Over the air HD TV on iPad while on board

[Hydraulicjump]

I presume members of the RT crowd have worked this out, so seeking advice. Our new marina has lousy AT&T coverage, so streaming is out unless I change providers. Also, sometimes (think football and the miserable news on any given day) my spouse does not want to "share" watching broadcast TV on the boat's TV. So I would like to find a set up that uses an HD antenna and streams/connects it to my iPad. I have seen some set ups for Android phones. Since I regularly use my hotspot on my IPhone as our modem/router on the boat, I was wondering if there is some way to connect there without streaming. Of course, some magic box that broadcasts over the air TV signals via wifi would be ideal, but I have yet to find one that does not rely on connecting through your home wifi set up.

Thanks. Any ideas welcome.

 

[Gin]

Hey Jeff!

Here’s something to checkout. It’s called HDHomeRun and my understanding is that you can use it to stream over-the-air digital TV to iPads and similar devises. A fellow boater in the Portland Christmas Ships parade had just heard about it and passed on the link to me. Neither of us have checked it out yet. I’m not sure if it will meet your needs, but maybe?

https://www.silicondust.com/live-tv/

Gini

 

[FreeSoup]

I have an older/original one of these that worked out well with an antenna in our attic to our home network, but thought it was only wired/ethernet connections, maybe you could get to it via wireless. Might have to check that out. Looks like they have a lot more models now.

 

[FlyMeAway]

I use one of the Silicondust tuners as my primary means of getting OTA TV at home. I recently rebuilt my entire setup from scratch after deciding to ditch AT&T TV Now for regular TV channels (we haven't had a cable subscription for many years). The Channels App is then what you need to watch on your iPad and it works great -- it isn't free to download ($25, or $8 a month with a bunch of extra features you probably won't use). The Silicondust unit itself takes a regular HDTV antenna input; I imagine it will but I wonder if it will work with the antennas we have on our boats. This is the one we have: https://www.amazon.com/SiliconDust-HDHR ... B076FNSM6B

You would also need a WiFi bridge to connect to the boat's WiFi network, that's another $30 device.

Alternatively, Amazon offers a turnkey solution (the FireTV Recast) that supports WiFi. It's a lot more expensive than the Silicondust offerings ($230) and also has a DVR which might be overkill (and prone to failure).

In a similar price range as the Silicondust, a company called Tablo also makes a similar device with built-in WiFi. It was much, much less well reviewed than the Silicondust, and I didn't need Wifi, so I ruled it out. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078YKTWV6/

 

[Hydraulicjump]

Thanks! This is all great beta. I will report once I make a move. I have inquiries out to various vendors. Some viable alternatives have just dropped off the market, too.

Jeff

 

[FWTMD]

A company called StarLink is launching about a thousand low orbit satellites to offer wireless broadband services.

Its now in beta test. Cost will be something like $80/month.

Not cheap, but its broadband. Wireless.

A marine antenna will have to be figured out, but it promises to solve a lot. You could then stream TV from whatever service you like.

Not today. But hopefully soon.