BRAVIA Internet Video Link

I believe it is a box to allow Japanese Bravia users to download and/or stream video material. I'm afraid I don't know whether it is HD, SD or sub-SD in quality - but I believe initial roll-out is confined to Japan.

This seems to have more info - though from the announcement rather than launch :

http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/07/s...or-hd-content/

Got one. The integration is great, though I'd like to see more content. There's a website that looks like it's going to provide more functionality at some point, at http://internet.sony.tv. Right now, all it seems to do is provide an alternate way to delete saved links/favorites. I also did a port scan on the device, and it turns out it runs a web server on port 9784. HTTP header says it's "Callisto Debug Server v0.2". There's no default page though, and I haven't been able to find one yet, after guessing at a few potential names. Using telnet returned an error saying "Media Renderer does not implement this method:". Anyone know more?

It is amazing how little information there seems to be out there in terms of what this thing can do. I have mine on order, should have it by friday. I get that one can watch video from online partners.... I'd love to be able to use this to pull video off of my server as well. Not sure if this can be done via RSS feeds or not... some sites hinted at this.

No (easy) way to get your own video on it yet. While the welcome message you get when you start it up tells you to go to the website (internet.sony.tv) to setup your own custom video links, there's no functionality available there (yet) to do so.

The weather and traffic page from Yahoo is nice, and it's handy having it right on the remote. The news they provide is fair... There's seven sources, one of which is their legal agreements, and while some are updated fairly regularly, the sports one hasn't been updated for over a month... The last story faded off it, and it's an empty channel now, at least for me.

I really want to like this, the integration with my TV is great, but it's not quite there yet on content and functionality. It is upgradable though (got an update when I first plugged it in, actually) so I'm hoping to see more and better things soon.

Still no luck on the web server on port 9784. There must be something there somewhere though...

Thanks so much for your response. Is it possible to add the rss feeds now or would that fall under the "coming soon" feature list?

There's no way to add rss feeds right now, at least not that I could find.

Guys, has there been any new websites added to the BRAVIA Internet Video Link services?

Or have any news on it?

Thanks.

I noticed you can now link your Yahoo account a couple days ago. I did, and while I've got access to a Yahoo channel of video's I don't think was there before (with some decent content) it doesn't seem to have much that I found in the way of customization yet.

I wonder if they will ever get youtube, or apple's movie trailers.

After that I would pick it up.

Did you add this stuff by adding content to your Yahoo home page? All of this is still so fuzzy. You would think that they'd have more detail somewhere.

Ok, maybe I'm missing it, but it doesn't seem like there's any customization available through Yahoo, yet... I added 3 videos to my favorites on Yahoo, but it doesn't look like that makes them available anywhere on my TV.

Has anyone viewed any HD content with the link?

Is it full screen, choppy?

What kind of connection are you using.

Just brought a KDL32S3000 and and thinking about adding this but there's not many reviews out there to see if it's worthwhile or a flash in the pan.

Leslie

I haven't seen any yet but I'm a little leery of HD content to a unit that doesn't have a hard drive for buffering/storage. I have a fairly big pipe (6 meg down) coming in to my house but it still takes a while for my directv on demand HD to flow down (probably a hour for a half hour segment, and from what I read this is better than most). Since this unit does not have a hard drive there is no way that the average home user could get HD content. I think the proof is in the pudding... most of the video out there is downsized.

I would think that the HD content would be offered as compressed, h264 or something like what ABC.com full screen offers. Don't really know, but most of yahoo vids, etc are really low rez. Don't see the point of streaming weather info, that's what the weather channels 4. Traffic info for me in smallville USA is irrelevant.

Leslie

Yeah, I'm not sold on this yet.

Well, I just found something very useful:

If you go to the page that lists your video links (says View Video Links on the top), then then change the URL to replace "EditBookmarks" with "NewBookmark", you'll get to a page that allows you to submit custom videos.

Just submitted one, and it said it should be available within 5 minutes. Hope it works.

Please go into detail. What do you mean by custom video, something off the web or your own?

Interested in what this thing is capable of doing.

Is this anything like what the PS3 has available for web content.

Sony announced Divx support for the PS3, I was hoping this baby would get it also.

Does anyone from Sony monitor this thread or can someone suggest another forum that would be more apropos.

Leslie

I'm about to RMA this unit.... I just can't see keeping this unit when their are so many other media units out there that do what we'd like them to do and much more. I'm a directv customer and their newest model HD dvr's are starting to offer integration with audio/video/photos. The audio and photo capabilities have been there for quite a while but the're starting to roll out the video as well. For someone that loves to play with this stuff, directv is awesome... anyone can opt in to their beta testing club and download the newest firmware months before it goes national. I had this kind of functionality and other cool stuff like Video on demand months before it happened, and they interact with you through a website so you can give feedback and report bugs.

A little more detail for those that are interested.... this kind of functionality generally requires you to have some software running on your pc. I'm currently using a program called TVersity that manages all of this for me. You simply point it to audio/video that can be on your hard drive or anywhere on the net. You really can create a link to anything, including sites like youtube. You can subscribe to any radio station, rss feed or podcast from anywhere on the net and have it visible on your device. And the device can be just about anything... a directv receiver, PS3, XBox, iPhone, etc. It couldn't have been easier to set up. On top of all of that, I can access my entire media collection through the browser from anywhere. I'd been using a program called Twonky for quite a while but this one seems to handle video better. All of this software appears as a UPNP device (plug and play) on your network for very easy access.

Anyway, as I said a few posts back, the biggest drawback to this unit is that it doesn't have a hard drive and that alone will limit functionality. For $300 you would think that you'd get a lot more.

I guess it must be a Japanese thing, but if they could give it some attributes of a sysabas player. Instead of a HD, they could use a memory stick. I love the small footprint and use of the TV's remote.


Leslie

A picture of the page to add videos, with the info about what formats it accepts. BTW, in practice the 5 minutes appeared to be instant, or nearly so. (No longer than the time it took for me to walk downstairs to my TV.)

Great info, so this is an undocumented feature?

Sounds like a little bit of work, but doable. Is it easy to navigate with your remote?

Were any of the video you played in HD? Was playback smooth?

I think Sony needs to add DIVX HD to seal the deal.

Lesiie

That's a nice find Jerrith, I'm amazed that nobody noticed this sooner.

Anyway, I dropped mine in the mail this morning - I bit the bullet and took the restocking fee. Who knows, maybe I'll be back in a year if they cut the price in half and add the ability to subscribe to other feeds. As Leslie said, the ability to use the tv remote was nice but this not a selling point for me personally because I have a harmony remote. Good luck to all of you. - Adam

That's another good question. I'm assuming that because this is a proprietary unit that the consumer would be at their mercy to add codecs, and I'm assuming the only way to do this is through firmware upgrades since codecs will always be changing for formats like Divx.

Any new news for the BRAVIA Internet Video Link?

Nothing, sadly. I haven't actually used mine lately. The add video page still isn't available as a direct link, you have to guess to find it. I never got anywhere with the web server on the open port on the device.

Well that sucks.