I repeat: BUY A SLINGBOX. DO IT NOW. Why are you still reading this? What part of DO IT NOW did you not understand? Get up, get into your car, bus, motorscooter, Goped(tm) or whatever mode of transportation you use, get down to BestBuy, and BUY A SLINGBOX. If you know me, and you trust me, go out and get one. Do it and do it now. I command thee, my Internet minions!
WHAT IS A SLINGBOX
It’s a device tat allows you to watch your actual home TV connection over the Internet.
The photo on this page is an actual shot of my "TiVo" software controller that shows on my PC to "remotely control" the video image coming from my home TV connection to my work computer – all over the Internet.
The Slingbox is essentially a device that hooks up to your home DSL/Cable network, your TV’s cable connection or your DirecTV connection, and allows you to watch a live stream of the video coming from it, while providing 100% full control over the "remote" over the Internet. Yes, you can change channels. Yes, you watch view pre-recorded content on your TiVo or Windows XP Media Center Edition system. Yes, you can command your system to "record" a show.
It took me 10 minutes to hook it up to my first TV with the following:
- DirecTV
- TiVo
- Microsoft Wireless Router
… it connected to my Wireless Router, opened up a port for outbound access, and was already configured to send signals to my TiVo to allow me to remotely control it from anywhere on the Internet.
WATCH FROM YOUR WINDOWS MOBILE PHONE
Here’s the crazy part: It also allows you to watch your TV from your Windows Mobile Pocket PC Phone for FREE until September 16th. The software installs on your Pocket PC Phone (including the Treo 700w as well) and lets you watch TV live over a 150kbps connection. After that you’ll have to pay $30 for the software.
WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH MICROSOFT
Why gosh, I’m glad you asked!
- Slingbox broadcasts only to Windows XP-based computers currently..
- Slingbox broadcasts only to Windows Mobile-based Pocket PC Phones & Smartphones.
- Slingbox broadcasts using Windows Media Video 9 (.WMV) codec.
CAVEATS
- OUTBOUND BANDWIDTH: The one thing I think that I’d recommend is having at least 256kbps upstream Internet connection. (I have a 3.0Mbps/768kbps connection so that’s not a problem for me) While it’s supposed to kinda work over a 128kbps connection according to some boards, I don’t know how well it would work in reality.
- VERIZON EvDO: I’ve been reading horror stories over people that are getting their data network contracts terminated over the use of Slingbox because of the bandwidth it consumes. Read the link and be careful.
- TCP PORT: This seems to use TCP port 5001. Some folks may want to use… oh I don’t know… port 80 for some strange reason <ahemfirewallsahem> and might need to tweak the Slingbox to do that. Fortunately the nice people at SlingMedia have provided documentation to do this.
DETAILED EXPLANATION
I can’t do it better than these guys. Read this if you want the details and screenshots. Better yet, just go get one. It’s only $199 and it’s probably the first device I’ve ever purchased that was cooler than my XBox 360, my Pocket PC Phone, and my HD-TiVo + Windows XP Media Center Edition combo… all COMBINED.
Kurt Shintaku's Blog 