Tivo HD, Slingbox, HTPC

So I got my wife (and myself) a Tivo HD for Christmas. Very nice! We also received a Slingbox AV. The Tivo is almost working (cable card issues) but even now I can see the system will be very nice.

After downloading the Tivo Togo desktop to my HTPC, I published my music and photos directories. I put shortcuts from my TV and home video directories in the proper folders as well. The music and photos showed up on the Tivo immediately. After some time and a few reboots, some of the videos showed up in the "Now Showing" portion of the Tivo.

The HTPC with Beyond TV is currently set to record in Mpeg 2 to a given directory. They automatically put the show information and a date in the file name. Amazingly, all my BTV HTPC shows appear in the listing for the HTPC on the Tivo! So now, you can watch all my HTPC shows in the den. Of course, the card is bad so these are grainy SD videos at best, but it is pretty slick to have access to your HTPC videos from the Tivo. Problem is, my AVIs and DVDs don't show up yet.

When watching these videos, the tivo starts to download them. It gives you the option to watch as it streams, but sometimes it is slow downloading and you have to pause. Ideally, you pick a show to download, watch something for a bit, then go watch your show. You also have to delete it, you can't just stream it from the HTPC.

The slick part is using the sling box to watch the Tivo. Now, I can easily watch the Tivo using the HTPC in the bedroom with the sling box. No Tivo desktop downloads, just watch like I was there. The quality is not bad, even for HD stuff. The HTPC runs at 1920x1200, and it looks ok when slingbox is streaming video. And the slingbox works at work and on my treo cell! Woohoo.

The system is not perfect, but it certainly is fairly slick and polished at this point. Other than Beyond TV needing daily reboots, the system appears stable. Now if Time Warner could get off their butts and get my cable card working!