Apple TV is expected to get some competition from Vudu

[Steve615]

Interested in "near Blu-Ray" quality video over the internet?
According to the following link,one of Yahoo's tech bloggers is calling Vudu "the best looking over-the-Net video I've seen yet,rivaling even Blu-Ray".

http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/patterson/27930

Some info from that article:
True 1080p image at 24 frames per second,using H.264 encoding.
Bitrates of about 20 Mbps and audio up to 640 Kbps for Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtracks.
Price point for the Vudu box is $299.Best Buy has announced that it will give a $200 credit to anyone buying a Vudu box.Here is Best Buy's page,listing their Vudu merchandise.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?_dyncharset=ISO-8859-1&id=pcat17071&type=page&ks=960&st=vudu&sc=Global&cp=1&sp=&qp=crrotcategoryid%23%23-1%23%23-1%7E%7Eq76756475%7E%7Encabcat0100000%23%231%23%232&list=y&usc=All+Categories&nrp=15&iht=n

One more link,to Vudu's home page.

http://www.vudu.com/

[Steve615]

Vudu has cut the retail price in half.
Their basic box used to cost $299.
It is now down to $149.
1,300+ titles are now available in 1080p resolution.
They have also added a new app for iPhone and iPod Touch access.

http://www.vudu.com/

[BattleZone]

Not many people will be able to stream Internet video at 10 Mb/s on their home connections. I'd be surprised if more than about 5% of homes have a connection this fast. I pay $75/month for my Internet connection and I'm only at 8 Mb/s.

Then there are the bandwidth caps. Even at only 10 GB per movie, which is about where you'd need to be to get the performance they're talking about, you'll exceed even the most generous bandwidth caps pretty easily. Comcast has the largest cap that I'm aware of, at 250 GB/month. That would be 25 movies, assuming no other Internet traffic. And if the movies are more like 15 GB, that number goes down fast.

Downloads *will* be an important player, but we're still many years away before it will be mainstream. Most people I know have 1.5 Mb/s download speeds, and that won't get you SD in real time, much less HD.

[Grentz]

Just really depends on your ISP IIP, and that just is luck of the draw. I have no caps and can get 10/1 service for $45/mo. 1.5m service is the standard, heck I have that right now, but most have faster options available they could move up to.

Now, it is definitely not for everyone, not arguing that, but there is a large percentage of people that can use the service with relatively little issue. They also supply 3 versions (SD, HD, and HDX) to help fit different internet pipe sizes and viewing habits.

[Steve615]

From Yahoo Tech News:
Vudu begins offering downloadable HD movies to keep...for a fee,of course.

http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/patterson/39903

Their selection is limited currently,with approx. 50 HD titles.
Prices range from $13.99 to $23.99.
They will be available in the following resolutions:
720p and Vudu's "new,near Blu-ray quality HDX format".

[Grentz]

Those prices just seem really expensive to me, the to keep ones at least.