Dear Sling Community:

Now that Sling is well on its way to bigger and better things, I'm off to join another startup in San Francisco. Michelle and Rich will still be here to handle new Beta Programs in 2010; they can be reached at beta @ slingmedia (dot com).

I realize this past year has been a little light on Beta Programs: we've been working very hard on all the new technologies announced at CES. I encourage all of you to hang in there and watch for further notices about upcoming programs during the year.

Please note that Sling's Beta notices and Community Portal will be getting a whole new look and feel this year. Further details, when available, will be posted at beta.slingmedia.com &/or support.slingbox.com.

Before I leave, I wanted to give a huge thanks to YOU, the community, for sharing your hearts and minds throughout Sling's wild ride from startup to stability. I was, and remain, impressed with your passion, smarts, and willingness to help each other. Your input directly helped to shape our award-winning product line and put Sling on the map. You guys rock!

SlingPlayer for Mac 1.0.8 Released Publicly Today

Thank you to those of you who participated in the private beta and also to Matt for the excellent write-up!

Sling Media Hearts the EU

We're looking for a couple more testers: If you have a Slingbox in the EU, and you’d like to be a part of a private beta test for SlingPlayer for Windows:
1. Register at beta.slingmedia.com
2. Add your Slingbox information (instructions are on the site)
3. Then email us:
To: beta @ slingmedia . com
Subject: EU Beta Candidate for SP Win 2.0

You must be able to communicate in written English for the beta program.  Please note if you’re  fluent in Spanish, French, Italian, and/or German.

Re: Our iPhone app – We’re waiting on Apple, who qualifies all apps before they get posted to the App store.

Sling on!

SlingPlayer Mobile for BlackBerry v1.0 is now a fully supported product, yay!  Thank you to all of you who contributed your time and suggestions to get us to this celebratory milestone.

If you have a Slingbox and a supported BlackBerry device*, you can try the full version for free for 30 days.  Point your BlackBerry browser to downloads.slingmedia.com.  If you have a supported device with current firmware, you'll be able to download.  If the firmware is out of date, you'll get a warning message.

 *See http://downloads.slingmedia.com/get/spm-blackberry-us.html for full details.

CHEERS EVERYONE - THANK YOU FROM THE SPM BLACKBERRY TEAM !!

In case you missed it, yesterday we rolled out a minor update to the PC client, which is bundled with the latest Slingbox firmware.

What's New:

• The Encoding tab has expanded options.  The UI will go through additional changes--this is just step one.  To check it out, click on the VGA/QVGA mini-icon, lower left just above the Play/Pause button.
• The Pro-HD firmware includes a fix to allow HD streaming to a SlingCatcher (which will require new Catcher firmware, due out "soon").

Critical fixes:

• Stream rate slows until it crashes. FIXED

     http://www.slingcommunity.com/forum/thread/24708/

• Some Vista Acer customers had installation issues  FIXED

What you need to know:

• For those who want to switch back and forth between connecting via the Slingbox ID and Direct IP, you'll now need to Add a second entry in your Slingbox Directory.  In other words, you'll have two entries to the same Slingbox: one via the SID, one via IP.

Sling Accounts will be offline for approximately 45 minutes tonight, beginning midnight Pacific Standard Time, to clean up the duplicate Slingbox entries that some people are seeing. 

During this wee window, your Slingbox will still automatically appear in the Slingbox Directory if it's on the same network as your PC (ie LAN).  If you're not (ie WAN), you'll have to wait it out (unless you happen to use SPM BlackBerry and know your Slingbox ID).  We don't expect outages like this often. 

Thanks in advance for your patience!

As we announced back on December 18th, we planned to have SlingPlayer Mobile for BlackBerry in public beta for 12/30.  It is 12/30 right now, at least on the east coast, and we've uploaded SlingPlayer Mobile for BlackBerry v0.5.0.3 and made it available to the public.  Users can visit http://mobile.slingmedia.com/ from their BlackBerry to install the software.  (We're not making a desktop installer available as part of the public beta at this time to reduce the support issues, OTA installs only.)  As previously announced, the officially supported devices are the Pearl 8120, Pearl Flip 8220, Curve 8320, 8820, Curve 8900, and Bold 9000.  Unofficially the EDGE-only 8100, 8110, 8300, 8310, 8800, and 8810 will also work.  All models must have firmware revision 4.5 or later to install SlingPlayer Mobile.

Sharon and I will be working the Sling Media booth at CES next week.  So if any of you will be attending feel free to drop by and say hello.

Sling Media today released updated versions of SlingPlayer Mobile for Windows Mobile Professional (touch-screen) and Standard (non-touch-screen) devices.  The primary feature addition in the new release is official support for new screen resolutions: 800x480, 640x480, 400x240, and 320x320.  15 new phone models are officially supported:

• Sprint Treo 800w
• Sony Ericsson X1
• Palm Treo Pro
• Sprint HTC Touch Diamond
• Sprint HTC Touch Pro
• Verizon HTC Touch Pro
• Verizon Samsung Saga
• Verizon Samsung Omnia
• AT&T LG Incite
• AT&T HTC Fuze
• AT&T Samsung Epix
• HP iPAQ 910
• AT&T Pantech Duo
• Sprint Samsung ACE
• Verizon XV6900

Other devices which share these resolutions, such as the HTC Touch HD, should also work with the new release.  The new WM Professional version is 1.6.0.111 and the new WM Standard version is 1.6.0.59.  SlingPlayer Mobile is available as a free 30-day trial so new users can ‘try before they buy’.  As always, we officially support phones with 3G and/or WiFi, but it may run, unofficially, on EDGE-only devices.

The latest SlingCatcher fixes and enhancements were just released to the public: both SlingCatcher software (aka firmware) and the SlingCatcher Desktop applications.

Full details: http://support.slingmedia.com/get/KB-005767.html

A few highlights:

- SlingSync BETA is a new application that allows you to easily convert files for SlingCatcher playback

- 64-bit Vista and XP are now supported by SlingProjector

- SlingProjector now automatically adjusts its performance settings based on your PC system's capabilities

...and yup, a whole lot more

Many of the fixes and enhancements were based on feedback from beta and from the Sling Community - so thanks from all of us!  Keep it coming.  We'll address as much as we can in this series of frequent, smaller updates.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS !!!

Those who use SlingPlayer for Mac: If you didn't happen to upgrade recently, you'll get a friendly reminder to do so, starting today.  Just launch SlingPlayer for Mac and follow the online instructions.

This latest minor revision contains the following:

- Latest remote codes
- Latest Slingbox software (aka firmware)
- PRO-HD improvements--particularly audio sync issues
- "Letterbox" and "Anamorphic" aspect ratios are back by popular demand
- Digital antenna users should see scanning improvements (ATSC/QAM)

As always, thanks for all of your notes and feedback on the community forums, and...

Happy Holidays!

 

Our first maintenance release of SlingCatcher firmware is now available.  THANK YOU again for all the forum posts.  We'll continue to release small, frequent updates based on your continued feedback.

Q. How will I be notified of the upgrade?
A. New owners will automatically download the latest during installation.  Current owners will get notified on the SlingCatcher home screen at a random time between launch (now) and 2 days from launch.  This staggered notification approach will help ensure a quick download time for all customers.  The home screen is accessed by pressing the Sling logo (“slinky”) on the Catcher’s remote control.

Q. Do I have to wait to be notified?
A. No.  You can download the latest release now, even if you don't yet see the notification.

Q. How do I force the upgrade?
A. Make sure your TV is set to the SlingCatcher input.  Using the Catcher remote control, navigate as follows: Logo (