Brad mentioned the forthcoming Linksys Networked DVD/DivX Player and Chris and Matt have been discussing the veritable merits of the (as-yet-unreleased) Apple iTV, and now we have NetGear's entry into the market -- the "coming soon" EVA700.What on earth are we all talking about here?
Well, essentially, Media Extenders.
Personally, I reckon this is going to be one of the big emergent products of 2007; a device to easily view (or listen to) digital content stored on your PC or Mac -- on your TV.
I've already mentioned the Kiss DP-600, a thoroughly impressive media extender unit with a whole host of tricks up its sleeve (namely HD output), but I still haven't managed to put my eye on one of these devices which can actually do what it's puports to.
However, when used in conjunction with NetGear's HDXB101Wall-Plugged PowerLine Starter Kit, things start to make sense. For a start, the electricity-based system of the PowerLine can transmit data from one wall-plug to another in your home at speeds of up to 200Mbps -- impressive, to say the least -- whereas every other one of the other products set out with the limitations of 802.11g wireless (54Mbps).
I'm slowly but surely starting to lean towards the NetGear system, if only they could get it released on time, which they never seem to be able to acheive.
1. If you're considering powerline (it's worked great in my house where WiFi was extremely unreliable), take a look at the Airlink101 product sold by Fry's:
http://airlink101.com/products/powerline.html
They frequently have these down to $25 per module. A big savings over the Netgear version. Only 85Mb right now but when they introduce a 200Mb model the price advantage should still be substantial.
Posted at 2:51AM on Oct 26th 2006 by epobirs