Help a newb?

boomerang

Lifer
Jun 19, 2000
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642
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We have two residences. We snowbird over the winter in FL. In Michigan, we have Dish for TV. I have a sling adapter connected to the Dish receiver and have connected through it when in FL on short stays and it works quite well. I connected my laptop to the TV (Samsung smart TV) using an HDMI cable and picture and sound were entirely acceptable to me. The DVR in MI did its thing recording the shows we wanted to see and I could view them when I wanted.

Rather than start up Comcast for TV for four months down there with all the hassles and bickering with Comcast, I'm thinking I'd rather just sling up to MI for TV.

Using the laptop is a pain. I have no good place to place it and I must leave the screen up so it doesn't go to sleep. I would rather have a small PC that I can attach permanently. My requirements would be HDMI output and wireless. At this time I do not want to go through the hassle of running a network cable. Eventually this will be our full time residence and at that time I will reconfigure the location of the modem and router and who knows, by that time I may be a cord-cutter but it's not what I desire right now.

I'm seeing mention of a Beebox in another thread. Would this be a good solution? Something else? Something small and tidy is what I desire.
 

boomerang

Lifer
Jun 19, 2000
18,890
642
126
Just thinking that I would need to interact with the box to go to the website. I guess a wireless keyboard/mouse?

I had tried accessing the site through the TV and I think the browser running along with the streaming kind of brought the TV to a crawl IIRC. There was some reason I went back to using the laptop. Might just have been the clunky interface for the web features on the TV. I don't recall.

Edit: Now I remember. The website needed to install a plugin which of course the TV was not suited for.
 
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JeffMD

Platinum Member
Feb 15, 2002
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I would think the Intel NUCs would be more then enough for this. And yea youll need one of the keyboards with a trackpad on it to navigate.
 

boomerang

Lifer
Jun 19, 2000
18,890
642
126
I would think the Intel NUCs would be more then enough for this. And yea youll need one of the keyboards with a trackpad on it to navigate.
Thanks for the reply. Yeah, research appears to show that the Intel NUC's have better reviews. A keyboard with a trackpad would definitely be the hot setup for what I want to do.
 

boomerang

Lifer
Jun 19, 2000
18,890
642
126
maybe that new kanagaroo, its cheap, and small
That looks interesting. At that price it could even be a throwaway if it fails.

Edit: This thing is almost too good to be true. I kept seeing mention of Windows 10. I assumed it would have to be purchased and installed. Not so. It comes with WIN 10 Home already installed! Pair it with a keypad/trackpad combo and it would suit my needs at a remarkable price.
 
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nfriedly

Member
Jan 14, 2014
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nfriedly.com
That kangaroo does look interesting, although having used other systems with similar specs, it's definitely going to feel a bit slow compared to a more expensive option. But, yea, you can't beat the price.

For a keyboard, I've used both the Logitech k400 and the k830 with my HTPC and both work well enough. The k830 is definitely nicer, but I'm not sure it's enough nicer to justify paying 3x the price. (Although lately I've been a bit miffed with logitech's support for taking weeks to respond, so I might look for a different brand entirely next time.)
 
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