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VUDU and Roku today announced the launch of the VUDU streaming channel on the Roku platform. VUDU is Walmart's subscription-free, video streaming service which offers more than 100,000 new releases, Hollywood classics, independent films and TV shows, and was recently ranked as the top streaming video service by Consumer Reports . Available now on all Roku 2, Roku HD (model 2500) and Roku LT streaming players in the U.S. and coming to the Roku Streaming Stick in October, VUDU offers the world's largest selection of HD movies and delivers a cinema-like experience with vibrant-streaming 1080p HD and rich Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound. Movies on VUDU are available the same day they are released to DVD or Blu-ray, and can be purchased or rented without a subscription.
"We're committed to offering customers access to their favorite movies and TV shows at the highest possible streaming quality wherever they choose to watch them," said Prasanna Ganesan, general manager and CEO of VUDU. "Our launch on Roku today allows us to offer our entire catalog on the most popular streaming player on the market."
"With its impressive library of a la carte movies and TV shows, and high quality surround sound features, VUDU is a great addition to the Roku streaming platform," said Anthony Wood, founder and CEO of Roku. "The ability to instantly watch the latest Hollywood releases is certain to make the VUDU channel a big hit among Roku customers."
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Syabas Technology Inc., a leading global distributor of digital entertainment solutions, is excited to announce the latest addition to the Popcorn Hour product line – the Popcorn Hour A-400.
The Popcorn Hour A-400 is the first player to utilize Sigma Design's Dual Core 800Mhz SMP 8911 chipset and offers up a fast and easy to use experience in a premium case made by Silverstone.
Studio-quality VXP® video processing is included, offering fully adaptive deinterlacing, adaptive detail enhancement featuring sharpness and texture enhancement with overshoot control, adaptive debanding, and adaptive contrast enhancement.
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Rovi Corporation, driving digital entertainment innovation, today announced Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers, a new offering that is expected to provide consumers in Europe and the U.S. more ways to turn their physical DVD and Blu-ray Disc movie collections into virtual movie libraries. Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers offers solutions for in-store disc-to-digital conversion services, as well as retailer-branded in-home services. Both services will use industry proven Rovi technologies for content recognition and authentication, and utilize core components of Rovi Entertainment Store™, the company’s platform for digital storefront creation and management.
Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers ties into UltraViolet™ - the cloud-based entertainment ecosystem delivering a new way to collect and enjoy home video entertainment. The offering can be integrated as a component of services already powered by Rovi Entertainment Store, or incorporated into existing digital entertainment service infrastructures. Rovi expects the first retailer services powered by Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers to be introduced later this year.
With in-home disc-to-digital services, consumers simply insert a DVD or Blu-ray Disc title into a Rovi Digital Copy-enabled PC or Blu-ray Disc player. In the case of in-store offerings, consumers bring their physical disc collections into a participating store where a sales representative will lead them through the ‘conversion’ process. In both instances, once titles are authorized by the content owner, consumers will then be presented with the opportunity to purchase and trigger access to an UltraViolet digital copy. Digital copies can then be enjoyed by consumers on a range of UltraViolet-enabled connected devices, such as HDTVs, Blu-ray Disc players, set-top boxes, game consoles, smartphones, tablets, and PCs.
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Diamond Multimedia, a leading manufacturer of Radeon Gaming graphics cards, Best Seller of the VC500 USB capture device for PC and Mac and other popular Multimedia products, introduced today the GC1000, which allows users to capture and edit game-play sessions from popular consoles -- including Xbox® 360, PS3®, Wii -- and VHS, DVD Player, Camcorder or satellite set top box, then share their tailored clips on YouTube™ and Facebook®. The device enables users to record, tailor and share their game-play highlights with zero disruption to the gaming experience.
"Diamond's GC1000 gives users the ability to record and edit video in real-time, right out of the Xbox 360 or PS3 on a PC in 1080 HD, sharing top game-play sessions with friends," notes Bruce Zaman, CEO of Diamond. "With Gamers and gaming as the core of our company, we know their pain points and and we wanted to provide our key consumer with a solution that provides them with an easy way to broadcast and share their game-play without disrupting the experience with lags and delays."
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Hauppauge Digital, Inc., the world's leading developer and manufacturer of TV tuners and HD video recorders, has launched their latest high definition video game recorder, HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition, at the gamescom2012 gaming show in Cologne, Germany. HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition will have a list price of $169 - and features high definition HDMI and Component video recording at up to 1080p30, plus HDMI "no delay pass-through" so gamers can record their game play while playing the game on a TV monitor.
The HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition is a complete kit for gamers who want to record their Sony PlayStation®3 or Xbox® 360 game play in high definition. HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition features near-perfect video quality and records HD video from either HDMI or Component video at up to 1080p30. Gamers can share their best video gameplay with friends on YouTube by using the included Arcsoft Showbiz application to record and then upload videos. HD PVR 2 Gaming Edition also allows users to produce their own movies from their gameplay.
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According to The NPD Group, a leading market research company, rentals of physical DVDs and Blu-ray discs (BDs) from kiosks, brick-and-mortar retailers, and Netflix Movies by Mail accounted for 62 percent of movie rental orders during the first half of this year. Digital movie rentals – including subscription streaming, pay TV VOD, and Internet VOD – accounted for the other 38 percent.
NPD’s “VideoWatch VOD” report also revealed that overall movie rentals through all of these sources declined 10 percent since last year. Rentals of physical discs, while dominant, are becoming less so; in fact, year-over-year disc rentals from all sources declined by 17 percent, as digital movie rentals increased by 5 percent.
Within the physical disc market, kiosks continued to extend their lead, with rental orders growing 5 percent over last year. Kiosk rentals accounted for 45 percent of the physical market, as rentals from brick-and-mortar stores continued to fade. DVD and BD subscriptions also declined, due to Netflix’s focus on digital-video streaming.
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Yamaha Corporation of America, AV Division, today introduced the BD-S673 and BD-S473 Blu-ray players, which offer superior audio and video performance, robust network features and easy installation. Both models are compatible with the company’s market-leading iOS, Android and Kindle Fire AV control apps and stream video from the popular Netflix, YouTube and Hulu (BD-S673 only) services. Designed to complement the company’s recently introduced RX-V “73 Series” AV receivers in styling and operation, both models feature one-touch power on and playback via Yamaha AV receivers’ SCENE buttons. The BD-S673 model adds Blu-ray 3D™ compatibility and built-in Wi-Fi for easy connectivity to the Internet.
The Yamaha BD-S673 and BD-S473 deliver exceptional video and audio quality with 1080p/24kHz-compatible HDMI video output, full HD Audio decoding and playback of all current HD formats and FLAC files. Fun and informative content from the Internet can be accessed via BD-Live and BonusView features. Additional content from portable devices and drives can be played back through the model’s front and back USB ports.
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Sony Electronics Inc. today announced the availability and pricing of the NSZ-GS7 Internet Player with Google TV, originally introduced in January at CES. Powered by Google TV, the Internet Player will be available at retailers nationwide on July 22, priced at $199. Pre-orders begin on June 25, 2012 at www.sony.com/sonygoogletv.
"Expanding the reach and interoperability of the powerful Android platform with Sony's smartphones, tablets and renowned Audio & Video products, we are proud to continue our relationship with Google through the introduction of the new Google TV set-top-box," said Phil Molyneux, president and chief operating officer of Sony Electronics. "Entertainment content is available through so many channels and sites, and Google TV helps consumers easily find what they want to watch, listen to or play using familiar search engine technology, enhancing the viewer experience. TV will never be the same."
In addition to the NSZ-GS7 Internet Player, Sony's newest Internet Blu-ray Disc player with Google TV, the NSZ-GP9, will be available at retailers in time for the holiday season, priced at $299. The NSZ-GP9 player features Sony's proven Blu-ray Disc technology coupled with the robust Google TV platform.
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NETGEAR, Inc., a global networking company that delivers innovative products to consumers, businesses and service providers, today announced the NETGEAR NeoTV Pro HD Streaming Player (NTV200S), the latest addition to the NETGEAR NeoTV streaming player family of products. NeoTV Pro offers high quality streaming content from a wide variety of online channels and is the world's first streaming player to offer wireless display capability using Intel® Wireless Display (WiDi).
With the NeoTV Pro, users can choose from a large selection of streaming movies, TV shows and music from streaming services like Netflix, Hulu Plus, Vudu, YouTube, Pandora and many others, and instantly stream it to their TVs in up to full 1080p HD and surround sound from the comfort of their living room. And now, for customers that are not satisfied with hundreds of streaming channels but want the worldwide web on the big screen, the NeoTV Pro enables consumers to wirelessly display virtually any type of content from an Intel WiDi laptop to a TV, including sport broadcasts that are only online, movies, music, photos and any Internet site.
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Western Digital, the world's leader in external storage solutions and maker of the popular WD TV® media player family, today introduced a variety of new entertainment options for the WD TV Live™ and WD TV Live Hub™ media players. Current and new users can now enjoy Red Bull TV™, ABC iview (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), Acetrax™, Maxdome, the BILD TV-App, and the AOL On Network. They can also watch live and recorded TV with the new SlingPlayer® app and save their premium HD movies to the WD TV Live Hub's internal storage with VUDU.
WD's new entertainment choices add to the WD TV media player family's prodigious ability to play personal content such as videos, photos and music by supporting a wide range of media formats. Users can watch content located on any networked PC or Mac® computer in the home, from a network drive such as WD's My Book® Live™ personal cloud storage, and from any directly connected digital camcorder, camera, or USB drive. WD TV Live Hub owners can also save and share pictures and videos from outside the home, using the WD Photos™ app for iPhone®, iPad® and Android™ mobile devices.
"WD continuously listens to its customers, and adds the content options they want," said Scott Vouri, vice president and general manager, WD connected home solutions. "With today's addition of hot international and domestic channels, live TV through SlingPlayer, and HD movie rentals, purchases and downloads through VUDU, the WD TV media players truly provide the most entertainment."
