Best way to watch tv
 

Best way or program to watch tv on your phone prefereable live feeds thanks a lot

EDIT Without sling box

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

"At home on your 50" Samsung Plasma" . Just joking.

Seriously, try ORB. its a freee app that works very well with WM.You will need a TV tuner for your pc though. Bu they are pretty cheap now.

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

spb online is an option depending on your interests

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i really wanna watch live sports when im not home or just like random things dont have a tv tuner and dont really wanna mess with it right now

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I think your best way would be the TV on the PC setup.

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You ask what the "best way" is & then say without a SlingBox which is by far & away the best way..........

~John

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

i disagree about the slingbox. I got one because everyone was raving about them, but I have never gotten it to stay in remote connection mode. also Its pretty ridiculous to make people pay an extra $30 for an already expensive setup, especially when the main reason that people are buying the thing is so they can watch tv on their phones. if watching sports is what you want, just get skyfire and use channelsurfing.net most all the games are on there. and if you just want to watch something on your phone to kill some time just go over to hulu.com.

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Get a Hava platinum - I got mine on sale at amazon for 80 bucks out the door.

http://www.amazon.com/HAVA-Platinum-...PQ7QYSSV1MS8ZA

Slingbox sucks, it's harder to setup and the mobile player costs extra. Have is cheaper and better and I didn't have to touch my router to get it working. The quality is better than a sling. I have owned and used both. Only issues right now are the mobile player won't work in landscape on a touch pro which hopefully they fix soon. Also the remote connection quality needs to be improved. Local is faboulus - but for the price you can't go wrong - mobile player is free

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im interested in that what i got it for sling you have to pay 30 bucks for mobile player but hava free.....but other than that no real differences?

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Alright, I will add my 2 cents about tha hava.

I bought one of those pices of garbage originally because it was cheaper than a slingbox. I gave up on it aafter the third one broke in six weeks. Hava has some of the absolute wort CS I have ever dealt with & the equipment is junk.

At that point, I bought a SlingBox & have never had one single problem with it. I watched HBO in my truck last week while driving on a six hour roadtrip & it worked perfectly the entire way.

~John

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

i got a question related to this, sorry for thread jacking, but how do you get justin.tv to work? i tried to get it on ie and opera but i couldn't even get the channels to display. do i have to download something extra on the phone?

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

Never used it. Sorry

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Justin.tv uses flash, so you would need a browser that supports flash. As of now I think Skyfire is the way to go.

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I am afraid I will have to second ORB. No extra cost for a sling box, no additional player to use, for the price of a TV card you have access to any channels you would have at home, plus the TV guide, the ability to program shows DVR-like, and you can view on your laptop/work computer (not suggested unless you are not threatened by being jobless in this economy) or any mobile phone capable of streaming video. Plus there is the fact that you can access your local items that are on your computer. (Burned DVD's that you may have on the hard drive for example.)

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I used this. Works very well.

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I've also used Orb. It's free and works very well. You can share live TV feeds, plus music and pictures from your PC. You do need some sort of way to get TV into your PC, but you can usually get them pretty cheap (<$30). Anything you do will work one of two ways - a box that has an input for video and ethernet (much like a slingbox) or a PC with input for video and ethernet. There's really not any other way to do it.

I had really hoped that the invention of IPTV would mean that I could plug AT&T's U-Verse ethernet connection directly into a Media Center PC, but alas, you still need a set-top box and must then run analog inputs to a TV tuner on the PC. Sigh.

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

slingbox, hands down. sling hd is nutz. goto know how to set it up. for justintv, i use juggalos opera build with flash and its way better than skyfire. also good for clearclips. lol

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Slingbox for sure. Ive used orb and a program called MY-IPTV and slingbox blows them both away. If anyone uses the pc that orb's on you'll either lose your signal or get garbage quality. MY-IPTV lagged horribly and had no way to optimize the stream. Ive never lost my slingbox connection even when Im down to 1 bar on my signal and having a dedicated ethernet line means no matter who's using what internet wise in my house I still get great quality. Also, having the ability to program my dvr from my phone is much better than using my pc as a dvr. This way I can watch my recordings on my TV without hooking my pc up to it.

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I vote SlingBox too, I have the Solo and the 720p signal through component is pretty good across my MacBook Pro, my PC and my Touch Pro. I wish Sling would make a better version of the mobile SlingPlayer (true VGA support and video performance, but that's HTC's job).

It's as close as to the TV you can get, instead of the actual TV, it's whatever you are using.

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When I had sling the audio would lag very badly. It also took longer to set up. Hava has better picture quality period. If you look at the specs it will stream in a higher rez. They do have some issues to work on for remote quality and the mobile player but this can be fixed via firmware update which will hopefully be soon. Take a look for yourself
http://boardingarea.com/blogs/travel...slingbox-solo/ You can't argue with the pictures - Also had a built in dvr or you can add a usb hard drive. I don't know why anyone would buy a sling - I have owned both and sling was a big pile of poop

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BTW, check craigslist for slingbox. I got my slingbox pro for $50

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

I honestly don't care if the Hava has very slightly better video quality (& if it does, I never saw it although I didn't compare them side by side), the equipment is junk & their customer service is horrible & that's not something that will be shown in an internet test comparing the two.

Do a fast Google search & you will pretty quickly turn up tons of Hava horror stories. That is not true at all of Sling.

~John

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Actually if you set the streamming rate and such manually like I do, and have the capacity for upstream (2mbps up for me at home), the quality is just as good as the others.

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Wow you watch TP screen for 6 hours or did you use the video out?

Your the only one going for the hava the specs dont lie but idk keep selling me i love all the input thanks everyone for keeping it on topic too

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video out hooked to my 7" DVD/NAV screen.

~John

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Thanks money right there for sure

What about the quality of orb vs. the other methods and does orb have the hiccups it use to?

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hmmmm, I know locally it will do up to 8 megabits - quality is fantastic. It won't let you set it higher than about a megabit if you are not local. At least for me anyway


Trust me get a hava - I had no problems with set up. Better video quality, supports windows media center, mpeg2 for local and mpeg4 for internet. Also you can stream the same stream up to 5 local players at the same time. The sling doesn't do any of that. I have owned both, the hava worked much better and works much better on my older work computer. The remote quality needs some work and I never tried the mobile sling player (which is extra by the way) since I didn't have a smart phone at the time. It does need some work but overall for the price how can anyone possibly argue the facts. The sling didn't work for me and I'm sure people have had problems with the hava. Let's say they have equal amount of setup trouble. The hava still blows the doors off sling feature/quality & cost. The mobile player still not working in landscape mode which sucks but hopefully will be fixed soon.

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well hava has crappy support no doubt, and they really suck on mobile support, but it does work. I too had a landscape problem with th TP and Hava but downloaded the 640x480 version and it seems to work, you may try that. I tried the other "touch" files and they both had issues. Try the other file. the local viewing is great but alas the remote viewing does at least work, although the software lacks a few things.

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Don't take this the wrong way, but you guys are on ppcgeeks. You write codes for all kinds of stuff and you can't set up a slingbox?

I totally agree with the frustrations toward having to buy the mobile slingbox app, but it definitely works well.....especially if you have a wifi signal. The only other thing I don't like about slingbox is that you literally control your tv, so that means if someone is home watching something on the connected tv, you have to watch what they are watching or vice versa. The ability to watch your dvr programs is priceless, though.

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Get the pro version and this isnt an issue. Its got a seperate tuner input for basic cable so if someones watching the cable box you can switch inputs and watch basic cable.


Im not sure why people are having issues with slingbox. Ive had orb, my-iptv and slingbox setup and sling by far runs the smoothest and was the easiest to setup.

As far as hava goes. Ive never seen it used so all I know is what Ive read on it. Not charging for a mobile player is very nice however I didnt mind buying slings. Everyone keeps pointing to the price but not realizing what you get for that price. $99 gets you the basic box which means you have to watch whats on your cable box. And if you dont have a cable box forget it because it doesnt have a tv tuner built in to accept coax. The model that youd want from hava runs 249 which is $50 dollars cheaper than slings pro hd box. Hava does come with built in wifi on that box however.

The biggest issue for me is if something goes wrong you have to ship it o hava and wait for it to return and Im reading alot of people waiting weeks to get back they're systems. At least with sling you can take it to the store and exchange it and be done in minutes.

Im not sure how havas customer service really is but it doesnt look friendly from reviews online and they sound quite uneducated on they're product. I called sling the day I got mine because the guy I got it from lost the IR blaster and sling overnighted me 2 new ones at no charge even though I wasnt the originally owner.

Lastly, make sure you have enough bandwith to use hava or sling. Hava requires significantly more because they're encoding with mpeg where as sling uses wm9. Sling does a great job optimizing on the fly to adjust for signal strenght on my phone and I never get a dropped feed even with 1 bar. Hava's got a great price point but its under the hood that counts and who you have to deal with if something breaks down.

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

Sling Box Pro ( The HD Model ) is Hands Down the best solution for watching TV on your Phone. If it's configured correctly and you have a Good Home Router and Signal on your Phone. Sling Box Pro can't be Touched.

The Touch Pro screen is so clear that it looks like your have a portable plasma TV in your Hands.

Not to mention with Sling box you can watch every channel that your Home Cable has. You can even watch Home DVD's from anywhere in the world on your phone. I can go on and on with the Slingbox features but I'll stop here.


ALi

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

I'm a fan of this idea too.

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I agree, I have the HD Pro (& that allows me to watch a DIFFERENT channel than the person at home)

I will state what happened to me with the HAVA setup that I started with first. I original went with the HAVA that is only $50 less than the SB because it offered more features for the money. Both Sling & HAVA are easy enough to setup that anybody who can't figure it out has no business reading this site IMHO.

My first HAVA set up in no time & worked great & at that point I was wondering why ANYBOBY would buy a Slingbox. I found out three weeks later when the thing stopped working (it was totally DOA). I called HAHA's tech support & had to call back a few times to get someone I could understand (I still think English was his 3rd language however). They told me "no problem, we will send you a replacement unit".

I was kind of in a hurry, so I asked them to send it fedex overnight & gave them a CC to cover the extra shipping charge. Well, they did fedex the package (& charged me the full ON shipping charge), the problem was they didn't send it out for over a week!! I was already pretty p!ssed about that, so imagine how I felt when the new unit was DOA right out of the box.........

I was fed up at that point & called them demanding a refund. I did eventually get the refund, but there is not enough time or space here to detail the hell I went through trying to get these clowns to credit my CC.

You guys do what you want, but I bought a Sling Pro the next day & never had one single problem with it......The HAVA is a better deal $ for $ & maybe you'll get lucky & get one that works & stays working, but they'll never get any more of my business.

~John

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

I have been using slingplayer mobile for about 3 years now. DSL connection at home with home line ethernet routing the slingbox to the dsl modem. Works great with a Sprint EVDO connection on the PPC6700, PPc6800 and the Touch Pro. No connection issues. I did keep the firmware on the slingplayer at the first one that supported 16:9 ratios as it seemed to have the best quality/speed. Perhaps thats the problem you ran into. One of the more recent firmware updates appeared to introduce disconnect errors on the device.

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

Sounds great....no landscape and the remote connection quality is crap...

Thanks. I'll stick with my Slingbox....

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Very interesting so that Hava works has built in WIFI and seperate tuner so i can watch whatever i want but no dvr right? and horrible customer service? Has anyone had a good experience with their cutomer service?

And sling box more expenisve in every way including 30 bucks for mobile player (which is a rip off) but less features unless i get the HD pro?

What bout orb compared to all these as for quality

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LOL!!

Other than that, it kicks butt.............

~John

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What bout orb compared to all these as for quality

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[quote=jmorton10;673049]I agree, I have the HD Pro (& that allows me to watch a DIFFERENT channel than the person at home)


So maybe I am one of those people who can't set up Slingbox correctly, cause I have the HD Pro, too. How do you guys have yours set up. I'm sure if I go back and look at it again I'll be able to figure it out, but if I can get a quick answer I'll take one.

I'm actually happy to hear that the HD Pro can do more than one channel at once. I have DirecTV and the way mine is set up right now, it changes the channel on the satellite box when I change the channel on my phone/laptop.

Re: Best way to watch tv
 

hd pro has a coax tuner built in but you need to have a coax jack hooked up to it. Basically without getting into all the details, if you have dish you cant watch one channel on sling and one on your tv because dish requires you to have a box to get channels. The tv tuner can run on a cable coax jack without a box giving you basic cable as well as using the component jacks to run your cable box.

As for orb, I literally just uninstalled it on my pc because I got tired of the constant buffering. Im using a 3 mb upload line and a full signal on my phone and it buffers like crazy. Sling never pauses during playback for me.