BlackBerry Playbook plays Amazon Instant Video and Hulu on the big screen
I woke up this morning in need of a new project. So I decided to attach my BlackBerry PlayBook to my 65-inch Panasonic TV and give Amazon Instant Video and Hulu a go.
First, I connected a Bluetooth mouse to the Playbook. This was painless; however, navigation was made somewhat difficult because the scroll wheel on the mouse did not work, and I was unable to exit certain applications with the mouse. Oh well, better a dysfunctional mouse, than no mouse at all.
Next, I connected the PlayBook to my TV via the PlayBook’s Micro HDMI port.
Set up was easy. The Playbook recognized the TV and automatically began mirroring its display in 1080p. I reduced the resolution to 720p for better results and navigated to the browser. I clicked on the Amazon Instant Video tab I had created, selected a video, and pressed play.
After a few seconds, the video started.
Playback was smooth and of acceptable quality. Success!
Next stop . . . Hulu.
As many have reported, Hulu no longer works on the PlayBook by going directly to Hulu’s website. However, as discussed in CrackBerry’s forums, playback is possible by emailing an embedded episode to yourself.
So I did this, opened Gmail on the PlayBook, and clicked on the link.
The episode you email yourself is unimportant because once the link is opened you can use the search function near the top right of the player to search for the show you want. I typed in Glee using the on-screen keyboard and hit the search button.
A list of results was displayed, I selected an episode, and it began playing. Another success!
Being able to stream your existing Amazon video library or watch new episodes of your favorite shows on Hulu makes this an ideal set-up while on vacation or on a business trip.
