ZeeVee Zinc TV viewer hands-on and impressions

ZeeVee just let loose its Zinc internet TV viewer, and we couldn't help but give it an install on our Windows XP-based machine. While it can be said that this is a competitor to Hulu, it actually provides access to Hulu material. In that sense, maybe it's infringing more on boxee's territory. Underneath, it really relies on access to public video RSS feeds, so obviously the options are pretty limitless. If you're interested in seeing just how quickly you should download / avoid this new piece of software, follow us past the break for a few impressions.

When speaking with ZeeVee CEO Vic Odryna, he mentioned to us that he's spent the last half-year or so retooling his entire company, focusing less on consumer hardware and more on the pro install market and the booming software side. We'll admit, the original ZvBox was a real mess to setup, even for those with half a clue about DIY electronics. To that end, we're thrilled to see ZeeVee turning its talent to honing its ZViewer (now known as Zinc) software.

Now sitting at Beta 3.0, the software is completely final and ready to roll, but according to Vic, he sees the "Beta" logo as something that gives it the right to change the application as needed. In other words, you won't find a half-defunct piece of software here -- think Gmail Beta, and you've got the idea. The biggest improvement in this version over the last version of ZViewer is that there is far more content to delve into now. It has added CBS' catalog as well as Netflix Watch Instantly, and the fact that Hulu material is accessible is a real burn to rival boxee. You'll also find a nice unified interface, and there are lots of ways to customize how your favorite material is categorized and cataloged. Here's a few impressions for you to soak in:

• The installation on a Windows XP machine was dead simple. The intro video upon first launching it was also quite helpful.
• ZeeVee asserts that Zinc is built to handle commands from pretty much any remote, with Media Center PC remotes working particularly well.
• There's no doubt that Zinc works great with a keyboard and mouse, but ZeeVee is hoping to add improvements to make things even more remote-friendly.
• The interface is spectacular. We mean, it's just downright pretty. It's simple to navigate, not confusing at all, and easy to find content to consume. Quite refreshing, actually.
• The interface was just as lovable on a PC screen as it was in a "10-foot environment" when used on HTPCs connected to televisions.
• Screen transitions were super quick and super smooth. We quickly forgot that all of this is internet-based (read: we were expecting lag), and we're using a simple cable broadband connection that occasionally infuriates us when it comes to upload rates.
• The amount of content at your fingertips is pretty remarkable, as is the ability to mark something as a "Favorite" and access your recently viewed shows in "History."
  
• There's even a Local Content viewer to pull up media stored on your HDD within Zinc, meaning that you can keep Zinc open rather than having to pop in and out of apps depending on whether your material is kept locally or on the web.
• Vic admitted that some content providers were better about hosting up UIs that worked well on HDTVs, while others obviously expect you to watch on a PC. Nothing ZeeVee can do about that, but we found its handling of various windows really admirable. Never once was our video window blocked by unexpected pop-ups or bad formatting.
• The only time we managed to crash Zinc was when we attempted to view Silverlight-delivered content without Silverlight installed. Once we manually installed the software, we returned to Zinc and everything loaded up perfectly.
• The bundled NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament portal is awesome. Granted, we dig the sports here at Engadget HQ, but how can you beat high-quality, live basketball presented right in your browser? Also, the tournament bracket GUI is a very nice touch. Needless to say, we'd love to see more providers offer up live broadcasts, and clearly, Zinc is really to handle it.
• Video playback was smooth as butter in our testing, and while that doesn't have much to do with ZeeVee directly, we were thrilled with just how elegant the Zinc software handled the video feeds. It really enhanced our ability to consume online material by making it painfully easy to plug in.

All in all, we can't recommend enough that you download this immediately. For fans of online content, or even for folks who've been dodging it for fear of complication, Zinc is a perfect way to dive in. It simplifies the process of finding material, and best of all, it's completely free to use. As for Mac users, you'll have to wait until April or so to join the fun. For the PC crowd, give it a go and let us know how you like it. Did we overlook any glaring issues? Are you similarly impressed? Sound off!

ZeeVee Zinc TV viewer hands-on and impressions

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 9:35AM]

Download link:
http://www.zeevee.com/zinc/download-zinc

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 9:27PM]

So can it work with Media Center extenders, if not are they releasing an app to allow it to be controlled remotely via an extender ? Still looking to watch Hulu content on my Living Room big screen via my networked 360.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 25th 2009 4:21PM]

Axel,

you can do hulu now with PlayON. I use it on my 360 everyday.

Have fun with that . . .

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 11:08AM]

Wow 3 crashes in 10 minutes after loading this software! Quality app!

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 1:20PM]

Peter,

We are very interested in understanding the problem you are having, and helping you get going. Can you provide us the details as to your situation via an email to support at zeevee dot com.

thanks

the Zeevee Team

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 4:36PM]

Why is it so unbearably laggy? My PC hardware is epic. What did I do wrong?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 6:37PM]

It seems to be working OK for me, but I can't seem to get it to do ABC fullscreen automatically.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 7:06PM]

Matt, Eric,

Full disclosure - I'm with ZeeVee.

I wish we could make ABC automatically go fullscreen. My family and I have recently been addicted to Lost, so we spend a lot of time there. They have a fairly complex player, which is very difficult to "force" to full screen mode. It worked better in the past, and I'm hoping that they realize how important it is for us 'living room' users so they can make it easy again in the future. We'll get there if we all let them know how important this is!

Eric - laggy? It's really snappy for me. Check your internet connection. If it's up and down, that can explain laggy. Are you just browsing, or searching?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 7:40PM]

I installed Zinc over two weeks ago and love it. My favorite part is when I click on the Zinc logo within firefox and the Zinc theme song blares over the speakers. no major glitches to report so far. however i am unable to launch netflix from Zinc. This package would be the mac daddy of all htpc viewers if I could add my own content i.e. Cnet TV, local news and so on. I use this on a dual monitor setup. the 17" monitor in the office and the 40" samsung in the living room. Both look great

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 8:13PM]

Kevin,

You can add any site that has a Media RSS feed to your favorites in Zinc. Using Zinc to browse to the site, look for the orange RSS symbol. Clicking on that Icon will bring up the feed, and offer you to add it to a reader. Zinc Favorites should be one of the readers listed. If you look at the source of the rss feed and find it uses the xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" then you can add it to Zinc. An example would be the video section of www.theonion.com video section http://feeds.theonion.com/onn/mrss .

It sounds like this would be a good topic for a video tutorial....

thanks!

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 24th 2009 8:13PM]

You need to have a netflix account to watch the netflix streaming movies. There is a one-time popup that should occur when you first access the netflix section to link your account to Zinc.

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 27th 2009 12:15PM]

Am I the only one who can't download this? Seems their server has been down? Anybody?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 25th 2009 9:58AM]

I saw a statement on the zeevee site implying that an iphone or ipod touch could be used as a remote for Zinc TV, but I can't find any information on setting it up - anybody know how do this?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 26th 2009 12:18AM]

Hi.. i eagerly ran home today to install Zinc on my xppro laptop.. i upgraded the intel915 embedded graphics to the latest version 9.1.1 which has opengl 2.0 support... it passes the zinc video card test.... but zinc wont launch... well, it launches and then quits within 2 seconds... i noticed in the taskmanager that zv.exe launches then disappears... i get the startup sound and a black screen and then nothing. gone... any ideas?

[(Unverified) Posted Mar 28th 2009 1:27PM]

Wow. Download, insall, run, all without a hitch. This app is what MS should have built into Media Center. Oh well, don't need it now. I tried on Fox, ABC, CBS, Hulu, You Tube, and some others that I'd never heard of. They all worked very nicely. Most even worked with my Media Center remote. I would probably pay for this one...Nice that it's free...

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 13th 2009 6:10PM]

ZV Beta 3 is way better than Boxee; Boxee has less Applications and you can't really enjoy watching anything on Hulu or Joost because the TV Series or Movie you're watching happens to sutter throughout the entire length of the Series or Movie. On the other hand ZV Beta 3 has way more Applications to choose from and I have notice that it also sutter a little while watching a Netflix Movie but not as much and as long as Boxee. I would like to know since I have ZV Beta 3 for Windows, when will it be available for Mac and once it becomes available will ther be an addition software added to it, whereas it can be installed onto Apple tv and be compatible to play on it like Boxee does. This will be great for us Apple TV users or any other Media Set Top Boxes to actually watch ZV Beta 3 on our 42' HDTV, instead buying any additional wires and cables and another Media Top Set Box to run it. All that I want to know; as soon as ZV Beta 3 for Mac becomes available and you can make it compatible with Apple TV please let me know.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 14th 2009 8:08AM]

does anyone know of any of these types of application that can filter out content that is unavailable outside of the US? I live (temporarily) in the UK and I know there are online videos that exist for the UK but I try to find them and I keep coming across US only content.

[(Unverified) Posted May 3rd 2009 9:37PM]

Anybody know if this will install on Vista x86 or Windows 7 RC x86? Also, any plans for a Linux version down the road?

[(Unverified) Posted May 4th 2009 10:57AM]

Hi Craig, I work at Zee Vee
Zinc runs fine on Vista, both 32 bit and 64 bit.
If Firefox runs on your PC then so should Zinc.
Your video card needs to be fairly new with latest drivers.

[(Unverified) Posted May 7th 2009 5:27PM]

Hello out there!, am I the only one asking the this question...When will Zinc Beta 3 be available for download for Mac & Apple TV. Last that iI check it was suppose to be available by the end of April and now it's going on t he second week of May and no avail. So can some one tell me wnts the hold up.

[(Unverified) Posted May 19th 2009 12:52PM]

Score!

I'll Be Cutting the Cable Cord as soon as I get someone to hook up my computer in the living room. Hey Vic, I CAN'T THANK YOU ENOUGH. I am diabled and the cable bill was killing me, limited income and all... This is an alternative i can easily live with. Melanie, at your Customer Service e-mail link gave outstanding, before you buy, advice and answered every single question I annoyed her with and she never got annoyed (I asked lots and lots of questions).

I have just one more. I failed the video card test but it works fine. Anyone know if that matters?

[(Unverified) Posted May 29th 2009 7:37PM]

I'm still waiting to hear of plans for Linux support!