A new gadget and my entertainment center!!
Hey! I like toys, expensive toys that can make noise, move, works with battery or A.C power. I just recently got a new gadget which I consider the best gadget of 2005 (which is why i bought it!!), and magazines like PC World, Men's Health rate it as one of the top 10 gadgets of 2005. Its called a slingbox, and what it does is stream you television online. you ofcourse should have broadband connection and also a router (wired/wireless)but then you probably already have these two!! All that you need to do is to connect the slingbox to you DVR/Cablebox/Cable and also plug in a ethernet cable to the slingbox and connect the other end to you cable modem and you are all set on the hardware side!!
The slingbox comes with a slingplayer, which you install in your laptop, and you have to setup the router and the slingbox for remote viewing (basic port fowarding etc., child's play for anybody who uses bit torrents to...well you know what!!). and that's it!! watch your TV from anywhere in the world!! The slingbox also comes with IR guns, which acts as an universal remote and enables you to control you DVR from remote location. You can even set up new recordings, watch already recorded programs off your DVR etc. It essentially is advanced signal processing which enables online streaming. Also there isnt any subscription fees, once you buy the Slingbox you are all set!!
For those of you who already havent guessed it, my long term plans with the Slingbox? set it up in my house in India, and then I can watch all the cricket matches, MTV, Channel V, Sun TV, Surya TV (Midnight Masala ;), Kahani ghar ghar ki etc., all over here (or anywhere else in the world) and i dont have to pay a dime for it...pretty cool eh?? My entertainment center is however now a mess though with all the complex connections. There are a zillion cables running around my house to service my DVR, DVD Recorder, Home Theater, Slingbox, Cable Modem and Router. Check out below a picture of my entertainment center (well, I built it from scratch) and also my connections of AV devices!!
This is what you need to know about the entertainment center I built....
Total cost for lumber $60
Capital equipment $25
screws and fastners, glue, paint etc., - $20
Value, satisfaction, Pride I get looking at it and the aesthetics of the entertainment center - Priceless!!
There are some things money can buy, but for cooler things you need to talk to me!!
P.S> If you are wondering why the entertainment center is multi colored...well I ran out of paint, and all that was left were the yellow and black colors...and i thought...well what the heck!! after all it was never meant to be a contemporary piece of art anyway!!
Well these are the connections of the AV and computer devices in my house!! check it out!
5 comments:
Hi venky ,
were u able to set this in India ?
I am trying to do the same , not sure if it will work bcoz its Pal Version in India , your reply is appreciated . Pls mail me at anilkuj@yahoo.com .
Thanks
Anil
Hmmm frankly I never thought abt it. I still havent set it up in India. But I am hoping since I will be connecting it off a set top box, It will work alright. Also some DVD players can act as cable boxes...which support both PAL and NTSC so you might want
to try that.
Hi da...
This is pretty cool really. But is it legal? It's almost like setting up your own broadcasting service ain't it
arun
Arun,
Not really dah....it can only be viewed by one person at a time and you will need the username, password, IP address and the port number, the slingbox is connected to. So its in effect equivalent to taking your television and cable with you where ever you travel.
good job with your entertainment center. as you said the pride and satisfaction is immense when doing projects like these.
I hope to start my maiden project in the near future
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