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Media HP Software Hardware Entertainment Linux

Hewlett-Packard To Offer Linux-based Media Hub 184

Posted by timothy from the it-should-have-an-iPod-dock dept.
Sammy at Palm Addict writes "According to the New York Times, Hewlett-Packard is to offer a new digital media hub based on Linux," excerpting "Hewlett-Packard will introduce a new device this fall meant to record and play back television as well as organize digital media, including photos, music and video, the company said yesterday. Hewlett already offers similar devices based on Microsoft's Windows Media Center Edition. The device, called the HP Media Hub, will be based on the Linux operating system." Since HP also sells self-branded iPods, it would be great if they'd make such a box iPod friendly.
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Hewlett-Packard To Offer Linux-based Media Hub More

Hewlett-Packard To Offer Linux-based Media Hub

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  • Late to the party... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by gubbas ( 651881 )
    It would be nice to HP announce something that hasn't already been done before... Where is the "invent" in this?
    • Hey....anyone getting Linux out there gets a nod by me. I say kudos to HP for doing this.

    • New Rule (Score:3, Informative)

      by OECD ( 639690 )

      OK, everybody. Time for a new rule: You cannot name your product after the generic name for your product's function!

      Got that? No HP Media Hub, no IBM Personal Computer, no MS DOS!

  • Pretty sparse article (Score:4, Interesting)

    by 14erCleaner ( 745600 ) <FourteenerCleaner@yahoo.com> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:21PM (#11269413) Homepage Journal
    No indication whether it'll be DRM-crippled.

    Of course, this is the new, evil, HP, so I guess I shouldn't get my hopes up.

    • Re:Pretty sparse article (Score:5, Funny)

      by brokencomputer ( 695672 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:24PM (#11269458) Homepage Journal
      Which new evil HP? Did HP used to be good? Has HP always been evil? What makes HP evil now? I might be out of the loop...

      • Pretty sparse article-A Black and White World. (Score:2, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        "What makes HP evil now? I might be out of the loop..."

        Simple really.

        Good==do whatever slashdotters agree is good.

        Evil==slashdotters don't like whatever your doing.

        Now I better get a patent on it, while I can.

      • Re:Pretty sparse article (Score:5, Funny)

        by Bloater ( 12932 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:30PM (#11269556) Homepage Journal
        It is a different HP, the old godly HP is a brown spicey sauce that British members of parliament enjoy in their bacon and egg sarnies.

        • It is a different HP, the old godly HP is a brown spicey sauce that British members of parliament enjoy in their bacon and egg sarnies.

          Yes... it might be delicious, but can it compute the value of pi?

      • Re:Pretty sparse article (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Billly Gates ( 198444 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:34PM (#11269610) Journal
        You may want to read the comments on this story and past HP stories for all the details.

        HP like IBM was a different company in the past. They were once known for their engineering, ingenuity, innovativeness, and big R&D.

        Today they are becoming the walmart of the pc industry while still charging high prices. Also they made some questionable business decisions in terms of their superior products. For example killing the alpha processor because they already invested billions in the sinking Itanium to killing off the clustering in the superior Digital Unix and using a vendor to write a lower quality clustering solution for HP-UX, etc.

        Also do not get me started on the calculators. They are practically non existent anymore as HP killed them off.

        HP has turned into a short sighted company who makes substandard products and does not look at the long term effects.

        I for one would never trust an HP printer or server made after 2001 as a result. They are just not good anymore and frankly are still expensive.

        Many slashdotters who have a grudge agaisnt HP were probably former HP customers and loyalists.

    • Re:Pretty sparse article (Score:5, Informative)

      by Wesley Felter ( 138342 ) <wesley@felter.org> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:28PM (#11269519) Homepage
      Broadcast flag? Check. It's required by law.

      OpenCable DRM? Check. It's built in to the standard.

      • DRM is not such a bad issue if you consider this (Score:4, Informative)

        by halfelven ( 207781 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:36PM (#11269642)
        It is still legal to sell broadcast-flag-noncompliant devices in the US until June 2005. One such device is pcHDTV [pchdtv.com] which works fine with MythTV [mythtv.org]
        Even after June, it will still be legal to use such devices, if they were purchased before the deadline.

        Can you put two and two together now? ;-)
        • Just out of curiosity (extreme curiosity, seeing as I don't even live in the US): would it be illegal to sell second hand non-compliant devices after that date, or only new ones?

          If it's only new ones, I think someone should buy a lot of those devices just before that date, just to resell later on...
        • I can put two and two together, but the pcHDTV does nothing to decrypt satellite or cable HD content. All this will get you is broadcast OTA HD signals. That is great if you like local sports and reality tv. Me, I don't like reality tv, and most sports I do watch are on cable as it is. Nevertheless, I will probably be getting one of these cards to throw in my myth box right around May, I mean if another tit gets shown on the superbowl, i want to capture that in its hi-def gloriness.
    • No indication whether it'll be DRM-crippled.

      No indication in that lame NYT peice, but C|NET [com.com] is quite clear that HP is will be producing DRM crippled crap:

      HP readies TVs, media hub products
      Hewlett-Packard plans to announce by next week a set of home entertainment products, including large-screen TVs and a digital storage console, embedded with copy protection technology.

      Yet another product that I absolutely positively will NEVER spend a single cent on, except perhaps specifically to help fix (aka cra

  • QNX (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:23PM (#11269437)
    "The device, called the HP Media Hub, will be based on the Linux operating system."

    They could have also used QNX for stability and it's sutability for real-time (of which media is).

    • Re:QNX (Score:3, Interesting)

      by garcia ( 6573 ) *
      They could have also used QNX for stability and it's sutability for real-time (of which media is).

      My Tivo has never crashed and it runs Linux. QNX also costs money to license eh? Linux doesn't. Personally, my media just isn't THAT important that I'd be willing to plop down even more money on a set-top-box just so that it was "more stable" than my Tivo.

    • Re:QNX (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Jason Earl ( 1894 )

      This isn't about hacking your digital hub, this is about the economics of operating systems. Basically HP is telling Microsoft that they like the Windows Media idea, but that HP doesn't like the idea of paying Microsoft to implement it. HP has finally realized that the average Joe isn't interested in running MS Word on their television, and so there isn't really any reason to pay Microsoft for the privilege of using Windows. This isn't an issue of Free Software, but of commodity software. That's why HP

  • Wont work (Score:5, Informative)

    by mboverload ( 657893 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:23PM (#11269441) Journal
    Of course, this will not let you transfer recorded shows to other computers on the the network. MythTV is currently the only "media hub" that does not have copy protection, or give away freedoms in any way.
    • I was almost sold to the idea of TiVO.

      Then MythTV came by.

      Then I heard Comcast would be doing something.

      Then I heard SBC would offer something.

      But M$ media center has been around.

      But it's technically no different with regular XP and snapstream Media.

      Then this HP wannabe device is coming out.

      Did I miss anything?

    • I'm considering "MythTV"izing my home setup (I dl'ed and installed the packages last night, but still need to redo some wiring and configure the thing). Is it as good as it sounds?
      • It's amazing. I didn't watch any TV show in the last year. Since i installed MythTV i caught up on Star Trek. :-)
        Now i understand those raving lunatics called TiVo nazis. ;-)

      • Re:Wont work (Score:3, Interesting)

        by JWW ( 79176 )
        Yes....

        Once you get it running.

        • Re:Wont work (Score:3, Interesting)

          by sulli ( 195030 ) *
          Isn't KnoppixMyth the thing here? (Install off a CD - that's what I have heard. I am hoping to build such a thing shortly.)

          • Re:Wont work (Score:3, Insightful)

            by JWW ( 79176 )
            Yeah, KnoppixMyth is out there.

            But its no fun if you don't get your hands a little dirty. ;-)

      • Re:Wont work (Score:5, Interesting)

        by GeorgieBoy ( 6120 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @07:07PM (#11269998) Homepage
        I've run Mythtv for over a year. I've been using:

        -Hauppauge PVR-250 hardware mpeg-encoding TV cards (though newer models are coming out to replace these, but driver support probably isn't as good yet). Note that cards without mpeg-encoding in hardware demand a far faster system: and I tried those first, then bought 2 PVR-250s. -various remotes, including Hauppauge black (crappy) and gray (good) -nvidia card with SVideo out -external firewire DVD burner to archive shows

        -a couple 120GB Seagate HDs set in LVM as storage Since the PVR-250 is an MPEG2 encoder, it's not too much trouble to export them to DVD. Editing/exporting the streams to remove commericials can be a bit annoying, though I think nuvexport [forevermore.net] can help with this.

        Note this setup is more expensive (in the short run) than just going with a prefab DVR solution with monthly fees associated with it, but you do have a great deal more control over your recorded content. It will probably take a lot for me to be parted with my setup.

      • Re:Wont work (Score:2, Interesting)

        by mikolas ( 223480 )
        I have a diskless MythTV setup w/ Hauppauge PVR-250, DVD drive and 5.1 decoder. It really is excellent as you basically only have one piece of hardware for all your media needs. And as I boot from a server using PXE, the MythTV frontend is also silent (all the DVR STBs I've tried produce more noise).

      • Re:Wont work (Score:3, Interesting)

        by evilviper ( 135110 )
        I've tried MythTV, and found it to be terribly lowsy. The interface is poor, it uses it's own stupid format, seeking is quite slow, your local media files have to be accessed through a different sub-sub-menu (and MythTV has a lot of sub-sub-sub-menus), and it's conflict resolution/priority system seems massively over-complex to me.

        In addition, if you are going to be doing software encoding, MythTV has terribly lowsy quality at even very high bitrates, and yet eats up tons of CPU power to do it. It's been

    • Re:Wont work (Score:3, Informative)

      by jbarr ( 2233 )
      Though not technically a "hub" as such, ReplayTV 5xxx boxes allow full control using the DVArchive app on a networked PC. Shows can be streamed to a player on the PC for viewing, "offloaded" to the PC, and once on the PC, streamed back to the ReplayTV box for viewing or archived to DVD for later viewing in a DVD player. All without DRM.

  • Microsoft's probably thrilled (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Jason Earl ( 1894 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:23PM (#11269445) Homepage Journal

    Microsoft is counting on Windows Media Center being the "next big thing" to give it the growth that it needs to justify its price/earnings ratio. A Linux-based contender in the same market developed by one of Microsoft's biggest allies is almost certainly going to be a major setback for Microsoft's plans.

    • Re:Microsoft's probably thrilled (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:36PM (#11269654)
      It may be just a ploy:
      Dell announces AMD based systems to get a better deal from Intel
      HP announces Linux based Media Center PC to get a better deal from Microsoft.

      Happens every so often...
    • Microsoft is counting on Windows Media Center being the "next big thing"

      What's so big about a 'media center'? All it is is tv/stereo in a different package. Being able to watch moving pictures was once big, now it's not. Being able to listen to sound over long distances w/o paying the telco was once big, now it's not. Being able to watch TV was once big, not it's not. Being able to own your own computer was once big, now it's commonplace, as is being able to time shift media broadcasts. How is a 'media ce

      • Re:Microsoft's probably thrilled (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Jason Earl ( 1894 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @07:12PM (#11270062) Homepage Journal

        It's not that Media Centers are revolutionary that makes them interesting to Microsoft. It's the fact that there is the potential to sell millions more copies of Windows. Right now almost no one has a computer hooked up to their TV, and those few folks that do have computers hooked up to their TVs aren't generally using any Microsoft software. Instead they are using something like Tivo.

        Microsoft sees the Media Center as a potential market nearly as big as the DVD player market, and Microsoft's marketshare in this potentially huge new market is miniscule. Microsoft is desperate for growth opportunities that would justify its price/earnings ratio of over 30, and Windows Media Center is one of the few Microsoft products currently available that has the potential to build new revenue streams.

        Personally, I think that the Media Center idea is several years away from being ubiquitous, but then again I don't have cable television either. I know lots of folks that would give up their firstborn son before they gave up their Tivo. It is entirely possible that eventually the home entertainment computer could even be a bigger market than the normal personal computer that we all know and love.

        More importantly, the home entertainment computer is very likely to become a very strategic piece of the overall media puzzle. For example, Microsoft is betting that if it can score big with its Media Center that it could sell the ability to do workable DRM to Hollywood. Microsoft understands the power of controlling the platform, and it knows that they could make billions if they could put Microsoft in a position to become the DRM gateway for all of Hollywood.

        Not to mention the fact that Linux-based computers hooked up to the television could easily morph into game consoles. All the pieces are there already.

        • Re:Microsoft's probably thrilled (Score:5, Interesting)

          by cmacb ( 547347 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @08:12PM (#11270653) Homepage Journal
          Microsoft is desperate for growth opportunities that would justify its price/earnings ratio of over 30, and Windows Media Center is one of the few Microsoft products currently available that has the potential to build new revenue streams.

          I think the problem is that in their desperation to duplicate their success with Windows they are forced to make moves riskier than they would really like (Xbox) or safe/easy where the return on investment is zero to low (Slate). I think the media center falls into that latter category. People aren't going to pay a $300 premium just to know that the thing is running Windows. The imagined "ease of use" issue that are applied to Windows don't apply to a device with a remote control. Especially when there isn't a sugar daddy (like IBM) who has already established a market for the hardware and done all the hard design work (not to mention a host of software companies that have all but solved those problems as well).

          I'll buy a Linux based solution because I know I am less likely to be locked into a no-choice-but-to-upgrade future. Microsoft can only succeed at this if they convince almost everyone to go along and nominate them as the gatekeeper of everyone else's profitability. I can't see Hollywood or the RIAA going for that. On the other hand, worse things could happen than to see MS beat the crap out of the movie and music industry, they do, in some ways deserve it.

          Meanwhile, I expect Linux, which has no market share, share price, or bottom line to protect to continue to nip at the heals of these media bastards, all of them. In the end if it takes, HP, IBM, or mainland China to be the champion of freedom for certain types of intellectual property (IE that not owned by a mega corporation) then so be it.

          I'll be in line to buy one of these (although I haven't watched TV in 3 years and still listen to my own MP3s made from my own CDs and records made prior to 1990.)

          • Very well said. Thanks.

          • I agree with most of what you said, but I'm having trouble buying this whole "forced to upgrade" idea. I've seen this thrown around here a lot. How many people have been forced to upgrade a Microsoft product as a direct result of a Microsoft action? I guess upgrading from one version of Windows to another because the old one was buggy and unstable might be a reason, but that's not outright forcing anybody. And the reason that printer x or scanner y didn't work is the fault of the printer manufacturer.

            E
          • In the end if it takes, HP, IBM, or mainland China to be the champion of freedom for certain types of intellectual property (IE that not owned by a mega corporation) then so be it.

            Microsoft was the first foreign company to gain admission to the China Software Industry Association. Microsoft Joins in China Software Industry Association [china.org.cn] (2002)

            China's Intellectual Property Law has been brought into synch with the WTO and it's major trading partners. The Ministry of Science and Technology: Laws and Regul [most.gov.cn]

            • Thanks for the links (all interesting).

              But I'm pretty sure Linux was well on its way in China before 2002. They have their own distro in fact.

              As for films and music, I didn't mean to imply that China would lead the way in piracy. But as their market grows (ditto India, Brazil, others) the Hollywood, RIAA gang shrinks in importance. At some point, the folly of fighting piracy, combined with a shrinking world market share, might actually shake some sense into them.

              The costs of producing music, and mov
    • You can't really call HP Microsoft's biggest ally... Sure, the majority of their software comes standard with MS Software but they are one of the few companies to offer desktops and notebooks preloaded with Linux... And they also have HP-UX (even if I can't say many positive things about it), so it's not like they're completely devoted to Microsoft.

  • Linux doesn't matter (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Wesley Felter ( 138342 ) <wesley@felter.org> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:24PM (#11269464) Homepage
    As was mentioned in the Linux-based portable media player thread, it makes no difference to the user whether these devices run Linux or not. You can't install any applications, you probably can't get a shell, and you can bet that HP will release the minimal amount of source that is legally required, so hacking will be frustrating.

    And it looks like this device might break a record for the number of different kinds of DRM in one system...
    • I wonder if it'll run any of MythTV [mythtv.org]
    • Well most people use PVR's to watch TV and record shows like a VCR on steriods. Not hack.

      Disabling DRM would be quite nice and so would something similiar to TIVO to go and perhaps a built in mp3 player would be cool.

      If I could install applications somehow it would be cool as I could turn it into a media hub to do anything.

      This is something MS wants to do badly and become the gatekeeper for any file stores whether its on the net, pc, or a tv show.

      • If I could install applications somehow it would be cool as I could turn it into a media hub to do anything.

        Then what you probably want is MythTV [mythtv.org] running on a no-name beige PC running Linux.
        Ok, maybe not beige, since there are quite a few cute mini-ATX cases that actually look better than most VCRs.
      • Well most people use PVR's to watch TV and record shows like a VCR on steriods. Not hack.

        Most Linux users use Linux to browse the internet and send email. Not hack.

        But that small minority that is able to, and does hack Linux is very important.

    • Matters to HP (Score:4, Interesting)

      by spud603 ( 832173 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:39PM (#11269684)
      You're probably right that from the user's point of view, this won't make a lick of difference. The only thing I can think of is that folks may manage to hack the system and start using VLC for playback, or something...

      But from HP's angle, I can't believe they're only doing this now. If Linux is good for anything, it's for optimized, customized systems. With Linux, HP can build in exactly the functionality they need -- nothing more. Plus it's free.

      • Yes, device makers benefit from using Linux, that's why they do it. But there's no point in advertising it.

        HP sold a Linux-based Digital Entertainment Center about 5 years ago, but it was too expensive for basically an audio jukebox.

    • Re:Linux doesn't matter (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I imagine I'm not the only /. reader who likes hearing that they're not inadvertantly paying the M$ tax. Also, the larger the market-share of linux-based devices becomes, the greater chance that companies will participate in the open source process to ensure that drivers/codecs/apps are higher quality.

      So, it does matter somewhat.

    • Re:Linux doesn't matter (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jomas1 ( 696853 ) * on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @07:16PM (#11270096) Homepage
      You are right that this media player may not be very hackable (although that remains to be seen) but you can't discount the effect of linux becoming commonplace in appliances. Linux as a desktop/server operating system may never mean anything to the average consumer.

      Linux as the operating system that powers their media devices, remote controls, cars, video game consoles etc, etc will mean a lot more. This may be one of the key ways that linux gains mainstream consumer acceptance.
      • Linux as the operating system that powers their media devices, remote controls, cars, video game consoles etc, etc will mean a lot more. This may be one of the key ways that linux gains mainstream consumer acceptance.

        I'd take the odds that:

        Embedded Linux has zero visibility to consumers, and at retail Linux based devices are not significantly cheaper or feature-rich when compared to their Microsoft branded equivalents.

    • Yeah, this doesn't matter for "users," but this is "News for Nerds," not news for linux advocates only(although it may seem that way at times) or news for wealthy, uncurious gadgeteers. Some of us here are in the business, and some of us hack harware for a hobby, and not just consumers. If I want to spend the time and effort, I bet I could install applications, or at least get to a command line shell.
    • it makes no difference to the user whether these devices run Linux or not.

      Yeah.

      Years of crashing computers have prepared customers for televisions that crash in the midd

  • i can make one myself (Score:3, Insightful)

    by halfelven ( 207781 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:26PM (#11269493)
    and it's based on MythTV:

    http://www.mythtv.org/ [mythtv.org]

    • DRM (Score:3, Informative)

      by halfelven ( 207781 )
      Oh, and if you're worried about DRM in the context of HDTV, have a look at pcHDTV:

      http://www.pchdtv.com/ [pchdtv.com]

      It totally ignores the broadcast flag. ;-) Works with MythTV. Enough said.
      BTW, it will be illegal to sell it in the US after June 2005 (or something like that), so plan accordingly. ;-)
      It will always be legal to use it, if purchased before the deadline, because all such devices will be grandfathered into the new regulations automatically.

      • It will always be legal to use it, if purchased before the deadline

        I've considered buying one before the deadline, but I've spent way too much on high-tech toys that have turned out useless to purchase this without much thought.

        You see, I'm sure I'm like a lot of people, in that I'm out-of-range of HD broadcasts. I suppose somebody might setup an HDTV re-transmitter around here, but even that will give me less than a handful of HDTV channels.

        With Satellite and Digital Cable, the HDTV broadcasts are tune

    • But can you do it for $200 - $300? That's one of the strongest arguments for a TiVO - that with rebate you can get one for about $100 that will work about as well with equally good (if not a little better) software than a MythTV system.

      Hopefully as equipment gets cheaper and video capture and playback becomes more common of a feature, there won't be such a cost difference in the future.

      Oh, and it should be pointed out the TiVO runs Linux as well... :-)

      ---

      I talk about this stuff here [blogspot.com] too. Go figure..

  • Nope (Score:2, Interesting)

    by pnevin ( 168332 ) *
    Come on, everyone has to go through the pain and grief of configuring Mythbox to get to all that tasty Linux media goodness.

    (Damn it, I had to)
  • Who really cares is this has an iPod dock or is compatible? What purpose would it serve? People already have a computer to sync to, and a device like this is presumably large enough to hold all the music you'd have on your portable, plus a whole lot more.

    Yep... just another blind, knee-jerk iPod reference.
    • technically you can't even put music on your iPod without syncing it to your computer.

      So.. yeah, what would be the point of an iPod doc?

    • Re:iPod compatibility...? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Wesley Felter ( 138342 ) <wesley@felter.org> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:34PM (#11269612) Homepage
      What if you could rip directly from CD onto the media hub, and then sync from the media hub onto an iPod? No computer needed, which some people might see as a benefit.

  • Hope its not restricted (Score:3, Insightful)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:31PM (#11269578) Journal
    All I can say is they better not bother trying any DRM bullshit, if it can't share all media, skip adverts etc etc its a useless pile of crap (actually i think shit even has more uses than a PVR/media center with DRM)

  • How long (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ifwm ( 687373 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:32PM (#11269588) Journal
    before the fact that something runs a version of Linux is no longer newsworthy. I like this product, and it's worthy of being posted. But I also think there's something a little sad about making a fuss over that fact. That mentality seems a little backward anymore.

  • hah! my Sony Grand Wega runs Linux, too! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:35PM (#11269629)
    - but i sure as hell can't get into the box!

    - Sony must have cleaned up on the Wegas in the last quarter: LCD projection TV w/built-in HDTV tuner, etc. for $2 (the bulb is replaceable)...

    - Linux apparently hosts the TV's menu system, built-in slide show app (w/a built-in sound track), and memory stick support...

    - the TV also plays .mp3 sound tracks from the memory stick!

  • Really? (Score:3, Informative)

    by Elwood P Dowd ( 16933 ) <judgmentalist@gmail.com> on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:35PM (#11269631) Journal
    Since HP also sells self-branded iPods, it would be great if they'd make such a box iPod friendly.

    I thought they sold Apple branded iPods. It's through HP's channel. I guess it is listed on PCConnection as the "HP iPod", but it's still got a big apple sandblasted onto the back. They never made that HP-blue iPod all the rumor sites were blathering about.

    • Re:Really? (Score:3, Informative)

      by javaxman ( 705658 )
      The HP logo is there [engadget.com]... under the word "iPod", which is under the ( larger ) Apple logo on the back. So, they are in a sense both Apple and HP branded, oddly enough.

      Perhaps they did some research into the marketability of an "HP blue" iPod and decided to call that off... after all, you can always buy the iPod Tattoo kit [hp.com] and print up your own blue umm... those are stickers, right? Yea, that's what I want to do, cover my iPod with stickers...

  • HP in the living room (Score:4, Informative)

    by UWC ( 664779 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:35PM (#11269635)
    They're apparently introducing TVs and projectors, too. According to a mini-article on Wired, 17 TVs and "TV projectors" in addition to the mentioned media hub. They're just coming a bit late to the wired living room scene, but apparently with a not insubstantial product line. If they integrate the product features well, the line might end up successful. Having an all-in-one HP remote would be a nice incentive, though I guess the one-remote-for-every-device (if you don't want to sacrifice functionality) situation is fairly well accepted at this point.

  • Yes but what happens in 7995 years? (Score:3, Funny)

    by texasfight ( 833973 ) on Wednesday January 05, 2005 @06:49PM (#11269784)
    Given today's earlier post http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/05/021 6220&tid=126&tid=218 [slashdot.org], is it Y10K ready, or do I lose almost 8000 years of my music downloads when New Year's comes around?
  • I've designed a new logo for the combo Linux / HP Media Center PC. http://thomashawk.com/2005/01/hp-launching-linux-m edia-center-pc-to.html/ [thomashawk.com]
  • but will Linux be supported? Or will this be an MS-Only device?

    Personally, I can't stand devices that are based on Linux yet don't support a Linux desktop client.

    • I'm almost ready to bet that there are more devices (watches, internet ready fridges, alarm systems, surveillance systems, cameras, media devices, Infinium' Phantom, TV remotes, cell phones, PDA/Handheld computers, VoIP Phones, Robots, Routers ...) out there that run linux, than there are home PCs and servers, therefor, Linux Desktop clients are only on a minority of all things that run linux.
      • Well, I personally wouldn't take that bet since I think your correct. However, there are still too many devices that run Linux that do not support Linux as a client. I just think that is wrong IMO.
  • This is an interesting development but is HP just using Linux to put further pressure on Microsoft as they have previously done?

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