Streaming Amazon videos?
We have no idea how we watch movies and show on Amazon. Do we need anything besides our TV? Can it go direct to TV screen, or does it go through the PC, then to the TV screen? We have Asus Lapto...
Forum Discussion
Amazon Prime is like the water company providing a spigot with water next to your trailer.
Wifi is like the hose you connect from the spigot to your trailer.
Having a Spigot with no hose you get no water in the RV.
Now once you have the hose hooked up:
- If you get a newer smart TV with wifi & Amazon Prime built in, you don't need a laptop.
- If you have an older TV, you can either connect the computer screen via an HDMI cord (with purely mimics the computer screen) or via a wireless device (firestick is a brand associated with Amazon but has some additional capability to play with other media sources)
- Some newer TVs can mirror the computer screen wirelessly even without a firestick (or comparable device). It does seem to be hit and miss regarding how well this works and it can be brand specific. At airbnbs we've had times when it works flawlessly and other times, it keeps dropping the connection. It's nice because you don't need a wire from laptop to TV, so you can keep the laptop next to your seat instead of getting up to go load the next show.
Biggest issue you will find is getting a wifi source that can handle video:
- Campground wifi is typically too slow to be usable. (think one garden hose coming into the campground and 50 RVs trying to pull water at the same time each RV get a trickle or maybe no water)
- Cellphone hotspots will often have enough speed but you will burn thru data very quickly downloading video (even unlimited plans they will quickly throttle the download speeds if you use a ton of data, so there is a lot of buffering).
If it's an occasional weekend, the cellphone hotspot is very much doable and if you don't expect high def video, it's even better (high def requires a lot more data). We watch a lot of youtube and you can select the video quality. Many videos, supper high def isn't important so we dial back the image quality to save data.
Wifi is like the hose you connect from the spigot to your trailer.
Having a Spigot with no hose you get no water in the RV.
Now once you have the hose hooked up:
- If you get a newer smart TV with wifi & Amazon Prime built in, you don't need a laptop.
- If you have an older TV, you can either connect the computer screen via an HDMI cord (with purely mimics the computer screen) or via a wireless device (firestick is a brand associated with Amazon but has some additional capability to play with other media sources)
- Some newer TVs can mirror the computer screen wirelessly even without a firestick (or comparable device). It does seem to be hit and miss regarding how well this works and it can be brand specific. At airbnbs we've had times when it works flawlessly and other times, it keeps dropping the connection. It's nice because you don't need a wire from laptop to TV, so you can keep the laptop next to your seat instead of getting up to go load the next show.
Biggest issue you will find is getting a wifi source that can handle video:
- Campground wifi is typically too slow to be usable. (think one garden hose coming into the campground and 50 RVs trying to pull water at the same time each RV get a trickle or maybe no water)
- Cellphone hotspots will often have enough speed but you will burn thru data very quickly downloading video (even unlimited plans they will quickly throttle the download speeds if you use a ton of data, so there is a lot of buffering).
If it's an occasional weekend, the cellphone hotspot is very much doable and if you don't expect high def video, it's even better (high def requires a lot more data). We watch a lot of youtube and you can select the video quality. Many videos, supper high def isn't important so we dial back the image quality to save data.
