Review on Sling Media AirTV: Stream Local Channels to TVs 📺 and Mobile Devices with Built-in DVR Capability, Perfect for Sling TV by Robert Gilbert

First a disclaimer: as a cord cutter I want this product to actually work so my four stars might be a bit high. Also, I don't really like writing reviews, but since AirTV has so much potential for us cord cutters, I wanted to share my recent experience with it. I use it in combination with Sling TV, two different types. Roku devices and the newer Netgear 56 wireless router. Setup. The product was very easy to set up and link to our existing Roku Sling account. I connected it to the antenna, quickly set up the Sling Android app and, bam, added local channels to my Sling account using the channel name. Information about the program, etc. Then I tested to get the best picture quality and a link to the network. Here are a few caveats to make setup and use easier: 1) Make sure you have good local reception, poor reception will only make matters worse. I'm on the subway in southeast Denver and by placing a passive antenna in the attic I can get strong reception even without line of sight or an amplifier. Before I had a permanent setup I did some initial testing with a cheaper omnidirectional antenna and found that poor reception caused issues with vapor. 2) You need to connect the AirTV to your network (wireless router) using an Ethernet connection. I connected it via Wi-Fi, and no matter where it was placed, I had trouble streaming. If it's on the other side of the house from your WiFi router, it just won't work. do not deliver a stable stream even with good TV reception. After connecting it to my router via Ethernet, 95% of my streaming problems were gone. Constant use is fine, as I mentioned earlier. I wish this was perfect as it offers so much value for cord cutters especially those using Sling but there are still constant quirks that are non-existential but show room for improvement. Here is the list after the first week of use, will update as I use it: 1) Every 15-20 minutes it freezes momentarily, it's a real pain watching sports, since it can last up to 30-45 seconds, although more often it is 5-10 seconds. I can't define if it's the broadcaster and I think the AirTV box just can't buffer for long. This is happening on two different Roku devices, so I believe it's an AirTV box. 2) Also, for no reason, it stops streaming and gives an error that the antenna is off. Since nothing has changed and the antenna is still in the attic, this is very annoying. To "reset" it, you need to restart the box, then rescan the channels in the Sling Android app, then wait a while for the channels to be back in Sling. The whole process can take 5 minutes or more. This has only happened a few times so far so I hope it stops, if I don't make any other changes to the setup, but I'll update this when I get better use of the system. 3) Finally, as for the DVR function, you cannot stop or rewind the channel you were watching. I believe it's just not in the feature set. It's good that recorded shows that use a separate hard drive show up with your other recordings on Sling, that's nice. In the future it would be nice to have features like DVR for live broadcasts. So all in all a decent device that plays an important role in cable cutting. Some of the previous reviews indicate that they have made improvements and I hope that future additional software updates will address the current issues and provide enhanced functionality.###Update 1-6-18###I have replaced a Netgear router with a Mesh DECO system from TP Link. It has a much faster quad-core processor and so far has eliminated any freezes we've experienced when using a slower router. Therefore, I strongly recommend that when purchasing an AirTV, you 1) have a router with a fast processor and 2) use an Ethernet connection between the AirTV and the router.