Need a SlingBox set up in Ireland

parsebandit

Please help. Am in Asia and the tv here is woeful. Have parents in Dublin with Sky who would facilitate a slingbox (and an additional sky+ box) but wouldn't have a clue how to set it up. So I need a nice man to do all the techy stuff in Dublin in return for credit card, cheque, cash or a combination of all 3. Any ideas gratefully received as I cannot believe I missed Mike's death on Fair City.

Sam Vimes

i bought a slingbox and all the instructions were in big coloured diagrams on 2 pages. it takes care of most things. maybe get them to give it a shot first before paying someone to do it.

take a look here:
http://support.slingmedia.com/go/slingbox_classic
and see if you'd be comfortable directing them over the phone

parsebandit

many thanks but they even have problems using the telephone and I'm not talking about a mobile telephone - they never got send button concept - so talking them through a setup would be a very frustrating call. Are there shops that sell them in Dublin who migyt be convinced with a fee to set it up?

CameraStuff

If your parents have Sky simply get the number off the Sky Card and log on to Sky Anytime online and then you can watch what you want.

No need for a slingbox and no need for streaming.

bk

CameraStuff wrote: »

If your parents have Sky simply get the number off the Sky Card and log on to Sky Anytime online and then you can watch what you want.

No need for a slingbox and no need for streaming.

Good idea, but it mightn't have all the content parsebandit wants, see details here:

https://skyplayer.sky.com/findoutmore/

Just a couple of points for parsebandit if you go down the slingbox service:

1) You'll need to connect the second Sky + box to a telephone line and you would need to get a Sky installer out to install the second Sky + box (would need to run two more cables from the sat dish).

Also it would be better to put the second Sky+ box in a different room.

2) You'll need a broadband service at your parents house with a high upload speed, preferably 1mb/s upload or higher.

Also this will use a lot of bandwidth, so watch out for caps.

Cabaal

Given the slow upload speeds provided by most ISP's and the fact that the vast majority have caps I would say sky player is the best bet, sure it won't have everything on it but it'll have a good few programs and should be better then Asian TV

Which reminds me, I must register my sky account to try out skyplayer

parsebandit

Thanks everyone. I can control the Sky+ implementation and they have the right broadband (don't ask me how or why) but i cannot control the installation of the slingbox. Sky anytime is ok but it wont show Mike dying on Fair City. thanks anyway. Please can someone install a slingbox for filthy lucre?

barnicles

parsebandit wrote: »

Thanks everyone. I can control the Sky+ implementation and they have the right broadband (don't ask me how or why) but i cannot control the installation of the slingbox. Sky anytime is ok but it wont show Mike dying on Fair City. thanks anyway. Please can someone install a slingbox for filthy lucre?

Mike died a month ago...

barnicles

Well Sky anytime was 56MB so i assume its a big DL

sweetie

parsebandit wrote: »

Thanks everyone. I can control the Sky+ implementation and they have the right broadband (don't ask me how or why) but i cannot control the installation of the slingbox. Sky anytime is ok but it wont show Mike dying on Fair City. thanks anyway. Please can someone install a slingbox for filthy lucre?

where are your parents based. I setup this recently at home.

parsebandit

Looks like I have someone who will do the setup. Meanwhile I tried a sample from a UK supplier and the reception is really bad. the streaming rate goes from 400 to below 100 and it freezes etc. I have a 3MB download capacity. Next one up is 8MB. Is it this capacity that's the problem as I don't want to upgrade if that isn't the issue? Thanks

robinph

If you get the new verison of SlingPlayer, only on the US site at the moment, then you can buffer upto an hours worth of the stream so that may get around the problem with the speed of the stream varying so much. That variation is not down to the Slinbox that you were trying though, it was their interweb upload speed that sounds dodgy. If there is nothing else being uploaded at the time then the boxes stream at a good constant speed.

Moriarty

As far as I know, the buffering is done on the client side via software. It'll work with any recent slingbox once you get version 2 of their client software.

parsebandit

Thanks all. the important thing seems to be the 512 kb upload speed. Am I right in thinking this is only important at the end where the slingbox is ie the transmitting end or do you need such an upload speed at the receiving/viewing end as well?

J-blk

parsebandit wrote: »

Thanks all. the important thing seems to be the 512 kb upload speed. Am I right in thinking this is only important at the end where the slingbox is ie the transmitting end or do you need such an upload speed at the receiving/viewing end as well?

Yes - on the side that's transmitting, you want the best possible upload speed, downloads are practically irrelevant and on your receiving end it's the opposite, mostly download speed really matters (though you don't need a very high speed connection - you'll be limited by the side uploading anyway). I use a Slingbox on my internal network (it's a pretty good way to send the TV signal to any room) and there it can peak at 3Mbps - anything over 500Kbps should give you a steady enough stream though. Ideally you'd want the uploading broadband connection to be 1Mbps capable or higher, in order to have some headroom.