The Hopper with Sling came out about a week and a half ago, and I didn’t want to tell you guys about it. No, not like that! I just wanted to try it first before I did. I made the upgrade as soon as I could, and I’m so excited to talk to you guys about it!
First, I’ll go over the new features of the Hopper with Sling:
- Obviously, a built-in Sling Adapter. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Sling, it’s a device that you can attach to your DISH DVR receiver that allows you to watch all of your DVR recordings, live TV, and On Demand content on any PC, mobile device, laptop, or tablet. The new Hopper has one built inside, so you don’t have to worry about paying for or connecting a separate one.
- Hopper Transfer. You can now transfer your recorded content directly from your Hopper to your iPad and then watch it whenever you’d like. You don’t need an Internet connection to watch, but you do need one to transfer the content.
- Speaking of Internet, WiFi just got better. The original Hopper requires the use of a dongle (funny name, I know! It gets me every time.) to connect to your WiFi network. However, the new Hopper with Sling has all the equipment you need to connect wirelessly inside, so you can easily run your Hopper off your home WiFi network with no problems.
These were obviously the selling points for me, but I had to test them and make sure this new Hopper lived up to its introduction. I was so impressed with the original Hopper that I assumed it would be hard to beat, so I didn’t want to get my hopes up about this one. How often would I use these features, anyway?
The truth is, I use them all the time. The new Hopper with Sling is a top-notch upgrade that I wouldn recommend to anyone, new DISH customer or current Hopper owner alike. And PCMag agrees.
I just read an review by Will Greenwald of PCMag.com, who gave the Hopper with Sling an “Outstanding” rating, the best on the PCMag scale. He pointed out the interface, three tuners, storage space, internal WiFi, Sling, iPad app, and free upgrade for new customers as pros of the Hopper with Sling and named only the ability to transfer video once per recording and the slow speed of conversion and transfer to iPad to be the cons.
My advice? Try it yourself. I don’t know how anyone could be disappointed! If you don’t have DISH yet, you could be eligible for a FREE upgrade to this glorious machine. Talk to my friends at Satellite Solutions Network if you’re looking to order DISH.
I hope you enjoyed my review of the Hopper with Sling. I’ll be back with more soon!
