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Netgear EVA9150 Digital Entertainer Elite review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £308
inc VAT

The EVA9150 is the successor to the EVA8000, which won a Best Buy award in our last group test.

The new model has some significant improvements, including an easily accessible 500GB hard disk and support for an even wider range of HD video formats and protected WMA-DRM10 files.

It’s larger than the other streamers here and is designed to match standard hi-fi components. It also provides more connectors than the others, with HDMI, SCART, S-video, component and composite video as well as analogue audio and optical S/PDIF.

Helpful setup screens guide you through the process of selecting your TV’s resolution and your location before prompting you to insert the installation CD into the networked PC that stores your files. You can skip this step, as the streamer can find network shares on any computer, but Netgear’s Digital Entertainer software adds extra features such as the ability to monitor BitTorrent downloads and transfer them to the EVA9150’s hard disk.

The interface is excellent and easy to use. The first time you browse your network, it scans and indexes your network shares. A basic web interface allows you to add RSS podcast feeds and internet radio stations without having to connect a keyboard or enter URLs using the remote control. Internet radio listings display stations by title, genre and quality.

We were impressed by its photo handling. Thumbnails help you to find what you want, and you can filter images by year, month and even the camera they were taken on. You can even view and filter photos from Flickr.

If money is no object, this is the streamer to buy. With a large hard disk, dual-band Draft-N WiFi, an excellent interface and the most comprehensive format support we’ve ever seen, it earns our Ultimate award.

Basic Specifications

Rating *****
Media Streamer type hard disk streaming multimedia receiver

Audio Compatibility

Audio MP3 playback Yes
Audio WMA playback Yes
Audio WMA-DRM playback Yes
Audio AAC playback Yes
Audio Protected AAC playback No
Audio OGG playback No
Audio WAV playback Yes
Audio Audible playback No
Other audio formats FLAC, WMA-Pro, M4A, M4P, AC3, PCM, LPCM, AIFF, DTS passthrough
Internet radio stream compatib MP3

Video Compatibility

Video MPEG-1 playback Yes
Video MPEG-2 playback Yes
Video MPEG-2 VOB playback Yes
Video MPEG-4 AVI playback Yes
Video MPEG-4 MP4 playback Yes
Video MPEG-4 DivX/XviD support Yes
Video H.264 support Yes
Video MPEG-4 MP3 audio support Yes
Video MPEG-4 AAC audio support Yes
Video WMV playback Yes
Video WMV-HD support Yes
Other video formats MOV, ISO, IFO, MKV (with AAC), Transport Stream (TS), M2TS, Program Stream (PS)
Internet video stream compatib FLV (YouTube)

Image Compatibility

Image BMP support Yes
Image JPEG support Yes
Image TIFF support Yes

Network Interfaces

Wired network ports 10/100
Wireless networking support Yes
128-bit WEP Yes
256-bit WEP No
WPA Yes
WPA2 Yes

AV Interfaces

Minijack line outputs 0
Minijack headphone outputs 0
Stereo phono outputs 1
Coaxial S/PDIF outputs 0
Optical S/PDIF outputs 0
Total SCART sockets 1
HDMI outputs 1
Component outputs 1
S-video output 1
Composite outputs 1
Other connectors 2x USB, USB mass storage

Physical

Size 51x432x254mm
Antennas 3
Internal/external antennas internal
Upgradeable antenna No
Power consumption standby 9W
Power consumption on 15W

Server Compatibility

Software included Netgear Digital Entertainer
UPnP No
iTunes No
SlimServer No
SMB Yes

Buying Information

Price £308
Warranty one year RTB
Supplier http://www.scan.co.uk
Details www.netgear.co.uk

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