Another way to watch TV: SlingBox
The first time I happened to read about SlingBox about a year ago. The idea of taking the TV with me to any point where there is Internet, seemed to me very tempting at once, but alas, for me the lack of support for anything other than the most popular OS, all practical value of this device nullified me. And a couple of months ago, it happened! Quite by chance I read, it seems on digg.com, about leaving the program of work with the sling for poppy. And spun;) But I'll start in order
I will not hide, I sometimes watch TV. Leaving the scope of the discussion, is there anything to look at, and to what extent does the scan destroy the brain, I would venture to repeat again - yes, I look at it. And at the same time, I sit at the computer for a long time. Firstly, like your own means of production, and secondly, like your entertainment center, information and other joys. I think this moment is quite understandable and in this aspect I am not particularly different from the majority of “computer dependent geeks”.
')
Obvious, at first glance, the idea to shove a TV into a computer, oddly enough, does not have an equally obvious solution. Of course, I know about TV tuners for a computer, and in different periods I tried both external and embedded ones. I have 2 claims to this decision, but both are quite serious. Firstly, this is clearly some kind of not elegant way. Agree, pull the analog cable through the whole house, then twist it into the tuner, tuning all these channels is rather a chore. Although of course, it is a working decision. But with the management of this economy complete trouble. All the tuners that came across to me assumed that we had another 20th century in the yard, and considered it normal and sufficient to give me the opportunity to switch channels from the console or directly from the program, but the channels are essential, well, in the advanced case of HDTV channels. But also essential. I don’t know what the producers were thinking about, and who they were targeting, but around me, in the market of the North American United States, which is visible to them and is one or even the most attractive, a significant part of the TV viewers do not watch TV. I will assume that the target group for all these devices is people who love to watch TV, who do this sensibly, feeling and arrangement. And these have been receiving the coveted signal for quite some time from some additional devices, from cable / satellite receivers controlled by a completely different way and physically using another remote control. There is also a third reason - often rather dubious signal quality. Perhaps this is some kind of my local specifics related to the fact that I did not connect the cable in the same way, or they were too long and of poor quality, but this again confirms my claim # 1. Not elegantly somehow that's all.
The idea of distributing a TV to a laptop in some more correct way is not new, and of course it asks. I even tried to build something similar by connecting one computer to a TV, capturing a signal there and sending it over a local network to another machine. That's the slingbox just about that. A small, silent device connects to a signal source, captures a picture / sound, compresses the case and sends it to a computer over the network. Theoretically, both local and global. Those. It is assumed that in any place where there is a fairly fast Internet, you can have a TV in your computer. And of course, for remote viewing you need the appropriate program, expectedly called SlingPlayer. In general, this and all that can be said about the monitored device in 2 words. Approximately as much information is presented in the accompanying manual and on the manufacturer's website. Of course, I am exaggerating, there is still quite obvious information about connecting wires and pressing the Next buttons in the installer. But according to the style of presentation and presentation of the material, it is clear that this is all oriented to the audience of “housewives” who deal with microwaves and coffee makers.
Of course, I speak my opinion after becoming acquainted with the product and using it for about a month. He sells here everywhere. In all large networks selling electronics, finding a slingbox is easy. He lies there modestly, does not cause panic in demand, and the staff can say little about him. In general, a strange exotic, in the opinion of an ordinary consumer of TV products. But back to the very device. Bright and catchy red packaging hides a very nondescript device, made of some dull plastic, creaking and bending in hands and giving a very full impression of a typical device made by Chinese craftsmen. In short, to proudly put it under / on the TV I didn’t have a desire, but on the other hand the desire to hide it away and realized was realized, out of sight. From a television connection point of view, everything is almost fine. There are inputs (and outputs) for all types of analog TV signals, and there is even an HDMI input into which, as it turned out, the HDMI cable cannot be plugged in. However, HDTV support is proudly announced, although right out of the box it does not work. In order to introduce a signal into the HDTV sling, you need to purchase an additional adapter, to the input of which you are sending a component signal, and connect the output to the HDMI input on the box.
In addition to the physical connection to TV sources, you need to befriend this box with your network. There is only one option - wired connection. No WiFi is not here, unlike for example AppleTV.
After all the wires are stuck where necessary, the process of setting the player on your computer begins. In the simple case, if you have one local network, and DHCP distribution of addresses, everything is on its own and is configured in 2 minutes. Otherwise, you will have to suffer. Especially if your computer is connected to several networks at once. In this case, the connection turns into a rather tricky dance with a tambourine, which of course does not frighten an advanced user, but still make you strain your brain.
After all behind it is a pleasure to use the sling. A very nice player works almost well. Almost, because when it closes, it hangs from time to time. But I think this is the specificity of the purely Mac version and the mass user on other OS will not face this problem. By the way, there is a version for PocketPC, so apparently you can watch TV and on your pocket. I did not try it, but in the forums I read that it works for someone.
The control is carried out either by the remote (software) or by the buttons "favorite channels" and "favorite actions". In the process of setting up, sligplayer will ask you what you are watching TV through, and will set up everything you need to control your cable box, satellite receiver or TV directly. Physically, control is carried out with 2x IR emitters, which are mounted in the area of your TV box. No other type of communication is supported. I mean, neither RF nor BT will manage to steer through the sling.
The main function of "watching TV on the computer" works almost well. Those. the picture is quite high-quality, although with HDTV, the sling 640x480 with a rather noticeable copy is quite remotely related. But I repeat once again, it is quite possible to watch. The degree of compression and transmission speed is set in the player itself. I settled on medium compression and 1200kbps. The improvement of these parameters did not lead to an improvement in the picture, but instead brought jerks and loss of frames. The aspect ratio (4x3, 16x9, etc.) in theory should be determined by itself, in practice it should be set directly by hand, which of course is not difficult (2 clicks) but a bit annoying. Attempting to turn on the stereo sound causes a very unpleasant psycho-acoustic effect of "split" sound. I don’t know if there’s a deal there, but it seems to me that the right channel is shifted by several tens of milliseconds relative to the left one. I am unable to listen to this, so I switched it to mono, where everything is in that sense, in order. Another complaint about the sound - from time to time there is a slight delay between the picture and the sound. It appears by itself and after some time disappears by itself. Attempts to play with different advanced settings, this effect was somewhat minimized, but not fully fixed.
I said that it is quite possible to watch TV through the sling, but this refers to the situation if your computer is on the same LAN with a slingbox. All my attempts to get him to work on WAN through NAT have failed. Ships are reportedly on forums where one of the central issues discussed are similar, the slingbox opens a counter connection to a dynamically selectable port, which is not good at all.
Summing up, I can confirm once again - this is quite a working solution for a local network that allows you to deliver TV to your computer in quite decent quality. At the same time, there remains a clear feeling of some kind of total dampness of the product, a lot of small and large flaws and a certain student level of performance. However, I still hope that the next versions of the player and the updated firmware of the receiver itself will in the future solve some of the problems and bring SlingBox to a more decent level of functioning.
I will not hide, I sometimes watch TV. Leaving the scope of the discussion, is there anything to look at, and to what extent does the scan destroy the brain, I would venture to repeat again - yes, I look at it. And at the same time, I sit at the computer for a long time. Firstly, like your own means of production, and secondly, like your entertainment center, information and other joys. I think this moment is quite understandable and in this aspect I am not particularly different from the majority of “computer dependent geeks”.
')
Obvious, at first glance, the idea to shove a TV into a computer, oddly enough, does not have an equally obvious solution. Of course, I know about TV tuners for a computer, and in different periods I tried both external and embedded ones. I have 2 claims to this decision, but both are quite serious. Firstly, this is clearly some kind of not elegant way. Agree, pull the analog cable through the whole house, then twist it into the tuner, tuning all these channels is rather a chore. Although of course, it is a working decision. But with the management of this economy complete trouble. All the tuners that came across to me assumed that we had another 20th century in the yard, and considered it normal and sufficient to give me the opportunity to switch channels from the console or directly from the program, but the channels are essential, well, in the advanced case of HDTV channels. But also essential. I don’t know what the producers were thinking about, and who they were targeting, but around me, in the market of the North American United States, which is visible to them and is one or even the most attractive, a significant part of the TV viewers do not watch TV. I will assume that the target group for all these devices is people who love to watch TV, who do this sensibly, feeling and arrangement. And these have been receiving the coveted signal for quite some time from some additional devices, from cable / satellite receivers controlled by a completely different way and physically using another remote control. There is also a third reason - often rather dubious signal quality. Perhaps this is some kind of my local specifics related to the fact that I did not connect the cable in the same way, or they were too long and of poor quality, but this again confirms my claim # 1. Not elegantly somehow that's all.
The idea of distributing a TV to a laptop in some more correct way is not new, and of course it asks. I even tried to build something similar by connecting one computer to a TV, capturing a signal there and sending it over a local network to another machine. That's the slingbox just about that. A small, silent device connects to a signal source, captures a picture / sound, compresses the case and sends it to a computer over the network. Theoretically, both local and global. Those. It is assumed that in any place where there is a fairly fast Internet, you can have a TV in your computer. And of course, for remote viewing you need the appropriate program, expectedly called SlingPlayer. In general, this and all that can be said about the monitored device in 2 words. Approximately as much information is presented in the accompanying manual and on the manufacturer's website. Of course, I am exaggerating, there is still quite obvious information about connecting wires and pressing the Next buttons in the installer. But according to the style of presentation and presentation of the material, it is clear that this is all oriented to the audience of “housewives” who deal with microwaves and coffee makers.
Of course, I speak my opinion after becoming acquainted with the product and using it for about a month. He sells here everywhere. In all large networks selling electronics, finding a slingbox is easy. He lies there modestly, does not cause panic in demand, and the staff can say little about him. In general, a strange exotic, in the opinion of an ordinary consumer of TV products. But back to the very device. Bright and catchy red packaging hides a very nondescript device, made of some dull plastic, creaking and bending in hands and giving a very full impression of a typical device made by Chinese craftsmen. In short, to proudly put it under / on the TV I didn’t have a desire, but on the other hand the desire to hide it away and realized was realized, out of sight. From a television connection point of view, everything is almost fine. There are inputs (and outputs) for all types of analog TV signals, and there is even an HDMI input into which, as it turned out, the HDMI cable cannot be plugged in. However, HDTV support is proudly announced, although right out of the box it does not work. In order to introduce a signal into the HDTV sling, you need to purchase an additional adapter, to the input of which you are sending a component signal, and connect the output to the HDMI input on the box.
In addition to the physical connection to TV sources, you need to befriend this box with your network. There is only one option - wired connection. No WiFi is not here, unlike for example AppleTV.
After all the wires are stuck where necessary, the process of setting the player on your computer begins. In the simple case, if you have one local network, and DHCP distribution of addresses, everything is on its own and is configured in 2 minutes. Otherwise, you will have to suffer. Especially if your computer is connected to several networks at once. In this case, the connection turns into a rather tricky dance with a tambourine, which of course does not frighten an advanced user, but still make you strain your brain.
After all behind it is a pleasure to use the sling. A very nice player works almost well. Almost, because when it closes, it hangs from time to time. But I think this is the specificity of the purely Mac version and the mass user on other OS will not face this problem. By the way, there is a version for PocketPC, so apparently you can watch TV and on your pocket. I did not try it, but in the forums I read that it works for someone.
The control is carried out either by the remote (software) or by the buttons "favorite channels" and "favorite actions". In the process of setting up, sligplayer will ask you what you are watching TV through, and will set up everything you need to control your cable box, satellite receiver or TV directly. Physically, control is carried out with 2x IR emitters, which are mounted in the area of your TV box. No other type of communication is supported. I mean, neither RF nor BT will manage to steer through the sling.
The main function of "watching TV on the computer" works almost well. Those. the picture is quite high-quality, although with HDTV, the sling 640x480 with a rather noticeable copy is quite remotely related. But I repeat once again, it is quite possible to watch. The degree of compression and transmission speed is set in the player itself. I settled on medium compression and 1200kbps. The improvement of these parameters did not lead to an improvement in the picture, but instead brought jerks and loss of frames. The aspect ratio (4x3, 16x9, etc.) in theory should be determined by itself, in practice it should be set directly by hand, which of course is not difficult (2 clicks) but a bit annoying. Attempting to turn on the stereo sound causes a very unpleasant psycho-acoustic effect of "split" sound. I don’t know if there’s a deal there, but it seems to me that the right channel is shifted by several tens of milliseconds relative to the left one. I am unable to listen to this, so I switched it to mono, where everything is in that sense, in order. Another complaint about the sound - from time to time there is a slight delay between the picture and the sound. It appears by itself and after some time disappears by itself. Attempts to play with different advanced settings, this effect was somewhat minimized, but not fully fixed.
I said that it is quite possible to watch TV through the sling, but this refers to the situation if your computer is on the same LAN with a slingbox. All my attempts to get him to work on WAN through NAT have failed. Ships are reportedly on forums where one of the central issues discussed are similar, the slingbox opens a counter connection to a dynamically selectable port, which is not good at all.
Summing up, I can confirm once again - this is quite a working solution for a local network that allows you to deliver TV to your computer in quite decent quality. At the same time, there remains a clear feeling of some kind of total dampness of the product, a lot of small and large flaws and a certain student level of performance. However, I still hope that the next versions of the player and the updated firmware of the receiver itself will in the future solve some of the problems and bring SlingBox to a more decent level of functioning.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/10824/
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