Best network video streamers

(May 29, 2009)

John P. Falcone
Senior Editor Digital media is great, but who wants to watch everything hunched over a computer when you have a comfy couch in front of your home theater system? That's where network video streamers come in, enabling you to stream digital videos, music and photos over your home network from your computer to your living room. Network video streamers are growing fast as a product category, but the list of recommendable products is still small -- there just aren't that many reliable devices on the market. We've even included some placeshifting devices, for those that want to watch their home TV programming from afar. Don't care about streaming video? Check out our top digital audio streamers list.

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Game consoles
As good as some of these products are, buyers should seriously consider skipping a dedicated video streamer and getting a high-def game console instead. The Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360 both offer streaming for DivX files, plus digital music and photos. The 360 also offers high-def movie rentals via the Xbox Live service and with the PS3 you get a built-in Blu-ray player. Since these consoles offer all these digital video goodies in addition to high-def gaming, they're usually the better buy. Prefer the Wii? Check out the free Orb software, that lets you stream media to the Wii's Web browser.