I got a new Pixel 6 phone not too long ago and while on the road figured I could install the Tablo app and watch my tablo remotely. Nope.
Start the app and it can’t find the tablo (presumably locally) and offers to search wifi. Umm – I’m on the road. Should it not offer an option to login to my account on account.tablotv.com so it can find my tablo and then I can use it remotely?
I guess to be able to use it remotely you first have to be on your home network to find your tablo and then you can be away from home and still access it? Seems not very logical – especially if you just installed the app and you are remote and want to start streaming stuff from you home wherever you are… can’t do it! Frustrating.
I’ve successfully streamed stuff from home w/ table remote – but that was on my previous phone and I believe the way it found the tablo was to be at home first … seems very counter-intuitive since ports are open on the firewall and the tablo can access servers and the other way around at least once the tablo has reached out to remote servers so remote servers can know the public IP address the tablo is behind w/ working port forward setup.
Am I missing something?
The remote is a great feature… just seems really rickity.
I’m used to Ubiquiti networks gear – their hybrid cloud access I’m thinking it was Tablo was trying to do although ubqiuiti doens’t even require ports to be opened… unifi controller behind any firewall or whatever once it is checked in with the cloud account, you can use a web browser or phone app w/ cloud account to get at any controller anywhere… great model.
Yes, the remote device, your smartphone, in this case, needs to sync with the Tablo on the same network the Tablo is in, before the remote feature will work.
I agree! Most of the time I’m on the road I might want to watch something via my Tablo at home with some random device and all I would need is my account credentials to get access… Ouch. I’ll get my phone working with it, but whenever I’m home I don’t think to get it setup… very strange way to do it.
I’ve also in the past to work around this setup a VPN to home so it can find the tablo. Issue w/ my pixel 6 the VPN support they removed L2TP which is ridiculous… only supports IKEv2 / Ipsec … so I couldn’t in this case temporarily start a VPN to get it synced… If the VPN is fast enough I found even w/o the remote support it could have the Tablo traffic come over the VPN tunnel to watch.
So I’ve been a TabloTV customer for many many years. So many customers have been asking for this, that I’m convinced there is some DCMA legal issue at play here and the main reason Tablo hasn’t appeased their customers. I have a condo about 350 miles away and there is no way for me to transport my 80" TV home to just “sync” it with my TabloTV. This is just stupid and the Tablo folks know this. Their recommendation is for me to purchase an Amazon Fire Stick, sync it at home, and transport it to my TV. So their answer is for me to spend more money, add an additional remote/device/training (family) on it’s use, vs just implementing a sign in or other authentication? No there is something else in play, and Tablo won’t be honest with their customers. I’m paying for YouTubeTV and getting my local channels, so that “content payment” undoubtedly appeases the local TV greed, but they will not extend that capability to those of us getting it transmitted (despite the FCC gave them the license). It’s all about greed and fleecing people.
So I start my quest to find a way to VPN or Zero Tier into my network.
Tablo doesn’t seem to be receptive to using passwords for remote streaming. They haven’t said why but if I were to speculate… It stops password sharing and reduces password compromise risks. I’m sure it also reduces customer support time.
I use a third party app for VPN on my phone. You should give that a try if you want to continue using L2TP. OpenVPN is superior to L2TP in some key ways so consider switching away from L2TP. I thought this was a good video showing the differences.
Okay tablo implements passwords. But on each connect for each unit they require 2FA and the response code will only be sent to one specific cell phone.
Setup is usually pretty easy and it’s likely you don’t need extra hardware. Set up a VPN server on the router that the Tablo is connected to. Your client router at the remote location probably lets you set up a VPN client profile that you can turn on and off. You probably don’t want all your traffic going through the VPN all the time so turn it off at the client router after you “authorize” your devices. After setup turning it on and off should be a matter of a few clicks.
I like the plan and thanks, now I need to figure out the pieces. I don’t have a router on the client side. It’s Ubiquiti Access Points in my condo, with no routers. We each have our own VLAN to separate traffic. My LG TV “may” have an ability to run a vpn client app, but I’ll have to look when I go back in a couple of weeks.
Well, I finally got back down here and once again TabloTV is not cooperating. I have GL-iNet router and loaded ZeroTier on it. I can via a laptop go right to any IP address on my home network 10.20.20.x, including the IP Address that comes up Nuvyyo Tablo Server web page. So I know I have a path through to my home server network.
Now, From the Tablo app on my LG TV, it will not find the Tablo DVR. The TV is getting assigned a 192.168.8.x address, so I’m assuming it isn’t seeing the sub-net that the Tablo DVR is on 10.20.20.39. If I try to assign the TV a 10.20.20.x address, it shows not connect to the internet.
