Slingbox

<p>I recently heard of this from another post I made, and did some research and it looks too good to be true.</p>

<p>So, for anyone who has this or has heard of this, etc…, does it work? Would you not need to pay for the CUTV subscription if you bought the slingbox and hooked it up? Is it really that easy? Enlighten me.</p>

<p>Website: <a href=“http://www.slingmedia.com%5B/url%5D”>www.slingmedia.com</a></p>

<p>Well, I don’t think so.</p>

<p>I think that in order to use the slingbox, you need a television signal in addition to your internet connection…</p>

<p>And, in order to get a TV signal, you need to get CUTV. Therefore, what you say probably isn’t possible.</p>

<p>Though, the Slingbox is a really neat device.</p>

<p>Well, I’d have the TV signal at my home be sent to my router and then over the internet. If you look at the virtual tour or whatever, it says you can use your TV signal at home to be picked up anywhere in the world</p>

<p>Slingbox is tied into a TV at home, and you probably need a dedicated TV at home. If someone at home changes the channel, that’s the channel that will be picked up in the dorm. </p>

<p>There was an article in The NY Times back in December (I think). I don’t have the link, but the article is “Take Your Cable Channels With You on the Road.”</p>

<p>We have a digital cable box in the basement that is rarely used. If I’m not mistaken, we could leave the digital cable box on at all times and just leave the TV off…wouldn’t that work?</p>

<p>I’ll try to find that article…thanks</p>

<p>Well, you know what…it might actually work. If you have a dedicated cable box and internet connection at your home, that should be all you need. </p>

<p>Honestly though, the only way of knowing for sure is to try it out!</p>

<p>That’s what we were planning on doing for the purpose of watching local sports.</p>

<p>I know the NY Times article was right after Dec 15 (ED accept) or I wouldn’t have even read it.</p>

<p>It totally works - a guy down the hall from me used it all 2nd semester.</p>

<p>I should also mention that he didn’t have CUTV, and he hooked his computer up to a TV for better watcher. I think he had fairly good quality as well.</p>

<p>I’m going to go ahead and bump this for follow up. Has anyone had any issues with this? It sounds like a great idea. My only issue is with the possibility of overage charges from CIT for going overboard with the streaming. Is this a real concern, or should I go ahead and pull the trigger on the SlingBox?</p>

<p>the overage charges would likely be significantly less than the cost of paying for the channels each month.</p>

<p>Well, you also have to consider the $180 for the Slingbox. It could add up to quite a bit if those overage charges are anything significant. I’m on the internet quite a bit doing standard internet things–downloading music, streaming YouTube videos, etc–if I’m streaming my TV over the internet too, I could see the bandwidth overage being an issue.</p>

<p>My D used Slingbox when she was a freshman. It worked great. She had a laptop and a larger monitor that she used on her desk. She used the Slingbox on her monitor. We have it hooked up to a cable extension at home - and our use of the TV is not affected by her use. It was really great and definitely saved money. She did not subscribe to CUTV and only needed the internet connection that is provided with the room.</p>

<p>Last year they had direct tv instead of the old cutv service, not sure if they still did that this year, but the cheapest package, I forget if it was 30 or 40 dollars a month but I think it was 30. And it came with the networks and some cable channels that no one watches. You had to spring for the next package up if you wanted all of the normal cable channels that people actually watch, though if you were fine with only the major networks then the first package would have been fine.</p>

<p>So that’s 30 bucks a month. Now after a quick google search if you use your slingbox in standard def and not hd, you should get at least 4 hours per gigabyte. Cornell charges a $1.50 a gigabyte above the threshold. Even if all of your slingbox watching was overages(which it wouldn’t be), for $15 you would get 40 hours of tv a month. That’s an hour and 20 minutes a day. Supplement this with dc++ and watching tv in the lounge and that’s probably about as much as you would use unless you’re a really heavy tv watcher. If you count the price of the slingbox then yeah it winds up being similar if you went $15 over every month though, but you get to keep the slingbox for the future as well, it might have other use for you, don’t know.</p>

<p>If you use slingbox hd then yeah it would be costly.</p>

<p>However I just used the dc++ and watched stuff on my laptop or went to the common room both of which were free.</p>

<p>Okay, the overage fees don’t seem to be that bad as I’m not going to need HD, plus I’d get access to my whole DVR here at home with my parent’s full DirecTV package. I think I’m going to go ahead with the Slingbox. Thanks!</p>

<p>Hey, I figured I’ll bump this as well considering I have some gift cards from graduation gifts that I’m thinking of spending on the Slingbox. At Cornell, is it popular? Can anyone share any more experiences/anecdotes about it? Lastly, is going over the usage really something to worry about if I’m a heavy internet user in addition to watching TV?</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

<p>The Housing pamphlet I got in April comes right out and says you should not bring a Slingbox. I’m thinking of just bringing the Xbox and using Netflix instant, Netflix mail, and the Internet to watch whatever TV I’m going to want to watch.</p>