Product Reviews

The Slingbox is a media streaming device that sends TV to your Mac instead of putting content on your TV from your Mac. It's not just TV, though: the Slingbox can transmit any video signal over your home network and even over the Internet for remote viewing. Basically, it shifts the video signal from your set-top box or similar to your Mac and lets you control it as if you were sitting in front of your TV.

The hardware has been available for a while in the UK, but Sling Media has only recently launched Mac-compatible software, making the Slingbox a viable tool for Mac users.

The Slingbox is oblong with a silver and red finish. It's designed to sit on top of an existing set-top box or similar. It has standard S-Video and RF connections for video, and a proprietary connector that handles composite video and audio. There's an Ethernet port to connect the device to your network and an infrared port to which you attach the supplied controller.

Hooking up the Slingbox is simple. Take the video output of the player from which you want to stream video and hook it up to the Slingbox. Connect the Slingbox to the television, and then connect the Ethernet cable. There's no built-in wireless support

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to the Slingbox, but we used an 802.11g wireless bridge without a problem. As with all things network, though, the wired solution offers a more reliable signal and faster transfer speeds.

Fire up the SlingPlayer software and it takes you through the process of identifying what you've connected to the Slingbox and begins to stream the content. In our case, we used a cable TV box. The image takes a few seconds to begin and in our tests sometimes the audio and video were in slow motion, but once the stream was optimised, there was no discernable difference between this and watching it normally through a television. Although the SlingPlayer software advises against viewing in full screen when on a wireless network, we found very few problems with it in practice.

The software remote control was a bit sluggish, although there's a setting that enables faster reactions to commands at the expense of video quality. Not all of the functions were available, although there's a method of adding commands.

Video quality is surprisingly good: even fast-action sports and detailed images are clear and very watchable. At full screen, the SlingPlayer software really does turn your Mac into a television. The unit would have scored more highly if it had built-in wireless, but, as we mentioned, it does work with a bridge. Further, the stream is limited to one connection so only one computer can use it at a time. However, these are minor irritations in an otherwise excellent product.

If you don't have the space for a television in your office as well as a Mac, or you want to make sure you never miss an episode of Coronation Street when you're away on business, then the Slingbox is a really neat solution. The software that runs the device is easy to use and the quality of video is excellent.