Big news for current and prospective Pogoplug users. The company today is announcing that the device will support music, photo, and video streaming to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 (I’m waiting to hear back if it’s designed to work with any DLNA/UPnP enabled device – see response below). In addition, the Pogoplug can now be configured to backup folders, on a Mac or Windows PC, in real-time using a new feature called Active Copy. And not only that… Active Copy can automatically backup important files to another off-site Pogoplug for redundancy purposes. MSRP of the latest Pogoplug is $129 and it comes with 4 USB ports and Ethernet connectivity — just bring your own external USB hard drive for storage. MORE »

It occurred to me that the Apple iPad has no native, cross-platform media streaming capabilities (a big missed opportunity if you ask me). Being the case, I did a quick search on Google for an iPhone app, since most are compatible with the new iPad, and discovered PlugPlayer (iTunes – $4.99). What’s interesting is that not only does PlugPlayer allow you stream and playback music (including FLAC and OGG Vorbis), photos, and video from any network connected DLNA/UPnP storage server or PC it also allows you to remotely control a music player docked iPod Touch (similar to the Tango remote app we covered earlier) with your iPhone — and I’m guessing via the iPad as well. Below is a quick user-created video demo of the software in action. MORE »

If you’re in the market for a digital media adapter or any kind of DLNA/UPnP powered device, you may want to spend a few minutes reading TwonkyMedia’s Connected Home/DLNA Best Practices. The guide has been designed to help the general consumer make sense of the networked device landscape, as well as, what to look for before making a purchase. People usually assume because a device carries a DLNA badge that they all work the same and support playback of the same file types, but the truth is each product has device specific limitations. MORE »

ABI Research’s “Home Networking Market Data” is forecasting that networked home media device makers will see revenues jump from approximately $100 billion in 2009 to over $243 billion by 2012. The jump is being attributed to the recent introduction of networked HDTVs and Blu-ray players, which they believe will be strong categories going forward, as well as the maturing of network-ready CE devices like set-top boxes, games consoles, digital media adapters, digital cameras, and photo frames. ABI Research does point out, however, that these trends mainly reflect the situation in North American, Asian-Pacific, and Western European markets where adoption rates are similar. MORE »

This is big news! Now any Wi-Fi enabled smartphone theoretically can become a UPnP media server — serving up stored photos, videos, music to game consoles, media adapters, networked TVs, photo frames, etc. According to the PacketVideo’s press release, TwonkyServer Mobile can stream content to multiple devices at once and even take phone calls while active without interruption. The new software is available today for Android handsets through the Android Marketplace (no word on when we’ll see it ported to other platforms at the moment). MORE »

Today the Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) has appointed DIRECTV, America’s #1 satellite TV provider, to become its latest evangelist of DLNA Certified devices and services, which make use of standards-based technologies like UPnP for streaming PC stored media around the Connected Home. While this news probably doesn’t mean much to consumers in general, it may, however, encourage more TV providers to network enable their set-top boxes and certify them as DLNA compatible. MORE »

While this isn’t the first NAS product we’ve seen that doesn’t come with a hard drive, the $69 Addonics Mini NAS is the first to offer the flexibility to use a 2.5-inch SATA, 2.5-inch Solid State Drive, 1 x Compact Flash (adapter req.), or 2 x Compact Flash (adapter req.) drives for storage. The Addonics Mini NAS is compatible with Windows / Mac / Linux and provides SAMBA, SMB, FTP, DHCP, UPnP, iTunes, BitTorrent capabilities. In addition, the device includes a USB port for LAN printer sharing and a browser-based UI for server management. MORE »

It’s been a while since we’ve talked about FON and its Fonera routers. Luckily, a couple of recent video clips of the Fonera 2.0n in action has prompted me to revisit the current offering. MORE »

Everyone who enjoys the benefits of network media streaming across various devices, computers, and applications should give the UPnP Forum a big virtual hug today on their 10th birthday. Seriously, without the UPnP Forum we would probably still be in the dark ages where only devices and applications with their own proprietary standards can communicate with each other and share data (sadly there are still products like this today). Presently, the UPnP forum consists of 889 members and boasts 3,000 UPnP certified products worldwide (many covered here on eHomeUpgrade). MORE »

If you remember about a year ago, Iomega released the first StorCenter ix2. Today the company is announcing the next-generation version of their product, the StorCenter ix2-200, with a refreshed design, energy-efficient hard drives, and newly added support for BitTorrent downloads and Time Machine backup for Mac OS X. Like its predecessor, the StorCenter ix2-200 offers a DLNA certified UPnP AV media server, Bluetooth connectivity, Gigabit Ethernet, RAID 1 data protection, IP security camera support, print server, remote files access, and cross-platform compatibility with Windows, Mac, and Linux. Pricing: $269.99 – 1TB, $369.99 – 2TB, $699.99 – 4TB. MORE »