I have a ProHD, too and absolutely love it. With a fast connection, it's unbelievable, but even with a slow connection, the picture is good.

I've had one for years and love it for traveling, I'm actually thinking about upgrading because the ipad app needs a newer version of the hardware than I have. That being said, I quite often watch pvr shows on my iphone in the hotel and surf on my ipad. I find that tradeoff better than watching on the ipad and surfing on the iphone :)

You can get a refurbished ProHD as an upgrade for $149.

http://www.slingbox.com/go/upgrade

:-)

yes, the new ipad app is very nice, and the new iphone app has stepped up the quality for an HD stream from a ProHD nicely too. With at least 700kps upstream, you CAN get the HD stream out of the LAN to a mobile device. I need more bandwidth though.

That is why I subscribed to Clear in Chicago as I spend a lot of time in hotels there. It now works great as long as I'm near a tower.

I was disappointed in the quality at hotel wifi and other hotspots.

This really has done it in hotels for me recently - paid for wifi giving <100K. I got a refund.

It's not the wifi/wired that's the issue - so many people are now sucking up the bits and the hotels haven't upgraded their pipes to accommodate.

That's why while Sling has some appeal, I would also be interested in ways to transfer DVR recordings for offline viewing before leaving on a trip.

Not sure if I'm typical but I have almost half my DVR filled with stuff I haven't gotten around to watching yet. It would be great to take some of that content on a trip, in case you have some down time and you can catch up on some of it.

I played around with Zumocast app. for iPad, which lets you stream from computer or transcode and transfer content to iPad for viewing offline, which lets you for instance watch on a flight.

Of course, most DVRs encrypt the recordings and won't allow third-party products to decrypt them. Direct TV is suppose to be working on something called Nomad, which would either just stream or allow transfer to mobile devices. But knowing them, they may charge an upfront fee as well as monthly fee.

People can get torrents of TV shows or just rip DVDs for offline viewing so the business model of Sling and other similar products is somewhat doubtful.

Mixed bag
 

I was recently "forced" to upgrade my Slingbox because I wanted iPad support. They pulled a planned obsolescence maneuver with the iPad app and it required an hardware upgrade even though my Pro with the HD dongle was fine.

I bit the bullet and did it to get iPad support, then I find out they simultaneously pulled the rug out from underneath MacOS users and the current Mac client does not support the newer ProHD device. Yes, you can use the website, but I prefer a full client.

Their support is virtually non-existent, and pathetic when accessible. Not to mention the fact that they pulled the SlingCatcher, which was a GREAT device.

So, overall, I would call myself a relatively unsatisfied customer at the moment, but unfortunately, there really is not a viable alternative that delivers like they do about 50% of the time.

Just my opinion...

-Rob

I used a Mac as my primary travel machine for the last few years and had *no idea* that I can no longer use the Mac client. That said, the Mac client was the buggiest, most crash-prone application I've ever used on the Mac.

Wait, I just connected with mine using the Mac client. I had to go into my Sling Account and get the Slingbox ID and then enter it into the Slingbox Info screen (Slingbox --> Get Info), but then it worked perfectly.

Check it out.

Yeah, the mac client works FINE WITH ALL SLINGBOXES, but it doesn't do ACTUAL HD streaming to the mac client, just 640x480. On a LAN it still can't be beat, but on the WAN one could actually get HD support out.

In order to actuall see the HD stream in "HD" one needs to use the browser client, which in my opinion works just fine.

So, no OFFICIAL ProHD support of HD streaming, but it works just fine

Just a note for anyone interested, the Slingcatcher still seems to be available in the UK.

John Lewis are currently selling them for £179.99, and Amazon.co.uk have them for around £170.

Office depot in Canada have Slingcatchers for $229 Cdn

http://www.officedepot.ca/a/products...cher/#firstTab

My slingbox stopped working mysteriously outside of my house one day (I have two), and I have never been able to resolve it. Beware.

Probably a port forwarding issue. It wasn't trivial for me to set up and I'm used to doing these kind of tasks.

yes, without have the slingbox setup with a static DHCP IP address, or a reserved address, and port forwarding it will stop working.

Also, the default port of 5001 is often blocked at offices, hotels, etc. I use 443 for all my SB's, haven't had a problem in over five years that way.

There IS a way to see if it is calling out btw