The Boxee Box Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Ganesh T S on November 23, 2010 5:42 PM EST- Posted in
- Gadgets
- Media Streamer
- HTPC
- Boxee Box
The Boxee Remote
You have two options for controlling the Boxee Box. You can use the Boxee iPhone Remote app (free) or the bundled Boxee remote.
It’s surprising that Boxee/D-Link were the first to build a remote like this. You have a simple remote control on one side, and a full QWERTY keyboard on the other. Pure genius. As a result the remote is pretty large - taller than your average smartphone, but incredibly versatile.
The actual remote side has three buttons and a directional pad. The topmost button is a play/pause button, that is only useful for playing or pausing content. The bottom button is a menu button which doubles as a back button depending on context. The directional pad is used for menu navigation, as well as volume output on the box. With your TV already on, you can effectively control everything you need to via the Boxee remote alone as a result. In the center of the dpad is a third button used to select menu items (and also to bring up a playback menu in certain situations). The multiple roles the buttons have to play can be frustrating for new users because there’s often little consistency. Try adjusting volume up/down before you take a web video full screen and you’ll get an error telling you that the video you’re watching doesn’t support the skip ahead function. Then there’s the Pandora app which uses up/down on the dpad for menu navigation and there are a separate set of -/+ controls for adjusting the volume.
Because of the simple front, the remote is easy to hold the wrong way. Whenever I grabbed the remote without looking I often found myself holding it upside down. Button feel is disappointing. All of the buttons feel very cheap and they’ve got this plasticky click to them.
The QWERTY keyboard is a wonderful addition to the remote as it makes all text entry a non-issue. You can fill text input fields you encounter with the remote’s keyboard. It’s much easier than hunting for letters via the onscreen keyboard, although you do have that option if you like torturing yourself. The remote’s keyboard is super convenient and avoids the silliness that we’ve seen with Sony’s Google TV remote/keyboard/Atari-Jaguar-controller-imitation.
The Boxee remote communicates with the box via RF and not IR, so you don’t have to point it at the box. Range is also good over RF, I measured about 50 feet through a wall and down a hall before the remote stopped responding.
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krotchy - Wednesday, November 24, 2010 - link
They must use the same electronics supplier we do at my work."Oh we decided to buy 500,000 older revision PCBs because the forecast said to, even though you already pushed all of the paperwork for the latest PCB revision and we were told not to order the old one. We will just rework them until the existing stock is gone unless you want to pay us $2,000,000 to scrap them"
justaviking - Wednesday, November 24, 2010 - link
For "average Joe" consumer products, I have ask myself, "Can I picture my wife using this?"I have to say, "No." She would probably make me return it within a week. Why?
- Inconsistent behavior. Sometimes you do this, sometimes you do that, other times you do something else. Full-screen display is an example of that.
- Lock-ups.
- Bugs.
- Sort of aggregated, but not really.
- A naming convention for files on your network? I don't see that happening any time soon in my house. I might do it, just out of habit, but my wife or kids? No way.
It's a good attempt.
I appreciate the challenge Boxee is faced with, and I'd be happy to pull the plug on my cable bill too, but I don't see it happening yet.
Jackattak - Wednesday, November 24, 2010 - link
Couldn't agree more. I would love to forcibly remove Comca$t out of our house, preferably kicking and screaming (mostly screaming), but this fails the wife test (and my wife is fairly tech-savvy).There has got to be a better way. This is not a consumer-ready product. This looked more like an alpha release review. Far too many bugs and far too little consistency.
Chillin1248 - Wednesday, November 24, 2010 - link
From what I understand from Boxee, the reason behind the strange (and internet download full) naming strings is due to the IMDB service that identifies the movies and shows. This is completely separate from Boxee.bernstein - Wednesday, November 24, 2010 - link
Quote: "You can’t build a similarly capable HTPC with better power characteristics than the Boxee Box (simply because Intel won’t sell you a CE4100)."This is just wrong... go to to www.pandaboard.org (or heck even a beagleboard) and get a beagleboard friendly build of linux/xbmc and you've definately got a more power-efficient htpc... best suited for 1080p playback...
and just how does a piece of hardware with 10w standby power have best power characteristics? heck not any notebook will consume anywhere near that power in standby...
now nough harsh words. great article, as always. a delight to read.
ganeshts - Wednesday, November 24, 2010 - link
Why do you think Boxee went off from Tegra 2 to Intel CE 4100? And the Pandaboard you are talking about is OMAP4 based.. Surprise Surprise.. OMAP4 host CPU = Tegra 2 host CPU, and the power profile of both is approximately the same.. so the capabilities of both are going to be similar.. in other words, don't expect 1080p60 or any other complex encoding playback!vhawkxi - Friday, November 26, 2010 - link
My sister brought me one from Canada as South Africa is again looked over as a country where people would like to have the device.I just love it, so much better than the MVIX device I had to use as media streamer up to now.
The networking works flawlessly and the 802.11 n wireless is more than sufficient to watch content in 1080p 24Hz.
Contents is currently an issue but as soon as Hulu is up and running, I will have access to the source I have been using on the software version. So I am happy with that.
The browser is still a work in progress but I assume it will eventually get there and allow nice browsing on my TV.
So overall - even at $199 which I was more than happy to pay - it is a nice product with great potential - and it has already received 2 system upgraded in the last week. Much more than one can say of similar devices that gets bug fixes once or twice a year.
Well done dudes - this may still be a winner !!
trip1ex - Monday, November 29, 2010 - link
About as expected. IT's a device that wants to give the consumer something it can't deliver - free cable tv.It's telling that the article felt it had to have the same number of pros as cons. YOu can tell this is the case when one pro says "it can only get better."
And another says, "they are pro-active at fixing bugs."
I sense some allegiance to Boxee. Maybe because they are a small company. Or because they have a personal relationship with those at the company.
In any case ....why wouldn't the folks who would tolerate bugs and problems just use a pc with their TV in the first place?
wadsworth - Monday, November 29, 2010 - link
Love it. The new Thanksgiving firmware update fixed a ton of issues I had with 720p and 1080p non-MP4 codecs. The thing played everything I threw at it, from flv to mkv. The show/movie stuff was okay, but nothing compared to the "apps" component IMO. It is up to 142 web interface apps with everything from MediaFly to YouPorn. Heck, I didn't even know Sarah Lane was doing stuff with Leo nowadays. Moving through your own files is fast/smooth, unlike my WD TV Live.saltyzip - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
Boxee has so much promise, but it doesn't deliver on the most important aspect which is speed and reliability, especially when it comes to HD content.I have evaluated the free downloadable version for the PC and posted my views on their forum, only to be flamed by the moderators for expressing my constructive criticism.
No support for blu-ray or HD streaming is a big issue in my books, but the general reliability of playing any kind of content is really a hit and miss experience.
I had crashing, videos only showing on half the screen, resolution not changing to reflect the media being played so was jerky.
Why would anyone want to put this onto a TV in the living room, it would drive my misses nuts.
It needs at least another year to get it right, but by then it will be too late.