It’s been two years since Sling Media launched the Slingbox PRO-HD on the North American market, and now they’re ready to release their European-centric version. Out goes the ATSC TV and in comes a Freeview TV tuner, meaning owners can now stream free-to-air digital TV as well as the various SD and HD video inputs. After the cut, more on the new PRO-HD, Sling’s push for in-browser viewing, and we talk to the company’s European VP about the future for place-shifting.
Like the original PRO-HD, the new version has composite, component, S-Video and S/PDIF inputs and pass-through outputs (for hooking up the local TV). Still no HDMI port, and nor is wireless built-in; instead Sling recommend a pair of their SlingLink TURBO powerline adapters.
Meanwhile Sling is also launching Slingbox.com in Europe, an online portal that takes the SlingPlayer experience into the browser. Rather than requiring a software client be installed on your PC or Mac, you can now view your streamed content in Internet Explorer, Firefox or Safari. Sling reckon it’s ideal for watching media when you’re at a friend’s house or using a public computer.
We caught up with Sling Media’s VP for Europe, Stuart Collingwood, to find out how the PRO-HD fits into the company’s vision, and he was unsurprisingly keen to point out that it’s just one step in pushing place-shifting to a broader audience. Collingwood said Sling was currently in talks with TV manufacturers regarding integrating Slingbox hardware into their future HDTVs, so you could plug in the set’s ethernet cable and automatically be pushing out content. Interestingly, Sling’s research found that 70-percent of buyers are using their Slingbox not for travelling but simply to placeshift content around the home, something Collingwood expects to increase as tablets like the iPad and Dell Streak increase in popularity.
Meanwhile, they’re also working with carriers and cellphone manufacturers to see the SlingPlayer app preloaded onto new handsets (the company has Android, iOS, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and Flash versions of its SlingPlayer Mobile app, and is working on a Windows Phone 7 version). In fact, they recently demonstrated a stripped-down Slingbox Solo – smaller than a new Apple TV – which they’re promoting among carriers as a potential bundle option: the buyer would just have to plug the tiny box into a video source and then start streaming content to their phone (likely with an unlimited data plan thrown in with the deal too).
Finally, we asked about YouView, and whether Collingwood saw either Sling’s hardware being integrated into upcoming YouTube IPTV STBs or, alternatively, a SlingPlayer client being developed for the OS. With discussions still at an early stage, he was understandably coy about saying anything concrete, but did say that Sling were keen to get placeshifting onto as many platforms as possible and that a Sling-capable YouView box was an obvious route.
The European version of the Slingbox PRO-HD is available to buy in the UK now, priced at £249.99. It’ll roll out across Europe in the coming weeks. Of course, you shouldn’t just take the press release at face value; check out our full review of the Slingbox PRO-HD too.