Boxee App is the New Remote

You got to check out Boxee Beta, which launched last January 7, 2010. It lets you watch videos from the internet and stored on your hard drives to your television.

The cool interface looks great! I imagined that it would be easy if you have a wireless keyboard and mouse combo. I mean, a wired keyboard and mouse, I have found to be too cumbersome to use when you are far away or in bed. So I decided to try the free Boxee remote app version 1.1.0 for the iPhone and iPod Touch (iTunes link).

Once installed and running, the first thing you need to be sure is that Boxee on your computer is already running and your computer’s firewall is not blocking port 8800.  This is very important or else boxee on ipod/iphone won’t be able to see your computer running boxee.

You will notice that Boxee for iPhone/iPod Touch automatically searches for the host (your computer running boxee).  if not, you have the option to manually add or search for it, then that works too.  As the screenshot to your left shows.

The Boxee remote app would give you a choice whether to use Gestures or Buttons. The Gesture interface would show the Boxee logo and a Back button. As you drag the logo across the screen  it changes to a red color to highlight whatever option you want on the TV screen.

The Buttons interface, would give you 4 direction arrows (up, down, left, and right), OK button, Back button, Stop Button, Play / Pause Button and a Volume slider. Personally, I still prefer the Buttons interface because of more control I get plus the volume controls. I should add that since the Boxee can be used to access internet content on your TV screen such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, whenever you need to input text the default iPhone/iPod Touch keyboard would appear.

If you click on the Now Playing button on the top right, a thumbnail of the video you are watching will be displayed. The Settings button would open some control options. Under Settings, you can edit and delete your host you have already chosen. Additional hosts can also be added here. You can also find a Sensitivity slider bar to control the responsiveness of the remote. Hoping future versions of the app, would also show a list of the available content available, playlist on queue and the history.