TVSquad

Monsoon Multimedia, makers of the Hava line of place-shifting set top boxes are taking a break from trying to one-up the Slingbox and trying to take on another big name in the placeshifting world: Orb. The difference is Orb gives away its product for free, which could make tough for Monsoon to grab any market share.

This week Monsoon announced HAVASoft, a video streaming, place and time shifting application for PCs with TV tuner cards. Users will be able to install a client on their PC and stream video to internet connected computers or Windows Mobile phones and PDAs. One thing HAVASoft users will be able to do that Orb users can't is broadcast their live or recorded TV streams to more than one user at a time.

Users will be able to pause, fast forward, rewind, and record live TV over a remote connection. And if you've got a wireless home network the software will let you use a TV tuner in one PC as a networked tuner for use by other Windows Media Center PCs in the house. Here are a few of the highlights:

• Support for Windows XP, Vista, and Windows Mobile 5.0 and 6
• Stream MPEG-2 video over a home network
• Stream MPEG-4 video over the internet

No word on pricing yet, but Monsoon Multimedia says the software will be available "in early 2008."

[via TiVo Lovers]

One thing that sets HAVA's place-shifting boxes apart from the better known Slingbox is that every Hava unit has a built in TV tuner. That means you can stream live TV across the internet just by plugging in a cable or antenna, no cable box, TiVo, or other device needed. It's also meant that you could use Hava boxes as networked TV tuners for Windows Media Center PCs.

But now Monsoon Multimedia, the makers of the Hava line, are announcing that you can plug a USB hard drive into a Hava Titanium box to turn it into a fully functional personal video recorder. You can schedule recordings remotely using the Hava interface, or remotely using Hava's PC or Windows Mobile software.

Monsoon Multimedia will be selling Hava branded USB peripherals for the Hava Titanium soon, but I'm guessing if the company issues a firmware upgrade for the box, you should be able to plug any old hard drive into the USB port.

The other day Sling Media announced the Slingbox Pro-HD, which is capable of streaming HDTV content over the web from your TV, TiVo, or high-def components. Now Sling arch-nemesis Monsoon Multimedia is striking back by announcing the Hava Wireless HD.

As you can probably guess from the name, the Hava Wireless HD not only streams HD video over the internet, but it can connect to your home network over 802.11n WiFi, while the Slingbox Pro-HD requires either an Ethernet cable or a wireless adapter.

The latest Hava box can stream 1080i, 720p, or 480p signals to more than one PC at a time. It also includes an integrated ATSC/NTSC tuner for receiving broadcast signals without a TV set. As with all previous Hava boxes, you can even use the Wireless HD as a networked TV tuner for your Windows Media Center PCs.

But while you can use SlingPlayer software to watch streaming video on devices including Mac and Windows computers, Palm, Symbian, and Windows Mobile phones, you'll need a Windows PC or Windows Mobile device to watch your streaming Hava content.

The Hava Wireless HD is set for a Spring release. No word on the pricing yet.

It's no secret that a lot of consumer electronics devices, including TiVo and Monsoon Multimedia's Hava place-shifting device are built using Linux and open source software. It's powerful, stable, and most importantly, available. The open source community has developed a wealth of code that developers can draw from in order to build robust consumer oriented products.

But while the software is often free, meaning you can use it without paying, it's also free as in speech. In other words, once you incorporate code that has been published under the General Public License, you have to allow others to see the source code for your device. And that's not something a lot of companies like to do. You know, trade secrets and all.

So when the folks that developed the open source BusyBox software, which is used in the Hava, asked Monsoon Multimedia for a peek at the company's source code and Monsoon failed to comply, two open source developers filed suit against the company.

This is apparently the first time anyone has filed a copyright infringement suit in the US involving an alleged violation of the General Public License. It should be interesting to see if the case goes to court where it could set precedent, or if Monsoon Multimedia decides to settle out of court.

[via CNet]