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Multimedia - Home Servers

September Reveal for New Apple TV?

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September Reveal for New Apple TV?

BuzzFeed News suggests another date for the reveal of a next-generation Apple TV, following no showing of the STB at WWDC 2015-- the launch should take at the traditional September Apple event, "for real this time."

Why did the new Apple TV fail to appear at WWDC? BuzzFeed says Apple delayed the launch in order to "do a bit more work on it," leading to a WWDC keynote focusing on OS updates and the Apple Music streaming service. The extra work brings about a "more polished" product, with featuring a "refreshed and slimmer" chassis and internal hardware improvements.

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Epiphan Announces AV.io HD Video Grabber

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Epiphan Announces AV.io HD Video Grabber

Epiphan Video launches the AV.io HD-- a device the company describes as an easy-to-use video grabber for customers wanting to capture video from HDMI, DVI and VGA sources.

The AV.io HD allows users to connect any device with an HDMI, DVI or VGA output, including cameras, laptops, tablets, projectors, game consoles and embedded devices to a Windows, Mac or Linux PC without need for any additional drivers on add-ons.

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Netflix Strides Further into Europe

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Netflix Strides Further into Europe

Three more European countries will get access to Netflix come October 2015-- Italy, Spain and Portugal make the first Southern European nations with access to the streaming service's library of TV and movie content.

So far 50 nations receive Netflix, 13 of which are in Europe. These include the UK, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg and France. The company has ambitious global plans, as it sets to expand operations to 200 countries by end 2016, all in the hopes to start making global profits in 2017.

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UHD Blu-ray Finds Specification, Logo

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UHD Blu-ray Finds Specification, Logo

The Blu-ray Disk Association (BDA) completes the UHD Blu-ray specification, the culmination of work by global CE, IT and content creation industry leaders, together with a new logo delineating UHD Blu-ray products.

“For years, Blu-ray disc has set the standard for high definition picture and audio quality in the home. Ultra HD Blu-ray will do the same for UHD home entertainment," the association says. “The technical capabilities of Blu-ray disc, in particular its significant storage capacity and high data transfer rates, will enable the delivery of an unparalleled, consistent and repeatable UHD experience."

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VidaBox Intros LiivStreamer Media Players

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VidaBox Intros LiivStreamer Media Players

VidaBox launches its latest media player generation-- the LiivStreamer, designed to pull content from LiivNAS on the same network before handling IP-based distribution of content over a single CAT5 network connection.

Available in 2 form factors (the ultra-compact "Mini" and the 2U rackmount-ready "Plus"), the LiivStreamer runs open-source XBMC/Kodi software with Linux as OS, and distributes Blu-ray, DVD, music, photos, videos and select free online content. Customers can easily create multi-zone or whole house setups through the addition of multiple LiivStreamer units.

The units support 1080p video, 7.1 lossless HD audio bit-streaming and pass-through for DTS-HD, DTS-MA, Dolby TrueHD and Dolby Atmos audio format.

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Nvidia Shield Becomes STB

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Nvidia Shield Becomes STB

Nvidia reveals the next generation of Shield device at Game Developer Conference 2015, and it's neither a handheld console nor a tablet-- not when it combines "revolutionary TV", "gaming console" and "supercomputer."

Marketing hype aside, the latest Shield device is actually a gaming-focused STB reminiscent of the Amazon Fire TV. It carries an Nvidia X1 chip (with a 256-core Maxwell architecture GPU and 64-bit CPU) and runs games both locally and from the cloud via the GRID streaming service.

Nvidia also describes the device as the "first 4K Android TV," since Android TV is the OS of choice and it handles 4K video streams from both local and online sources, with HDMI handling connectivity to TVs. Game resolution reaches 1080p if customers have a 30Mbps connection, while those stuck at 10Mbps get 720p streams.

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Providers Form Streaming Video Alliance

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Providers Form Streaming Video Alliance

A group of 17 streaming video providers, content companies and vendors form the Streaming Video Alliance, an organisation set to create architecture, standards and best practices for high-scale online video services.

Members includes Alcatel-Lucent, Charter Communications, Cisco Systems, Comcast, Epix, Fox Networks Group, Korea Telecom, Level 3 Communications, Liberty Global, Limelight Networks, Major League Baseball Advanced Media, Qwilt, Telecom Italia, Telstra, Ustream, Wowza Media Systems and Yahoo-- but the two biggest names in online video, Netflix and YouTube, are notably absent. This should not come as a surprise, as such giants would probably not want to change their technology to something created by an external consortium.

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IHS: High Hopes for European Netflix Expansion

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IHS: High Hopes for European Netflix Expansion

IHS predicts international customers will make 20% of overall Netflix subscribers as the video streaming service is set to be available in Belgium France, Luxembourg, Austria, Switzerland and Germany by end 2014.

According to the analyst the move will see the addition of 5-6 million new subscribers.

"Between the expansion of Netflix and its growing popularity in markets such as the UK, Ireland, Netherlands and Scandinavia, we anticipate that the company will add a total of 8m new subscribers to its European tally by the end of 2018,” IHS says.

Further on the analyst says the Netflix rollout should propel the W. European online subscription market to a 35% CAGR over the next 5 years.

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BBC: Nvidia Preps PC Game Streamer

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BBC: Nvidia Preps PC Game Streamer

The BBC reports Nvidia is set to challenge Valve's upcoming Steam Machines with a "a new gaming device" able to stream games from high-end Nvidia-powered PCs to TVs using GameStream technology.

Reportedly the unnamed device also runs Android games natively via Tegra K1 chipset. Recently shown off at the Google I/O 2014 with an Unreal Engine 4 demo, the Tegra K1 features an ARM-based CPU and a 192-core GPU.

Also mentioned is a "budget-priced separate controller," making one wonder if the device is either a regular STB-style console or a tablet.

The first Nvidia take on game consoles, the Project Shield, already features GameStream allowing gamers to stream games from PCs carrying compatible Nvidia GPUs. However the bulky handheld device failed to set the world on fire like its makers' hoped it would.

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