Slingbox 700U Unveiled [New Slingbox Will Be Sold Through TV Service Providers]

Tweet

Sling Media has been producing one of the hottest gadgets of the past few years. Their humble looking set-top box, the Slingbox, when attached to your home TV, will let you view the content you record at home over the internet. Typically, one would view this content over a laptop or cell phone. Sling Media has shown off the Slingbox 700U, a model that would be sold through TV service providers.

Rather than sell the new Slingbox directly to customers, customers would order the Slingbox 700U through their TV provider, similar to the way you’d get a satellite receiver box or a DVR. Sling Media explains in their press release, that they’re doing this to make money to save TV providers the time and expense of trying to develop their own place shifting technology (that’s what Sling Media calls what Slingboxes do).

So far, DISH Network has signed on to be the first TV service provider that will sell the Slingbox 700U to their customers. This really isn’t any surprise since DISH Network’s former parent company, EchoStar, owns Sling Media, and EchoStar and DISH Network maintain close ties.

As for the device it sell, it will be the smallest Slingbox ever, and Sling Media has promised that will be the simplest Slingbox ever, both to lower training and installation costs for TV service providers – and because it’ll likely be used by a wider, non-tech audience.

This is a smart move for Sling Media. Generally, devices like this only cater to the gadget tech crowd (and a few brave outsiders), but with the device being sold along with cable and satellite TV packages, a wider audience will get to experience. With Sling Media’s close association with DISH Network, it’ll be interesting to see if other providers will sign on, or if they’ll attempt to forge their ‘place shifting’ technology.

No word on when these will be available from the TV service providers, or what they’ll charge for them.