- iPad Support
- Wireless Media Stream
- ATSC HDTV Tuner
Great for hacking, like HomeRun.
01/03/2014
This review is from: AVerMedia HomeFree AVplus F210 Watch Live TV on iPad
Pros:
Great on iPad 2 (need N WiFi, see other thoughts)
Cheap.
Great reception.
Hardware encoder for SD analog. (I have not use it yet).
Very Hackable (TCP calls to stream direct to VLC, use WireShark to get API).
WMC works great with it.
Built like a tank, unlike other hardware nowadays. Mostly metal. It is heavy and feels good.
Cons:
Contrary to many I do not like PC suite. While it works flawlessly with WMC, driver is heavy and for some reason uses WinPCap, same packet capture driver used by Wireshark and other snooping software.
Included DVR software is ugly. Still need it if you need to setup IR blaster for analog input.
While iPad software great and light, I was initially confused by some bugs in it: Initial scan reveals no channels, progress bar never moved. Then, like 5 minutes later, on another app restart, all channels just appeared!?! Whatever, it does not affect use.
It does not have re-encoder, like SlingBox or some newer HomeRuns. For the price none expected, really.
Apparently it is discontinued, no further support expected?
Overall Review:
For most it will be great network tuner, especially for WMC, cheaper alternative to HomeRun. I do like it for great option to stream to iPad, app is free and works great.
I do have HomeRun and SlingBox Pro HD, but all apps to stream to iPad from them are not free or severely crippled.
Now, common complaint about no HD channels to iPad: FALSE. Box will pump raw demuxed program stream to whatever device you have, there is no software limit on that. Most home WiFis will choke on that. I have iPad 2 and multiple access points through the house. It is impossible to stream any HD through G. Two other access points are N. Results are different. One breaking stream badly and the other is very watchable, with only occasional stutter on HD channels (probably decoding, not network). I think, because iPad does not have MPEG2 decoder in hardware, it must be soft decoded and processing resources are important, for iPad2 it is at the edge. I'm pretty sure that newer iPads with faster processors will have absolutely no problems to run full HD (with appropriate WiFi).
I just got second one to stream to VLC, (directly, not through the driver).
It is a great hardware. One egg off for bulky Windows software, bug(s) in iPad app and limited support form the manufacturer.
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- Anonymous
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Owned For:
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