Streaming of the ILDN

[marty]

I'm sorry for the dumb question, but what do people use Roku for?  I can stream on my computer, and if I want the larger screen I can directly cable to the TV.

Does this give higher resolution or extra features, like being able to dump the feed to TiVo and watch later?

I'm not being deliberately dense or, for once, Luddite.  I just don't get what it's for.

Convenience. You can, of course, hook your laptop up to the TV, but that generally precludes you from using it at the same time, and also increases the work to view versus just slamming your ass on the couch, turning the TV on, and picking up the Roku remote (or Apple TV remote, or phone in case of Chromecast).

The Apple TV is also useful for casting content from your Mac laptop that you can't get natively on a Roku or Apple TV: just connect your laptop to the Apple TV via airplay, and it becomes another display into which you can drag a web browser, all without a cord connected to your laptop. This is how I watched the games on my TV last year. The video quality isn't as smooth, but given ILDN's overall quality*, it wasn't really a problem.

*Much better than pre-ILDN Redcast, but still lagging the state of the art for internet video streaming.

A ROKU box in the video cabinet also produces less of a target for rampaging 3-year-olds than a laptop tethered to the TV.  We started with a ROKU stick which plugs right into the HDMI port, but that is also somewhat vulnerable, as we unfortunately learned.

Class of '35.  If that good with a stick at age 3, sign em up!