Netflix Starts Streaming, With Help from Roku

Netflix is offering a set-top box that will let you stream more than 10,000 movies and TV shows directly to your television.

Beginning today, customers can purchase the box from a small company called Roku, known for its SoundBridge digital radio, for $99.99. The Roku box is about the size of a paperback book, has no hard drive, and simply streams video through an ethernet or Wi-Fi connection. For the best possible viewing experience, Netflix recommends an Internet speed of at least 1.5 Mbps.

The new service is supposed to work seamlessly with Netflix's current set up. You simply add movies to your queue, and, if they are available for streaming, you can watch them right on your television for no extra charge. The Roku box will also let you read synopses and rate movies. Today's announcement is a follow-up to the video streaming service the company began offering last year. At its launch, Netflix allowed its subscribers to stream about 17 hours of video per month on a Windows-based PC. But after Steve Jobs introduced movie rentals for Apple TV at this year's MacWorld Expo, the company quickly removed the cap and has increased their selection of movies from 7,000 to 10,000.

Netflix has had some serious competition recently from both Apple TV and Blockbuster's Total Access service (basically a Netflix clone). But the Roku set-top box should have a distinct advantage over competitors. Apple TV, for example, starts at $229 and requires purchases from the iTunes store, while the Roku box costs half that and no extra purchases are necessary. Total Access gains an advantage because subscribers can choose between receiving their DVDs through the mail or at a retail location, but even that convenience does not compare to the 'watch instantly' feature offered by Netflix.

The Roku box may be the first of many such devices as Netflix looks to increase its customer reach. The company is also working with LG to introduce a set-top box that will work with the Netflix service later this year.
(-- Credit to PC World contributor Ian Paul)

Comments

Great Idea but .....

Isn't Concast and cox cable internet service bandwidth throtting all long downloads due to supposed P2P bad boys?

Does this fit into the same catagory?

Comcast is already throttling my long database backup file transfers !

What is the difference ?

amccollo

May 23, 2008

10:06 AM PT