Slingbox Mobile: Streaming to a 2005 iPaq Pocket PC 

Being able to watch 4K HDR content on my phone will never be as impressive to me as something like this, pushing the limits of outdated technology is so much more fun than things just working on new hardware.

I love how this stuff worked until 2022 and still works on local connections. Meanwhile, many things made within the past 5 years stop working entirely when the servers go out, even if it's something that should in no way need servers

Another example of why electronic right of ownership is important. All those soon to be bricked Sling box's could be reused etc

I can totally imagine someone using this to catch up on their soaps at 5fps. I remember watching movies on my xbox360 through USB and being amazed so this thing would have blown my mind.

That is the nicest-looking iPAQ I’ve seen in well over a decade. I remember writing software for these things. Even programmed on them in a limited way (external foldout keyboard and a little on-device programming language environment).

Happy 2023! Thanks for the updated video. I’m so pumped that you got it working on the iPAQ! 🎉 I’m glad you were able to find the right files. My Palm TX seemed to hover around 12-15 FPS, so I was surprised to see your iPAQ suffer so much. But as you said, there are a lot of wonky factors into getting these silly things to work. Thankfully I had my Sling devices unplugged, that bricking business sounds terrible!

It's really cool that these old slingboxes were still supported for this long. Will still be sad when they finally shut it down. Edit: Turns out they already shut it down this past November. But at least you can still use it on your local network!

The bricking is real and you can downgrade thankfully, although that is as usual absolute voodoo. Here is how I made my Slingshot work from remote without any servers for shits and giggles: 1. Setup a raspberry PI of your choice to be an SSH bridge to your home network (I recommend just getting dyndns setup first, saves you a total headache) 2. Login from hotel into your home network 3. use local port forwarding to associate the remote slingshot stream with your localhost (much easier on Linux) 4. watch the software struggle with that fact that it sees the service on localhost for a bit 5. Enjoy 90s goodness

I had a Dell Axim PDA that I used as a GPS in my car LONG after PDA's were no longer cool (hey, it still worked...if it aint broke right?). I have fond memories of these little devices...less capable sure...but somehow...I ended up doing more with them it seems like. My phone is probably magnitudes more powerful and it ends up sitting in my pocket or on my desk most of the time. My trusty old PDA went everywhere with me and was always in my hand and I was ALWAYS trying to find neat new ways to make use of it. Maybe it's just the nostalgia goggles talking.

Very cool! I had an iPAQ back in the early 2000’s. This was before iPod, so carrying music digitally wasn’t a thing, and managed to afford the Wi-Fi version, which was barely at the beginning of Wi-Fi being a thing. I setup an IceCast server on my home PC, and then streamed all my techno. Even setup a telnet control server for it so I could change music on the go. This would have been much cooler!! Thanks for the reminder and the cool overview!

That WRT54G is a true classic! I still use a WRT54GL model with the latest compatible version of DD-WRT installed as a wireless bridge for an IP-Cam in my garden! South-park even used this router model in an episode where all the internet fails, really hilarious!

The days when you had a cell phone, pda and mp3 player as separate devices. 😁

Nice to see the old HP iPaq again. I used to have one of these back in the day but I sold it on ebay over 10 years ago. It was always a pretty neat device for sure.

This bring back memory. I use to work in HTC. We made those PDA for HP. Glad to see people still play around with it

Don't make me bust out my handspring and use my magic jack

I used my WRT54G until maybe 4 years ago. Such a solid unit. Especially with DDWRT

You and me are the only two people I know with working iPaq units that still works and we still use them.

Watching The Shining just as Kubrick intended!

this stuff hitting just right on my mid 2000s unitched areas

Final software should be open source

> it still works after the servers shut down Awesome! Glad it was designed prope- > They pushed a firmware update that bricks it Oh for the love of...

Kinda off topic, but it's a shame Windows Mobile doesn't exist anymore, and by that i mean specifically the PocketPC paradigm of mobile computing rather than the more traditional smartphones. I feel like a power user focused approach to mobile computing would be welcome with how many people do most of their daily computing on their phones.

You're legit the coolest person I've never met. Don't let it go to your head, I'm legit NOT important

It's terrible how they just bricked the hardware after shutting down the servers. I can't imagine that's legal. Hopefully someone takes them to court over it.

Now I can stream 4K 120fps games from a server somewhere out in the world with low enough latency that I can forget I’m not running Cyberpunk 2077 on my phone. Wild how far we have come in less than 20 years.

pocket plerbs

The Shinning at 4fps on a cellphone. Truly the way Kubrick meant it to be seen.

if that works on a local network, could it work on a private VPN?

I wonder if you could use a virtual LAN system to connect with Slingbox to allow it to have some semblance of its normal functionality, or I guess something like Google Chrome Remote Desktop.

The very idea that you could watch TV shows in bed on a mobile device almost a decade before Netflix is kind of mind-blowing

"Why is that... oh yeaaah..." - Most of my projects ;-)

so you can still using it over the internet, when you have a VPN server at home

Are we gonna get a house tour once everything is set up, showing us all your obscure, rare, and retro tech, what got installed where and how you're using it? That would be awesome!

Hey Clint! I spotted a DNF2001 shortcut on your desktop there.... Can we expect anything? =D

The fact that a PDA device from 2005 can stream video from a sling box is mind blowing how HP used to put a lot of effort into their mobile devices until Apple and Google came in with their mobile devices!

I still remember hearing about sling on The screensavers on G4/TechTV. Your videos have been like a follow up segment

I immediately recognized what this was. Loved the pdas of the late 90s and early 2000s. To this day, nobody has come close to recreating the quality of the Targus quad fold keyboards that were so popular with Pdas of that Era.

It makes me happy seeing the WRT54G again. I miss mine, and also going back and forth between Tomato and DDWRT firmware because I'm indecisive. Side note: it boggles my mind that you don't have an accent despite being from NC.

I found devices worked better in the 2000s than the early teens,

I still have some PalmOS devices and peripherals. Last i remember was a "hack" to allow sd cards larger than 2gb, overclocking from 200mhz to 333mhz...and enabling bluetooth mouse and I have that Palm btanded folding ir keyboard (that also works on hacked PSP). That is with my Palm Tungsten E2. None of my devices have native wifi though...so bummer. There was an sd card slot wifi card available but i nwver got one.

Will Slingbox still work if you set to direct IP address? What does the server do? I haven't got one, I just want to continue living in a world where you can stream laserdiscs to obsolete PDAs from 17 years ago. I'm actually really jealous, I want one of those Ipaq things!

one of my very good high school buddies bought a casio EM-500 and let me use it for a few months. this was back in like 2000/2001 or so. i used to play NES games on an emulator on it in my easy classes, i'd also installed pocketdivx as well but never really had any content to watch. also had a 16MB MMC card with as many oggs i could get on it at a 56kbps sample rate... i even overclocked it with a trace drawn on the PCB with pencil lead (from 150mhz to i think like 180?) TF you were a good guy, i'm sorry we never remained in contact

7:40 - OOH! BLADE! Literally my first DVD! What can I say, that techno tune from the trailer compelled me! XD 8:00 - sling... blade. mm-hmm, I C whut U did thar...[/BillyBobThornton]

Oh snap. My first GPS!!! I had the HP with the SD card for street maps. And a Bluetooth GPS. I was the shitznits in the early 2000s

As an old Ipaq user, this both amazes and terrifies me. I remembered getting quake to run on one of these things.

mmm love me some LGR Blarbs...

I wonder..... VPN @ home ? You could watch video anywhere, as long as you had the right ports open. Performance could be another question but, this low bandwidth so over VPN it might be sold and perfect...

I still use one of these old Ipaqs

Just realized my gen1 ipad mini still has the app, pretty sure I have a couple samsung sch-i670’s buried somewhere with the win mobile app. Sling felt like a quantum leap in user experience from the old ati all in wonder tuner/video card. Rip

I've never heard of Slingbox, even though I well remember the iPAQ era. (Never had one myself, though.) Have you done a video just on it? If not, you should do before it gets completely forgotten.

I literally did this around 2005 on my Dell Pocket PC, which I think may have been a rebranded iPaq. I had the first model and one of the last models. Now it just makes more seems to stream directly from the services.

Fyi, LGR was playing, "Blade" video on the PC. Pretty Dope!!! Lol.👍

Remember PlayTV on PlayStation 3? You could watch recorded shows remotely on a PSP.

That Techno Gadget Thing Does Looks like a Writing Notepad is we’re we Could Say.

I wanted an iPaq back then. I waited till 2008 and saved up from my 1st job and got an iPod touch instead. Boy how I wish I had gotten an iPaq or similar instead.

What the heck, laserdisc movie playing on a powerpc powered pda via an ancient slingbox steaming service. How many levels can this rube Goldberg of retro go? Lol

I had one of these! My dad gave it to me because they gave it to him for his job and he never used it. I wrote essays, surfed the web, and threw away my agenda book for school and carried my Pocket PC instead. Unfortunately the battery went dry and it would no longer boot, then it got lost in a move.

THE ONLY REASON: nerd bathroom time! dued its fun

Those iPaqs had so little RAM that pretty much any application just absolutely choked.

What about VPNing back to your house? That would should work remotely?

Told you - capture the moment it turns off. Could've preserved the historical moment.

For what it's worth, I tried it on my Dell Axiom And achieved similar results.

Man this brings back memories. I'm pretty sure my dad still has the old sling box, though he doesn't use it anymore. We actually used it for a long time. I remember he had it hooked up to the directv box in my parents' bedroom and I would watch TV using the app sideloaded on my Ouya in my room. (yes. Had one of those too. Still do.) Before that we had the locationfree player. Same concept but there was an app for psp of all things. My mom and sister each had a psp and I remember my dad setting up a 3g Hotspot when we were camping so my sister could watch a show she didn't want to miss. (we didn't have a dvr or anything to record it). It worked pretty well.

There's something deeply depressing that the world had already turned into "Do it now" "Remind me later" "Register now" "Register later" Please throw it into fire and see if it fixes our awful future [Throw it into fire now] [Remind me later]

What slingbox did you use?

This was extremely cool in 2007 when my friend bought one used.

I remember using that app on my iPaq back in the day. It was an awesome novelty.

Back in 05 if they had a blackberry app I would have wanted one of these... I loved my blackberrys, always wanted to try new stuff.

It's cool this still kind of works. All so after seen the movie footage. Need to go back an re-watch Blade.

And... this is exactly what I used my iPaq for most of the time (that and responding to email).

Back then I was just amazed to pull up photos on a portable device or play music.

I mean, that still works.

You can still use it over the internet using a VPN (not a VPN service like the ones advertising on RU-vid)

The way that servers are being shut down you have to wonder what will happen when a digital store like Vudu or any other one went out of business what would you do because you only rent to videos for a unspecified amount of time but once they are gone you can't just download the video you have to buy the video again and you are out the money for that video. The going all digital movement to a disaster waiting to happen to everyone who goes all digital.

That's just nostalgic as hell installing apps on a PDA or phone from a cab file, damn.

I used to see sling commercials back in the day I was wondering what happened?

That completely sums up my windows mobile experience

There is no feeling like watching a movie on 2000s tech and also on a CRT monitor.

This makes me want to dust off my Toshiba e740 Pocket PC to try some future tech on it.

Could something akin to this service be replicated using, I dunno... A Raspberry Pi for example? ... Why do this? Why not? 😉

For a second I thought Clint was trolling us with the Endless overlook kitchen video lol

End of an era. An era I never knew existed. At least in the UK. At least in a consumer box.

This also means a VPN ago your LAN would allow you to still stream remotely

Hd home run and jellyfin works great

I used to use slingbox on my first android watch. It was a moto actv that i rooted and side loaded a buch of apps

If it works on lan it should theoretically work over the internet with a vpn setup on a router .

Are you running Tomato on that WRT54G?

My slingbox solo asks for admin password. How to find the default admin password?

4Talk walkie talkie. I would love to see a video on it & duke Nukem

One feather in its cap is the menu responsiveness is better than 99% of smart TVs

I need your I have ipack but I an not even get the password

only 700kbps over LAN... still kind of weak :P

I think my neighbours are slingers.

It was wise to test this app with a cinematically slow-moving movie like The Shining. It would have been virtually unwatchable if you’d picked a frenetic movie like Transformers.

Could use remotely with tailscale

Can it be configured for an open source server.

Amazing! I used my Slingbox for something similar back in the day - and I had an iPaq 1910 (I think). I still have my Slingbox in the closet. My friend in Denmark used my Slingbox often (I'm in the US) and said the video was very reasonable. When I got my first Dish Hopper - you purchased an external Slingbox and connected it to the Hopper via USB, after that, Sling was built in. All in all, a good product.

What about Linux Slingbox 😅

Things that work amazing in the year 2023, yet voice to speech commands, Internet streaming, Devices without buttons, Headphone jacks, etc.

Wow it is really cool. Happy new year