JetStreamHD is the missing link between networked media and the iPad
Streaming is the way of the future. In the case of the iPad, the lack of proper hardware decoding for video formats have rendered the thing pretty useless when it comes to HD video unless it happens to be in Apple’s rather limited video spec – which few things are. In order to watch any format on the device, you either have to convert the files beforehand, use something like SplashTop to stream the entire video output of the computer or use any of the services that stream any format by converting on-the-fly. The latter option hasn’t been the most practical so far because many computers aren’t powerful enough to keep up and even those who are will have performance impacted when used that way.
The solution is now available in form of the JetStreamHD. It’s essentially the missing link between all the media on your network (network drives, networked computers etc) and the iPad. It grabs the media from wherever it’s located, converts it to a proper format and bitrate (depending on the network connection between iPad and the streamer) and streams it to the iPad. At $199 this device is a lot cheaper than getting a more powerful computer to do the same task, and the interface in the video above looks rather polished as well. It’s shipping now.
[Engadget]
