Just wanted to put up a quick review of the streaming products and apps I've recently purchased for those interested. I've recently added to the past lengthy thread about "Cord-Cutting" and based on many of those that have followed suit and purchased a variety of products and components I've been getting acquainted with the few I've purchased and thought I'd pass on some fruitful comments.

Device:
-Apple TV 4th Gen.
Since I only have an HDTV that I wanted to currently hook up in my bedroom I purchased this model rather than the newest 4k Apple TV devices.

-OTA Televes DigiNova Boss UHF/VHF Outdoor antenna

-Tablo Dual Lite DVR w/Seagate 1TB HD purchased separately

-Netflix and Sling TV apps

With my subscription to Sling TV I purchased the outdoor OTA antenna and they contract with Dish TV service's to come out and physically install it. The Televes Boss OTA antenna was $100 and $50 for Dish TV rep to install it outside.
***Note*** I'm currently not really capable of any kind of ladder climbing or have any business being off the ground due to health/age restrictions so a DIY wasn't at all an option. I would also add, that I currently had a Direct TV satellite dish mounted outside on my master bedroom roof area. I had asked the Dish representative if he could just remove the physical dish and add the OTA antenna on it's existing post mount. The Dish representative was excellent, arrived on time, very courteous and complied without any question about the removal and new installation. Since I already had the coax cable they the outside bedroom wall all I had to do was attach it to my Tablo DVR and set that device up. The Dish rep offered to do it as included with the OTA antenna installation but I told him I'd just do it myself later. I would also add that since I live on the south skirts of Miami everything is very flat and reception of the OTA antenna didn't even need to attach the included powered amplifier to get excellent reception of 47 crystal clear stations up to almost 70mi.

Following a quick setup of the Tablo DVR and install of the Apple TV device and subsequent Netflix and Sling TV apps I happy to report that with the exception of a small learning curve, everything is working as expected and really exceeded my expectations. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the Apple TV device for streaming too. My only complaint however small, is that the remote is so small that it takes some getting used to to navigate the operational buttons and touch pad. Since I've used the Apple touch pad on my MacBook for many years I found it to be quick and adaptable. The remote however small is very strong and durable..it's had a few spills now and works like a champ!

As for Sling, Netflix, and using the Tablo DVR, I'm very occupied for quite some time!

Also I would add a comment about the setup it was simple and quick.

What was also a bonus is the size and compactness of the devices. Between the Apple TV and Tablo+ext hard drive, they all could stack up to a size of a large textbook.

Final thoughts is that the auto-skip commercials with the Tablo DVR works fabously!

I looked at the Tablo, but they didn't support 5.1 sound at the time. So I went with Silicon Dust.

Our system:

Silicon Dust HDHomeRun CONNECT Quatro (4-channel) OTA network tuner.

Winegard HD7078P VHF/UHF rooftop antenna

Synology DS218+ NAS with two 4TB drives in RAID1 (mirroring) running the Channels networked DVR service.

A mix of Apple TV 4K, Amazon Fire TV Gen. 2, and Xiaomi MiBox S Android TV streaming devices on the three TVs in the house.

NetFlix, Amazon Prime, PBS Passport and One America News streaming subscriptions.

The rooftop antenna also directly feeds the main TV. The two smaller TVs have Winegard FlatWave Amped antennas on them. So if the HDHR tuner ever goes Tango Uniform, we can at least still watch live TV directly on those until I get it fixed/replaced.

The Channels DVR server can also be reached remotely, so we can watch live TV or recorded content from anywhere in the world we can acquire an Internet connection using our iPads, iPhones or the Amazon Fire TV stick I bought.

Future:

There will be 4-5 TVs, eventually. The two MiBoxS' are currently retired. The two Fire TVs will be, someday. I plan to move over to Apple TV boxes entirely.

^^^^^
ensigmatic, yea I do have the Tablo that supports surround sound and have enabled that feature, though my older model Sharp Aquos wall unit in my bedroom only supports their version of Dolby Virtual Surround sound using a 2-ch version thru their Dolby Pro Logic II circuitry that imo just adds a bit of depth to the sound at short listening distances, so without using the home theater system with 6-speakers it's hard to say how accurate or improved the sound actually could potentially be.

With that said though, over all I'm extremely pleased with the streaming experience. I've been binge watching now Netflix and other stuff for a couple of weeks. What I do like about streaming TV is that you can switch apps and watch new apps/content easily.

Over in the Roku or Apple TV thread, FHHM213 had mentioned:

quote:

Originally posted by FHHM213:
A graceful, user friendly (ie wife’s perspective) OTA DVR has remained somewhat elusive over the years. We use a Tivo but they’ve long had their limitations and she gets annoyed with swapping inputs from Tivo to Roku.

"Graceful" and "user-friendly" are often in the eyes of the beholder, but one big difference with the solution I've implemented is, although you have to switch apps to go between OTA TV, Netflix, etc., the apps all more-or-less have a similar manual of operations, and, of course, there's no swapping of remotes or changing devices on universal remotes.

The app we're using to view Live and DVR'd TV, the Channels app, even works mostly the same on Android TV, Fire TV, and Apple TV. This is a Good Thing, because I haven't yet replaced all the Android and Fire TV streamers with Apple TVs, so when my wife moves between the family room and living room TVs, she's presented with a nearly identical user experience.

If you have an iPhone or iPad you can use that as the remote for the ATV instead of the remote it comes with.

quote:

Originally posted by Prefontaine:
If you have an iPhone or iPad you can use that as the remote for the ATV instead of the remote it comes with.

Funny you should mention this as I was just thinking about the "Screen Mirroring" interphase on my iPhone just the other day. I was joking to my wife that on the local news they had a photo of a dangerous panther on the loose here in South Florida that I had displayed on my TV using that mirroring interphase a photo from my iPhone Photos app an image of my cat It had me curious about what can be displayed for amusement on the HDTV from my phone apps like my Ring doorbell videos, the local live weather apps, Notes etc. I still had to use my iPhone instead of the Apple TV remote to maneuver through the apps but it was strictly for amusement and curiosity, an interesting feature nonetheless.

I use the Siri feature sparingly and mostly for a few search functions within the apps themselves or to quickly get the time on occasions. I'm getting quite comfortable with the Apple TV remote features and gestures and very satisfied.

In addition to the question about the OTA DVR use, the Tablo that I purchased coupled with my outside OTA antenna has worked flawlessly and even for me has proven to be quite simple to use. With little effort to input channel recordings with a click of the remote onscreen menu, your good to go, and it's local channel auto-skip commercial feature is a blessing. My OTA picks up 47 local channels up to 70mi clear as one could want.

I would also add to this topic, anybody's streaming TV experiences are welcome here. There are so many good combinations of user streaming TV components. My choices are always going to be in a state of flux, now and as the future unfolds. Tech may change, come and go by choice or by age related failure so I always keep my options open.