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Roku Box Adds HD, Grows Beyond Netflix
DeviceGuru writes "Roku has announced two free updates to its Internet-enabled Netflix movie-streaming set-top box. The initial update adds advanced compression capable of streaming HD video over average consumer broadband connections, while the second (expected during the first quarter of 2009) will add A/V streaming from sources other than Netflix (e.g. YouTube, Hulu, Comedy Central, MSNBC, etc.). Roku faces growing competition from other providers of Internet-based video-on-demand STBs, such as Blockbuster's STB, Syabas's Popcorn Hour (aka NMT), AppleTV, and others. Roku hasn't said anything specific, but perhaps it'll partner with Boxee, which already provides a popular AppleTV hack."
... but seriously when is porn going to get into the streaming scene? (insert joke)
We figured out a long time ago that it's easier to elect seven judges than to elect 132 legislators.
Someone just needs to build a nice small XBMC replacement. Something the size of Popcorn or Apple TV. Donate some engineers / money to the XBMC guys to get it to work with your chipset. Maybe some 1080p hardware decoding.
My XBOX is starting to show its age, but XBMC hands down beats every single one of those players hands down.
Just add the ability to talk to a Mythbackend and output HD at 1080p and I'll get two!
Isn't HD Netflix OnDemand available already? I see a section under their OnDemand feature labeled HD with a small selection of content.
The article says
I'm pretty sure this would be a licensing issue, not at technical issue about streaming formats.
It's one thing to have to sit at your computer, or faff about with a media PC to watch content. But I imagine the networks would be very scared of a simple, cheap, no subscription, plug-in box. I'd be (pleasantly) surprised if they let Roku get to that content.
Once Hulu comes to my Tivo (I hate having a million boxes for different things), I'd reconsider why I even pay for even the cheapest tier cable.
If anyone wonders what the Comcast 250G caps are about, they have nothing to do with bandwidth contention and everything to do with them realising soon they will loose half (more?) of their business when cable TV dies.
I think it might go the other way. It's one thing for a few geeks with home-brewed media center PCs to start streaming lots of movies and run up huge bandwidth totals.
It's a totally different thing for "Interweb" users with a cable modem and a single PC they use for online banking, when they get something like AppleTV or Roku and can start watching lots of stuff that way.
That is, once this starts to go mainstream, when average home internet users can start using these devices, there'll be a lot more pressure for ISPs to NOT impose those bandwidth caps.
At least, that's how I'm hoping it goes.