Almost every month we hear about new supported services being added to networked Blu-ray players and HDTVs from the likes of LG, Samsung, and others. Today Samsung is pushing out a new firmware update that adds YouTube (not YouTube HD — at least not yet) and Blockbuster video streaming to its line of Network Blu-ray players. But if that wasn’t enough Samsung has added support for the fairly new and popular video container, MKV. According to CNET, an MKV-wrapped AVC file worked well playing off a USB flash drive and had no problems jumping forward and back through the track. MORE »

In a joint press release with Samsung, Blockbuster is announcing that later this Fall they will begin offering their OnDemand movie service via select Samsung HDTVs and network Blu-ray players. (I’m sure other partners will be announced later.) What’s interesting, is that in order to do this, Blockbuster must have updated their OnDemand service to provide instant streaming similar to Netflix to support these devices instead of progressive download playback – which is how their own hard drive based 2WIRE MediaPoint Player works. What would really be lame (depending on your point of view), however, is if the new service required one to attach an external USB hard drive in order to use the service. Someone please tell me that’s not the case. [via + image credit] MORE »

Well, it looks like Samsung finally got around to creating the portable media player we all hoped they would have back in 2004. The new Samsung Mondi (SWD-M100), which the company is calling an MID for Mobile Internet Device, runs Windows Mobile 6.1 and is packed with all kinds of goodies sure to please. Features include: 4.3-inch touchscreen, slide-out QWERTY keyboard with optical mouse, 3 megapixel camera, WiMAX / Wi-Fi connectivity, GPS, Bluetooth 2.0, and even HDMI TV out. Samsung says the Mondi is capable of supporting services like Fring (VoIP), Gypsii, and Route 66. The Mondi comes pre-loaded with the company’s own TouchWize mobile applications, Opera 9.5 web browser, Microsoft’s PIM / Office utilities, and a multimedia player designed to also be able to playback movies and music from the Internet. MORE »

Samsung will soon be shipping a new version of their of their popular UMPC (Ultra Mobile PC) called the Q1EX-71G. The keyboard-free Q1EX-71G UMPC was first showcased at CES 2009 for all to drool over, but the company has finally gotten around to posting a product page for the device. The Q1EX-71G will retail for $749.99 and provide users with a 7-inch 1024×600 pixel touchscreen, 1.2Ghz VIA Nano processor, VIA Chrome9 HC graphics, 2GB of RAM, 60GB hard drive, 802.11b/g Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0, and SD card slot. This UMPC is powered by Windows XP Tablet Edition and will be able to operate for up to 4.5 hours with a full charge of its 4-cell lithium ion battery.

This morning I stumbled on a press release from Broadcom announcing a partnership with Chumby to extend Internet-connected TVs, set-top boxes, and Blu-ray disc players with Chumby powered Widgets via Broadcom’s system-on-a-chip solution. Then I jumped over to Chumby’s news release section to see what other developments have been going on and it turns out that Chumby also has arrangements with Samsung and Marvell (announced at CES ‘09) to use Chumby Widgets with their processors as well. Interesting. Who would have believed that the Flash-powered Widgets delivering infotainment services to a cute, little device would be ported for use in mass CE devices? MORE »

Sure we’ve started seeing a crop of “Connected HDTVs” making the news this month, but the real winner here is the Yahoo! Widget Engine and Intel’s system-on-a-chip (Media Processor CE 3100) which provides the TV’s processing power to handle all the various interactive media application services. In other words, all future HDTVs supporting TV Widgets powered by the Yahoo! Widget Engine will have the ability to tap into the same services – through a broadband wired or wireless connection – currently provided by eBay, MySpace, CBS, The New York Times, Netflix, Amazon, Blockbuster, CinemaNow, Showtime, USA TODAY, Pandora, Rhapsody, Twitter, Flickr, and Yahoo! News / Weather / Video / Finance. In addition, Intel and Yahoo! have announced that they are now providing a Widget Development Kit (WDK) to interested developers, CE manufactures, advertisers, and content publishers. Comcast has also developed proof-of-concept TV Widgets for tru2way capable HDTVs in order to create a richer Comcastic set-top-less environment. Something tells me this is going to be big. MORE »

Looks like the guys at LG aren’t threatened by the likes of Samsung’s BD-P2500. LG is announcing that in the next few weeks owners of their BD300 Network Blu-ray Player will gain access to CinemaNow – including its HD library – and YouTube content directly from their player. These new enhancements are in addition to LG’s recently added Netflix HD streaming support. Now, if someone can pass the word along that us, connected home enthusiasts, would like to see UPnP functionality added so we can stream our stored media from network PCs and NAS servers, that would be very much appreciated. MORE »

For those Samsung HDTV owners who’ve been saving up or putting the Samsung MediaLive on their wishlist, EngadgetHD has a review post you should have a look at before pulling the trigger on this tiny little Media Center Extender. Bottom line: It’s a nice a device if all you care about is adding Media Center Extender functionality to your TV and don’t mind not having all the new whiz-bang features now included the Xbox 360’s NXE (New Xbox Experience) for about the same price (note: the Samsung MediaLive has built-in 802.11n connectivity while the Xbox 360 does not). Interestingly, or not so interestingly, EngadgetHD found that the Samsung HDTV’s Toslink is only capable of passing two channel audio from the extender, which may put a hamper on your style if you’ve invested in a high-end home theater system.

Related: EngadgetHD – The Media Center Extender shootout (6/19/08)

There’s some interesting developments happening with Netflix of late. First, the company announced last week that they’ve partnered with Samsung to provide streaming video to Netflix subscribers directly through their BD player set-top (FYI, Samsung has also added Pandora music streaming support as well). And today Netflix is out saying that Mac OS X users running computers with Intel’s architecture will be able to tap into the streaming service via Microsoft’s Silverlight web browser plugin for Apple Safari and Firefox. While all these steps forward are all well and good, ABI Research analyst Steve Wilson has some good commentary on the announcements and believes that Netflix will soon be hitting a snag with their present model if they don’t begin delivering HD video (as well as more streaming content in general) to users, especially those who’ve got their media streamers and Blu-ray players connected to their HDTVs. However, more HD video may soon be on the horizon now that the company is leveraging Microsoft’s PlayReady DRM for Silverlight. PlayReady Details: “Silverlight with PlayReady offers a powerful and secure toolkit for delivery of dynamic streaming, which offers faster start-up, and higher quality video, adapted in real time to users’ connection speeds,” states Netflix Chief Product Officer Neil Hunt. MORE »

Finally… after about 9 months from its original “soft” unveiling at CES 2008 (and its official press release in July and its “Coming Soon” list status at Best Buy), Samsung will actually ship their MR-00EA1 MediaLive Digital Media Adapter on October 15, 2008 to the public, according to the product page at Amazon.com. The only drawback is this product just works with 2008 Samsung HDTV’s exclusively: series 4, 26″ and up, series 5 and higher with a HDMI-CEC connection. On the upside, the MR-00EA1 will still sell for only $199, offer 802.11n connectivity, be capable of streaming and playing back 1080p video from a Windows Vista Media Center PC, and provide access to web content from MSN Internet TV, Amazon Unbox, and Netflix. Why Samsung? Why just limit this product to Samsung TVs? [via]