Items tagged with Streaming
There are a bunch of streaming services out there, with some recent additions bringing more competition to the fold. Plex, a popular service for helping users wrangle their own media, is now rubbing elbows with them in a bigger way than before. The company just launched an ad-supported streaming service with thousands of movies, TV shows, documentaries, and more. The service is free, as it is funded entirely by ads. Not to worry, though, Plex will not be interrupting your own content with ads. Plex rightfully says that would be a "terrible idea for many, many reasons," so unless you happen to have a catalog of commercials for some reason, you will only see them when viewing the free streaming...
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Twitch launched a closed beta for Twitch Studio a few months ago. The beta was a new streaming app, and Twitch says that "tons" of streamers that signed up to try it. After taking all the feedback from the streamers who tried Twitch Studio beta, the beta is now open to everyone who wants to try it out. Twitch Studio Beta is available for anyone on Windows 7 or newer operating system. To talk streamers into trying the open beta for the new Studio, Twitch is running down some of the best features of the beta software. The setup is guided, making it easy to detect your mic, webcam, monitor resolution, bitrate, and more to help the stream look and sound great. The beta offers customizable templates...
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The NVIDIA SHIELD TV is widely regarded as the best media streaming device on the market. In addition to offering high-performance, access to a massive repository of 4K streaming services and apps, and leading-edge features that some competitors have only just recently caught up with, the SHIELD TV gives users access to GeForce NOW and game streaming capabilities from a GeForce-enabled PC. There is a growing library of native AAA Android games too, along with a myriad of casual games as well. And that's not to mention the huge community of enthusiasts that use the SHIELD TV to emulate a multitude of consoles and retro arcade machines from yesteryear. Whether using it right out of the box or side-loading...
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The number of “cord cutters” has accelerated over the last decade. Many people are cutting their ties to cable companies TV programming packages, and instead looking for online entertainment solutions. In that regard, consumers have been turning to streaming devices like Google Chromecast, Roku and NVIDIA Shield TV. However, HDMI wireless transmitters and receivers are another viable option for cord cutters. Wireless transmit/receive video products like these can be used for much more than streaming your favorite shows, including everything from gaming to office presentations and live drone footage. The Nyrius Aries Pro is one of the latest offerings in the market for...
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Google has been bragging about Stadia for months now, and as the launch nears, new details about the gaming service have surfaced. One fresh bit of information is likely to be disappointing to potential subscribers: Google has announced that at launch, the Stadia controller will only work wirelessly with the Chromecast Ultra. That means you can play with no wires when the Chromecast Ultra is hooked to your TV, but if you want to play on other devices, you will need to connect a cable to the Stadia controller to use it. The Stadia controller is the only first-party hardware that the service offers at this time, and it features Stadia-specific shortcut keys and integrated WiFi. Google has stated...
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Console gaming fans are looking forward to the next year or so as the PS5 game console is set to land in the holiday season of 2020. The Google Stadia game streaming platform is set to launch next month, and in a recent interview, the head engineer for the Google streaming platform talked about performance. VP of engineering Madj Bakar believes that Stadia will be faster and more responsive than local gaming hardware. The catch to that statement made by Bakar is that he says Stadia will be faster than local gaming systems in "a year or two." Bakar says that Google is on the verge of being better than local hardware due to advancements in modeling and machine learning. He says that the Stadia...
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Today at TwitchCon, NVIDIA announced some interesting new tech that can be quite beneficial to the livestreaming community. The company has been leveraging the RT and Tensor cores in its current generation of Turing-based GeForce RTX graphics cards to enable features like real-time ray tracing, but that same hardware will be used to power the company’s new RTX Broadcast Engine. The RTX Broadcast Engine will leverage the onboard Tensor cores to enable a wide variety of effects in real-time including style filters, augmented reality, and greenscreens. In the case of RTX Greenscreen, NVIDIA is using artificial intelligence to scrub the background in the livestream, leaving just your face and...
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Microsoft is getting ready for the future of gaming that will allow you to stream your favorite games to multiple devices. A preview is underway with Xbox Console Streaming Preview and Project xCloud Preview that will start in October 2019. The previews are a first look and will allow the streaming of Xbox games to an Android phone or tablet. Microsoft says that there are two ways to stream in a pair of technical previews. One is to stream from the cloud with the Project xCloud Preview. This method allows fans to play Xbox favorites on an Android phone or tablet directly via the cloud. Microsoft promises console-quality games with no waiting for downloads. Gamers wanting to try this out...
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Are you in the market for a new streaming player? Roku just released new versions of the Roku Express and the Roku Ultra. The two streaming players are meant to provide a “device for every type of streamer”. Roku last refreshed its line of players this past autumn and the updated devices come with a number of new features. The new and improved Roku Express is reportedly 10% smaller than the original Express. The device is meant to blend in with the user’s environment and it can be powered by one’s television if an outlet is unavailable. The Roku Express features HD streaming. It also includes a power adapter, high-speed HDMI cable, and a simple remote. Roku...
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It's no secret that people are cutting the cord with their cable and satellite companies around the country. While cord-cutting may not be as feared by cable companies as it once was, streamers still need internet, after all, there are still millions who are cutting the cord. A new study conducted by Roku has found that 60 million U.S. households are expected to access content on TVs exclusively via streaming in the next five years. If that happens, Roku says that streamers will surpass traditional Pay TV viewers for the first time. Roku's study says that U.S. market data suggests that so far in 2019, 2 million homes in the U.S. have cut the cord and left traditional cable or satellite providers....
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Amazon just rolled out a new streaming music tier that it hopes will draw users away from competing services such as Spotify and Apple Music. The advantage of the new Amazon Music HD subscription option is, simply put, higher quality audio feeds, with more than 50 million songs offered in high definition and "millions" of songs in ultra HD. What exactly does that mean? Amazon is offering music listeners access to lossless tunes. What Amazon is calling HD music boils down to 16-bit, 44.1kHz audio, which is basically CD-quality audio. On top of that, there are millions of even higher quality tunes, specifically at a bit depth of 24-bit and a sample rate up to 192kHz. This is what Amazon refers...
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If you are about to purchase a Fire TV Cube, just stop. Amazon is releasing a second generation model, and while similar in functionality to the first-gen version, the newest Fire TV Cube offers some interesting upgrades over the original. Perhaps the biggest is a meaty upgrade to an octa-core processor, making it the "fastest and most powerful Fire TV" devices ever. According to Amazon, it offers up to a 2X performance bump over the first-gen model, along with instant access to Dolby Vision and 4K Ultra HD content at up to 60 frames per second. On the high dynamic range side of the equation, it's not just Dolby Vision, either—it supports HDR10+ content as well (Rtings has a good breakdown...
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Roku just made it easy to upgrade your television's audio and add streaming capabilities in one fell swoop. The new Roku Smart Soundbar is notable because not only is it the company's first soundbar, but it also comes with a built-in Roku Ultra streamer, allowing users to stream videos in up to 4K Ultra HD with HDR support. Granted, most modern TVs come with built-in streaming capabilities, so for some it might be a redundant feature. However, for those who prefer Roku to Chromecast (the latter of which is found on many TVs), the Roku Smart Soundbar could serve as a nifty 2-in-1 upgrade, piping out better audio than a TV's speakers with 4K HDR streaming support to boot. "We’ve been very...
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Do not hold your breath waiting for a version of Project Scarlett built exclusively for streaming. Xbox boss Phil Spencer threw cold water on what was becoming a hot rumor, fueled in large part by comments he previously made regarding the company's future console plans. As it stands, Project Scarlett will stick to the usual script. The speculation stems in part from Project xCloud, a streaming service Microsoft is working on that will allow users to play games on any device. This is not meant to replace power consoles like Project Scarlett, the codename of Microsoft's next flagship Xbox console, but rumors of a dedicated streaming SKU launching alongside the main console have persisted nonetheless....
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