Jon asks:

So I live in Seattle now and I'm thinking about hooking up a Slingbox in my parents' house in Salt Lake City and then watching Utah TV up here from my laptop (University of Utah football and Utah Jazz basketball games for example). I was just wondering what I would need to get it set up and how well it actually works and if it is a good idea or not.

Slingbox seems to be making the jump from geek item to mainstream mainstay, as we keep hearing more and more questions about the placeshifting gadget. The basic answer? Slingbox is what you'll need to get TV out of any home to any remote location.

Slingmedia started with the original Slingbox as a solution to a simple problem: How do I watch MY local TV stations anywhere in the world? The original solution, much like the current iteration of Slingbox, hooked a signal out of a cable box and into the unit, then looped it through to the TV. In essence, whatever is playing on the cable box is now playing over the Slingbox to the internet, and any user that can log into the service can watch the cable box. Keep in mind that unless Jon's family wants to spring for an extra cable box that doesn't have a TV attached to it, Jon's family will have to be watching the big game in Utah for Jon to watch it in Seattle.

Getting video from one place to another requires one of the basic Slingbox units. Sling Media sells three separate Slingboxes, the Solo, the Pro and the Pro-HD, that vary the level of connection to your home theater rack. If you're simply looking to take video from a cable box and push it over the internet, the Solo will do the job. At $180, it's not cheap, but it'll get analog video at standard and high definition quality over the internet. The Slingbox Pro has a built-in tuner, which allows it to act without a cable box and watch some of the most basic channels, but any of the extended channels in the digital cable tier will still require the Slingbox to interface with your tuner. If you're looking to stream multiple devices over the net in HD, the Slingbox Pro-HD will stream that TV across the web in glorious high definition, though it'll cost $300.

Once you've picked out your flavor of Slingbox, the next step would be to configure it in your parents' home in Utah. They'll simply plug in the Slingbox to their cable box, hook up an infrared blaster to control the cable box (like a faux remote control) and plug in an ethernet connection so the video is ready to stream over the internet. Once the cables are plugged in, set up of the box using the included software, then login to the Sling services remotely and you're set. Your laptop should be ready to receive the broadcasts without much more than downloading the Sling Media client software, and Sling has even said they're working on a browser plugin so you won't even have to download any software in the future.

Once you're comfortable with the basics, there's one more step you can move toward: The Slingcatcher. Like the Slingbox, the Slingcatcher is a home theater component, but instead of sending the video out of your home, this unit recieves the video sent out by the Slingbox and displays it on your TV. The person using the Slingcatcher has full control over the cable box just like they would if they were at home, but they can take their home TV anywhere they are. Like every part of the Sling Media equation, new technology doesn't come cheap. The Slingcatcher costs $300 on top of the Slingbox, but if watching those University of Utah games on your big screen in Seattle is important to you, this is one of the easiest ways to do it.

Another alternative: If your family, perchance, has a Windows Media Center computer, or is thinking about purchasing a new computer with Windows Media Center, point them toward Orb. Orb is a free software based solution that works similarly to Slingbox, and will allow you to watch programming remotely using your laptop or even a Windows Mobile smart phone. The downside? Setting up Orb is definitely more complex than Slingbox, so if you're looking for fool proof, spending the extra dough might be worth it.

Lastly, both Orb and Slingbox let you stream to other places than your laptop or your big TV; both services have support for Windows Mobile devices, and Slingbox also has a BlackBerry plugin so you can watch your streams on the go. Keep in mind, if your BlackBerry isn't 3G capable, your connection speed will severely limit your experience, but it's still your TV on the go.

Hopefully you've got the basics down. If we're missing anything, feel free to leave a shout out in the comments, so Jon can get his stream on as quickly as possible.

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