Sony has included many of its own apps as well as apps with its own content. You may notice an icon for video search. Like other media player and TV Internet browsers, you can play videos from some Websites, but the TV networks and many movie sites block the Sony from playing full episodes. Unlike other media player or smart TV Internet browsers that offer a mouse-like experience, the Sony player exclusively uses the navigation arrows on the remote to move from link to link on a page.
The highlighting box is hard to see. Its sleek design was easy for me to use but may be a challenge for those with large hands. Rather than drill down through menus and submenus, the main menu runs horizontally, and the submenu options cross it vertically. For example, when you highlight the video menu, all of the video options appear, including a list of home network sources—computers, media servers, NAS drives—as well as the video streaming services offered online.
While it is convenient to see the submenus this way, the same cross system is used to display media files. Instead of a full-screen grid of thumbnails as most media players display, the Sony shows the files in a vertical scrolling line. About 10 photos, songs, or video titles are listed on the screen. Regardless of the size of the library, the photo thumbnails populated quickly.
Thousands of photos appeared almost as fast as I could scroll through them. Video files did not display thumbnails of the title or movie still, as many other players do. Then again, neither competitor is as trouble-free as the Sony. Most players will continue to play music—from your music library or a streaming service like Pandora—allowing you to control the playback from any screen. Set-up is no ordeal, with network settings proving to be the only mild chore thanks to the forehead-corrugatingly lavish text-input system.
But you need do that only once. Several of the other apps feel like also-rans, however, offering highlight content rather than full programming. Both services work over the cloud on other Sony devices, too. Storage devices, whether networked or attached via USB, appear automatically in the menu system,.
The Sony merely presents a list of sometimes impenetrably long file-names. Format support is fairly extensive. Play some video and results are good. Its sonic performance is very Sony-ish — detailed and clean, but a little lean-sounding at times. With an available USB port on the pack, media fans can also directly plug in their media storage hard drive and play their content of choice.
Press release, after the jump. Are you ready to explore? Enjoy on-demand, online movies in HD and 3D. Bring to life photos and videos on the full space of your TV screen. TV is nowhere to be found, nor are many of the popular music subscription services, such as Rhapsody, MOG, or Spotify.
Sony's own Music Unlimited is supported, although that doesn't have nearly the support on other devices that competitors do. There aren't any social media Facebook, Twitter, and so on apps, either, although that's not a big loss, since they usually don't translate well to the big-screen environment. We do miss support for a major photo-sharing service like Flickr or Picasa, as using a box like this is a nice way to show off photos. We actually had pretty good success playing back a mishmash of content off a connected NAS drive, but you're best off searching user opinions on CNET and elsewhere if you're looking for compatibility with specific media types.
We'll also quickly note that there's an Internet browser, but the experience is so slow and frustrating that we doubt we'd ever use it. We had no problem streaming media over our home network or over the Internet, using both the wireless and wired connection. Of course, streaming-video quality and network performance depend a lot on your broadband connection and home networking conditions, but we had consistently solid playback with the SMP-N Is it better than the Roku 2 or Apple TV?
The Roku 2 doesn't really handle your own digital media collection and the Apple TV is limited in the streaming services it supports. The Sony SMP-N fills that niche, with a good selection of streaming services and decent playback of your own digital media. The problem is that the SMP-N doesn't do anything particularly well.
The subpar user interface holds it back as a streamer and it's just OK at handling your own digital media, especially compared with boxes like the WD TV Live or Boxee Box. We imagine most buyers will go with the box that handles their personal lifestyle the best Apple fans would go with the Apple TV, heavy streamers would stick with the Roku 2, and so on , which leaves the Sony SMP-N with limited appeal.
Matthew Moskovciak. The external design is also considerably improved over last year's, especially the new simple remote.
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