If a video site doesn’t show up as an app, you can always navigate to it using the Boxee browser (which is itself an app). For example, when I tried to exit a music video on Vevo, the exit confirmation screen appeared only for a second and then disappeared it took me several tries to hit the navigation enter button quickly enough to confirm that I wanted to stop watching. The interface shows rows upon rows of what looks like the packaging for DVDs, giving the page the look of a video store.Ĭontent accessed through Boxee apps looked fine when it played, but sometimes the Boxee Box appeared to crash and reboot, especially when I tested the Boxee over Wi-Fi (as opposed to an ethernet hookup via a HomePlug AV switch).
#Boxee box review 2014 tv#
Movies and Shows are fairly self-explanatory they list films and TV shows that can be accessed directly from Boxee. The menu items are Friends (which shows shared Facebook videos) Watch Later (for items you’ve tagged while browsing content libraries) Shows (TV programs) Movies Apps and Files. You can link your account to Facebook, and then share your media choices with Facebook buddies, while viewing the videos that they choose to share.īoxee’s home screen has a menu of six icons lined up across the top half and a horizontally scrollable selection of screenshots from featured content on the bottom (you see three screens at a time). That account will store your information, including your account data for services such as Netflix, Pandora, and YouTube. Setup is easy, though: Once you hook it up and power it on by pressing a button on the box (or thereafter by pressing the menu button on the remote), you’re directed to adjust the display to fit your TV’s screen, and create a Boxee account. That said, it’s still complicated enough that it could use a full-blown user manual, as opposed to the tiny setup booklet I got with the product: It took me a while to figure out that hitting the menu button can exit a video. Vendors invariably insist that various issues or missing content will be fixed via firmware updates, but I’m starting to get tired of seeing products being sold before they are fully functional.īoxee tries very hard-and for the most part succeeds-in eliminating the geek factor you see in many set-top boxes, mainly through the use of attractive graphics. Also, several key services aren’t yet available even though the product is shipping Boxee says it will have Netflix, Hulu Plus, and Vudu streaming by the end of the year or early in 2011.
#Boxee box review 2014 software#
Furthermore, the software didn’t always feel fully baked: The device froze and crashed a couple of times while I was testing it, particularly when I used Wi-Fi, which tends to be problematic for streaming media in my crowded downtown San Francisco neighborhood. Boxee allows Web-based streaming, but some TV networks are blocking their video content I couldn’t play CBS or NBC shows, although I was able to stream Fox and ABC programs and, the unit sometimes felt slow when rendering Web pages. Unfortunately, Boxee suffers from problems that we’ve seen on competitors, most notably the
#Boxee box review 2014 Pc#
What distinguishes this streamer is its impressive range of Web video offerings, both free and paid a slick, videocentric user interface (elements of which you can try out on a PC or Mac by downloading Boxee’s free software) and an attractive industrial design that includes, besides the box itself, a petite, candy-bar-style remote. You connect the box to your TV using the included HDMI cable, and to your network wirelessly using 2.4GHz-band 802.11n Wi-Fi or ethernet.
However, once connected to your HDTV, the Boxee Box works much like other set-top boxes that stream media from your network and the Internet to your TV.
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