I normally toss these things, but today I was reading the latest Buy.com junk mail catalog, which has an entire page dedicated to "networked DVD players". They highlight two models: the GoVideo Networked DVD player and the Oritron On-media Player. The Oritron doesn't seem to exist on Oritron's web site at all, although you can get it at Buy.com. Wunderbar. The GoVideo player (buy.com page), for which I also can't seem to find the real vendor's page, looks somewhat less like a cheap piece of plastic, although it doesn't support as many whizzy features.

The claim for these gizmos is that they can such MP3s, videos, and JPEG files out of your computer and display them on your TV/stereo. Plus, they've got the usual progressive scan DVD players (no doubt with chroma bugs and other oddities still intact). Sounds nice, in theory, but we know it's all about the quality of the software. Has anybody played with one of these things yet?

Given how crowded my equipment rack is, I'll have to remove something to add something. I'd rather not buy a new DVD player until it can do "everything" I might need. Of course, "everything" includes SACD/DVD-Audio, these sorts of network functions, and certainly other things I can't yet imagine how I could ever have lived without. Or something like that.

Thoughts anyone?