Slingbox Personal Broadcaster

[spike5884]

Just found an interesting piece of hardware called the Slingbox. In a nutshell, it allows you to watch TV on any computer attached to your network. They even created a new buzz word to go with it called "placeshifting".
CompUSA is selling it for $249.99.

[mikejaner]

Yeah, it's a pretty neat idea, but there's a drawback with this product. You have to install the Slingbox software on whatever machine you are going to watch the stream on. They use a proprietary video format, which supposedly looks good though. I guess if you have a laptop, and want to watch a show which SageTV recorded, then you could take advantage of it without too much trouble.

[DynamoBen]

The claim is that you can watch TV anywhere in the world as long as you have a high-speed internet connection. It’s a bit pricey at $250 but thought it was interesting.

http://www.slingmedia.com/

[ozfiles]

It would be nice if the slingbox software could be incorporated into or as an add on to sage.
I'm overseas but I have a subscribtion to http://www.a2btv.com/ and stream directv channels to my htpc.
If the slingbox was incorporated into sagetv then I could put the channels into my epg and select them from there without even leaving sage.
Maybe something for the future.

[JUC]

why can't you just record your shows on your sage server at home then use the placeshifter to view them overseas? Isn't that the same thing?
Juc

[ozfiles]

Juc, that would work if I had a private U.S residence with a sage server but this is a service that streams the directv service using a slingbox setup.
So if I want to watch my U.S stations, I have to leave sage and fire up the slingbox software. It would be great if all my content was on the one application.

Oz

[mattdcknsn]

My boss has one of these at home. I have seen the video streamed to another location. It looks good, but in the end its just placeshifter. It has to be plugged into his source (analog cable), and it works just like a very limited sage server. I dont think the one he has includes any recording functionality, it just re-broadcasts live TV.

[sainswor99]

I think what ozfiles wants is the ability to subscribe to the service that he already has, and use SageTV to control that information. The service is built using Slingbox, but it might be an interesting partnership to see if their broadcasts can be ported to placeshifter.

I wonder how they're handling the re-broadcast legality issues....

Stu

[ozfiles]

Stu, I think it's a bit of a grey area in regards to the re-broadcasting of the content.
When you sign up for the service you actually buy the slingbox and the directv subscription is in your name. So the way I understand it, is it is your subscribtion and you are only placeshifting the content to your location.
Certainly makes the world a lot smaller.

[jdamore]

You can also use the slingbox to stream to your pocket pc which is very nice for those times your out and very bored. This solution is a little to expensive for me with the added cost for the pocket pc s/w.. but has a great "wow" factor.