How to watch TFCnow on an iPad
Being overseas, one of the things I miss most is watching Filipino TV shows. It’s a good thing that companies such as ABS CBN have online streaming services such as TFCnow. As much as I like the service. There are still some drawbacks to it.
1. You’ll need a PC to watch it (never got it to work on my Mac) as the shows require a DRM that needs Windows media Player
2. I can’t get it to work on my iPad
This article would tackle the 2nd point noted above. Sometimes, I cannot be bothered to go to my PC just to watch some Filipino shows.
While there is no straight way of watching it on my iPad natively (Hopefully, ABS CBN can make an iOS app in the future). What one can do is essentially control the PC through the iPad. One can do so by using Remote Desktop software.
I downloaded an app called Splashtop remote for iPad. While this app doesn’t support standards such as VNC and RDP. It does make up for making it dead simple to setup. It took me 5 minutes to get everything running on my home wifi network. The app can also be configured so that you can remotely access your PC from somewhere else but I haven’t begun tinkering with that.
To get everything running, you’ll need:
*PC
*Splashtop remote desktop for iPad
*Wifi router
1. First, download the Splashtop remote desktop for iPad. I was able to get it for au$2.49 on sale. Might be cheaper or expensive.
2. Download and install the Splashtop remote streamer from their website.
3. After installing, the remote streamer app should ask you to create a password. 8 characters long. Numbers and letters
4. After setting this up, you should see the app saying that its all configured and ready to go. Now even if you close the program. It will stay in the system tray ready to work.
5. Fire up The Splashtop remote desktop app on your iPad. You should be able to find your recently configured PC.
6. Then it will ask for your password. Input the one that you configured with the PC program.
7. You should be able to control your PC now. Basic controls would be touch with a finger to click on a part. 2 finger scroll when scrolling up and down a page. Go to the TFCnow website and watch normally like you would on your PC.
Here’s a video showing the playback of the video on an iPad:
Next video shows how a side by side comparison of TFCnow working on an iPad with Splashtop remote desktop and the PC that is being remotely controlled.
You should be able to watch TFCnow as well as other streaming shows on your iPad after following this post.
