[mythtv-users] OT: HD playback device

[Brian Wood]

On Sunday 16 August 2009 02:25:57 Richard Morton wrote:
> http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/16/wd-tv-2-spruces-up-western-digitals-alre
>ady-attractive-media-pl/

Interesting, but probably inevitable.

I'm starting to see more and more such devices, using hardware for playback.

The baseline is probably the Roku Netflix player at $99, I'm wondering if we 
will see alternative firmwares for this device.

Moving up in cost, we go through the PCH units, the various Networked media 
Tanks including Myka, high-end networked Blu-Ray players, TV sets (HP and 
Sony Bravia) that can act as UPnP/DLNA clients, and even game consoles like 
the PS3 and the XBox can be used as UPnP clients.

The reason I'm interested in the Myka is that the OS and software is on a hard 
drive, and accesible via telnet, FTP and other protocols, and so it is easier 
for the user to modify things without having to create and figure out a way 
to load a third-party firmware.

The PlayON server is (IMHO) a bargain at $40. I makes Hulu, Netflix, Amazon 
VOD and most other such services available to any UPnP/DLNA client, including 
some DirectTV receivers that have UPnP/DLNA capability. The main drawback is 
that it is Windows-only, at least so far.

Most of these units use a Sigma Designs hardware chip to playback just about 
anything. Given the problems that video cards and their drivers/setup cause 
for Myth users, I think this may be the way to go for HD (and SD) playback - 
easier setup (virtually none), lower power consumption and (in many cases) 
beter picture quality, are all nice things that we all want.

-- 
Brian Wood
beww at beww.org