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Elgato eyetv netstream sat March 2011
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n www.elgato.com n £200
The Opposition SkyStar USB HD n Very affordable PC-only HD sat tuner, but the software is fairly basic and no networking
This PC/Mac tuner’s ability to stream HD satellite TV across a home network is useful, but marred by its erratic WiFi features Elgato already makes a satellite TV tuner called the EyeTV Sat, which allows you to watch satellite channels on a PC or Mac. However, the EyeTV Sat needs a USB connection, which means that you must keep your computer right next to the EyeTV Sat and the LNB wall-socket that provides your satellite feed. Not much use if you want to use your computer in another room, or to let another family member use the tuner on their computer too. Now, for a rather hefty £200, Elgato has released the more versatile Netstream Sat, which can connect to your home or office network and stream the TV signal to any computer on the network – regardless of which room it’s in. There’s also an EyeTV ‘app’ that can be used to watch TV on an Apple iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch – although, rather annoyingly, the app costs an extra £3.
Build and connectivity The Netstream is a neat little device shaped like a square silver lozenge, measuring 119mm on each side. Tucked around the back of the unit you’ll find the power socket, an Ethernet interface for connecting to your network, and a single LNB connector for the satellite cable. Unlike the EyeTV Sat, the Netstream doesn’t have a CI slot, so you don’t have access to additional pay-TV channels. There’s no remote control included either, but that’s not really necessary as your computer and the Netstream are unlikely to be in the same room together. It supports both DVB-S and DVB-S2 broadcasts, so it can receive BBC HD, BBC One HD and ITV HD along with all the standard-definition Freesat channels. Just remember that you’ll need a fairly powerful Mac or PC – preferably with a 2GHz processor – and a fast network
Interface
Terratec S7 n Cheaper than the Netstream Sat, and equipped with a CI slot, but it can only connect to a Mac or PC via USB
Elgato eyetv netstream sat
Terratec’s Home Cinema software is included for PC users. It’s not as slick or feature-rich as EyeTV3 but it will work with the tvtv extended EPG
Elgato’s own very Apple-like EyeTV3 application for Macs also works with tvtv and allows for recording and subsequent exporting to iTunes
Purchase the EyeTV app and you can stream TV over a network to Apple’s portable devices (iPad pictured), but our experience was disappointing
Test satellite Basic use The Home Cinema software isn’t very elegant, but it provides a useful range of features, including the ability to record and timeshift live broadcasts, and a handy ‘Mode’ button that allows you to quickly switch between live TV, recordings and radio channels. The standard Freesat EPG isn’t supported and standard DVB data wasn’t picked up either, but Home Cinema does allow you to use the online tvtv service instead. The EyeTV software for the Mac provides a similar range of features, but has a much more elegant interface, including features such as a graphical preview of your recorded programmes (similar to the album artwork display in Apple’s iTunes). It managed to pull in up to four days’ worth of DVB EPG data and supports tvtv.
Performance
connection to stream HD content. Having just a single LNB connector means that the Netstream Sat can only stream TV to one computer at a time, although it is possible to switch the TV signal from one computer to another if you want to. However, the Netstream Sat also has a USB port on the back that will allow you to connect an optional tuner module, the EyeTV Free. This will allow the Netstream to stream two different channels to two computers at the same time. This was not available for testing at the time of writing, but will cost around £90.
Setup Once you’ve plugged in the power and Ethernet cables you then need to install the software provided. Elgato has a strong background in the Mac market, so it includes its own easy-to-use EyeTV software for Mac users. If you’re using a PC then the manual states that you can either use the Windows Media Centre software that is included as part of Windows 7, or use the copy of Terratec’s Home Cinema software that is also supplied with the Netstream Sat. Sadly, the Windows Media Centre on our Windows 7-powered laptop simply told us that it couldn’t detect a TV signal and refused to proceed, so we moved on and installed Terratec’s Home Cinema software instead. Luckily, Home Cinema was able to automatically detect that we had the Netstream Sat connected to our network and we were then able to install the software and start scanning for channels. The scanning process took 23 minutes, but was trouble-free.
Up to this point the Netstream Sat had worked perfectly well, but had only been used with computers that were connected to our network via Ethernet cables. If you’ve got a wireless router then Elgato says you should also be able to stream the TV signal over your network via WiFi. Unfortunately, this is where things started to go wrong as we were unable to stream the signal via WiFi using our normal BT HomeHub2 router – even though the router’s WiFi features works perfectly well with other streaming video services such as the BBC iPlayer or LoveFilm. We had similar problems with a second router from D-Link and only managed to get the WiFi streaming working on our third attempt with a Belkin N+ wireless router. Even then, the WiFi transmission was rather erratic, with noticeable stutters and jerks on both SD and HD channels. We had long discussions with Elgato in a bid to sort out the WiFi problems; it even sent someone to analyse our network setup, but to no avail. The iPhone and iPad only work via WiFi, which means that the erratic WiFi performance produces poor results on those devices too. We found it was possible to stream the TV signal to our Mac using Ethernet cables and then use the EyeTV software on the Mac to relay the signal via WiFi to our iPad, but that’s a clumsy way to do things – especially as you pay extra for the app n Cliff Joseph
Verdict We certainly like the idea of being able to stream satellite TV channels across a network to any room in your home. However, the Netstream’s unreliable WiFi features restrict its usefulness at the moment – especially for iPad and iPhone owners – so that’s something that Elgato must iron out before we can give the Netstream Sat an unqualified thumbs-up.
DC power input
LNB input
Ethernet network socket
USB port
Tech Data FTA scan, Astra 2/Eurobird: 23m 05s 0
30 mins
Power consumption: In use: 5W Standby: N/A Common interface support: N/A
Features System requirements: Wired or wireless broadband router, PC with Windows 7, 1GB RAM and 2.0GHz processor, Mac with OS X v10.5.8, 1GB RAM and 2.0GHz processor, EyeTV app (£2.99) required for iPhone/iPad, internet connection for online EPG Linux: No LNB inputs: 1 LNB loopthrough: None UHF aerial inputs: None Networking: 100Base-T Ethernet, WiFi Common interface: None CAM: None EPG support: DVB/12-month tvtv subscription
Ratings PLUS
n Streams satellite TV over network n Supports HD and SD channels n Compatible with PC,
Mac, iPhone and iPad
Minus
n Expensive n iPhone/iPad app costs extra n Unreliable WiFi connectivity
Build Setup Searching Navigation Performance Features Value
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65%