HAVA Promises To Unseat Slingbox
Up to now, the Slingbox has been the reigning champ of TV retransmission, taking your programming from your cable or satellite setup and forwarding it to a computer or other device. Well, Snappy Multimedia is looking to make you forget about your Slingbox with their competing set top box, the HAVA Video Streamer. While it basically does everything the Slingbox can (it even has a weirder name), the HAVA has a number of extras that will make DVR enthusiasts salivate, including Wi-Fi access point capabilities, DVD-quality transmission, and the abilty to connect to a network via Wi-Fi 802.11a/g (802.11b doesn't have the necessary bandwidth for this technology; time to upgrade!) rather than Ethernet. Basically, this allows you to put the HAVA in a different room than your broadband connection without having to trip over networking cable. Oh, and did we mention that multiple users can watch TV via the HAVA at once? The IPTV wars are officially on.