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May 20, 2008

rivals

Netflix to sell an Apple TV Rival. For $99.

Posted May. 20, ’08, 6:51 AM PT by Cyrus Farivar
Category | Apple » Rivals

20netflix-inline-190.jpgEnter the new Netflix Player by Roku. This svelte, paperback-book sized box is here to throw down with the Apple TV. And priced at $99, it’s ready to rumble.

At first glance, The New York Times appears to think that this thing will be a game changer — “It is the most impressive product we’ve seen attached to a TV this decade,” said Richard Doherty, the director of the Envisioneering Group, a consumer electronics consulting firm.

Crunchgear agrees, calling it: “This is one of the most elegant and surprisingly usable dedicated devices I’ve seen in a long time.”

Still, its major flaw, in my book, comes way down at the bottom of the article:

Unlike the Apple TV or TiVo devices, the Roku box does not have a hard drive. It plays video directly from the Internet by way of an Ethernet cable or home wireless network. That means that the picture could freeze on slow Internet connections. Roku recommends that users have a connection speed of 1.5 megabits a second or faster.

That seems like it would be a dealbreaker for me. I barely trust Skype calls on my network, much less full-streaming video on a massive screen. Then again, I don’t have a TV to speak of, so I probably don’t know what I’m talking about.

Either way, Netflix needs to get its act together if it wants to move some product — there’s no mention of the Netflix Player by Roku on its homepage at all.


3 Comments

Donn Author Profile Page said:

Too narrow of a focus for me. If it doesn't hook in to my PC and let me watch the content I already have, it's pointless.

Side-rant: I don't know why more people don't take advantage of the video-out capabilities of modern PCs/Macs. All you need to have computer/internet content on your TV is a cable, and maybe your Apple remote or a Bluetooth mouse to control it. I watch streamed network content from the comfort of my couch every week, no set top box (or dedicated mini) required.

May 20, 2008 9:06 AM
Paul Author Profile Page said:

Actually, I find this quite interesting ... I currently use Front Row a Mini connected to our TV for various video, with a Windows VMWare image for accessing Netflix streaming movies.

Although this setup works fine, it's a pain to drop out of Front Row to the desktop, start VMWare, navigate to the movie I want to see, switch to full screen etc.

It won't replace it or Netflix DVD deliveries but this would be a nice complement to the Mini. And I consistently get 5Mb/s on my DSL so I can rely on that.

Still, I'll wait to see if Netflix get their instant view running on a Mac soon ... it would be a nice project to write a Python Front Row plugin to access the Netflix movies I have in my queue.

May 20, 2008 9:14 AM
Sam said:

No HDD? It must be buffering to memory, but does it have enough to allow the entire movie to load before viewing or does it require you to watch the movie as a streaming video? If that's the case then I don't think it will be very usable.

May 20, 2008 9:21 AM

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