Cut the cord but miss PBS and local news? AirTV links broadcast signals with streaming set-up

Mike Snider | USA TODAY

Free, local TV channels are often forgotten amid the ever-accelerating quest for more broadband-delivered streaming content.

AirTV could make it easier for cord cutters to add those local channels into their viewing portfolio. The new AirTV device (out now $119.99) connects to an antenna to capture over-the-air broadcast signals and to your home Wi-Fi network to send video to Android and iOS phones and tablets, and to Roku and Amazon Fire TV devices.

You can use the AirTV app or SlingTV app to watch local TV channels on your TV or devices. (AirTV is a subsidiary of Dish Network, which also operates Sling TV, a broadband-delivered TV service for $20-up monthly.)

Depending on where you live, you may be able to get 50 or more local channels from ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, PBS and other broadcasters. Visit the AirTV website to input your zip code to see what you might likely receive.

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The AirTV box (dimensions: 6 inches by 4 inches by 2 inches) looks a lot like the Slingbox, which for more than a decade let you watch pay-TV content you paid for from another location. Dish's parent company EchoStar acquired Sling Media in 2007, a few months before spinning off the EchoStar equipment business from Dish Network.

Even though it's modestly sized, the idea is that you won't see the box, says Mitch Weinraub, AirTV's director of product development. "We expect most people will put it in their attic or upstairs on a shelf, wherever the best place for them to put the antenna is, as opposed to wherever the television is."



Two simultaneous streams of different channels can be watched, one of them on portable devices outside the home.

For now, watching broadcast channels must be done live, but AirTV plans a software upgrade later this year that will let you connect a USB hard drive. "They can plug that into the port on the back (of the AirTV device) and have a whole-home DVR," Weinraub said. "They will get the guide data for free and they will be able to record all of their local channels and play them back with no monthly fees."

AirTV is available on the AirTV website, at Amazon.com and some retailers.

To note: this is a different product than the company's AirTV player, which has been available for more than a year. That player connected to an antenna and a TV for Sling TV and local TV in a single programming guide.

Follow USA TODAY reporter Mike Snider on Twitter: @MikeSnider.