The Home Base can also use one of your external drives as a media server for DLNA-enabled devices, like the Xbox 360 or PS3. If I didn’t already have the PS3 Media Server on my Mac, I’d get the Home Base just for that function alone. You can get the Belkin Home Base at Amazon for $66 (USD). That’s very cheap, considering Belkin’s asking $130 for it on their online store.

[via GadgetGrid]

When you plug it in, the device is recognized as a flash drive, but actually it only links to the actual storage media where your files are stored. So for example you can configure it to access the music on your laptop, or perhaps the videos in your home server. In other words, the virtual capacity of the Wireless Media Stick reflects the actual capacity of the drives it streams from.

Definitely a device with lots of potential, especially since its simplicity makes it compatible with a ton of devices, even cheap DVD players or digital picture frames. The Wireless Media Stick’s price and release date should be available later this week during CES.

[via Everything USB]

Each DreamScreen features a bright, high-resolution LCD color screen, and has built in speakers so it’s a completely self-contained media playback device. And if you don’t want to bother streaming media from your PC, the DreamScreen has a built in 6-in-2 media card reader and a pair of USB ports too. Video formats supported include MPEG 1, 2, 4 and H.264, while you can listen to audio in MP3, AAC, WMA and WAV formats.

In addition to media playback, you can access Facebook and view updates without getting up from your chair. There’s also a slideshow integration with Snapfish, so you can upload photos to their site and view them on the DreamScreen. HP has also been kind enough to provide access to streaming digital music via Pandora, and HP’s own “SmartRadio” which aggregates Internet radio from around the globe. There’s also a built in calendar and alarm clock, so you might want one of these on your bedside table instead of a traditional alarm. There’s no word on future plans to roll out additional Internet services, but I’m hopeful HP will release more integrations in future.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

The only major downside I can see to the DreamScreen is that it’s crying out for a touchscreen surface. For now, you have to navigate using the buttons along the sides of the screen, or using the included wireless remote. Hopefully, HP will make a touch-enabled version in the future. I also wish there were an open standard for widgets like there is with the Chumby.

The DreamScreen 100 features a 13.3″ display, while the DreamScreen 130 has a 10.2″ screen. Both devices have 800×480 screen resolution, so the smaller display just has smaller pixels. The DreamScreen 100 lists for $249.99 (USD) and the DreamScreen 130 is $299.99, but you can find both models over at Amazon for a few dollars less.

Of course, 13,000 of those individual items (give or take) will be television episodes. But don’t worry! Owners of the new portable, set to launch on the first of October, will also have more than two thousand movies to choose from. The important part, of course, is the games–and including the new minis and full retail games, there will be more than 200 games available. Certainly not bad numbers!

For those who prefer to do their purchasing at brick-and-mortar locations, there will also be retail codes for sale that can be redeemed for downloadable content. Of course, after dropping $249 for another PSP, you may be hard-pressed to afford more than a few items right up front.

[via IGN]

Setting the WD TV up is simple: just connect it to your TV – it supports HDMI and composite A/V – and then to a USB drive and voila, easy access to your stored media. The My Book external HDD in the picture is not included with the WD TV, but that’s a good thing since it helps keep the WD TV’s cost down.

The WD TV supports a ton of formats and codecs, like MP3, WMA, OGG, WAV/PCM/LPCM, AAC, FLAC, Dolby Digital, AIF/AIFF, MKA, JPEG, GIF, TIF/TIFF, BMP, PNG, MPEG1/2/4, WMV9, AVI (MPEG4, Xvid, AVC), H.264, MKV, MOV (MPEG4, H.264), MTS, TP, TS, ABCDEFG you get the idea. It also recognizes subtitle files. And of course, no HD playback device would be complete without full HD 1080p resolution.

Th WD TV looks like a nifty device for people who don’t rely too much on streaming content. You can order one now at Western Digital’s online store for $130 USD.

Thanks to Rosenred for the tip:D

At the heart of Myka’s hardware is Sigma Designs’ SMP 8635, which “provides CPU and digital signal processing capabilities.” Like the Apple TV, Myka has both wired and wireless internet connectivity, a USB port and the customary HDMI/composite/SPDIF ports. Unlike the Apple TV however, Myka’s internal hard drive capacity can be as large as 500 GB. If you’re wondering if it’s already supported by major content providers, the answer is no, not yet. So what are you going to put in all that hard drive space?

Easy, just torrent ‘em. That’s right, Myka has a built-in BitTorrent protocol – or can be installed with one of your choice, it’s open source remember? No need to use a separate computer. The company also says that they Netflix support may be available soon.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

To match all the stuff that you can download or stream, Myka supports a boatload of audio and video codecs, some of which have yet to exist. Kidding. Some of you probably know that support for various media formats is another weakness of the Apple TV.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

I could go on and on about the features and possibilities that Myka offers, but we’ll just have to wait and see if the device lives up to its potential. Support from both the big industry players as well as community developers will be equally crucial in Myka’s rise or burn out. You can order one now at the company’s website; the 80 Gb Myka costs $300 USD, the 160 GB costs $350 USD, and the 500 GB version costs $460 USD. Myka are slashing $20, $30 and $70 USD off the respective prices for the first 1,000 buyers.

[via Home Theater Blog]

Under the hood of the U200i mobile phone wristwatch dwells a quad-band (unlocked) GSM phone, complete with a 1.3MP digital camera, Bluetooth connectivity, and full media player capabilities. And thanks to an external OLED display, you can check the time, signal strength and battery meter at a glance.

You can even watch tiny little MP4 videos on the 1.5-inch color display, which also happens to offer touchscreen capabilities. In addition to the stainless steel case shown in these pictures, the U200i comes in a solid black case design as well. But my favorite part of the design has to be the decidedly retro round dial pad, complete with otherworldly blue backlighting.

So if you’re ready to wear the kitchen sink on your wrist, you can grab the U200i mobile phone watch from Chinagrabber for $234.99 USD.

[with a tip of the hat to TFTS]

The Alienware HD Media Server (HDMS) comes in a dramatic brushed aluminum, rack-mountable enclosure, and provides a powerful HTPC under the hood. Powered by a smokin’ fast Intel Core 2 Quad core processor, the HDMS provides plenty of storage using a hot-swappable RAID 5 array with up to 4-terabytes of disk.

In addition to a standard slot-loading DVD/CD writer, there’s a dual-layer Blu-Ray/DVD±R/W/CD-RW burner available as an option. The HDMS comes with a complete set of tools for managing your media files and offers high-definition DVR capabilities for recording and playing back content at up to 1080p resolution.

There are a plethora of audio and video outputs including Component video, VGA, DVI/HDMI, digital audio and 7.1 surround pre-amp connections. The beast has two built-in CableCard compatible tuners, and can support a set of external tuners for recording up to four simultaneous video streams. Network connectivity is achieved using a pair of Gigabit Ethernet LAN connections, or via an optional 802.11N high-speed wireless connection.

The system is available only from custom installers at this point, so be prepared to drop some serious dough if you want one.

[via SlashGear]

For starters, the Archos comes with double the storage for less cost than Apple’s set top boxes. The TV+ also supports recording of content from analog video devices (note the component, S-video and composite inputs on the back panel), and acts as a full DVR, complete with a TV program guide. Just like it’s competition, the device only handles standard-def content, meaning that you’ll be able to store a whopping 700 hours of video on on the larger model.

In addition to its media recording an playback capabilities, the Archos TV+ can surf the web using an optional Opera browser with Flash capability. It can even read PDF files if the mood strikes you. There’s also access to the Archos Content Portal which allows for digital downloads and streaming of new content to the box. Network connectivity is provided via built-in 802.11g Wi-Fi or a wired Ethernet port. I particularly like the provided QWERTY remote control, which should make web surfing and navigation a breeze compared to normal remotes.

The 80GB version of the TV+ will retail for $249, while the 250GB model will run $349. Expect to see the Archos TV+ hit stores sometime this later this year. You can check out the detailed product specs here.

[via Ubergizmo]

So what exactly does plunking down six Franklins get you? For starters, this player is encased in a beautiful mirrored stainless steel and scratch-resistant glass body. The controls are accessed using a silicon rubber keypad, and track information is displayed on a bright full-color LCD screen.

B&O also includes a pair of their high-end A8 earphones, which look pretty slick and should sound great too.

So is beauty only skin deep? Certainly, the BeoSound’s uninspiring 4GB of (non-expandable) storage isn’t going to win any awards – nor will the display’s anemic 128×160 resolution. On the other hand, the player’s 40 hour battery life is well above average, so it’s got that going for it. That’s about where the story ends though. At $600, the fact that the BeoSound doesn’t even play video clips is absurd. Sure, it looks pretty, but your average $100 player can handle some video these days.

I guess if you’re incredibly brand-loyal to the Bang and Olufsen name, you might have to own one. But with Apple’s equally purty 16GB iPod Touch costing just $399, it’s hard to imagine why you’d pay $200 more for 1/4 of the storage and far fewer capabilities.

At the heart of the compact box is a 120GB 2.5-inch hard drive, capable of storing many hours of HD content in MPEG 2, WMV9HD, or DiVX formats. The tiny box has outputs for component video and coax digital audio, but doesn’t offer HDMI at this point. Regardless, those outputs should satisfy most of us with a high-def craving.

It’s even got AC3 and DTS audio processing circuitry, so you can have full surround sound if you hook it up your amplifier’s digital input. In addition to its video playback capabilities, it’s also a full-fledged audio server, with playback of MP3, WMA and OGG format sound files.

As is typically the case with these cool Korean gadgets, you’ll probably have a tough time finding one outside of the region. If you’re willing to deal with the overseas shipping you can find these for about 219,900 KRW (about $235 USD.)

The iRiver NV features a clean minimal design with a large 7-inch LCD screen. Its primary input device is a dramatic scroll wheel, which happens to feature a functional color display in the middle of it for displaying context-sensitive icons and information.

The player doesn’t just look drop-dead gorgeous, it’s loaded with just about every feature you could want. Sure, the player can handle a wide variety of audio and video formats, but it’s also got GPS navigation under the hood and can receive DMB digital television signals as well. There’s also a digital camera (although it’s only 1.3MP), and an FM transmitter for broadcasting sound to your car stereo.

The display has a nice white LED backlight for low power consumption, and a whopping 800 x 480 resolution, which should make anything you play on it look great. The clean Flash-based interface is also quite striking, and as a side benefit, allows the player to handle Flash content.

At this point, all we know about the NV is that it’ll ship in Korea later this year, but I’m hoping we’ll see it or some similar model in other parts of the world sometime in the near future.

[via AkihabaraNews]

The server features HDMI output for pure digital quality, and streams content off of a high-speed SATA drive to ensure stutter-free media playback. For those of you without a digital video connection, it also offers component, S-video and composite outputs, and stand-alone digital and analog audio connections as well.

It can play video files in a ton of formats, including WMV, WMV HD, AVI, MPG, VOB, MP4 and ASF among others. It’s no slouch in the audio department either, with support from MP3, WMA, AAC, FLAC, OGG, PCM and M4A file formats too. The server can easily connect to your computer network making it easy to move content from your PC to the server’s internal hard drive.

The M-5100SH retails for a little more than $500 when configured with a 250GB SATA hard drive. TViX also offers options for a digital ATSC tuner with DVR capability, as well as wireless network connectivity.

Among the new rack systems revealed are the NHS-1030, NHS-2030 and NHS-3030. The top of the line 3030 model integrates an 7.1 channel ES series A/V receiver with six sources, including a 400-disc DVD changer, media server, XM radio and secondary DVD players. More high definition sources can also be added to the system as needed.

The 3030 can send audio and video signals to up to thirteen individial rooms, while the less expensive 1030 and 2030 models support up to six rooms each. Wall-mounted remote controls and LCD touch panels are also available

Also introduced were Sony’s new Sposato series of in-wall and in-ceiling speakers. These feature a unique design to reduce undesirable echo and reverberation, and are matched to work with the NHS series of A/V systems.

Systems will range from as little as $10,000 to as much as $50,000, including typical installation costs.

More information should be available from Sony’s New Home Solutions website in the coming weeks.

The story claims that Apple may be getting ready to announce that they will offer licensing of its proprietary Fairplay digital rights management to Made for iPod licensees. If this really happens, streaming media devices other than Airport Express and the forthcoming Apple TV could be enabled to play purchased iTunes media.

There are a handful of devices that do provide streaming of iTunes tracks to non-Apple devices, such as the Logitech Wireless DJ and Netgear’s recently announced EVA8000 Digital Entertainer HD media streamer. However, it’s my understanding that these devices don’t directly access tracks, but instead piggyback onto iTunes to let it do the DRM authorization.

I’m hoping that this story does turn out to be true, as it’s one of my biggest frustrations with iTunes purchased media. I personally don’t care for Apple’s current streaming solutions, and would love to be able to use my purchased iTunes tracks on other media devices such as a Slim Devices Squeezebox, or (wishful thinking here) my Xbox 360.

[via Reg Hardware]

The Axion AXN-8017 iPTV will feature a 7-inch widescreen LCD, along with hardware that will stream your home television, cable, satellite, DVR or VCR programming (

Slim’s reasonably-priced Squeezebox and high-end Transporter media devices allow you to send media from your PC to your home entertainment system. Their products are reknowned for their outstanding industrial design as well as their usability and sound quality.

Having already produced some of the best bang-for-the-buck audio systems for media PCs and small media rooms, along with 2004′s acquisition of Harmony, maker of excellent remote controls, the acquisition helps to round out Logitech’s portfolio. The company’s desire to grow in the home entertainment arena is clear, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see future acquisitions in the area of HDTV accessories or other living room tech.

At this point, Logitech expects to keep on the team from Slim Devices, so hopefully we’ll continue to see quality hardware, while prices will likely come down thanks to Logitech’s production and distribution scale.