Not only can you use this to play back streamed HD content from the Slingbox Pro HD on your HDTV, the Slingcatcher acts as a file dump for tons of file formats as well (DivX, XviD). The third and most innovative feature of the Slingcatcher is its ability to take video from your PC (either a portion of a screen or a specific window) and stream that to the Slingcatcher. It lets you watch YouTube video, ABC HD video, or anything you can play back on your computer—but on your living room HDTV.
The Gadget: Linksys’ slightly fancier Windows Media Center Extender, which streams the Windows Vista/XP Media Center interface over the network so you can watch live or recorded TV and downloaded files on TV in HD.
The Price: $US299
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As dapreview points out, this just-announced Cowon N3 looks quite like the Cowon Q5W we reviewed a few weeks ago. The most noticeable difference comes from the fact that this has a 7-inch screen as opposed to the Q5′s 5-incher. Other than that, there’s no internal memory—you have to use one of two SDHC slots to add storage—and GPS and DMB (portable TV) support. The good news is that this does support DivX/XviD and all the other video and audio codecs the Q5W does, meaning that you’ll never have to go a second without entertainment. Ever. [Dapreview]
Huzzah! I’ve discovered why XviD files didn’t work in the PlayStation DivX Playback test. Apparently, streaming over Windows Media Player 11 does not work for any XviD files and most DivX files, but it does work fine if you load the files onto an external USB drive or burn it to a DVD. But there’s a workaround, kind of.
The PlayStation 3 2.10 update is here, bringing with it not only Blu-ray Profile 1.1 support (which adds picture in picture among other things), but DivX and WMV playback as well. Unfortunately, DivX support means DivX support, and doesn’t include XviD as some of us hoped according to readers includes XviD support, but the files we have tested don’t work at all. We threw our normal battery of files at our PS3, and came to the conclusion that it’s not quite as good as the Xbox 360 implementation. Here are our notes.
Update: We’ve found that XviD playback does work, but only on burned DVDs and external hard drives. See here for an update and a workaround.DivX and WMV play back fine. Just as they claimed, the PS3 now can play back DivX files and WMV files. No problemo.
Remember Connect360, the app that let you stream music and video from your Mac to your Xbox 360? It’s just been updated to support XviD and DivX functionality to match the fall upgrade you installed earlier this week. It still costs $US20 if you haven’t purchased it before, but you can try it for free to see if it works for you. If this were the policy for everything, we’d have a lot of half-eaten bananas at the supermarket, along with much cleanup needed in the diaper aisle. [Nullriver]
The Gadget: The Cowon Q5W PMP that has a feature list as long as my leg, which (and this is abbreviated) supports a bunch of video formats such as DivX and XviD, along with various nerd-friendly audio formats like OGG and FLAC. It’s also got an optional GPS mount as well, in addition to 60GB of storage and a 720×480 display.
The Price: $US599 for 60GB, $US549 for 40GB
The Xbox 360 supports DivX and XviD as of today, which may make some of you with big file collections (like us) as giddy as a kid in store with puppies made of candy. We threw our entire collection of movies, TV shows and random clips at it and found that the 360 can play back pretty much anything. Here are some notes.
The Cowon Q5W could be one of the most feature rich PMPs we’ve seen yet, even beating out Archos’s big boys in terms of how much stuff you can cram into a music and video player. Oh, and it’s not nearly as un-carriable as the Archos devices either, which is fantastic.
Update: Apparently there’s actually something good in this update! Too bad they didn’t actually include it in the press release, but the Xbox 360 will support DivX and XviD! Hurray! Here’s what we got from the Xbox team:
**15. What types of AVI files are supported?
