July 6, 2005 -- A candy-bar shaped silver box and an Internet connection are all it takes to watch TV anywhere now.
Slingbox is a new gizmo that connects your TV's cable box, satellite receiver or digital video recorder to your computer. Once it's hooked up, users can access their TVs on their computers from anywhere they can find high-speed Internet connections.
The box sells for $249 with no monthly service fees at Best Buy and Comp- USA. Retailers are having a hard time keeping it in stock since its release last month, says one of its three inventors and the CEO of Sling Media, Blake Krikorian.
Slingbox works mostly because of its simplicity. If you're sitting in a Starbucks in Singapore with a laptop computer hooked into the coffee shop's wireless connection, a live Yankee game is only a click or two away. And it works just as well in the different TV-less rooms of your home as it would on the other side of the world.
"Slingbox was born out of consumer frustration," says Krikorian of the device. In 2002, Krikorian and his brother, Jason, were consultants for large tech firms like Microsoft — and rabid San Francisco Giants fans.
But their work took them around the country just as their beloved baseball team was in a heated pennant race, and outside of the Bay area, the games were hard to come by. So the Krikorian brothers enlisted the help of software engineer Bohupen Shah and the result is Slingbox.
Slingbox software that will allow users to watch TV on their phones and PDAs is due out soon, Krikorian says.
Source
Slingbox is a new gizmo that connects your TV's cable box, satellite receiver or digital video recorder to your computer. Once it's hooked up, users can access their TVs on their computers from anywhere they can find high-speed Internet connections.
The box sells for $249 with no monthly service fees at Best Buy and Comp- USA. Retailers are having a hard time keeping it in stock since its release last month, says one of its three inventors and the CEO of Sling Media, Blake Krikorian.
Slingbox works mostly because of its simplicity. If you're sitting in a Starbucks in Singapore with a laptop computer hooked into the coffee shop's wireless connection, a live Yankee game is only a click or two away. And it works just as well in the different TV-less rooms of your home as it would on the other side of the world.
"Slingbox was born out of consumer frustration," says Krikorian of the device. In 2002, Krikorian and his brother, Jason, were consultants for large tech firms like Microsoft — and rabid San Francisco Giants fans.
But their work took them around the country just as their beloved baseball team was in a heated pennant race, and outside of the Bay area, the games were hard to come by. So the Krikorian brothers enlisted the help of software engineer Bohupen Shah and the result is Slingbox.
Slingbox software that will allow users to watch TV on their phones and PDAs is due out soon, Krikorian says.
Source
