D-Link DSM-330

Hello, I'm Ian Morris and today I'm going to be introducing you to the D-Link DSM-330, a DivX connected media streamer. Before Apple TV was even a twinkle in Steve Jobs' eye us geeks have dreamed of a decent way to move our music, video and photos from our PCs over to our TVs. Many have tried, but many have also failed to produce a good solution to streaming video. Even once sir Steve gave birth to Apple TV, we still didn't have a decent media streamer, because as you probably know, DivX and XviD won't work with Apple TV out of the box. This little machine is different though, and it hopes to win you over with support for DivX and XviD support. Which means you can play most of the videos you'll probably have run into online. This system consists of two separate parts. The first is the hardware, here. Which sits next to your TV. The second part is the DivX connected software, which streams the media from your PC to the D-Link. It's worth pointing out at this point that in order to get the best out of the system, you really need a fast computer, this is because the hardware part of the system doesn't actually do any of the video decoding, this is all done by your computer. If you're PC isn't up to the job, then you'll have a lot of problems with playing media We like the hardware, it's pretty compact and totally noiseless. Wireless is fast enough to stream standard definition, but you'll struggle with high definition. With ethernet, you won't have any problems. However you connect the machine to the network, you'll be cursed with a blinking blue LED to tell you it's transferring data. We think this is ridiculous as it's distracting. The user interface is also pretty cool. It's only a little bit less-cool than Apple TVs, and all of your media is organised into simple categories, with logical names. You can also add plug-ins that will improve the functionality of the system, these are easy to install, and the development kit is freely available. The remote is small, easy to use and has buttons in the right place. It's also pretty responsive. So no major complaints there. In theory, this system is pretty good - but it does have some problems. Sometimes it won't detect the display correctly and you get a distorted picture. But when it's working, it's a pretty neat way of watching your media and it's pretty cheap too. I'm Ian Morris, and this has been the D-Link DSM-330.