Patriot's $130 Box Office 1080p media player streams on the cheap
By Darren Murph 
posted October 18th 2009 7:02AM
posted October 18th 2009 7:02AM
[Via thegadgetsite]
posted October 18th 2009 7:02AM
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good for the pocket, don't know about the eyes!
Too bad it doesn't have Gbit Ethernet and a 3.5" HDD slot. It would be much better for transfering files/backups...
The gigabit, yes, I agree. But just get one of those external, 2.5/3.5" SATA hard drive bases and connect it via USB or eSATA. Pop the drive in the base, copy the files over, take the drive out and put it in the Patriot media streamer. They're at most $50 on NewEgg. Hell, I've seen them that price at Best Buy!
Important question, can I have Boxee on it?
I'm the same, I wouldn't replace Boxee with anything. I really want to get rid of my AppleTV, but I don't need all that extra crap. Wireless N, and power for 1080p is all I need.
it doesn't seem that bad... but at $130 plus the cost of a drive... I am thinking why not just get one of the new atom based HD capable boxes and have all that extra versatility.
Show me an Ion-based nettop for $130. Oh that's right, there aren't any. Atom by itself can't do 1080p!
Show me an Ion-based nettop for under $150. Oh, that's right, there aren't any! A normal Atom nettop can't do 1080p MKV...
A normal ION nettop will run the interface of my choosing and
I know it will integrate well with what I already have because I
control it.
This little black box is well... a "black box".
One of the key reasons that many of us run HTPC systems
is that we can impose an order of our choosing on our video
players. One remote for all the players. One UI for all of the
players. The ability to dump all of those silly DVD/BD menus.
Not one of these "black boxes" has yet to achieve any sort of
Tivo-esque status where you might be tempted to put up with
the limited proprietary interface because it actually is a good
interface.
@cesium & @cesium again...
I don't think I said I could buy one for the same price did I, captain sarcasm?
My implication was clear that I would rather spend the bit extra for the extra functionality...
Considering this box is $130 w/o hard drive... so we are talking about $180 w/ hard drive for a locked in box with unknown support going forward...
Yeah... I'd rather pay a bit more for worlds more flexibility of an Ion/ Atom (or whatever other competitive systems show up in the class) based HD capable machine.
we need an Ask Engadget. way too many of these floating around...
Everybody wants in on the action after the success of the WDTV, atleast that's my opinion. I was holding an OEM version of this last week its pretty crap compared to the new WD TV Live or the Asus O!Play. Poor GUI, don't know if its wi-fi dongle compatible as the WD TV and you know your not gonna get any firmware update support either. I say fail!
There's a $30 rebate, making the box $99. Also, if you pre-order through Amazon, you get the $30 wifi adapter for free. Now that's a good deal. If only I didn't get screwed by customs if I shipped to Ireland....
Another boring Realtek player its the same thing as the Asus O!Play and the dozen or so others.
As soon as someone get's one of these things right I'll buy in a heartbeat. Netflix, possibly other online services like Hulu, and streaming with a decent interface and I'm sold. It's like you have to pick one or the other for some unknown reason with these things.
I am still loving my xtreamer
*yawn*
Yet another HD-decoder-black-box with a clunky interface.
Give me a box that runs a real GUI, like XBMC or Boxee, and I'll get my wallet out.
Someone really needs to start a company buying these types of devices and selling them w/ xbmc/boxee installed. It makes no sense slapping some homebrew GUI on such a potentially powerful device. Can I go to the bathroom? ... Thank you.
here here. I got a $100 "CinemaTube" box in my living room. Handles all the files I throw at it, works, but the horrible interface will likely ensure that I'm the only one in the family who will bother to use it. Not to mention a whole bunch of other benefits XBMC (or one of it's variants) brings to the table.
I really don't understand why these companies don't open up the specs on their devices so that we can go in and tweak the UI or maybe (just maybe) install something like XBMC onto it. We're obviously buying it just for the hardware, and makes things easier on their side too.
I concur. This and similar media players may play HD video at a fair price, but the interface is completely horrible. Nettop PCs are nearing 2 GHz and starting to use dual-core CPUs. I'd rather have something easily customizable, easily upgradable, with built-in wifi, and can rip DVD/Bluray and encode videos. An extra $200-250 seems worth it.
Better or worse than wdtv?
to bad no gigabit ethernet
no good for me
BD rips can be streamed over 100 Mb ethernet, what resolution media requires gigabit?
THJ: gigabit ethernet is useful for transfering files from the PC to this box or vice versa. It's not just a streaming device, it has internal storage and USB connections...
I was just about to buy the western digital one but now this just came up on my search.
Same question as Fant really, how does it compare to the WD TV Live one on http://1080pmediaplayer.co.uk that's already on Amazon?
Cheers, not a big media geek lol I just want something for our living room without needing to move hard drives around - does it also have youtube et al like the other one?
Oh Mr xuchaoxio12, with your spam posts you are truly spoiling us.
poor form engadget.
the asus O!PLAY, whilst being a near identical product, RRPs for $99, and you complained about it.
stop hiring such moronic, opinionated writers to cover unreleased products.
personally, i'm waiting to see how X360 homebrew develops. XBMC360 would decimate any 'black box' solution.
I've built one HTPC myself, and bought a standalone streamer unit (CinemaTube), and use my computers. But I'm an addict and love hearing about more devices like this that bring streaming media on the cheap. However, for $150 I can get a referb xbox360, and I hear those things go great as media centers right out of the box, let alone looking into homebrew/hacking options. The kind of thing that would blow a little box like this out of the water, plus add games if that interests you as well.
amazon has it for 99.99 AR with free wifi adapter. For that price, there is no other media player takes a HDD i tihnk. Already booked mine and see how it perform.
here's some nerd's vidoe unpacking it, looks pretty good.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGytUXZK0Zs
got the WDTV Live a couple of days ago. It's got a fastish UI, plays everything I have on my server. Native youtube was surprisingly clear and fast. Netflix and Hulu via Playon worked well (Hulu worked how it does [or doesn't] anyway).
The best thing, is the main dude who created the DVD drive boot program, that can also let you add custom skins and apps, it already working on bringing his stuff to the Live.
Waiting on the comparo article for all these new streaming boxes...