Tablo TV app is not a "Live TV Sync Source" on Fire TV

Support & Troubleshooting
1

My new Tablo TV Whole Home DVR (model TF1282B-01-CN) works pretty well on my FireTV (running Fire OS version 7.6.6.4). However, “apparently” the Tablo TV app was not designed to be a LIVE TV SYNC SOURCE. Other apps like Sling TV and Paramount+ are Live TV sources on Fire TV. Their channels can be synched with the FireTV app and utilize the shared common interface to the channel guide. I have reported this in support request #182087, with several illustrations, but the support tech has yet to fully understand the request.

Is this a bug or a missing feature?

3 Likes
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Hi @billmo - It’s technically a missing feature.

However, this feature is a lot more difficult than one might think to implement.

The services you mentioned are web-based (they live in the cloud) and have a very specific set of programming.

This makes it much simpler for the Amazon Fire TV to sync the channel/content lineup for the service.

Everyone’s Tablo lineup can be slightly different, and the specific list of channels is stored on the Tablo itself, vs. in the cloud.

This makes adding Tablo as a live source MUCH more complex. So much so that it may not be possible.

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OK, it is good to know that is is not a bug. However, I do wonder though, couldn’t my local Tablo device offer a web-based interface on my network so that the FireTV app could sync with the locally stored list of channels?

Regards,
Bill

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That’s just not how the feature is designed on the Fire TV. It’s designed to fetch sources over the internet, not the LAN.

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While I’m not familiar with the FireTV or TabloTV specifications or implementations, I am very familiar with Internet Protocols (IP) such as HTTPS, TCP/IP, FTP, SMTP, etc.

Obviously, my TabloTV DVR is communicating over the Internet with an IP to download the channel guide and it is also communicating over my LAN with an IP to interface with the Tablo app running on my FireTV. Offering another IP interface to the FireTV for synchronization with the channel list stored on the Tablo DVR isn’t how it currently works, but perhaps it could with some effort.

In fact, the old (discontinued) Fire TV Recast DVR provided such an interface on the LAN.

1 Like
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To be fair the Fire Recast had the home team advantage because it was made by the same company that makes the Fire TV. Tablo isn’t likely to get a great response if they asked for a change in the Fire TV firmware to accommodate them.

Have you ever self hosted(on your home network) any of those services? That means opening ports and setting up security certificates. Doing it properly isn’t as easy as you might think.

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Amazon has all of the API for the integration documented. It just needs to be added to the app. The recording could be added as VOD so the voice search could find recordings also.

Hopefully they will add this feature soon.