Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

While rumors have been flowing hot and heavy about VUDU’s possible demise, it seems the company has other plans in mind. We’ve received word that select beta team members are now being asked to try out new downloads that are intended to rival Blu-ray quality. Dubbed HDX movies, these ultra-high-def flicks are currently being watched by folks willing to wait a number of hours (two to three) for a film to start, but there’s no guarantee that we’ll ever see this hit the masses. Sure, we totally dig the idea of BD-quality content on-demand, but we could almost scoot down to Blockbuster, rent a bona fide Blu-ray Disc, watch, and return it before a so-called HDX title even begins.

[Thanks, anonymous]

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Filed under: Home Entertainment

Shortly after picking up its very own adult channel, VUDU is announcing a more, shall we say, family friendly bit today. Effective immediately, VUDU users will be able to renew any SD rental for $0.99 within seven days of first viewing the film, while renewals of HD rentals will cost $1.99. Additionally, VUDU has launched a new “99 for 99″ movie channel which contains a rotating list of 99 films that can be rented for — you guessed it — just south of a Washington. Interestingly, VUDU calls the deals “summer blockbuster specials,” though there’s no sign of an end date for either. Can’t say this totally changes the way we see the movie set-top-box, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction. Full release after the jump.

Continue reading VUDU announces $0.99 extended rentals, “99 for 99″ movie channel

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Filed under: Home Entertainment

Now that you’ve had a little over a month to cram down popcorn while enjoying your shiny matte new Roku Netflix Player, we’re interested to find just how pleased (or displeased) you are with the $99 purchase. Has it lived up to your expectations? Is the quality sufficient for you? How does it look on your HDTV? Is wireless performance up to par, or were you practically forced to run an Ethernet cable all the way downstairs? We already know what the paid professionals said — we want the cold, hard facts straight from the users themselves. Let us have it comments below.

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Filed under: Home Entertainment

Hope you’re not too sleepy, you hacker you, ’cause we’ve got a juicy one coming your way. No sooner did we find that the Netflix Player would be streaming content from other players in the industry later this year than Roku opens up the source code vault. You heard right — the GPL code has now been posted for the world to see, meaning that there’s just one link standing between you and umpteen delicious tarballs. Mmm, tarballs.

[Via Hack-A-Day]

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Filed under: Home Entertainment

Hope you’re not too sleepy, you hacker you, ’cause we’ve got a juicy one coming your way. No sooner did we find that the Netflix Player would be streaming content from other players in the industry later this year than Roku opens up the source code vault. You heard right — the GPL code has now been posted for the world to see, meaning that there’s just one link standing between you and umpteen delicious tarballs. Mmm, tarballs.

[Via Hack-A-Day]

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Filed under: Home Entertainment

DVD rental kiosks have been lighting up pharmacies and supermarkets across the US, but it seems that UKers and Irish lads / dames will soon have the great, great privilege of interfacing with Movie Booths in the near future. This particular unit doesn’t seem all too different from other variations we’ve seen, boasting a simple touchscreen display and a built-in android tasked with fetching your selected title and spitting it out for a nominal (read: undisclosed) fee. Apparently, trials have been deemed a success in outlets like Tesco, Centra and Applegreen, thus paving the way to see these pop up everywhere by the year’s end. Any chance we’ll see a Blu-ray Disc or two popped in there?

[Via Pocket-lint]

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Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

When MovieBeam shut down operations last December, we had a feeling we wouldn’t be mourning for long, but we definitely didn’t see it playing out like this. Reportedly, Movie Gallery is asking for bankruptcy court approval to sell its VOD service to one Dar Capital Limited for a cool $2.25 million. Should the deal go down, the firm would technically pick up 1,800 customers who had once shelled out for the dedicated set-top-box — but really, why on Earth would any halfway sane investor exhume this thoroughly decomposed corpse and attempt to breathe new life into it?

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Filed under: Home Entertainment

Earlier this month, we disagreed that HD movie downloads would trump HD DVD / Blu-ray disc purchases in the not-too-distant future, and now we’ve got yet another clever alternative on deck that just doesn’t have the makings of a winner. While it seems that consumers still prefer something tangible when purchasing movies, we can’t help but agree that flicks on flash drives just wouldn’t work. Aside from the prohibitive cost to pop out a standard DVD on a flash chip versus a disc, the idea of having customers flock to some sort of movie download kiosk to refill memory cards with new releases just seems absurd. Sure, we understand how this could sound marginally appealing from the sidelines, but we just can’t imagine all those DVD cases at your favorite big box retailer getting swapped out with movie-filled SDHC cards anytime soon.

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