Netgear launches a ‘net TV box

Yet another alternative to cable TV has arrived in Netgear’s EVA2000 Digital Entertainer Live.

The set-top box streams movies from your computer, plays online video directly from YouTube and offers pay-per-view movies on demand. It connects to your television via HDMI, composite or RCA cables, and joins your home network through an Ethernet cable or optional wireless USB Wi-Fi adapter.

Additional video sites, such as Hulu, can be accessed through PlayOn, a $40 program that runs video on your computer and sends it to the set-top box. Even more content is available with a subscription to VuNow, a service that pulls video from around the Web.

This is, essentially, an Xbox 360 or Playstation 3 without the games. Both of those game consoles allow streaming from networked computers, and they can also access PlayOn for Hulu, YouTube and other video sites. Netgear’s box costs $150, so if you were to spend another $50 on an Xbox 360 Arcade, you’d have most of the Netgear Digital Entertainer Live’s functionality, plus an entire gaming console.

Still, Netgear’s got an interesting product on its hands. Thanks to PlayOn, it’s one of the few ways you can access Hulu on your television without physically connecting a computer. The only other official PlayOn-compatible devices, besides gaming consoles, are Moxi’s HD DVR, which is considerably more expensive and feature-rich, and HP’s MediaSmart TVs (other DLNA-compliant devices may work, but they’re untested).

Any device that makes watching Internet video and digital media on a TV is welcome in my book. It only increases options for consumers and allows them new ways to be entertained without hooking up to a costly cable subscription.