Interact-TV announces 3.75TB MediaPool home media server

While we're still kind of left wondering where the reviews are for all of Interact-TV's previous kit, the company is announcing a new, 3.75TB MediaPool home media server. At this point, the typical conversion into # of DVDs capable of being stored becomes a little absurd: ~750, in case you were wondering. It's also upgradeable to 5TB in a RAID 10 formation thanks Hitachi and co. -- and features enough throughput for high definition video. We're guessing that means the MediaPool features HDMI, although since Interact-TV failed to include that basic fact in the press release, that assumption could eventually make an ass out of ... well, nevermind.

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Pioneer's BDP-LX80 Blu-ray player supports HD audio bitstream output

Pioneer just announced that Blu-ray Disc player with "HD audio bitstream output" they alluded to with the launch of their BDP-LX70. In what appears to be an industry first for BD players, the new BDP-LX80 supports bitstream output of both Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD high resolution lossless audio output over HDMI 1.3. Sorry, no DTS-HD Master Audio this time. Still, a worthy update from the LX70 assuming your home theater gear is properly matched to decode that signal. Something you'll want to check, and double-check, before dropping the tax inclusive roll of ¥210,000 or about $1,768. We could be wrong, but the move from the LX70 to LX80 appears to be a firmware change only so why all the fuss with a new model Pioneer? If true, then don't be surprised to find a hacked version of the firmware for the LX70 on the Internets soon enough. No word on a global launch -- Japan-only for now with a local release scheduled for October.

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