The short of it: Run tv cable to your Slingbox. Plug network cable into Slingbox. Plug other end of network cable into your Router. Open up port 5001 on router. Watch tv and change channels from anyplace you have an internet connection. PCs, laptops, Windows Mobile devices.
The long of it:Slingbox comes in 3 flavors – Tuner, AV, and Pro. The “Tuner” version works great if you only want to watch regular cable without the on demand or dvr stuff. The “AV” version is set up to interface with your cable box for on demand or dvr stuff. Basically it has the AV inputs and IR stuff for the remote control of your cable box. The “Pro” version has all features of the other two units combined plus hi def plugs. I don’t know anything about hi def so that’s all I’ll say about that.
The most complicated thing about setting up the Slingbox is opening the port on your router, seriously. The software that comes with the unit is simple and attractive. It tries to help you open the correct port on your router, sets up the inputs on the unit (tunes channels, that sort of thing), and lets you set up an access password as well as an administrator password.
Slingplayer is the software used to watch the stream, and is free for desktops. It’s $30 for mobile platforms, which is understandable, because there are so many. It works flawlessly on my Dell Axim with Windows Mobile 2003/2005. It will run under WINE if you’re using Ubuntu linux.
If you have the administrative password, you can boot anyone else who is watching with the access password. You can tailor the stream (resolution, bitrate, framerate, etc.) to fit your available bandwidth, although it works wonderfully with Insightbb broadband.
I would recommend this hardware solution to anyone who has messed around with software / tuner card solutions. Just install it and be done with it. And be able to change your channels too!