SteelSoftTV

SteelSoftTV

SteelSoftTV is better than some of the other Internet TV programs we’ve encountered, though to be honest, that’s not saying much. The vast majority of the channels that it offers actually work, though whether they’re broadcasting anything you want to watch is another question entirely. If you’re interested in news or religious content from around the world, SteelSoftTV isn’t bad. If you’re looking for entertainment, you should probably keep looking.

The program’s interface resembles a flat-screen TV, and you’re stuck with it at its current size; there’s no full-screen option. A sidebar to the right lets you select from a long drop-down menu full of different countries, and once you select your desired country, channels are organized in a tree hierarchy by category. These include Education, News, Talk, Culture, Christian, Entertainment, Government, Sports, and others. Some countries have many more categories and channels than others, so don’t get too excited about watching Chinese sports or Haitian talk shows; some of the countries have very limited content available. As is the case with many Internet TV programs, there were quite a few channels that didn’t load; we were frequently greeted with the less-than-eloquent error message, “Now, the channel of you choose do not broadcast. Please change another.” We had no trouble viewing meetings of the Sarasota County Planning Commission and other such government offerings, but on the whole, there wasn’t a lot of interesting content here. Still, if you’re interested in checking out television from around the world, you could do worse than SteelSoftTV.

SteelSoftTV comes as a ZIP file. It installs politely but leaves a folder behind upon removal.