CES 2007: Wrap Up

CES 2007 will probably be remembered best as a show that concentrated on the refinement of consumer products that already have market acceptance along with the maturation of digital convergence products. We have only looked at a small subsection of products that were available for viewing. At times it felt like we had seen the same product at least a dozen times when walking through the various consumer sites showing row after row of plasma, LCD, or DLP screens. Every once in a while we would notice something that would catch our eye, but overall the show was fairly bland which allowed us to concentrate on actual discussions about the products we were interested in rather than standing in an hour long line to view some hot new item.

NETGEAR: Digital Entertainment

NETGEAR, Inc. is a worldwide provider of technologically advanced networking products for both consumers and small to medium businesses.


The Digital Entertainer HD (EVA8000) was the first product we viewed at NETGEAR's booth, and it's a set-top digital media receiver that can automatically discover HD movies, TV shows, music files, and personal photos on a home network, across multiple PCs. It organizes these into a single media library than can then be displayed on a TV without the need for media server software running on the computer. The unit is expected to ship in late March at a price of $349.

With the included Windows PC software, the Digital Entertainer HD enables users to listen to music from iTunes and view YouTube videos and access their PC desktop from their living room or other areas in the house. Using the included remote, users can search their entire media library by multiple criteria including title, actor, date, genre or thumbnail images (from photos, album art or DVD covers). When the PC has an optional TV tuner installed, users can schedule recordings and pause or rewind live broadcasts using the unit without the need for an additional DVR device. The product also plays internet radio directly and can access RSS news feeds and local and national NOAA Weather and maps.

Multiple receivers can work in concert throughout a home. Using "Follow Me," users can pause a video in one room and resume it in another. Another option is "Party Mode," where users can synchronize video or music playback for whole home listening. They can also plug in their USB flash drives, iPods, or other USB storage devices directly into a Digital Entertainer HD to instantly access and play high-resolution digital media.

The Digital Entertainer HD includes one HDMI port (up to 1080P support) for digital AV connectivity, RCA connectors for composite and component video outputs, stereo RCA audio ports, coaxial and optical digital audio outputs, an S-video port, and a SCART connector for regions requiring it. The digital media receiver decodes most leading audio formats (MP3, WAV, WMA, FLAC, M4A, AAC, AC3), purchased music from iTunes on Windows (M4P), video formats (MPEG1/2/4, WMV, Xvid, H.264) and image formats (JPEG, BMP, PNG, TIFF). It integrates a 10/100Base-T Ethernet controller, support for 802.11g wireless networking (with WEP, WPA-PSK and WPA2-PSK support), and two USB 2.0 ports. It also supports multiple interoperability standards, including Universal Plug-and-Play (UPnP AV), Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) and Microsoft Windows Media DRM 10 for Network Devices.