TrulyObscure - article - gadgeteer - Slingbox Brings Your TV Anywhere

Posted by Greg May Nov 19, 04:41 PM to gadgeteer : -

We’ve done a fair bit of traveling: year-long trips to China, long vacations to far-flung exotic locales. And nearly every time, we end up missing our favorite shows, and often more important events- the Superbowl, election coverage, our friend’s appearances on commercials.

The good folks at Sling Media came up with a solution. As long as you have a decent internet connection on both ends, you can get your TV channels and content from your TiVo wherever you happen to be. This may not sound important, but if you are stuck at at the office without a television during your favorite show… or in a hostel during a fire or earthquake or other disaster that strikes your family… well, the Slingbox Solo can help.

It’s one of those things that you don’t know you need until you have it. The service is free, and you don’t need to worry about piracy fears, plus the Slingbox is easy to use and the software simple to install. That’s not to say that you won’t have issues- installation requires a bit of hassle, but only needs to be done once. The newer Solo model accepts HD inputs, but only through component and S-video and not through the increasingly-common HDMI input, and also downconverts the feed to standard definition. Of course, few devices have HDMI, and even fewer people have access the bandwidth that would make HD content streamable, but we like to keep an eye on the future.

The only other issue we had with the Slingbox was a lack of wi-fi. Of course, wireless-N hasn’t been finalized, and until then, it might be better to wait anyway (current wireless standards aren’t great for high-definition video streaming). If you have an earlier model, it might not yet be time to upgrade. But if you need to catch your TV on the run, Slingbox offers support for a variety of mobile platforms. Sadly, no native support for the iPhone yet, but Symbian, Windows Mobile, and Palm OS devices are all good to go, and the quality is decent (if a bit stuttery).

Make sure that you choose the model right for you- the Pro-HD offers more features, including a built-in tuner and true HD streaming, but the Slingbox Solo is about half the price ($140 versus $300). Either way, enjoy your television or personal video recorder wherever you are.