Wii owners will soon be able to stream video to their machine via Netflix, but what if you want to watch a video in a room that’s not the living room? Well, a new Netflix survey hints at the possibility of the DS being turned into a portable video device in future.
Although at the moment the survey is only enquiring about the potential audience for such a feature, presumably Netflix have the technical capacity and infrastructure to make it happen, so it’s a very real possibility.
The question naturally raises yet more questions – such as, “what would the quality be like?”, “what would go on the other screen?” and “could the Godfather trilogy’s rich colour palette and beautiful cinematography survive the transition to a portable console?” – but at the moment we have no answers, only the merest tease of possibility. Stay tuned for this one and we’ll update you if we hear anything else.
Comments 20
Wouldn't the quality be really bad if Netflix was on the DS? Just saying...
is there a way to take this survey if I am interested in letting them know how much I support this? I have netflix, and I REALLY want this to happen. Heck, I might use this more than my PS3, 360, and if I ever recieve my disk, wii. It would be nice to watch things in my room, and since I am at a campus a lot, it would be nice to watch whatever I want during my breaks
@v8 Ninja, what if they made it a cartridge? Like the free netflix disks. Then the DSi would not have to use its processor for much of anything beyond streaming, rather than internally running software AND streaming. Nintendo would go for being the first portable movie streaming device, so I am sure they would make a few cartridges. Then you have to question whether it would be free or not. Chances are they would charge for it, either through the website or in stores, then let you stream netflix for free beyond that.
If we can watch movies on an iPod...
that is surely something they are considering. at least for the touch and the iphone. but if the DS got it, I think it would boost sales and subscriptions
"Wii owners can already stream video to their machine via Netflix"
Am I missing something? I didn't think this was available yet.
I remember there being some rumblings about an iPhone app, but DS? I shudder at the low-res screen.
Same here Edwin. I have yet to receive my Netflix disc to stream video. I think someone is getting ahead of themselves.
Yeah, I agree with Panda...the DS is barely SD
I think Netflix is blowing smoke
He's trying to say that this service has been confirmed for Wii, but technically Wii owners cannot yet "already stream video". No one has gotten discs yet. This is worded a little falsely, though, especially since if anyone one did get the discs, I'm sure there'd be all kinds of chatter on this site about it as well.
this is a great idea, though. Who cares about resolution for the episodic TV shows that mostly make up the DL titles on netflix? As long as the audio is ok and the picture is visible at all, it's an awesome option for portable viewing on the go, especially if it just comes along with a regular netflix subscription like the Wii service will.
Lame. The DS screen, as others have said, would be terrible for this.
They just said they were hinting at it, so they might be throwing out ideas for DS2.
There's also a DVD player on skymall built for DS lite so maybe check the res on that.
I'm with armoredghor. I think it might be for the DS2 since it will have high resolution and more power. Also, I think it will be awhile before this actually happens since right now it's just a survey leaving enough time for the next ten DS.
The quality actually wouldnt be bad AT ALL.. Have you guys even SEEN the japense version of this? Dokodemo Wii No Ma? The quality is very very good. I was surprised at how good it was actually. So the quality wouldnt be bad at all.
down't the XL hav the same resolution as the DSi? If so, it would hav worse graphics than DSi. And, top screen= movie, bottom screen= play/pause/ff/rewind, stuff like that. thats what i guess.
The DS seems perfect for movie-playing. The top screen would display the movie, while the bottom one shows buttons that let you pause, rewind, and fast-forward the movie! The problem is, though, that it doesn't seem possible to stream video on the handheld. Like I said on the forum topic, if it takes a few minutes to display a one-minute long flipnote on the DSi, imagine how long it would take to load an entire movie.
Like destroyer said...except I would prefer everything to be on cartridges or whatever. I'm not much of a technical nerd, so I dunno what everyone is talking about low-res when I'm sure the DS can pull of sharp videos.
Duly noted and edited. Cheers guys
@bellgoriiing It is a bit low res, but the human eye can only see so much detail. If you have a 1080p HDTV that is 12" big, will it make a HUGE difference from SD? not really other than the picture being brighter than a CRT
I used a video converter to send video clips to the MAX Media Dock for my DS phatty. Quality is comparable to Youtube videos. The DSi has more CPU power and RAM under the hood, so if the DS phat could do it through a media dock, I'm sure the DSi could too. The only potential bottleneck in my opinion would be how fast the data could be streamed through it's wireless connection. Just because the wireless connection itself is 11Mbit or 54Mbit or whatever doesn't necessarily mean the internal data bus can handle those baud rates. Ever try using the "download play" option on your old DS? It's really quite slow However I imagine that DSi-only apps could be streamed much faster with the updated hardware.
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