OK Dish, where is the freaking Sling catcher?

[DustoMan]

Now maybe the GTV box will have an IR blaster and Dish couldn't turn that off. But they sure could turn off the Ethernet and HDMI command parser. FWIW, I definitely most positively answered the Dish/GTV poll saying I wasn't going to pay anything further/month.

The Logitech Revue box has THREE IR blasters. One front-left, right, and center on the little box.

Edited to add: what the heck are we discussing GoogleTV in a thread on the Sling catcher in the 922 subforum?

Because some people are equating the theoretical inability of the 922 being able to do built-in GoogleTV with the hardware not being powerful enough to send another video stream to the Sling Extender. I know... crazy huh?

 

[TheKrell]

OK, got it. Yeah, that is crazy.

 

[CSI007]

I don't need all this crap. My 922 works just fine. I have a web browser in my phone, my notebook, my desktop and on my PS3. I JUST WANT TO BE ABLE TO WATCH HD VIDEO in a second place in my home without another stupid receiver.

This is it, the only reasonable solution.

 

[hamishm]

i am kind of amazed dish are selling the 922 to the public now. i mean it is SO not ready - reminds me of beta testing boxee last year. some fun features but you wouldn't want to live with it. the sling stuff is barely usable at present which leaves me without a single reason to recommend a 922 over a 722, and dozens of reasons not to. kept our old 622 so 922 is just an additional box, but it's a pig, i have to be frank. right now, for example, i am programming WMC on HTPC to record the us open OTA on CBS tomorrow because the 922 literally refuses to do it. absolutely will not play ball.

 

[hahler2]

I'm starting to wonder if they are having trouble making the 922 stream HD to the extender. I know if you access the sling features even on your own network where the video quality is the highest it still isn't HD. It's only 640 x 480 or something like that. I'm betting that's why it's taking so long to come out.

 

[mike123abc]

I almost wonder if they decided the sling catcher has to go through dish.sling.com or something instead of directly talking to the 922 over your LAN. How else to easily track what you are doing?

 

[MikeD-C05]

I gave up on this sling catcher and added another 211k with external hard drive months ago. THis way I get HD on every tv in my house and I didn't have to wait for this Sling extender vapor ware to appear.

 

[TheKrell]

I gave up on this sling catcher and added another 211k with external hard drive months ago. THis way I get HD on every tv in my house and I didn't have to wait for this Sling extender vapor ware to appear.

$20 says the Sling Extender will cost more than a 211k.

 

[MikeD-C05]

The way DISH is headed you would win that bet. I am also betting that their will be some new HD extender monthly fee to go with it if you use it . DISH is all about the fees you know. Hard to believe they used to advertise against cable and all their fees in their promotional advertisments a few years back.

WHOSE The PIG now Charlie? OINK! OINK!

 

[CSI007]

I am starting to have buyers remorse with this whole thing. I should have probably waited.

I sure hope the new IPTV service takes off. If it delivered everything I have read about I will dump dish in a heartbeat.

 

[shaudods]

I finally got fed up with waiting for the sling extender as well so i got online to see about adding a 211k... And not to be surprised, i quickly became disappointed with dish customer service (yes the self proclaimed "best in the industry")... they informed me that I had already used my yearly upgrade and that if i wanted to add a box, I would have to pay $100 for the new box. My response to that was "Upgrade??? Oh you mean where I shelled out $200 bucks to you guys to be a free beta tester for a box that caused me to lose the use of my bedroom TV and is buggy at best (i use an HDMI splitter so i didnt actually lose the other TV, but they dont have to know that... haha)?" I went back and forth with them obviously to no avail... To me it just seems like bad business on two levels. One, is that dish is treating its best and most knowledgeable customers (922 users) like crap... and two, it seems stupid to me that I am totally willing to give them $7 dollars more a month for a second receiver and they wont take it!!

Anyways, enough ranting... I say all that to say that i called a buddy of mine that installs both Dish and DirecTV systems. He is going to try to get them to allow me to add a 211k... While talking to him, I asked about the sling extender, and he said that he thinks that Dish may be ditching the idea of the sling catcher in lieu of a whole home DVR setup similar to the new DirecTV system. He said the Directv system is essentially technology that Dish came up with but abandoned when they acquired Slingbox. He said that he thinks that based on the critical acclaim that the direcTV system is having, Dish has realized their mistake and may be switching back to the idea of networking its receivers together. Which is why he suggested letting him try to get me a 211k instead of waiting for the Sling Extender... Either that or switching me over to Directv... haha! I told him i would, but i have a TB's worth of shows on my DVR 922 that i dont want to lose! Anyways, who knows what the deal is with the sling extender... but it sure is fishy that the sling accessories havent come out yet!

 

[MikeD-C05]

I hope you are right about the networking idea. I thought that idea that Directv is using sounded like something that DISH should of come out with first. The sling idea was a cool idea but I feel that it is not of much use to the majority of DISH subs. There are many areas of the country that still can't get broadband which makes the 922 and the sling catcher/hd media extender useless for them.

Many people on this web board still complain about the problems they are having connecting the 922 to the computer. It shows yellow more than green is often heard. I think the networking concept of all receivers is cool and useful technology that most subs would like and appreciate ,unlike the problem ridden sling 922 dvr.

 

[CSI007]

Wow,
If that is the case and the 922 is basically a doorstop now. I like having the additional HD space and the fancy interface, sling etc. However, when I purchased the device I was told the catcher would follow soon. I wanted HD on another TV and this thing has yet to provide me with that ability.
If the catcher is a no show Dish will have lost a long time customer. If the sling catcher does not ship in 2010 I will leave and pay my early termination fee.

 

[shaudods]

Wow,
If that is the case and the 922 is basically a doorstop now. I like having the additional HD space and the fancy interface, sling etc. However, when I purchased the device I was told the catcher would follow soon. I wanted HD on another TV and this thing has yet to provide me with that ability.
If the catcher is a no show Dish will have lost a long time customer. If the sling catcher does not ship in 2010 I will leave and pay my early termination fee.

If you are that dissatisfied, you might want to consider going ahead and leaving. The sling catcher will most likely incur a fee very similar to having an additional 211k. The only difference is, if the 211k is networked to the 922, you will have an extra tuner... meaning you can record 2 shows and watch a third live. With the sling catcher/extender, it will tie up your 2nd tuner on your 922 which means it will basically be a 722 except TV2 will be in HD. I'm actually kind of hoping they go with the networking multiple boxes option like DirecTV did. The buddy i talked about in previous posts used to strongly encourage his customers to go with Dish (he installs both Dish and DirecTV)... he said now he is kind of 50/50 because the new directv box networking feature is really cool!

 

[hahler2]

I finally just went out and bought this: Amazon.com: Brite-View BV-2500 Wireless HD Video Transmitter and Receiver Kits: Gateway@@AMEPARAM@@http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31NARoIl8EL.@@AMEPARAM@@31NARoIl8EL

It's a little more money but no more fees. And it works perfectly! It's actually pretty cool. The sending unit has 2 hdmi and 2 component and the receiver has 1 hdmi output. So it converts component to hdmi. I just left the hdmi connected from the 922 to my main tv, connected the component from the 922 to the sending unit, and split the hdmi on my ps3. Now I can watch dish or ps3 in the other room in HD without running any new cables. Very cool.

A 211 would have set me back a little ove a hundred dollars plus the monthly fee. And the catcher I'm betting will be at least 200 dollars plus a monthly fee. So I figure long term I'm money ahead. Plus I gain the ability to watch multiple sources. Only thing i was giving up was the ability to watch two different programs in either room but since my wife and i are usually watching tv together, not a big deal.

 

[CSI007]

I finally just went out and bought this: Amazon.com: Brite-View BV-2500 Wireless HD Video Transmitter and Receiver Kits: Gateway

It's a little more money but no more fees. And it works perfectly! It's actually pretty cool. The sending unit has 2 hdmi and 2 component and the receiver has 1 hdmi output. So it converts component to hdmi. I just left the hdmi connected from the 922 to my main tv, connected the component from the 922 to the sending unit, and split the hdmi on my ps3. Now I can watch dish or ps3 in the other room in HD without running any new cables. Very cool.

A 211 would have set me back a little ove a hundred dollars plus the monthly fee. And the catcher I'm betting will be at least 200 dollars plus a monthly fee. So I figure long term I'm money ahead. Plus I gain the ability to watch multiple sources. Only thing i was giving up was the ability to watch two different programs in either room but since my wife and i are usually watching tv together, not a big deal.

Before I purchased the 922 this was what I was seriously thinking about buying for the 622. In light of recent events I should have done it.

 

[CSI007]

I should note that when I bought the 922 I was thinking that the catcher would not have a fee involved with it's usage. As of now this might be the case, then again, we might not see the device either.

 

[CSI007]

Another concern with the bright-view device is it's range. I have got to go about 28ft with the signal. The 922 is on the first floor, the TV I want to have HD is on the second floor. It's up about 10ft and then over about 28ft or so. I am not sure this device is capable.

 

[JamesThurber]

The networking of the DVR's actually sounds similar to what was shown 3+(I think) years ago when Dish first started talking about the VIP series as well as the external hard drives. I believe that it was at CES that they actually showed a VIP receiver attached to a physical server(Windows Home Server I believe) and stated that you would be able to archive to the server and then watch it from any other VIP. Ideally they would continue with this idea as well as the ability to just network your receivers together to see what is on each one similar to how DirecTV does it. I personally would build a server as right now I have four 1TB external hard drive in use(not all full, but segregated based on the content and all at least half full) and one 2TB drive about to be put in service. (We record a lot of shows but don't always have time to watch them so they get backlogged)

 

[DustoMan]

The networking of the DVR's actually sounds similar to what was shown 3+(I think) years ago when Dish first started talking about the VIP series as well as the external hard drives. I believe that it was at CES that they actually showed a VIP receiver attached to a physical server(Windows Home Server I believe) and stated that you would be able to archive to the server and then watch it from any other VIP. Ideally they would continue with this idea as well as the ability to just network your receivers together to see what is on each one similar to how DirecTV does it. I personally would build a server as right now I have four 1TB external hard drive in use(not all full, but segregated based on the content and all at least half full) and one 2TB drive about to be put in service. (We record a lot of shows but don't always have time to watch them so they get backlogged)

Yup! At one point that had video streaming between receivers using DLNA. Soon after that was demoed, Echostar bought Sling and that was put on the back burner. Would have been nice for them to had finished and pushed that out to people so that we could have at least got in-home streaming. Sling could still have been used for streaming outside your network and to small handheld devices like iPhones, BlackBerries, and iPads. Oh well. Maybe it didn't work so well on the hardware or something... same reason why I don't have EHD support on my ViP222 that I bought specifically for that feature.