Netgear has beaten Apple’s iTV to the punch with its Digital Entertainer HD media receivers. The set-top boxes work much like the soon-to-market iTV, finding media on your network of PCs or Mac’s wirelessly and allowing you to play it all back on your home theater system.
Though not compatible with iTunes downloads, the system can play back most other media formats, including DRMed Windows Media files and even XviD, and exciting proposition for you Bit Torrent fans.
What’s remarkable about the Digital Entainer HD is that besides the standard def content you might have, it also supports the HD content that should be rolling out this year, connecting to your HDTV via HDMI for resolutions up to 1080p. Now there’s a few acronyms in there, but the short of it is download high-def, rip high-def, play back high-def.
No pricing announced, but we should have more news later in the week, as things at CES are just getting started, and you know our road crew are there to work for you. Yours truly, however, remains here at CrunchGear HQ to keep things grounded while my colleagues are enjoying the sights, sounds, and smells of Las Vegas.
Netgear EVA800
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