Ziova CS505 High Definition Network Media Player
The Ziova is another product that has realized what consumers want and has delivered. The CS505 does just about all you could want out of a networked player. It will play back just about any format you can throw at it and stream it over a wireless( 802.11G ) or wired network. The interesting addition to this product that sets it apart is the inclusion of a DVD player. We have to say that this is a nice touch. We have a bunch of network streaming devices in the house and if only they had a DVD player we could ditch our current DVD player and have one less unit in our already crowed entertainment center.
The CS505 is a complete all in one solution for someone looking to transform their collection of CD's and DVD's into digital files that can be viewed anytime over the network.
The support for file formats is where this sucker reallly shines. Just take a look at what it can handle:
Video
- Windows Media Video 9
- XviD
- Nero Digital™
- MPEG-4
- QuickTime
- MPEG-4
- MPEG-2
- MPEG-1
- DVD
- and the curious "and other formats"
Audio- FLAC
- OGG
- AAC
- MP3
- WM9
- CD
- and various others
We aren't sure why they love to put this "...and other" part in there when talking about what they support. Our only guess is that they are covering their basis if they decide to upgrade the the firmware on the box to support new formats.
Ok so back to the box and what it can do. One of the things we love about network streamers is when the designers don't ship you an overly elaborate server software for sharing your files. The people at Ziova have decied to forgo writing server software and just let you interface with computers on your network via SMB( Windows file sharing ) as well as reading files from an attached USB drive. This really lets you have a lot of flexibility. We have a large central server for all of our media files and it just makes our lives easier if we can just access those file directly without having some random server software get in the way.
For video outputs it has the following:
- HDMI
- Composite
- S-Video
- Component
and for audio:
- HDMI
- Analog Stereo
- Digital Coaxial
- Optical
From what we can tell from reading reviews, the CS505 performs great. The video quality is high end, which is great since this is geared for HDTVs. The photo and audio streaming are also said to be very well done. There is mention of a strange weather app on the device that doesn't really seem to fit with the rest of the offerings( reminds us of that Sesame Street bit...One of these things is not like the other) , but since it works and doesn't get in your way I guess we will just chalk that up to a nice bonus feature.
We are hoping to get one of these bad boys in house soon so we can give you our detailed review, but from what we have read it sounds like one great device. Stay tuned for more.
via gizmodo
Read More in: Audio Streaming | Image Streaming | Video Streaming
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Posted by David Ficocello at May 1, 2007 12:00 PM
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