Roku
 

I had not come across this before - a wireless internet TV streamer. Anyone any experience of it?

Indeed. We have it. Pretty good selection of movies and a lot of old TV shows as well. You buy the unit, then have a monthly fee for the "channels". We have Netflix and Amazon.

That said, we already had Amazon Prime so it was part of the deal as well. Small unit, HDMI cable to the TV, wireless to the Router.

Not bad.

Thanks 11 - I don't want the 'game' but think the £100 version is otherwise a better option for HD. Which one do you have?

Sounds similar in functionality to Apple TV, no?

Yeah, my wife got it so I'm not certain. All I know is that is has a bunch of different channels (if you will) to choose from and it is HD. No games that I know if and it was like 80 to 100 bucks for the device itself. Then a monthly subscription to Netflix and like I said, we already had Amazon Prime.

rg, Please don't tell your wife about this. She already hates me. I don't know what Apple TV is. I'm a PC.

Don't worry about it 11Fan, as we watch very little TV or movies. (Except in the summer when we're always tuned into a NY Yankee game!)

Besides which, I have enough problems with the Kindle Fire as it is.
Don't need to compound the issue!

Footnote: the Mrs. is still not sure what an 11Fan is anyway. At first she asked me if it was part of an aircraft. Then I mumbled something about US Army infantry and she said "...figures..."

Gotta love it!

I shared your Kindle story with Madam Fan. She chuckled.

I wonder if you all might be willing to resurrect this thread for a while.

I have dumped cable except as an internet source, and now have two of these Roku things.

I'm curious about compartmentalization worldwide however.

I can find content from just about everywhere but Germany.

My wife and kids are polyglot and it would go a long way toward maintaining my TV privileges to be able to watch, for example, F1 races, Red bull idiocy and trashy cowboy movies auf Deutsch.

There is a pay channel here called Weider TV, but it's God-awful expensive and has very limited content.

I have to think the Germans stream content just like the rest of us, but I am having a hard time finding any.

Any help would be appreciated

Prices: look before you leap. Maplins has them at 49.99 pounds less a print-at-home 5 pound voucher (last week). Comet has them at 39 pounds. I'm sure there are other deals.

I already have 2, and they're apparently a lot cheaper here.

(around $50)

Is it something like this : Slingbox.com - Slingbox Home which I have been thinking of getting?

As far as I know the Slingbox is used to send programs received over your own satellite system at home, via the internet, to where you are on your travels.

Media streamers OTOH connect your old-fashioned* TV set to the internet via cable or wifi and enable you to watch anything** available on the net, on your TV.

* Old fashioned, because I understand that since I bought our flat screens a few years ago, we have progressed to TVs which are wifi 'enabled' and from there to TVs which have wifi with built-in media streamers.

** Anything that is which is not blocked for foreign consumption, such as the BBC iplayer. This is why one might need a virtual private network (VPN) which conceals your physical location.

The advantage of the Roku seems to be that it has a fair number of available content "channels" and seems to support small-time development thereof, so that there's a lot of arcane content available for free.

Obviously, it works with the larger streaming services like Netflix, Amazon, Epix etc.

Here be the beast itself in pictures:
 

These were £39.99 in PcWorld in Cambridge today. Quite tempted if I can't get my Raspberry Pi working on XBMC over wifi.

Well, it gets a 5/5 from me as a technology and platform, though the second one I bought has dedicated buttons for Netflix, Crackle and Hulu which seems to be a little commercial for my taste.

But the fact remains, I can't find any decent German programming.:ugh:

Anyone,...

Buhler.....

Apart from the usual roku channels there are a lot of 'unofficial' ones that you can add. If you Google for 'streamfree' and 'roku' you might find a few there - along with info on how to access them.

Another alternative is to install Plex on your PC and use that to access relevant sites. (roku->plex->internet)

Thanks. !