Innovative British manufacturer Cello has unveiled the iViewer – the first television with integrates IPTV support for the BBC iPlayer.
The company has already made waves with some of its prior innovations, but with the IPTV world still rowing about Project Canvas or focusing on set top boxes, Cello has stolen in and produced a television that allows access to BBC's catch up service.
iPlayer has been a massive success for the BBC, and a trailblazer for other channels' VOD services.
And now you can either plug in an Ethernet cable or a wi-fi dongle to the iViewer and get iPlayer straight to the television – as well as a host of other internet television services.
Additional IPTV channels
Additional online 'channels' that can be streamed directly through the iViewer include Disney Movies Preview, Movie Rush, Autocar Magazine, Sky Sports Boots and All, the CNN daily video podcast, Jamie's Ministry of Food, Delicious TV Veg, Revision 3 Diggnation and the Larry King video podcast.
The Cello iViewer television will come, initially, in 32-inch (£599) and 26-inch (£499) models, and includes integrated Freeview, two HDMI ports and a seven day EPG.
The 32-inch version is 1080p and its little brother HD ready, and have a UK release date of mid-December.
Currently the company has a deal with Marks & Spencers to distribute the television, with sets expected to sell like hotcakes.
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cghallen
February 15th 2010
1. I have had the 32" TV for nearly a month. TV quality is perfectly acceptable but the iplayer is a little unreliable. I have connected the TV wirelessly with the supplied dongle and, using the ethernet cable, via a BT broadband intelliplug which routes the signal through the house wiring to a matching plug connected to the router. Both connections seem equally subject to freezing or becoming disconnected from the network. Freezing is very frustrating when half way through a programme because the programme has to be reloaded, restarted and wound forward on a very slow and haphazard fast forward function to where it froze. Also, the i-player content and interface is not that on the BBC web page. Content is not as much; for some reason items do not appear on the cello box that are on the web site and there is no facility to look for multiple episodes of a series. All items seem to be there just for the week. As for the interface, it is not as user friendly as the BBC iplayer. Having said all that it is extremely useful to be able to watch (most of!)the iplayer content on a TV in comfort in the sitting room rather than on a PC screen in the study. Hope software relaeases will fix these early teething problems.
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