want to watch, change the channel and soon you will have your TV streaming to you. Using their proprietary software and streaming codec, the Slingbox and player constantly adjust the quality to give you the best quaity streaming you can get based on your high speed connection.
There are two disadvantages that I have seen so far, only one person can connect to the Slingbox at a time, and if someone is watching the device they will have to watch what you watch (the exception being a basic cable feed as the Slingbox has it’s own built in tuner).
What can you do with the Slingbox? So far I have used mine around the house on my wireless laptop to watch TV in other locations in the house. I have connected from hotels in various cities and watched shows. Another cool little trick is that I have copied the Slingplayer software to an USB Key and have used that. Simply plug the key into an Internet connected pc, start the softwre connect and away you go. I recently did this at my parents place to watch a football game while there house is under renovations and they didn’t have a TV set up.
I recently saw someone using the new slingplayer for mobile devices watching a golf tournament from a club while his kids were doing their activities!
Sony offers their own package called location free TV but it is also 150.00 more but does allow multiple users to connect at the same time.
The Slingplayer is ideal for travellers and sports fan you want to watch local TV while they are away from home. I give it a big thumbs up!
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