# Slingbox replacement



## bberger (Nov 2, 2012)

I've read a lot of posts and don't see anything that replaces my slingbox. I am a retired international airline pilot and have used my slingbox from all over the planet for many years. I just want to access my direct TV dvr remotely. I don't care about streaming (although i do it). I want to be able to watch my shows and skip the commercials. I watch 99% of TV without them. Yes....it's wonky using the remote but I live with it. Thanks in advance.


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## juan ellitinez (Jan 31, 2003)

Try looking on ebay...not sure you can buy a new one


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## Phil T (Mar 25, 2002)

I believe the slingbox is dead or close to not being supported anymore. 

Probably DirecTV Stream would be your best bet, but if I remember right It will only do locals in the area you are in.

I have used Tivo's with cable and now OTA but not sure I would invest in Tivo equipment any more. They seem to be dying a slow death also.

Tablo looks interesting but I really don't know of a product that does what slingbox did or as well as it did it.








Tablo Products


Tablo is a DVR for cord cutters who use an Over-the-Air antenna to watch free live, local TV.




www.tablotv.com





I currently use a OTA Tivo Bolt, Evoca TV (only in limited areas), a Roku and streaming services, Netflix, Amazon, Apple TV and Paramount + to get what I used to be able to get with one service. 








The smart, simple way to watch TV!


Evoca uses Next-Generation broadcast technology to provide high quality, reliable programming at a fraction of the cost of cable.




evoca.tv





DirecTV and Comcast have gotten so expensive it was not worth it anymore to me. The best content now seems to be on multiple streaming services.

I guess we are dinosaurs. The younger generations want nothing to do with DVR's or OTA TV. They want everything on their phones and streaming.


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## AZ. (Mar 27, 2011)

Support runs out this November if I remember correctly? Yes I love my slingbox also!...


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

TiVos and Tablos aren't really a solution to the problem as they can only record content from their tuners (none of which support satellite).

What Slingbox is shutting down is their locating service but I think there may be a way to use a Slingbox without the service.

Before Sling had the locating service, we could access the box with an IP address which could be handled with a dynamic DNS service.


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## Rich (Feb 22, 2007)

bberger said:


> I've read a lot of posts and don't see anything that replaces my slingbox. I am a retired international airline pilot and have used my slingbox from all over the planet for many years. I just want to access my direct TV dvr remotely. I don't care about streaming (although i do it). I want to be able to watch my shows and skip the commercials. I watch 99% of TV without them. Yes....it's wonky using the remote but I live with it. Thanks in advance.


I'm not sure what you're exactly looking for but I switched from D*'s satellite service to their streaming service and it's quite a step up from the satellite service. The remotes are different but easy to use, and you can do damn near everything you can do with the satellite service's remotes. Watching the streaming service is like watching Netflix; very few issues with the picture or the audio. The DVR function is so easy to use compared to a physical DVR that I can't imagine returning to an actual DVR. 

The only problem I had was taking the streaming service for a test drive. They offer a free five-day trial without the box or the remote. I don't see how anyone could decide to switch without the proper equipment. There is no commitment, and I bought a box that came with the proper remote, I figured I could return them if I didn't like the service. All it took was a day to get used to it and a comparison of a baseball game viewed on both platforms. The streaming service is so much better that I canceled my satellite service and bought four more boxes. Unless something catastrophic happens, I'll never use a DVR again. 

If someone had told my a year ago this would happen I would have laughed in his face. And I would have been wrong again. Try the streaming service, it's too good to pass up. I think.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

Rich said:


> I'm not sure what you're exactly looking for...


The hows and whys of the Slingbox are widely known. Given that most legitimate streaming services are geographically limited (even with VPN), they are often of very limited utility for the World traveler. The Slingbox effectively steps around geofencing which perhaps makes it a boon to those who want to use streaming services from outside their home region.

Given that this is in the general satellite discussion, it can be inferred that we're probably talking about content that is perhaps not well covered in the streaming service world.


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## techgreggtv (5 mo ago)

juan ellitinez said:


> Try looking on ebay...not sure you can buy a new one





bberger said:


> I've read a lot of posts and don't see anything that replaces my slingbox. I am a retired international airline pilot and have used my slingbox from all over the planet for many years. I just want to access my direct TV dvr remotely. I don't care about streaming (although i do it). I want to be able to watch my shows and skip the commercials. I watch 99% of TV without them. Yes....it's wonky using the remote but I live with it. Thanks in advance.


Take a look at the AMAZON TV RECAST.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

techgreggtv said:


> Take a look at the AMAZON TV RECAST.


The Fire TV Recast, like the Tablo and TiVo DVRs, can only be used for content tuned by their internal tuners -- in this case, OTA DTV signals.

The only device that really came particularly close was the ReplayTV and DIRECTV flushed that down the tubes many years ago.


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## Mike Lang (Nov 18, 2005)

I tossed my Slingbox 500 a few weeks ago knowing it was about to be obsolete. With what's available via streaming nowadays, it wasn't the big loss it would have been just a few years ago.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

Mike Lang said:


> I tossed my Slingbox 500 a few weeks ago knowing it was about to be obsolete. With what's available via streaming nowadays, it wasn't the big loss it would have been just a few years ago.


The nifty thing about the Slingbox is that allowed the user to remotely interact the device that it was associated with as if you were at home. You could navigate the menus and check the recording history or even execute something like an OTA re-scan from hundreds of miles away. When streaming services start carrying ALL of the available channels (including your home OTA and possibly FTA channels) as well as content not meant to be streamed out-of-country, then you have a partial solution.


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## Mike Lang (Nov 18, 2005)

Except the video quality was trash & the UI was super laggy & cumbersome to the point of dreading needing to use it.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

Mike Lang said:


> Except the video quality was trash & the UI was super laggy & cumbersome to the point of dreading needing to use it.


Much of that was related to poor computer performance and/or slow uplink speeds that probably aren't the issue that they once were.

There are many places on the planet where one's streaming service option is staring at wallpaper due to geofencing. The streaming services continue to get smarter and smarter about VPNs so it seems likely that option is destined to get less optional rather than more.


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## Mike Lang (Nov 18, 2005)

Nah, it was still trash compared to streaming on the same device, same network, same day.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

I got an email sling box is shutting down 

"Dear Slingbox User,

On behalf of the Sling Media team, we'd like to remind you that Slingbox servers will be permanently taken offline November 9, 2022, at which point all Slingbox devices and services will become inoperable.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## Mike Lang (Nov 18, 2005)

You should have rec'd notice long before now. It was announced in November of 2020.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

I think (hope) there's a big difference between Sling shutting down their server and the boxes losing all utility. The server is only a tool to locate your Slingbox (and maybe get around port forwarding) but there's other ways to go about that. I'm pretty sure we got along without the server early on and hope that it will continue to work that way after the server is shut down.


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## dtv757 (Jun 4, 2006)

Doesn't the server (or an auth server) process your authentication 2 sling as well ? 


If the server shuts down you won't be able to log in (to the app or website) to view remotely 

Just my thoughts 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

dtv757 said:


> Doesn't the server (or an auth server) process your authentication 2 sling as well ?


No authentication is necessary with the Slingbox itself.


> If the server shuts down you won't be able to log in (to the app or website) to view remotely


As I pointed out in my previous post, we used the Slingbox without the server before they set it up. I reason that we should be able to continue to do so without the server (unless there's something about the software that is now inextricably tied to the server). The server was really just a device to allow us to find our Slingbox on the Internet and there are other ways to do that.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

harsh said:


> there are other ways to do that.


Would nice to share them here


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## Terry_G (Jun 21, 2007)

A way to keep Slingboxs going after Nov 9, 2022 has been found. But you must get you slingboxes passwords before Nov 9. You need to login to Slingbox.com, stay logged in, then get your slingbox’s admin passwords from this: 
Slingbox - Country Selector
Save all text info to email, Word etc. for later use. Do it now!

https://github.com/GerryDazoo/Slinger


https://www.reddit.com/r/slingbox/comments/vxgozw/some_genius_has_sorted_out_using_a_slingbox/


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## AZ. (Mar 27, 2011)

Terry_G said:


> A way to keep Slingboxs going after Nov 9, 2022 has been found. But you must get you slingboxes passwords before Nov 9. You need to login to Slingbox.com, stay logged in, then get your slingbox’s admin passwords from this:
> Slingbox - Country Selector
> Save all text info to email, Word etc. for later use. Do it now!
> 
> ...


This looks very confusing?


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## Terry_G (Jun 21, 2007)

AZ. said:


> This looks very confusing?


Yes it is confusing, after a month of reading 100s of posts I got one working. Often the instructions are vauge, but I will give basic instructions here. But, the first step is to get your slingbox info by using you Slingbox username and password to login to your account and going to the page I referenced. Note, that I typed it all in, but this Forum turned it into a shortened clickable tab. You should do this even if you are no longer interested in Slingbox. You may change you mind or want to sell it in the future.

while on the site, download "Slingbox Player for Windows" it is not totally needed, but will speed things up without having to do port forwarding on your router.

More later after someone reports that they have their box admin password and other data.


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## AZ. (Mar 27, 2011)

Just got my Slingbox dear John letter....sure going to miss it!


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## Terry_G (Jun 21, 2007)

AZ go to ‘Slingbox-discontinue-nov2020’ _discussion on page 7:_
Slingbox discontinued NOV2020
You can kept it working by running a program on your home compute.


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## MrEngineerMind (3 mo ago)

I built my own Slingbox replacement using just two products from Amazon:

My setup doesn't require all these confusing hacks and settings
My setup doesn't require a dedicated PC (or pi) to be powered on 24/7.
My setup uses a true HDMI input instead of the component input of most slingboxes - many users have reported that the picture quality is noticeably better than a slingbox.
My setup is future-proof: Just replace the encoder with a 4K one when you want to
My setup is easy to fix - just replace the encoder if it ever goes bad (many different companies make one) - no need to hunt ebay for a used one and hope that you can use the default admin password to set it up
There is nothing proprietary about my setup - the encoder and IR blaster can be easily replaced with one from another manufacturer. 





__





Build your own Slingbox Alternative/Replacement DIY


There are three parts to replace the features of a slingbox: 1) Setup Encoder, 2) Use a player app to view, 3) Use an IR remote control app



max-soft.com


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## AZ. (Mar 27, 2011)

MrEngineerMind said:


> I built my own Slingbox replacement using just two products from Amazon:
> 
> My setup doesn't require all these confusing hacks and settings
> My setup doesn't require a dedicated PC (or pi) to be powered on 24/7.
> ...


This is easier that the other slingbox plan? I will need to do something as I love my Slingbox, before that I had a Vulcano that was solid also.


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## MrEngineerMind (3 mo ago)

AZ. said:


> This is easier that the other slingbox plan? I will need to do something as I love my Slingbox, before that I had a Vulcano that was solid also.


The "hardest" part of my setup is setting up a port forwarding rule in your router


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

MrEngineerMind said:


> The "hardest" part of my setup is setting up a port forwarding rule in your router


Port forwarding is required either way so that's probably not something to cite in comparing solutions.

I would argue that the most painful part of setting up is configuring Dynamic DNS (also required for both solutions).

Your assembled solution may be a better alternative but it comes at a considerable cost.


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