Orb Networks announced that starting today more than 17 million households with gaming consoles worldwide can now enjoy and share all of the digital entertainment on their home PCs directly on their living room TV screen, using the company’s free MyCasting software as the bridge. The announcement comes as Apple begins shipping its Apple TV.

Orb MyCasting now works with the Microsoft Xbox 360, the world’s largest game console installed base, as well as the Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation 3, giving gamers the ability to bring all digital media to their TV screen without any additional costs or hardware requirements.

Digital media convergence has arrived by way of the gaming world and Orb. We basically beat Apple to the punch,” continued Costello.

According to Costello, the Orb application has the power for widespread adoption for two reasons - first, it’s easy, and second, the number of game consoles being purchased continues to rise rapidly - currently at the rate of 250,000 each week. “The speed at which people are buying and using video game consoles is astounding, and that level of growth and adoption will have a tsunami effect on the way people consume digital media in the future,” he said.

Recent industry forecasts show that 30% of households worldwide will own a Nintendo Wii alone in the next five years. ABI Research is also monitoring this trend.

“When trying something new, you want to be able to push play and have it work,” said Costello. “What’s so great about the gaming console is that people already like and know how to use it: Orb really extends that fun experience and gives them a huge number of new choices - whether it’s watching their favorite Internet video or listening to music through their living room sound system. All of their own digital stuff is there to enjoy easily on the main screen in the home, where most of us want to be entertained.”

Michael Wolf, director of ABI Research says, “This new generation of gaming consoles - which ABI Research believes will have an installed base of 168 million worldwide by 2011 - will be one of the main interfaces for consumers to access a variety of digital media in the living room. By reaching the XBox 360 as well as the two other consoles, Orb has given millions of consumers a way to access their digital media today, and has extended the reach of the company’s MyCasting platform further.”

Orb turns the home PC into a personal broadcasting system, and lets users build and organize their own “channels” to enjoy their music, photos, video, TV, documents and other extras for viewing on any device with a streaming media player and Internet connection. The free MyCasting software allows you to enjoy all digital media from your home PC, as well as online videos from the growing source of Internet TV and content sites, on any networked device with an internet browser - be it other PCs, lap tops, PDAs or mobile phones with streaming players. And now, TV with gaming consoles including the Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 3.

How Orb Works with your game console:

Download load Orb at www.orb.com (Version v2.00.0856 or higher) onto your always-on Windows PC at home. It takes less than 3 minutes to do.
For the Wii and PS3, turn on the TV that is connected to your game console and open your Web browser. Using your remote control or controller, log onto your Orb account through your game console at mycast.orb.com.
For the XBox 360, go to the media tab and select the media type (video, photos, or music) you want to play on your TV. Click “computer” from the list of options, and you will see a list of the computers running Orb on your LAN. Select one and then pick from the available video, photos, or music.
That’s it. Now enjoy, watch and listen to any digital content on your home PC - videos, music, Internet TV and radio or any other online content you programmed in your Orb MyCast application: they are now all airing on your TV screen.

Because I am awesome, you can now check this out.

- DoubleJ

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 25th, 2007 at 9:07 pm and is filed under Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.