Neuros, who built their reputation with weird, chunky (but wonderful) modular MP3 players, has long since moved exclusively to the home entertainment field. Their latest attempt at eroding the Apple TV’s market share is the Link, a set-top streaming box that will pull video from a wide range of online TV sources — Hulu, NBC, ABC, etc. — as well as stream local audio and video content from any USB hard drive. As is always the case with Neuros set-tops, the Link’s software is open source and ready for modification. This time, mercifully, that might not be the box’s biggest draw.
Neuros has taken another stab at the open-source set-top box market, and created the “Open Source Device 2.” The original OSD was aimed at developers, but ended up finding use as a DVR. The new OSD2 has a more conventional box, can encode video at 720p in MPEG-4 format, H.264 D1 resolution (that’s DVD quallity) from an analogue video source, upscale video to 1080i or transcode it for a PMP. It’s got a serial port, IRBlaster port, connections for Wi-Fi antenna, USB, LAN, HDMI, composite video and stereo audio, and even packs an SD port. It’s shipped with a Linux-based firmware stack, but is completely open to user OS hacking. Available now for $US250. [Linuxdevices]
This isn’t the first time someone has offered a bounty to hack the Linux-based Neuros OSD, but if successful, this hack could have some very interesting implications. The goal is to get the Neuros to piggyback on the TiVo’s recording schedule and make MPEG-4 recordings that can be simultaneously transferred onto a portable device like a laptop or an iPhone. There are two segments to the bounty, with a cash reward that totals $US3500. It sounds pretty cool, but whether it can be done is up to you. [DVRupgrade] More »
