Intel's making a big TV push here at IDF, and a lot of it centers around the
CE 3100 Media Processor, which combines an 800MHz Pentium M core with a proprietary video processing core all on one chip. That's about as much power as a 1.2GHz Atom, and it's enabled some pretty cool demos, like this box that's running a custom Flash Lite UI on top of Linux. The video silicon accelerates H.264 playback, so newer YouTube content looked fantastic -- some of the best big-screen YouTube we've ever seen actually. That's all the software was optimized for, however -- older content that required software decoding looked much worse, and playback wasn't stellar. That's down to optimization, though, and we're willing to forgive it, especially since the demo was put together in two weeks or so. Of course, the big question when you're looking at an IA core running Flash is whether or not this rig can do Hulu on a big screen, and the answer was cautious but optimistic: it's technically possible and even somewhat easy, but as usual it all comes down to Hulu allowing it. (What else did you expect?) Still, it's interesting to see a set-top box with some actual processing power, and Intel's got some more interesting demos for us coming up, including a three-tuner Tru2Way HTPC that can send video to a PS3. Video after the break!
posted September 22nd 2009 4:51PM
"running" flash.. The menu looked pretty unusable by my standards.
The menu was just to make the functions go, it's not anything like a shipping UI -- the developer said he'd knocked it together in just a few days.
Unusable is pretty much what we'd expect from another crappy Flash UI.
The last thing we need is more Flash. It's a dated hallmark of hack Web sites and a crutch.
I have no idea how they would fix that, but here's to hoping they can.
Forget flash, let's get some AJAX goin! Say yes to Prototype, Scriptaculous, jQuery and best of all - HTML 5!!!! =P
sorry, but H.264 never looks fantastic. It can look "very good" but not fantastic. Uncompressed 10-bit looks fantastic.
Cry us a river, will ya?
Ugh, not more flash! So does html 5 make this box obsolete?
nope...
Actually, the answer is yes and no. Flash is a thing of the past, so yes. However, the hardware is still usable, so no. Who wants to sit there and wait for a flash website to load when with AJAX and HTML 5, not only can you SIGNIFICANTLY decrease the size of files on your site (decreasing your bandwidth costs), but you can SIGNIFICANTLY cut down on load times BECAUSE those files are so much smaller.
Isn't that the same processor used in the appletv?
800MHz Pentium M
I though Pentiums were long gone.......
Sorry, but they don't have to ask Hulu if they want to demo full screen flash. They can just demo ANY flash video playing back full screen. The reason they didn't is that this box can't support it. Which makes it useless.
Exactly my thoughts.
Hulu is probably blocking it as we speak.......
err, is that an Apple TV? Pretty much the entire post described an Apple TV. We all know how big of a dud that has been.
+1. With portable devices(such as the Zune HD and others) that can already output HD video, boxes like these are already outdated.
@Mark so proprietary PMPs are going to open you up the world of Flash and other Microsoft competitors? Nope
If Apple TV has been a dud then Zune has been an Epic Failure. Zune Sales = 2+ million; AppleTV = 6+ million
@kibbled_bits: What? First off we were talking about online HD video boxes. That aside, the Tegra chipset has hardware accelerated Flash support... The hell are you talking about?
Too bad he was talking about Tegra pmp's. The original zunes have nothing to do with that, only the zune hd and that one is not even a month old.
@kibbled_bits: As long as we're talking about something completely off topic just to be a troll: XBox 360 = 31+ million.
btw, I agree with Mark. Why get yourself a set top box when you can carry around your PMP that does about the same?
mark
well...that didnt work...
it was supposed to say "mark hearts the zune hd (and rightfully so, she's pretty"
@Di3, Mark
Not everyone would rather to have a Zune or the like to play on their TV. They may be outdated by technological standards, but they're definitely not outdated by market standards. I'd prefer a set-top box that I don't have to plug in everytime I want to use it, and be able to have a family member or whoever use it in the house while I'm gone with my PMP.
Nice, seems like a competitor to the Roku box. Just got my Roku box in, can't wait to set it up
Damn it, after that last one I thought this guy was banned. Nilay, please ban him. Please.
What are you guys making such a fuss over a developer demo?!!!! This guy is showing you a REFERENCE of what Intel WOULD like to do! The menu is just to get the thing going. This was done by ONE guy at Intel. Don't you guys think that if they go ahead with it, they would put a TEAM of developers on this? Stop jumping to and screaming, just to be jumping and screaming. GEEEZZZZZZ
intel is the best
I'm sorry, what is this? It allows you to watch youtube on a TV?
There are other solutions that allow you to watch 1080p media on a TV, but flash is a crutch.
Still others allow you to watch Netflix, but local media sucks.
2009 (almost 2010) and stupid (single-feature) gimpy boxes like this are news?
i forgot to mention the boxes that give you Amazon Unbox and Vudu in a box and 'local media browsing coming soon!!!'
~sigh~