Boxee Moves to Intel Chip and Offers Pre-ordering Now

Posted by Richard Kastelein in Breaking News on September 14, 2010  |  0 Comments More from this author  |    |  Follow Richard Kastelein on: Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter | YouTube

The Boxee Box device can now be preordered at $199 by consumers in the USA according to the companies' official blog earlier this week. The box, made along with D-Link and with an Intel chip, will ship through Amazon and arrive in November. Later on this year in November the Boxee Box will be available in the following countries: the US, Canada, Australia and in Europe – Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Macedonia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.

The box will be part of Intel's "Smart TV" program. Intel's chip replaced Nvidia's Tegra 2 platform, and the switch led to a delay in the box's release.

D-Link has signed up Amazon (US only) as exclusive pre-order partners for the Boxee Box. People who pre-order through Amazon in the US will receive their Boxee Box before it goes on sale anywhere else.

Boxee thinks their product is ideal for people who::

• Play what you normally watch on your computer (whether it is on the Internet or your home network) on their TV
• Tailor the Internet experience to a huge flat screen
• Do it in full HD, 1080p with 5.1 surround whenever possible
• Share the stuff you watch with your friends and see what they are watching
• Use a simple remote rather than a keyboard and mouse

The Boxee Box has moved to a  new platform, and is now based on the Intel Atom Processor (the Intel CE4100 system-on-a-chip codenamed “Sodaville”). This switch means that Boxee will be part of the Smart TV program that Intel is pushing and that will be heavily promoted this fall.

They decided to make the switch to Intel earlier this year (which was a part of what delayed them from their earlier ‘Q2 launch date) to provide better support for high-profile h264, HD playback.

Check out the inside story on the chip switch at Anandtech.