Slingbox

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 12:59 pm

Anyone familiar with this at all?

It interests me a bit for abusing purposes but I'm curious how it works exactly.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slingbox

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:09 pm

they're pretty awesome

it's basically a hardware VLC

ie

it takes incoming video, re-encodes it on the fly, and transmits it via http(i think, might be rtsp) then you can watch the video signal whereever

over the internet, or just in a different room in the house

they're great, specially now that they're getting cheap

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:13 pm

Ok here's where I'd want it.

My Dad has a full sports package from Rogers that costs him over 100$ a month. He's got NHL/NFL/NBA league pass the whole deal. I'm cheap though so I don't want to pay the fee but I want to sponge off him.

My only concern is this, do I have to watch whatever he's watching? Or do I have seperate control of the cable feed. I'm guessing it's the same.

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:20 pm

Zanchief wrote:Ok here's where I'd want it.

My Dad has a full sports package from Rogers that costs him over 100$ a month. He's got NHL/NFL/NBA league pass the whole deal. I'm cheap though so I don't want to pay the fee but I want to sponge off him.

My only concern is this, do I have to watch whatever he's watching? Or do I have seperate control of the cable feed. I'm guessing it's the same.

yeah

basically you watch what's currently streaming

you can change channels remotely, so that if he's not around, you can change channels and whatnot

but if he gets the stuff on 2 receivers, just put the slingbox on the one he's not watching

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:24 pm

Hrmm you wouldn't even need to it be hooked up to a TV though. It might be worth adding a cable box to his bill sticking it in a corner somewhere and just streaming from my home.

I'll look into it further.

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:40 pm

Zanchief wrote:Hrmm you wouldn't even need to it be hooked up to a TV though. It might be worth adding a cable box to his bill sticking it in a corner somewhere and just streaming from my home.

I'll look into it further.

that's an easy way to do it yup

i've got an extra box sitting in the media center dedicated to my HTPC

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:49 pm

This opens up a whole other host of possibilities.

Are you familiar with the software? Can I save the stream easily into some common video file?

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 1:55 pm

Zanchief wrote:This opens up a whole other host of possibilities.

Are you familiar with the software? Can I save the stream easily into some common video file?

I'm not sure really

if you're looking to do some PVR type functionality, you might be better off going the HTPC route, and running ORB (http://www.orb.com)

orb is kind of the pc based software version of the slingbox

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:17 pm

I use my xbox to watch all the stuff on my TV. I just need a way to stream it to my computer basically. I have a feeling that what ever proprietary software slingbox uses, it won't allow me to capture it for legal reasons.

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:28 pm

Zanchief wrote:I use my xbox to watch all the stuff on my TV. I just need a way to stream it to my computer basically. I have a feeling that what ever proprietary software slingbox uses, it won't allow me to capture it for legal reasons.

well, how i'd do it would be to use the slingbox to send it to your home pc

on home pc, grab the incoming stream with VLC (http://www.videolan.org) and then you can use VLC to to save it to a file

the part that'll suck is somewhere along the way you have to find a way to name everything so that it makes sense (as opposed to just a time stamp)

that's why I'd look into a HTPC type solution, because all that stuff is generally pre-built, instead of having to cobble a ton of shit together linux stylez

my 1st htpc cost me probably under $200(with $100 of that being the tuner card) and it does everything that a slingbox does, and 100x more

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:32 pm

What's the monthly fee for the cable into your HTPC though?

I'm doing this because I'm cheap~

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:36 pm

Zanchief wrote:What's the monthly fee for the cable into your HTPC though?

I'm doing this because I'm cheap~

it costs me an extra $2.95/month for the set top box for the HTPC
I could just use the existing one, and save 3 bucks, but on the rare occassion where I want to record something while I'm watching something else, it's well worth the money

now, if you've got analog cable, then you don't have to pay anything extra

analog cable's days are numbered though

if you seriously want to make it happen, let me know. I can get you up and running with the software and what not that you'll need

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:47 pm

Right now I don't pay any cable bill because the cable company just forgot to unhook the juice when the previous home owner left. My cable package is limited though, that's where my dads cable comes in.

Making a PVR is all well and good, but I would still need to be streaming something that's about 30 km away from my place.

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:00 pm

Zanchief wrote:Right now I don't pay any cable bill because the cable company just forgot to unhook the juice when the previous home owner left. My cable package is limited though, that's where my dads cable comes in.

Making a PVR is all well and good, but I would still need to be streaming something that's about 30 km away from my place.

distance is immaterial

all you really need to do is get the signal to your house, then you can do whatever with it

if you just simply want to redirect the stream from A to B, then a slingbox would work great

if you want to be able to record it, then you need to introduce a pc/pvr/htpc of some sort

Zanchief · Post by **Zanchief** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:03 pm

Well if the cable box that I'm slinging from is PVR than that would satisfy that condition.

It would require a greater monthly fee though so that would be debatable.

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:57 pm

Zanchief wrote:Well if the cable box that I'm slinging from is PVR than that would satisfy that condition.

It would require a greater monthly fee though so that would be debatable.

you don't have to do the pvr at the far end
you could just stream whatever you wanted to your place, and record it there

Gargamellow · Post by **Gargamellow** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 11:12 pm

some folks call it a sling box i call it a keiser box

Darcler · Post by **Darcler** » Tue Jan 02, 2007 5:54 pm

Gid's dad got this for Christmas. It plays very well on his Palm. I know it took a little while for him to hook it up, but the quality is really very good. Gid needed this during the World Cup stuff.

Tikker · Post by **Tikker** » Tue Jan 02, 2007 7:52 pm

yeah, they're really well done, and supported pretty well

10sun · Post by **10sun** » Tue Jan 02, 2007 8:19 pm

Friend of mine uses it to TIVO all the OSU games and watch them after work. He lives in Tokyo and the slingbox is located in a friend's apartment in Columbus. It works just fine for him.