Got Money to Burn? Check out the Kaleidescape

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.hometoys.com/news.php4?section=enhancedview&id=18985124' target='_blank'>http://www.hometoys.com/news.php4?section=enhancedview&id=18985124</a><br /><br /></div><img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/images/18985124" /> "The Kaleidescape System organizes your DVD collection while providing nearly instantaneous access to your entire DVD collection from any viewing location in your home. After loading your DVDs onto your Kaleidescape Server, you can access any movie in your collection using an intuitive and entertaining on-screen user interface that provides multiple ways to browse and select movies, play, pause, and resume movies, jump to favorite scenes, and exercise parental control over which movies are available at each viewing zone.<br /><br />...A Kaleidescape System comprises rack-mountable hardware components, proprietary operating system software, and Kaleidescape’s Movie Guide Service. A basic Kaleidescape System has one Server (with five disk cartridges for storing up to 160 movies), one Movie Player, and one DVD Reader. Additional cartridges can be added to the Server, up to a total of 12, which is sufficient to store 440 movies....The Kaleidescape System has been designed for the anticipated widespread availability of HD content. The massive capacity of the Server is ideal for storing large HD movies and the Movie Player hardware is designed to support both 720p and 1080i video output. <br /><br />Pricing will depend on the amount of movie storage as well as the number of viewing zones. A base Kaleidescape System lists for $27,000 and includes a Kaleidescape Server with sufficient storage for 160 DVD movies, a Movie Player for playback in a single zone, and a DVD Reader for importing DVDs. The storage capacity can be easily expanded to over 400 movies for less than $6,000 and an unlimited number of Movie Players can be added for $3995 per zone. The Kaleidescape System has a 36-month warranty on the hardware and lifetime support on the software and Movie Guide Service."<br /><br />The words "Holy DVR Batman!" don't begin to describe this beast. 8O The price is outrageous, but this isn't for your average consumer - just like Samsung is targetting their 60" plasma TVs at the billionaire market, this device is targetted at rich people who like their toys. Conceptually, this is very slick though, and I can see it trickling downstream to the rest of the world. I wonder how the movie studios feel about this though? I bet there's massive DRM on the movies that are ripped...

[RenesisX]

I built something very like this with a mate last year from off-the-shelf parts. The biggest cost was for the 12 x 250Gb Maxtor external Firewire drives (USB2 pretty much explodes when you plug that many drives in..). Those drives came to maybe $2,500 if I remember right - plus the PC was another $500 or so on top. But that gave enough space to put all my 400 DVDs onto the system.

We built a very cool remote-controlled interface to the entire system and it boots straight up into this full-screen (848x480) interface.

We had to pull the DVDs off in full MPEG2 as we both own plasmas - recompressing into any format produces very noticable digital artifacts on a plasma :(

I think this device in the article is a bit over-priced though compared to the costs!

> Chaz &lt;

[Jason Dunn]

I built something very like this with a mate last year from off-the-shelf parts. The biggest cost was for the 12 x 250Gb Maxtor external Firewire drives

Chaz, you are officially my hero. :werenotworthy:

[JR]

I think this device in the article is a bit over-priced though compared to the costs!

> Chaz &lt;

What would be a more realistic price? You may find a side-job here. 8)

[Crocuta]

I think this device in the article is a bit over-priced though compared to the costs!

> Chaz &lt;

What would be a more realistic price? You may find a side-job here. 8)

Really! I'm thinking if they're getting that much for their systems, you could undercut them by half and still make a huge profit.

[RenesisX]

Chaz, you are officially my hero. :werenotworthy:

Hehe :) I will have to post a photo some time this week. I think it's about 16 plugged in there now. It's tempting the limits of Windows stability though - you really need to boot with them all plugged in already, and shutdown with them all in there. Trying to take one out of the loop is like pulling the table from under a house of cards ;)

I'll try and get a screen-cap back up of the main interface too. My mate and I have worked on the UI design for several years to get it as easy and simple as possible. The folks at Redmond got a preview of part of it recently and I think they were pretty impressed.

> Chaz &lt;