The Boxee Box Is The Best Media Solution
Ever!
By Twanee Phelps
Should I
Buy The Boxee Box?
You are looking to buy the Boxee Box but is not sure whether
it is the correct gadget to buy or not. You have read reviews and many of them
are from professional reviewers. So now why not find out the real experience of
actual owners of the Boxee Box. Get it straight from the horses’ mouth…
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best
Thing I Ever Bought for My HDTV, March 31, 2012
By Shawn Simmermon "cynet2k" (Blue
Anchor, NJ USA)
As
this is my first media player streamer I was very skeptical on which to
purchase and did a lot of research. It was
between this and two others. My brother in law bought one and said he loved it
so I decided to bite the bullet and go for it. I purchased a refurbished one
and absolutely love it so far. I watch everything from TV shows to 1080p HD
movies to regular DVDs. It coverts anything and
everything I throw at it and its so easy to
use. And even if I play a crappy movie that has the audio sync off, the
Boxee has quick and easy adjustment settings that I can make the movie audio
sync right in the middle of the movie if I want to. Or if I want subtitles on
or off simple click away.
This thing is awesome
and I like it better and easier to use then my BluRay player. I am absolutely amazed at how clear the 1080p is when I
stream it. I dont know what some of these
other people are whining about but I love love love this thing. I use it
every day.
The
double sided remote is so easy to use. I watch a lot of my own movies on here
and not stuff over the internet but it works with everything and is simple and
easy to use and navigate around with and perfect having that qwerty keyboard
one side so you can search for things super quick. My mom wants me to buy her one
and stream everything to her from my room so that is my next plan. Ill review
back when I do but I see no issue...
4.0 out of 5 stars The
best media solution ever, May 8,
2012
By Avi Burstein (Astoria, NY)
Over the years I've
tried a variety of media systems for my ever expanding library of digital
content, and the Boxee Box is finally the solution that meets all my needs.
My primary use of the Boxee is to play saved video files (not streamed online content) and in that regard it performs exceedingly well. I have never come across a common video format it could not play (although I did hit some obscure formats that it couldn't fast forward through properly). It never skips, stutters, or has codec issues of any kind.
My primary use of the Boxee is to play saved video files (not streamed online content) and in that regard it performs exceedingly well. I have never come across a common video format it could not play (although I did hit some obscure formats that it couldn't fast forward through properly). It never skips, stutters, or has codec issues of any kind.
It correctly catalogs 99% of my
media automatically, pulling in titles, genres, cover art, airdates, synopsis
info and even categorizing TV shows into series and seasons properly. The user interface is elegant and easy to use. My
2 TB media hard drive that's attached to the Boxee is accessible from my PC as
a NAS device so copying files from my computer to the external hard drive is no
hassle.
Resuming a file that was previously interrupted gives you the option to
return to your last position.
Fast Forward/Rewind
through a movie is fast and accurate. It automatically keeps track of
what you've already watched (and it's simple to modify when you need to
manually change it).
Controlling how to view the listings
of all your media gives you a choice between a number of really nice layouts.
"Favoriting" an item is simple and easy. They even got the little
things right, like easily toggling between seeing how far into the movie you
are and how much time is left.
Once you get used to
it, the remote's few control buttons are easily accessed by touch so you don't
need to look where you're pressing, and it even works when under the covers
(usually). Even obscure specialized issues are
handled well, like accessing subtitles, or letting you adjust the audio delay
if you encounter a file that has audio-video synchronization issues. They even
have an Airplay interface so you can send a movie from your iPhone, iPad or
from iTunes on your PC, directly to the Boxee Box and it will pick up from
where it was playing on the other device.
Unequivocal verdict: For viewing stored digital media the Boxee Box excels like no other.
My other main usage is to watch content from sources such as YouTube and Vimeo, and in that regard it also shines excellently. I use the PC bookmarklet feature to save items when I'm browsing on my PC during the day, and when I come home later at night, these items are all queued up in my "Watch Later" folder for easy access. Having the ability to easily play/pause/FF through high quality streaming YouTube or Vimeo content with a remote, and not have to use a clunky TV mouse interface is just wonderful.
I also occasionally use some of the many Apps that are available, but usually it's simpler for me to find what I want to watch using my PC and then just bookmarklet it to show up in the "Watch Later" queue, so I don't bother with those too much. But hundreds of sites have made Boxee Apps (including NetFlix, MLB, YouTube, Flickr, Pandora, The Onion, and all the other well known media sites) that let you access their media content through a much better interface than clumsily navigating a website through a TV.
I don't use it for watching mainstream online content, although I have tested that at times to see how well it works with streamed content from established media sources like CBS or the like. Some of those sites worked ok, but it was inconsistent, and I haven't gone back to that very often as the need has not arisen for me.
I'd wholeheartedly recommend the Boxee box to anyone that has lots of saved media and/or wants to easily stream YouTube or Vimeo content to their large screen TV. It isn't perfect though, and I do have a few minor gripes, but overall I am extremely satisfied with how this device performs. The few gripes are as follows:
* Importing extra features of films & TV series into the catalog is cumbersome and not well implemented. (They should make a library management program that lets you edit and manage the library from your PC, and then syncs that with the box.)
* The keyboard keys on the remote are hard to see in the dark.
* Navigating through seasons of TV shows could be improved. (And why'd they take away the episode synopsis from the full listings?! Now you have to select an episode to see the synopsis. Very stupid design change.)
* No Hulu!
* The occasional format that it doesn't handle 100% properly. (It's almost always WMV, which is really not very common anymore.)
* Home screen items should be able to be customized. (Can't stand that it keeps trying to push subscription services like Vudu.)
* Auto shutoff doesn't kick in when online content has finished playing.
* System occasionally hangs (once a month or so I have to manually restart it). Badly coded apps also seem to cause the hanging sometimes.
Unequivocal verdict: For viewing stored digital media the Boxee Box excels like no other.
My other main usage is to watch content from sources such as YouTube and Vimeo, and in that regard it also shines excellently. I use the PC bookmarklet feature to save items when I'm browsing on my PC during the day, and when I come home later at night, these items are all queued up in my "Watch Later" folder for easy access. Having the ability to easily play/pause/FF through high quality streaming YouTube or Vimeo content with a remote, and not have to use a clunky TV mouse interface is just wonderful.
I also occasionally use some of the many Apps that are available, but usually it's simpler for me to find what I want to watch using my PC and then just bookmarklet it to show up in the "Watch Later" queue, so I don't bother with those too much. But hundreds of sites have made Boxee Apps (including NetFlix, MLB, YouTube, Flickr, Pandora, The Onion, and all the other well known media sites) that let you access their media content through a much better interface than clumsily navigating a website through a TV.
I don't use it for watching mainstream online content, although I have tested that at times to see how well it works with streamed content from established media sources like CBS or the like. Some of those sites worked ok, but it was inconsistent, and I haven't gone back to that very often as the need has not arisen for me.
I'd wholeheartedly recommend the Boxee box to anyone that has lots of saved media and/or wants to easily stream YouTube or Vimeo content to their large screen TV. It isn't perfect though, and I do have a few minor gripes, but overall I am extremely satisfied with how this device performs. The few gripes are as follows:
* Importing extra features of films & TV series into the catalog is cumbersome and not well implemented. (They should make a library management program that lets you edit and manage the library from your PC, and then syncs that with the box.)
* The keyboard keys on the remote are hard to see in the dark.
* Navigating through seasons of TV shows could be improved. (And why'd they take away the episode synopsis from the full listings?! Now you have to select an episode to see the synopsis. Very stupid design change.)
* No Hulu!
* The occasional format that it doesn't handle 100% properly. (It's almost always WMV, which is really not very common anymore.)
* Home screen items should be able to be customized. (Can't stand that it keeps trying to push subscription services like Vudu.)
* Auto shutoff doesn't kick in when online content has finished playing.
* System occasionally hangs (once a month or so I have to manually restart it). Badly coded apps also seem to cause the hanging sometimes.
5.0 out of
5 stars Finally
The Multimedia center,
June 5, 2012
By ksd
"ksd"
First i thought it too
much money for this device but after i tried WD Live i realized that Boxee box
is fast ,unique, much options to configure, also web browser.
Before Boxee box ,i was using PS3 to
watch and stream movies to my TV.(Nullriver software installed on macbook pro)
But PS3 doesn't support too many file formats like FLV,MKV and sometimes drop
connection and not flawless.After i got Boxee box finally no hassle no freezing
no issues at all.
Even 3d or 1080p movies over
20gb.You can fast forward or rewind. adjust subtitle ,I read bad reviews about
boxee box and i disagree with them.No restart no freeze its just perfect.it can
support iso,zip files its all you can want from a streaming,multimedia device.
Web browser and web search works good and flash support also. But browser its not that good even with wireless mouse.there is no shortcut buttons like windows or Mac browsers but its get the job done.
Web browser and web search works good and flash support also. But browser its not that good even with wireless mouse.there is no shortcut buttons like windows or Mac browsers but its get the job done.
one more thing forward and rewind
needs some improvement there is no sensitive adjustment like PS3.less you can
rewind or forward minimum 8 or 10 seconds or something like that.
So i Recommend this product to every one who is looking for really good unit to watch simple every file format even iso and zip files also streaming from windows or Mac.
So i Recommend this product to every one who is looking for really good unit to watch simple every file format even iso and zip files also streaming from windows or Mac.
I haven't use google tv but i tried
the other Boxee box is way to go!
What
You Can Be Expecting To Get With The Boxee Box
With the Boxee Box you can expect to get:
- Intuitive, very easy and friendly interface. Some owners even found the Boxee Box’s interface easier to use than their Blu-ray
- Converts and plays almost any media format.
- Awesome two sided remote with a QWERTY pad on the other side for easy typing
- Cool and imaginative casing design that easily fits on entertainment area and have a tendency to be a topic of conversation with your guests
- Great job playing local content
- Plays flawlessly and clearly the 1080p mode.
- An owner with WDTV Live, Logitech Revue, Acer Revo 3600, and Roku found the Boxee Box to be the best
- An owner with Google TV and Roku, found the Boxee to be the best of the 3
- Able to pull down profile information such as a movie poster thumbnail, synopsis, trailers, and the Rotten Tomatoes and IMDB rating and also cast and crew lists
- Scans content from the likes of NBC, CBS, ABC etc. to pull down available TV show content
- Very simple installation and awesome performance. Able to discover NAS and local storage devices.
This is a comment from an owner… “for
now this is the device to get. I think I might buy another.” Get yours
now.
Figure 1 - The Boxee Box by D-Link
