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Slingbox Comes to the Mac

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the slung-like-a-cable-box dept.

Egadfly writes "The Slingbox has arrived for the Mac world. Some long delays during development now seem over. Sling Media has finally released version 1.0 of their software for Mac OSX. This means that, after buying and installing the Slingbox, Mac users can 'sling' their home cable and satellite signals to themselves at the airport, or in a café hotspot, or over their office computers. The article on SlingCommunity.com gives the details of the software's development — from last year's much-discussed beta to today's v1.0. Screenshots show how a standard-looking "TV remote," displayed onscreen, allows the Mac users to change channels or browse Tivo recordings over the Internet, many miles from their living rooms."

13 of 76 comments (clear)

  1. Mac or not, the Slingbox simply rocks! by LibertineR · · Score: 5, Funny
    No more being a slave to whatever is playing in my hotel room. With a fast connection, I can watch and control my own DirecTV from wherever I happen to be. Either on my laptop, or my Treo, I can watch what I want, when I want. Slingbox ought to hire me, because I help sell a few units everytime I connect up waiting at an airport gate. People cant believe I am watching my own DirecTV on my phone.

    Get one, bitches.

    1. Re:Mac or not, the Slingbox simply rocks! by Zhe+Mappel · · Score: 4, Insightful
      No more being a slave to whatever is playing in my hotel room. With a fast connection, I can watch and control my own DirecTV from wherever I happen to be. Either on my laptop, or my Treo, I can watch what I want, when I want. Slingbox ought to hire me, because I help sell a few units everytime I connect up waiting at an airport gate. People cant believe I am watching my own DirecTV on my phone.

      Get one, bitches.

      You're still a TV slave. You're just placeshifting your shackles.

    2. Re:Mac or not, the Slingbox simply rocks! by jaredcat · · Score: 4, Informative

      I've got one of these too (CompUSA's going out of business sale), and I love it.

      I travel for business about 2 weeks per month, and I go mad trying to find something to watch on Hotel television.

      The Slingbox lets me see and control everything on my Tivo Series3 and the quality is pretty good even at full screen.

      The SlingPlayer client is amazingly well thought out, even though the UI could use some refinement. For instance, during initial setup, the SlingPlayer client asked me for my home router's password and automatically configured the ports it needed.

      Also, I don't need to know my IP address at all... Once I've connected to my Slingbox 1 time on my own home network, it remembers that Slingbox's ID on SlingMedia's server. The next time I go online anywhere in the world, the SlingPlayer client looks up the real IP address of my Slingbox on SlingMedia's server and then connects automagically.

      My only complaint about the SlingBox (and its really not SlingMedia' fault) is my HDMI troubles with the Tivo Series3. When the Tivo is connected to a TV via HDMI, and that TV is off, it doesn't see the HDMI DRM handshake signal. When that happens, Tivo displays an error message on all video outputs. My SlingBox is connected to my Tivo via Component video. So the first time I went off on a trip, all I could see when I connected to my Slingbox was the menu screen and that stupid HDMI error message. The workaround was to just unplug the HDMI cable when I know I'm going to travel... Or I guess I could leave my TV on 24-7 too.

      Sometimes I use SlingPlayer at home when I just want to watch Tivo in a little square while I'm working insted of putting my laptop in front of the TV. On the local LAN, the quality is at least as good as SDTV.

      Anyway IMHO the SlingBox is a must-have for any business traveler.

  2. Full circle by jfengel · · Score: 4, Funny

    Can I then use the iTV to sling it back to my television set?

    Maybe we can get them to sling it back and forth until it opens a wormhole or something.

  3. Re:Intel??? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    It supports intel macs. The software is a universal binary. Happy slinging.

  4. Re:Isn't this news a little stale? by Timesprout · · Score: 5, Funny

    Slingbox for Mac went 1.0 a few weeks ago I think. I'm not sure why it's just making Slashdot now.
    The original announcement was recorded on Slashdot's tivo, they just got round to watching it now.
    --
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  5. Re:What is it? by Mr.+Bad+Example · · Score: 3, Funny

    > Is it a unique product users will find interesting, that Sling something?

    Some people call it a kaiser box...I call it a sling box. I aim to watch TV with it.

  6. Re:What is it? by tlhIngan · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Is it a unique product users will find interesting, that Sling something? (writing comments so that part of story isn't showing up)


    It's a place-shifting box. Sure, all the Linux-heads can do 100x better with Linux, a capture card, and VLC, and some hacked lirc stuff, but for the rest of us who don't want to leave a PC on all day, it's effectively all that in a little box. Plus your cable TV coax to it (or your composite/svideo/component outputs), plug in the power supply, plug in the Ethernet, and in a few minutes of setup, you're watching your TV on your computer (PC/Mac), phone or PDA.

    The smart ones hook it to their TiVos. There's an IR blaster so you can use the virtual (i.e., onscreen) remote control to control it.

    Can it be done with a regular Windows PC? Yes. Linux? Most definiteiy. But if you want something easy to set up, a Slingbox works.
  7. This "news" is only about 4 weeks old... by CptTripps · · Score: 3, Informative

    ...but it's still awesome.

    I've been using mine for a while now, and can tell you that this is about the coolest invention I've seen in a while. Originally, I wasn't sure why I'd need one...now I can't travel without it. I sit in airports watching TV on my MacBook, and always get 1-2 people that ask about it.

    Great stuff...

    --


    My .sig can beat up your honor student.
  8. iphone by Rethcir · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Hopefully this is a prelude to compatibility with a certain phone running MacOS..

  9. Re:Now comes to the mac? by KFury · · Score: 3, Informative

    RTFA. The Slingbox itself is OS independent. The *Client Software* is not, nor should it be. Video decompression in Java? *That* would suck.

    --

    Kevin Fox
  10. Forget Slingbox by pecosdave · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I've been using MPEG4IP since before a Slingbox was trendy, not sure buy maybe before it was released. It's not exactly meant to be used the way I used it, but I can stream audio and video from my TV card and I can change channels when I want as well.

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  11. Are you NUTS?! by Crash+Culligan · · Score: 2, Funny

    jfengel: Maybe we can get them to sling it back and forth until it opens a wormhole or something.

    My ghod! Listen to yourself, man! You're trying to make television suck harder than it does now!!

    --
    You cannot truly appreciate Dilbert until you read it in the original Klingon.