This is a major update from this post: Wii as a media center
Ok, I bought a Wii a couple of months ago. My main goal was to get rid off Comcast cable (too expensive). I thought that instead of buying an expensive laptop to stream hulu, It would be better to buy a gaming console. I have 2 daughters (1 and 3 years old so I thought the Wii was the best fit as a gaming console for the next 2-3 years).
Looking at the Console competition landscape: Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3. The Wii seems not, at first glance, the best console as a media center:
- Can't just plug it to a Windows media center
- No upnp capability
- No Hard drive so limited streaming capacity (In fact it is possible through the homebrew hacking scene.)
But the cheap price, the integrated wifi and the fact that it is the best console for young children made my decision.
Anyway, here is my need:
1) Stream my music from my windows PC
2) Possibility to use Hulu
3) Movie streaming from my PC
There was some major updates since my last post on this subject:
- The Playon version for the Wii is now in Beta. here is my review.
- After hacking my Wii, I tested MplayerCE
- Flash upgrade on the Wii browser (hello Youtube)
I am blown away by the quality of the video that you can stream through Wifi now! Playon and MplayerCE are just awesome softwares. I tried tons of other solution: Orb, Tversity, Weezo and all of them had terrible streaming video quality.
It is great! I can watch all my last Hulu show on my TV through the Wii now. Bye bye Comcast, hello Hulu.
Basically, I am using Mplayer for Music and Divx Streaming and Playon for Hulu streaming. (Those two solutions let a Wii connect a remote PC with media content).
Of course, I am still missing some old DVR features. I would need to add a tv tuner to my PC to fix this but it would become an overly complex project.
[Update August 2010] - I tried this month the Netflix online service with my Wii. It is awesome. Hard to believe the streaming is coming throught the Wii.
Here how it is working: When you subscribe to Netflix online package, you can ask to get the streaming through a Wii. In this case, you will receive a free DVD with a software to Stream Netflix (yes, even with a one month trial). The interface is great, the movie quality perfect. You can stop the movie/rewind/move forward/Resume a movie couple days later. No bugs, hassle free. Compare to Playon this is night and day. Of course, Playon is giving Hulu...
The only drawback of the Netflix online streaming solution is the choice of movie. It is really poor. Perhaps good enough during a couple of month and then I guess you will have seen all the interesting movies.
