News and Reviews....

    The BOXEE BOX    December 2009     

    The video streaming company BOXEE unveiled the Boxee Box at an event in Brooklyn last week (December 10, 2009. The Boxee Box is a D-Link product which allows users to stream movies and TV shows from a variety of online site. It is expected to debut next year (2Q  2010). it is expected to sell for $200 and is shaped like an off-kilter box. It includes an HDMI port, wifi, Ethernet, two USB ports and an SD card slot. It will be capable of streaming 1080P Internet video. As reported, the box has no internal storage, but users can store content on SD memory cards for playback on the box.

Boxee and D-Link are the second group of companies to use SD cards to store video content. Toshiba and kiosk companies NCR and MOD Systems are using SD cards to store movies downloaded through digital movie kiosks now in test at Blockbuster and Hollywood Video stores. Digiboo is another company set to roll out digital kiosks that will offer downloads to USB devices at the start of the year in Movie Gallery stores. It is unclear if BOXEE BOX will support playback of movies from other kiosks companies. Boxee Box is likely to become implanted in other products, allowing them access to the streaming content.

Comment .....  The only drawback we see from the BOX in general is that HDMI is the only direct output and HDMI has been a finicky scheme. To pacify the movie houses, reduce their chances of getting hauled into court, a new product has succumbed to the HDMI scheme which holds true the HCCP handshake and prevents the digital format from escaping the loop of box to TV. Essentially designing in our opinion a product that limits its use to those that have HDMI interfaces.