If Sony really wanted to make an impact in the HTPC world, they will be fully supporting and funding the Xbox Media Center XBMC project to have it fully natively developed for the PS3. A PSMC device would be insanely cool and powerful. Imagine the ability to play two 1080p HD videos at full speed, store and manage huge media collections, etc.

Google is also helping this project. It would be wise for everyone to come together and release a free (or very low cost) PS3 Media Center platform that does what XBMC does. Since Microsoft won't let XBMC run on the 360, the PS3 is the place to go. There should be custom motion sensing remote controls, external storage array (or just NAS), etc.. all based on the PS3 geared for home media and server applications.

I want these to scale to be used for tunnel boring. or maybe drilling a well.

Ugh.. come on already. Nearly every chipset (both compression and decompression codecs) supports 1080p (even multi-stream for the newest chips).. And so do the chips that they use to drive the display.. Even if the SlingCatcher upconverted everything, I'd still be greatful for 1080p..

I guess I'm going to still wait for all the cheap Asian *non copy protect-ANAL* 1080p place shifting stuff to come at the end of 2008...

The "HDMI to 1Gbit Ethernet" converter will be my favorite I think... less than 1 second compression-> send -> remote display time :) :) :)

Maybe it is using h.264 for the compression? Hence the low bitrate but high res

Lurkster - I'm pretty sure you are in correct on multiple fronts. USB2.0 is about 60MB/sec, and there is no "hi-speed" usb 2.0. USB 2.0, is the hi-speed version. Of course after overhead and delays I doubt you come anywhere near the 60MB/sec potential. I still say you tend to get about 1/4th the theoretical speed when connecting to HD's. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_device_bandwidths

Second, a HD's continuous throughput tends to be in the 40-50MB/sec range for medium range drives, 60-75MB+ for the high end. http://www23.tomshardware.com/storage.html?modelx=33&model1=117&model2=676&chart=34

Unfortunately USB is a crappy interface designed to be cheap. They could have easily improved it's poor effeciency, cable length limit, and throughput (1gbit+) but didn't. Look how cheap gbit ethernet chips are now.

ok, read everyone’s comments and wanted to provide some answers, input, and venting.

I bought a Dish 622 about a year ago and I am very happy. 8 out of 10 stars. I could write up a list of 50 features just off the top of my head that they should, or need, to add. But I’m still happy. The 622 is what the 721 should have been. Dish still needs to learn to design hardware that doesn’t over heat. I finally bought a large laptop cooler and stuck it under my 622 because of this. If there was one feature I would surely pay for it would be for the unit to have 4 satellite tuners and 2 HD OTA tuners (instead of 2 & 1).

Dave - Are you saying you are dropping Time Warner cable internet because the Dish 622 is enabling it's ethernet port? The 622 will be a network client, not a internet provider of any kind. Of course if Dish was actually up with the times they might someday all your PC to connect to the 622 over your home network and watch content off the system. Something similar to a SlingBox.

Greg - in reply to your comment "I don't think they should charge to use your own equipment". Both Dish and DirecTV nickel and dime you in every way they can. Odds are they find an excuse to charge you for the software development that it took to support external storage. Oh wait, they will.

Andrew – agreed. Of course RIAA will force Dish to follow so many rules for sharing the content to a PC/IP device that it’s more likely Dish will abandon the idea for another 5 years, or have to spend so much to make it secure that they’ll be “forced” to charge extra for the functionality. Did I mention I don’t like RIAA. Or DRM. Or fluffy bunnies.

YES – you can record hi-def without a phone line. You can also Order PPV’s till your system demands you plug in a phone line. No way around it, you’ll eventually pay for the movies even if you PPV’ed them 6 months ago.

A USB2.0 drive will perform approximately 1/4TH of the drives speed as if it were on a SATA bus. So a 50MB/sec drive will maybe get 13MB/sec. Thus, I don’t think Dish feels comfortable recording over a USB bus, only moving or archiving to the external device. I do think you should at least be able to play from the external drive…?