Splitting signal from streaming device?

[yankees60]

Seems like there are a lot of technically oriented people here so high probability I'll get an answer to my question.

Right now I have DirecTV. The box is in my living room. I take the box output and run it to a splitter. The TV in the living room connects to that splitter and then a long cable that runs to a TV in this bedroom also connects to that splitter. Of course I can only have one thing on at a time but I can run multiple devices off one satellite box without having to pay for more boxes.

I am only one person in the house so it is still only one person benefiting from that one box. So far...no gerbil, rat, or cat has requested that they get to have something on the TV different than what I have on!

I am now strongly considering purchasing one of these.

https://brewboxz.com/

I know two people who own more than one and both of them are completely satisfied with them. One of them is so satisfied she has both several for other people.

The device costs $275 with no monthly fee. There seems to be an $80 annual fee. But it seems like you get almost EVERYTHING with this device. Obviously it would represent a tremendous savings over the cost of either cable or satellite.

Now my question related to how I'm currently splitting above. I would like to do the same thing with this device. However its output is HDMI. Is it possible to split an HDMI signal to send it to two devices?

[Xan]

https://www.google.com/search?q=hdmi+splitter

But, it doesn't sound like this is a legitimate product.

[yankees60]

https://www.google.com/search?q=hdmi+splitter

But, it doesn't sound like this is a legitimate product.

Thanks, Xan. I was hoping you'd answer as I you'd be my first bet for having the answer.

As far as it being legitimate? That was my first concern. How can it be legal?

Here is their response:

https://brewboxz.com/faq/

Q: Is Brewbox legal to use?
A: It’s a big Yes! We are 100% legal. Brewboxz is a highly optimized computers that allow you to STREAM your content rather than DOWNLOAD content. Since you never have an appreciable amount of the content at any one given time, you never violate any copyright or ownership of what you are viewing. It’s also a reason we do not even put a hard drive in our device. Simply stated, ownership is the law – If you download, that’s illegal… If you stream, that is not.We have negotiated agreements with carefully screened Channel Providers, so you do not have to pay subscription fees. We will be adding to our Channel Provider list, creating more value for you as a Brewboxz owner.We will continue to work for you to bring quality channel partners and Addons. When we add a new channel partner, it will be loaded into your box automatically. Customers that have registered their Brewboxz will receive an email update with details.Through our Channel Providers, newer releases of movies and shows only streams just like other content was can access. They are streamed from other countries. Movies and TV shows are released in other areas before they are released in the US. The piracy laws are different overseas. If you are only accessing information on the internet it is not illegal; however, if you were to download a movie onto a flash drive and distribute it, that could be considered illegal. The Kodi software is not downloading anything, it’s only accessing content that is readily available online.

Brewboxz is built on quality Xmbc plugins. Xmbc hates piracy. Sadly, many streaming box makers promote junk pirated content plugins. We expressly frown on pirated content. There are plenty of totally legal and free channels and movies available. And if you want the latest high-def movies, and live stream sports, there are legal premium plugins that give you this, the right way.

[Xan]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

[yankees60]

Sounds like a good deal if it's legit. But it would be a non-starter for me without the ability to DVR the shows and watch later without commercials. I never watch live TV with the occasional exception of sports (which is now off my list due to wokeness anyway).

Believe it or not I still do not own a DVR. I discovered a long time ago when I used to use VHS to tape things that if I could not watch it when it was on then I usually did not find the time to watch it later.

My TV watching is almost totally confined to sports. I can later get to them for watching the games again via a web site like MLB.com.

[pp4me]

You can get a Roku or Firestick for under $50. Then you can dump DirecTV and throw all the cables in the garbage and watch all the shows you want at the same time anywhere in the house. I dumped the cables a couple of years ago and I'm never going back.

[Cortopassi]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

[Xan]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

I think that's actually unlikely; you get nasty letters when you're observed uploading content. Typically that's done by monitoring torrents or something, I believe, not by the ISPs directly snooping. So you're overwhelmingly likely to get away with it. Just don't believe that since you sent money to somebody that it's supporting the creators of the content any more than just stealing it yourself would be.

[yankees60]

You can get a Roku or Firestick for under $50. Then you can dump DirecTV and throw all the cables in the garbage and watch all the shows you want at the same time anywhere in the house. I dumped the cables a couple of years ago and I'm never going back.

Except nearly all my TV watching is C-Span 1 & 2 and baseball and basketball. I don't think either of your options would give me live sports? I pay about $15 a month just so I can get Yankees pre- and post-game shows.

[yankees60]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

How is it any different than me using my MLB.com account to stream both the Yankees TV and radio broadcast at the same time. Is this device going to create any more traffic than that?

[yankees60]

There's been a number of posts requesting IT help recently including confusion between "reply" and "edit" functions on the forum.

I propose we start a stickied IT HELP REQUEST post and I nominate our very own Executive Member, Mr. Mark Leavy, to take point, given his breadth and depth of knowledge in IT as an entrepeneur.

After I made my error yesterday it educated me as to why in the past I have seen two or three of the same post from some people. Realized that they must have just made the same error that I had.

[Cortopassi]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

How is it any different than me using my MLB.com account to stream both the Yankees TV and radio broadcast at the same time. Is this device going to create any more traffic than that?

Xan, Vinny, here's my experience -- I have Plex to manage my media needs and I run it through Rokus. So all my movies, TV, photos, music, etc are on my main desktop and I stream to the Rokus over Ethernet.

At one point, years ago, Roku had plugins -- one of which was a movie torrent plugin. I used it to stream a few movies, and obviously not totally legal here. So to me that is streaming/downloading/buffering, and playing movies near real time.

Soon after I started getting letters about unauthorized usage from my ISP. When I called them about it, they were able to list a few specific movies I watched.

I don't see how this box does any different. It seems to be taking streams from normally paid sources, and doing whatever to then get them to the box you bought from them?

[yankees60]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

How is it any different than me using my MLB.com account to stream both the Yankees TV and radio broadcast at the same time. Is this device going to create any more traffic than that?

Xan, Vinny, here's my experience -- I have Plex to manage my media needs and I run it through Rokus. So all my movies, TV, photos, music, etc are on my main desktop and I stream to the Rokus over Ethernet.

At one point, years ago, Roku had plugins -- one of which was a movie torrent plugin. I used it to stream a few movies, and obviously not totally legal here. So to me that is streaming/downloading/buffering, and playing movies near real time.

Soon after I started getting letters about unauthorized usage from my ISP. When I called them about it, they were able to list a few specific movies I watched.

I don't see how this box does any different. It seems to be taking streams from normally paid sources, and doing whatever to then get them to the box you bought from them?

I do not know exactly how they do what they do. I do personally know two people who have been using the device for anywhere from two to four years..and neither of them has received any letters or notices from their ISP.

[Xan]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

How is it any different than me using my MLB.com account to stream both the Yankees TV and radio broadcast at the same time. Is this device going to create any more traffic than that?

Xan, Vinny, here's my experience -- I have Plex to manage my media needs and I run it through Rokus. So all my movies, TV, photos, music, etc are on my main desktop and I stream to the Rokus over Ethernet.

At one point, years ago, Roku had plugins -- one of which was a movie torrent plugin. I used it to stream a few movies, and obviously not totally legal here. So to me that is streaming/downloading/buffering, and playing movies near real time.

Soon after I started getting letters about unauthorized usage from my ISP. When I called them about it, they were able to list a few specific movies I watched.

I don't see how this box does any different. It seems to be taking streams from normally paid sources, and doing whatever to then get them to the box you bought from them?

That sounds like an awesome setup, Corto. Good for you on the Ethernet, too. I'm a big hardwired guy myself.

You say this was a movie torrent plugin. Torrenting involves uploading, that is, connecting to a "thing" that anybody else (including movie studios) can connect to, and then both receiving AND sending data. That sets up a situation where rightholders can observe you sending their movie to randoms on the Internet, and they have your IP address, and they report you to your ISP.

If you really are just receiving, then it's legally much harder to go after you for copyright violations. And if the sender is in another jurisdiction, and the exchange happens OUTSIDE of the public view (unlike a torrent), then there really isn't much that a rightsholder could do, probably.

[pp4me]

You can get a Roku or Firestick for under $50. Then you can dump DirecTV and throw all the cables in the garbage and watch all the shows you want at the same time anywhere in the house. I dumped the cables a couple of years ago and I'm never going back.

Except nearly all my TV watching is C-Span 1 & 2 and baseball and basketball. I don't think either of your options would give me live sports? I pay about $15 a month just so I can get Yankees pre- and post-game shows.

I don't watch live baseball or basketball but I watch some football and have no problem watching it. I subscribe to Sling TV for $39/month.

Actually, if I remember correctly, ROKU had a DirectTV app so you might even be able to keep that service if that's what you're using to watch your shows. I'd be surprised if you couldn't replace all the things you watch with a wireless service.

Just checked.. google directv on roku. Yes, they have it. Also looks like you can get it on firestick.

[Cortopassi]

They're trying to worm their way through some loopholes.

Legal? VERY doubtful.

In practice? Well, it's not any different from just pirating what you want to watch anyway.

Exactly. Streaming vs. downloading? If your ISP sees this traffic going to your IP, you are quite open to be getting nasty letters at a minimum from them. If you go this route, get yourself a good VPN too.

How is it any different than me using my MLB.com account to stream both the Yankees TV and radio broadcast at the same time. Is this device going to create any more traffic than that?

Xan, Vinny, here's my experience -- I have Plex to manage my media needs and I run it through Rokus. So all my movies, TV, photos, music, etc are on my main desktop and I stream to the Rokus over Ethernet.

At one point, years ago, Roku had plugins -- one of which was a movie torrent plugin. I used it to stream a few movies, and obviously not totally legal here. So to me that is streaming/downloading/buffering, and playing movies near real time.

Soon after I started getting letters about unauthorized usage from my ISP. When I called them about it, they were able to list a few specific movies I watched.

I don't see how this box does any different. It seems to be taking streams from normally paid sources, and doing whatever to then get them to the box you bought from them?

That sounds like an awesome setup, Corto. Good for you on the Ethernet, too. I'm a big hardwired guy myself.

You say this was a movie torrent plugin. Torrenting involves uploading, that is, connecting to a "thing" that anybody else (including movie studios) can connect to, and then both receiving AND sending data. That sets up a situation where rightholders can observe you sending their movie to randoms on the Internet, and they have your IP address, and they report you to your ISP.

If you really are just receiving, then it's legally much harder to go after you for copyright violations. And if the sender is in another jurisdiction, and the exchange happens OUTSIDE of the public view (unlike a torrent), then there really isn't much that a rightsholder could do, probably.

Thanks, Xan, it works well. And my daughter also remotes into Plex from school, so she can watch local live TV if she wants too (I have a dual tuner).

I understand what you are saying, just not my experience. The first thing I do when I use a torrent app is go into options and set the upload bandwidth to zero. Theoretically, that should prevent any uploading but who knows for sure. I just pay $20 a year now for a VPN that works well as added protection (I use Windscribe).

[yankees60]

You can get a Roku or Firestick for under $50. Then you can dump DirecTV and throw all the cables in the garbage and watch all the shows you want at the same time anywhere in the house. I dumped the cables a couple of years ago and I'm never going back.

Except nearly all my TV watching is C-Span 1 & 2 and baseball and basketball. I don't think either of your options would give me live sports? I pay about $15 a month just so I can get Yankees pre- and post-game shows.

I don't watch live baseball or basketball but I watch some football and have no problem watching it. I subscribe to Sling TV for $39/month.

Actually, if I remember correctly, ROKU had a DirectTV app so you might even be able to keep that service if that's what you're using to watch your shows. I'd be surprised if you couldn't replace all the things you watch with a wireless service.

Just checked.. google directv on roku. Yes, they have it. Also looks like you can get it on firestick.

Being a fan of a baseball team (the Yankees) and being out-of-market (being in Massachusetts) ends up costing me a lot of extra money so as to be able to follow the Yankees.

I know with DirecTV I am always going to be able to get what I currently get. Doesn't something like Sling TV frequently changes is offerings? Finally I'm not sure why I'd want to use ROKU or firestick if I still need to maintain the DirecTV service?