But tracking down the best of these Internet Hi-Fis is not easy. Some are simply gimmicks, with sound quality that doesn’t match the promises offered. Others offer no more than a simply USB port.

But some offer much more. Of the five we’ve tracked down, some will let you stream your tunes from your mobile phone as well as your PC; others will let you stream your tunes wirelessly from your iPod or iPhone; and will even act as an extrenal sound card for your PC!

All these Internet Hi-Fis have several things in common, though – they’ll all connect to the Internet, they’ve all got great quality Hi-Fi sound, and they all come with built-in amplifiers, so you don’t need a Hi-Fi to plug them into – they are your Hi-Fi!

so if you’re looking for a hi-Fi that does more than just play tunes, check out these 5 Internet Hi-Fis.

Sony CMTMX750Ni DAB WiFi iPod Micro System

What is it: Possibly the best social Hi-Fi ever invented – at least in terms of features!

What you’ll love: This beast does everything. Stream tunes from your PC over WiFi? Check. Listen to 1,000s of Internet radio stations including SHOUTcast radio – without even switching your PC on? Check. Stream tunes from your DLNA-equipped mobile phone via DLNA? Check! How about iPod dock, USB port, CD player, DAB and DAB+ tuners and 100W amp? Check! It even looks great!

What you won’t like: The sound quality isn’t as good as some of the other systems here, but the features are superb.

Check Deals

Marantz M-CR603

What is it: The ultimate Hi-fi to free your music, hoovering it up from your PC or the Internet, and pumping it out loudly in perfect audio quality.

What you’ll love: The Marantz’s sheer versatility. You can stream tunes from your PC via (wired) Ethernet, plug in your iPod or MP3 player into its front-facing USB port, listen to your old CDs via its CD player, or just listen to DAB and DAB+ radio. At 60W per channel, it’s also twice as powerful as the Denon. It’ll even work as a sound card for your PC, giving you superior quality sound for your music and your games.

What’s not so good: Wired-only Internet connection, plus it’s not cheap, but its sound is better than most.

Check Deals

Yamaha MCR-140

What is it: A micro system in many colours with great sound, wireless streaming, and a good price.

What you’ll love: The MCR-140 comes with Yamaha’s high-quality AirWired wireless streaming technology. Plug your iPhone or iPod into the supplied transmitter, and you can stream your tunes from your mobile directly through the MCR-140′s 15W amp.

What you won’t like: Great for bass, but not so good for vocals. Wireless streaming only available for the iPhone/iPod.

Check Deals

Denon D-M38DAB

What is it: The award-winning Best CD system of 2010.

What you’ll love: The D-M38DAB is a 30W per channel CD system with iPod dock and USB port. It’s not the cheapest hi-fi here, but its sound is beaten only by the UnitiQute – which costs over £1,000 more! So if you want the best sounding Hi-Fi for your iPhone or iPod, this is the one to buy.

What’s not so good: Although you’re fine if you own an iPod or iPhone, there’s no streaming options on the D-M38DAB, making connecitivty to other devices and services limited. Which is a bit of a problem for an Internet Hi-Fi, but there aren’t many good ones around!

Check Deals

Naim UnitiQute

What is it: it’s a top-end audiophile Hi-Fi from legendary Hi-Fi company Naim.

What you’ll love: The gloriously-named Uniti-Qute can pull music from any source you care to throw at it, including DAB, Internet radio, network streaming from your PC (wired or wireless), an MP3 player via USB, or your iPod or iPhone. You can even control it using an iPhone app. Best of all, though, is the sound. No other machine here will beat it, so if you want the best sound quality you can get, you need to get the UnitiQute.

What’s not so good: The price! It’s £1350 and there’s no CD player, but it did win What Hi-Fi’s Systems Product of the Year.

Summary

It took me surprisingly long to pull this list together. Hi-Fi manufacturers seem reluctant to boast about their Internet Hi-Fis and Hi-Fi review sites seem reluctant to review them! Maybe both are too worried that network-connected Hi-Fis will be too easily dismissed by audiophiles and that they won’t be taken seriously enough.

If so, then the entry of Naim with its stunning UnitiQute should certainly start to change that. Naim is a big name in the audiophile world with superb quality products. The UnitiQute is one of the coolest Hi-Fi products around at the moment, but at £1350, it’s unfortunately a product I can only dream about at the moment!

Fortunately there’s a solution. The latest generation of digital cameras have all manner of social photo features that let you upload your pics to sites such as Flickr, Picasa and even Facebook with absolute ease.

We’ve rounded up 5 of the latest social snappers to see how they help you share your pics amongst your friends and across the world,

Kodak SLICE – The sleek-and-cool option

Let’s start with one of photography’s biggest guns – Kodak. This sleek number is one of Kodak’s newest devices, the Kodak SLICE, and it’s bursting with technology to bring your pictures to the web on a device barely bigger than a mobile phone.

The SLICE has a massive 14 megapixels with a 5x optical zoom (never trust digital zooms) and has a very cool 3.5″ touchscreen interface on the back making it simple and intuative to operate. It also has face recognition, so you can tell the SLICE the name that belongs to the face, and when you take pictures, it automatically tags them with the right names. This can save you hours on Facebook!

The best thing about the SLICE, though, is its one-touch upload feature to Facebook, Flickr or email (and even videos to YouTube). Simply find the photos you want to share, press the ‘Share’ button, and select where you want to share them to. The next time you plug the SLICE into your PC via USB, all the pics are automatically uploaded to the destinations you’d selected. There’s absolutely nothing for you to do, it’s all taken care of for you.

The Kodak SLICE is one of the smartest cameras today, and could be the one for you if you want the technology without the fuss.

Samsung ST1000 – The kitchen sink option

The Samsung ST1000 is a camera that has a trick up its sleeve for all you travellers out there – GPS. No, you can’t use it to find your way to Rickmansworth, the GPS is there for Geotagging, the simple process of adding location data to each shot.

So what esle does the ST1000 pack in to its little case? How about 12 megapixels through a very smart 5x inner zoom lens (yes, the zoom is still optical but it’s inside the lens housing!). Not enough? How about bluetooth to send the pictures to your smartphone for emailing? Or onboard WiFi to skip the PC completely and email them from the ST1000 itself? Or DLNA networking for viewing the photos and videos on any DLNA device, such as an HDTV?

Phew! On top of all this, the ST1000 is Flickr compatible (of course) and also boasts working with Facebook, Picasa, YouTube and Samsungs own photo website. This is definitely one for the travelling social media enthusiast.

Samsung ST5500 – The amazing screen option

The must-have phone this year has arguably been Samsung’s Galaxy S, and its biggest draw has been its luscious AMOLED screen. Anyone who’s seen one will rave about their vibrant colours and unrivalled contrast.

So what kind of device could also benefit from a display with vibrant colours and unrivalled contrast? A device concerned with imaging maybe? Stwp forward the Samsung ST5500, the world’s first camera to have a beautiful 3.7″ AMOLED touch screen integrated right into its frame, giving superb and accurate previews of the photographs you’ve shot, taking much of the guesswork out of how well the colours and shade have come through its 14 megapixel 7x optical zoom lens.

However it’s not just a camera with a pretty screen. It’s got the same Wifi / DLNA / bluetooth connectivity of its little brother, the ST1000, and also like its sibling, it will upload to Flickr, Facebook, Picasa and YouTube. You can even use the wifi to email straight from the camera.

The ST5500 also has some clever ideas about control – yes, you can control it by touching that lovely screen, but you can also control it by tilts and shakes, scrolling through your pictures with a shake of the wrist!

If you like the look of the ST1000 but want that little bit more opulence and image control, the Samsung ST5500 is for you.

Kodak Easyshare C142 – The social media on pocket money option

The gear above is great, well specced and impressive, but it’s also expensive. A much less expensive option is the Kodak Easyshare C142. Coming in at nearly a quarter of the price of the SLICE, this is social media photography at its simplest.

A solid little camera, the C142 still packs an impressive 10 megapixels through a 3x optical lens, and it also boasts a 2.5″ LCD screen, so it’s no slouch technically. The C142 is the modern embodiment of the simple point-and-shoot you had for holidays, so while suited to the kids, it’s also at home with people who don’t want to worry about shutter stops, white balance and ISO speeds but just want to take snaps.

Nowadays we don’t get them developed in an hour at Boots, we upload them, so the Kodak makes that easy too – it’s not called Easyshare for nothing. There’s even a button for it, called – wait for it – Share, which you use to mark the images you want to er, share. Come on, it wouldn’t be easier if it uploaded them for you would it?

Hmm, well actually it does do that too, taking your share tagged images and uploading them to your profiles around the web. See, now it can’t be simpler unless it went on holiday for you and took the pictures itself, and where’s the fun in that?

The Kodak Easyshare C142 isn’t for photographers, it’s for you, the person who just wants a good value and simple to use camera to take a decent picture.

Eye-Fi – The I’ve-already-got-a-good-camera option

There will be some amongst you who have your perfect digital camera, such as a Panasonic Lumix, but find it’s not very good at sharing. However, you’re certainly not going to trade it in for one that does, as the camera you’ve got gives much better results (particularly true if it’s a DSLR you’ve got).

So what do you do? Simple: you buy an Eye-Fi. Using some sort of technology voodoo, the clever bods at Eye-Fi have shrunk a wireless dongle, 8GB of memory, geotagging and “endless memory” into a regular Secure Digital card that’ll pop in a SD card compatible camera (which is most of them).

With the Eye-Fi, you go out and take your pictures as usual, treating it like a regular 8GB memory card. Then when you return home, you switch on your PC and your camera and you go and make a cup of tea. While you do that, the Eye-Fi sends your images wirelessly to your PC – it really is as simple as that.

But what if you’re not near a PC? Well you can even set the Eye-Fi up beforehand with your favourite social site (and trust me, it’ll work with nearly all of them – Flickr, Picasa, MobileMe, SmugMug, Photbucket, webshots…you get the picture), and the Eye-Fi can upload them through Wifi. Let’s not forget Endless Memory either – it basically senses when the card is nearly full and automatically uploads your images, clearing space on the card invisibly to you.

Eye-Fi is an excellent solution for those who want to keep the camera they love, plus it’s also the best option if you want the easy life with its simple wireless uploading.

Summary

So that’s 5 devices to get your pictures out onto the web with the absolute minimum of fuss. There’s a wide variety from the great value C142 to the very cool SLICE, with some excellent gear inbetween. You can even get in on the social action even if your beloved camera isn’t quite modern enough.

So now you have no excuses not to go out into the world and bring back some memories to put on the web, without losing hair over it. So much better than leavin gyour pictures buried somewhere on your hard disk, lost amongst the thousands of others and never to be seen again!

TV is going through a transformation the likes of which it’s not seen since the birth of Satellite TV.

New Internet TVs don’t just give you a TV with YouTube – they give you a whole new viewing experience that’ll transform your living room.

To guide you through the minefield of the different technologies available, we’ll take a look at 5 televisions that let you connect to that most social of video sites, YouTube.

TVs with YouTube – making the TV social again

Here at MediaMentalism, we’re all about the social. We’re also about the smart technology, but what really gets the MediaMentalism boat afloat is when the smart technology gets with the social.

Everything’s getting in on the act, from cameras that are Flickr friendly to blasting out your favourite tunes with a HiFi and Last.FM. Now even the TV is getting in on the social action, growing network interfaces and talking to the Internet.

Every TV manufacturer is doing things slightly differently though. To help you choose the best way of watching YouTube on your TV, we’ve looked at different models from different manufacturers, grouped according to the main TV tech being used.

Internet-equipped LED TV

Panasonic D25 LED LCD

While Samsung and LG have cornered the public’s eye with catchy adverts, Panasonic have quietly released their own LED LCD screen, the Panasonic D25 series. Keen AV followers will know that any Panasonic TV comes with an impressive heritage and the D25 is no exception.

Using a top-end LED backlit IPS panel, the D25 comes packed with Freesat HD to flex those HD pixels, 4 HDMI sockets, a very cool USB “HDD PVR” function which allows you to record onto a USB hard drive, and finally the all important Ethernet socket. Through this you have access to Viera Link, Panasonic’s web portal, which includes the usual news and weather, and also social elements like YouTube and even Twitter.

Now you can watch dancing mongoose and tell the world without touching a phone or PC!

The Top End 3DTV

Samsung UE40C8000 3D LED TV

Maybe LED is not enough for you, and you crave something that little bit more. Ok, how about the very cutting edge of television technology from one of the world’s biggest names in TVs?

Samsung’s 8000 series sets are not only the de rigeur LED LCD flavour but these uber-TVs have that trick up their sleeve that everyone wants – 3D. Looking stunning in brushed titanium, the 8000 is loaded with a full HD VA LCD screen (better than monitor-type TN LCD), Freeview HD, 4 HDMI sockets, 200hz motionplus and the all important network connection (WiFi optional).

Samsung’s web service is the very-90′s-named internet@tv and it offers an original take on the whole idea with widgets. You can add new widgets to the taskbar on the screen, from BBC iPlayer to Flickr and from Twitter to YouTube. The 8000 even has a Skype widget for video calls on the big screen, very 21st century.

If you are looking for possibly the most Web-aware and technologically advanced TV, the Samsung 8000 series must be at the top of that list.

The 3D LCD Bargain

Samsung LE40C750 3D LCD TV

While Samsung’s 8000 series is at the high end of today’s TVs, it also has a price to match, so in these somewhat frugal days it’s always worth keeping one eye on the cheaper option. Though it may not have the ultra sleek titanium frame and LED technology of its fancy brother, the latest Samsung 7 series LCD TV (the C750) is still getting plenty of praise for its deep black levels, impressive 2D to 3D conversion and great viewing angle.

Still equipped with a raft of socketry (including the now standard 4 HDMI) and Freeview HD, the C750 runs the same internet@tv as it’s bigger brother, so you still get access to cool widgets like YouTube, Lovefilm, Twitter and more, but big screen Skype is kept back for the big boys toys only.

The C750 offers a taste of the big time for small potatoes, so if you’re on a budget, go check it out.

The Refined Plasma TV

Panasonic G20 Plasma

The Plasma vs LCD/LED debate has been going for some time now and shows no sign of stopping. Both have their advantages and their disadvantages – LED TVs are razor thin with a sharp picture, but plasma sets have better black levels and motion handling. Horses, courses!

Panasonic’s G20 series are plasma-based TVs and are one of the best options if you want both plasma technology and YouTube in your new TV with Panasonic Viera Cast. Using Panasonic’s NeoPDP panels (the closest any panel has come to Pioneer Kuro black levels), the G20 packs in a whole lot of tech for a fantastic, lifelike and vibrant image.

A full 1080p display, 4 HDMI inputs, 600hz motion, intelligent frame creation, Freeview HD AND Freesat HD, the G20 has optional WiFi and it’s THX certified so you know it’s been calibrated to motion picture standards.

Another distinct advantage plasma holds over LCD is how well it handles SD video, with LCD tending to be very matter-of-fact and showing all blemishes and noise. Plasma on the other hand will gloss over much of the issues in a similar way to CRT TVs did with video files, smoothing them out and making them look more like regular film.

With YouTube generally being at a lower resolution, plasma may well be the best way to view it on a 42″ screen. Plasma is often (incorrectly) assumed to be old technology, but visit any decent TV showroom or audio visual forum, and you’ll see the enthusiast’s TV of choice will have a plasma screen.

The Cracking Budget Choice

LG 42LD690 LCD TV

LG’s sets have come on leaps and bounds in the last few years, with excellent budget plasma panels, highly reviewed LCD set and revered top end LED model all doing well. Even though it is the cheapest option here, the LG LD690 is still an excellent HD TV for the money and carries on LG’s good name.

Coming packed with Freeview HD, the LD690 can also boast 3 HDMI inputs, 100hz TruMotion and network connectivity. LG have used that inconspicuous little ethernet socket to give the LD690 DLNA capabilites, allowing you to stream videos from any computers or network drives that are sitting on your home network – no boxes needed.

They’ve also used it for NetCast, LG’s answer to Panasonic’s Viera Cast and Samsung’s internet@tv. Netcast offers the viewer weather reports, photoshare, Skype video calls (soon) and YouTube, all on a 42″ full 1080p high-definition screen.

Significantly, as a majority of Channel 4′s demand service, 4OD, is on YouTube, you can now watch it on demand and in your front room. While LCD may not handle YouTube as gracefully as Plasma, it’s a sharper image with HD sources like consoles and Blu Ray players, and in the LD690′s case, it’s a few hundred pounds cheaper too!

The Clever Box of Tricks

WDTV Live

What if you’ve got a great TV already? Let’s say you’ve spent a few thousand on a 60″ Pioneer Kuro and nothing bests it in your eyes, but you still want to dabble in social media and the web on a big screen, so what’s the answer?

Western Digital’s WDTV Live.

Western Digital’s little box of tricks is not only an excellent networked high definition media player, capable of playing back AVI, WMV and MKV up to 1080p, but it also has the all-important on-line action.

The WDTV Live allows you to access YouTube, Flickr and internet radio from Live365, all up on your big screen. It also has HDMI out and optical digital out to get the best sound out of the little box into your hifi or surround system. The WDTV Live is a great YouTube player with a simple but powerful media player in the package too, and makes a great media hub at a fantastic price.

Summary

Ok, so there you have six ways to get the power of the internet into your front room – and this is just the beginning. The internet and our front rooms are merging, with services like Google TV, Zune Videos on the 360, Apple TV and many more aiming to stream not only YouTube but high definition films into our living rooms over the internet.

Even YouTube itself is going high definition and even 3D, so it’s a very exciting time. The Web can be at your fingertips if you want it – enjoy yourself!

There are a plethora of sites out there on the World Wide Web that enable you to watch just about any program or movie you can think of. I recently took a trip down memory lane and watch some of the kids programs I grew up with… did I mention the Internet is awesome? Anyway enough about me; as with “steaming web media with a Wii” this article is not aimed at telling you how to steam media but is intended to help you find the thing you want.

GENERAL TIPS

Before we get started there are a few things to keep in mind when finding your videos on the internet:

• Several of the videos are of low quality but you can find some real treasures out there so don’t get disheartened just keep looking.
• Depending on your bandwidth and internet provider, videos can take a little while to download so be patient, but remember you don’t have to wait for it to be fully downloaded when streaming before you can start watching.
• The DivX player has a neat feature. When it streams it saves the video on your hard drive in the folder “DivX MoviesTemporary Downloaded Files”. The file will have an extension of .part, just rename the file extension to .avi and you can play the movie on your machine without accessing the internet. This is particularly useful if the video is in a foreign language because you can download the subtitles from sites like OpenSubtitles and SubScene. Once you have the video and subtitles downloaded just rename the subtitles to have the same name as the video and then play the video. As long as you have something like DirectVobSub installed you will see the subtitles.
• If all else fails google is your friend. Try typing “watch [video] online” where you replace [video with the thing you want to watch. Or if you are feeling adventurous you can use a combination of advanced search operators that specify video files available in an Apache directory listing to find video files on servers. Try this search for videos related to James Bond: -inurl:(htm|html|php) intitle:”index of” +”last modified” +”parent directory” +description +size +(mpg|avi) “james bond”.

TV CHANNEL SITES

There are a growing number television channels which are making their TV programs available online. Can I hear a hurrah?

One problem with these official sites is that they often restrict usage to particular countries, such as Hulu below which requires you to be located in the US. There are ways around this so if you are an American visiting the UK never fear because you can us a proxy such as Hotspot Shield which will make it appear like you are accessing the internet from America.

For all those based in the United States (and those using a proxy), here is a treat for you. Hulu is an awesome site which brings together media from several different sites. With Hulu you have access to content from Fox, NBC, Warner Bros. TV, and over 15 cable networks (Bravo, E! Entertainment, USA, and more). The site has licensing deals with Fox, MGM, Sony, Universal, Lionsgate movie studios; as well as the NBA, and NHL.

Hulu brings you a wide variety of full-length episodes, popular video clips, and even a few full-length movies which are easy to search and play. One downside except for only being accessible to the US is that some of the content has adverts, but that is only a minor issue when you think of what you are getting in return.

Moving onto the awesomeness that is the BBC iPlayer. With this beauty you can watch BBC programs or listen to BBC radio online for free. In my opinion the iPlayer has gone from strength to strength and the video quality is superb. In the past the BBC iPlayer only kept programs on the site for 7 days but it seems that some programs are being kept online for longer now.

We could carry on listing all the television channels and their corresponding website but that would bore us and you, so if there is a program on a particular channel which you like just do quick search for the channel and chances are it will have a catch up section which will enable you to watch the desired program. If not then don’t worry, just keep on reading this article because there are plenty of ways to get around such problems.

LINK INDEX SITES

The websites that fit into this area do not host videos themselves but instead amass a huge resource of links to other sites which do host the videos. These sites are invaluable to the watcher of free media. Here are three of the best on the web.

General
Surf The Channel has a small ambition in life: “indexing “all videos, everywhere” and listing them in easy to navigate pages”. And I have to say they are doing a great job. Surf The Channel have got several categories to choose from and also have a leaderboard of video sites that makes it a doddle to find new video sources.

AllUC is similar to Surf The Channel, if you can’t find the video you want on one try the other. The videos are split into: cartoons, TV-shows, anime, movies, music videos, sports videos, and documentaries. The videos are rated so you can see which ones are good or not and the links are regularly checked to make sure they are still working.

Anime

Kumby is a specialised link site which focuses on links to anime series and anime movies. Personal favourite of mine, this site is great for all those who love anime and can’t wait to download them using torrents.

Movies

Online Theatre & Digital Jukebox is not nice to look at and is badly designed, but if you can get past that it has a whole load of movie links which will keep you entertained for days. A nice touch to the site is the descriptions of the movies as well as the links to actually view the movie.

VIDEO HOST SITES

Everyone is familiar with this type of video site; if you have not heard of YouTube by now then you are in for a real treat. I had to mention YouTube because it is so big and well know but there are others out there which rival this giant.

Guga for example has a huge selection of TV and movies, yet is virtually unheard of compared to YouTube. Guga has fast speeds and excellent quality (far better than the one I have already named three times).

Tudou is huge over in China, moving more than 1 Petabyte of video every day. This is a great site with fast download speeds and because it is in Chinese you will find videos which are deleted off other sites are not deleted off Tudou. The downside is it is in Chinese so use sites like Surf The Channel to find the videos.

Megavideo allows large video file size upload so movies and TV programs are generally in one piece rather than split into multiple bits. Megavideo is known for good quality and fast loading times. Like Tudou, videos tend to stay on the site because there is virtually no moderation done.

Whatever way you choose to watch your programs and movies I hope you enjoy the free resources of the Internet. If you have any other links please share them and post a comment below.

So, in no particular order, here’s a list of the 16 next-gen gadgets you’ll want to buy in 2009.

Super-thin and super-smooth HDTVs

HDTVs have suddenly dropped in price and look set to go mainstream by the end of 2008. For 2009, expect the newer models to come super-slim. How slim? How about slimmer than your mobile phone? Amongst the exhibitors were the following tiny TVs:

• Sharp XS1 LCD TV. 65″ viewing screen, just 23mm thick (see pic). Due in 2009, with a huge 131″ screen coming out the year after.
• Sony ZX1 LCD TV. 40″ viewing screen,super crisp picture, and an incredible 9.9mm thin. Available in the next few months, but for a whopping $4,000!
• Philips 32″ LCD TV – just 8mm thin! Only a prototype at the moment, but expected to go into production early next year.

To give you a sense of scale, the first generation Motorola RAZR was 13mm thin!

In addition, new advances in picture quality mean the next-gen of HDTV will look better than ever before:

• Toshiba Regza ZF – uses the same Cell processor found in the PS3 to upscale an existing TV signal to near-HD quality. The TV plays at 24fps, has a contrast ratio of 30,000:1, and will also play full HD (1080p) if you a suitable high def input. Toshiba would rather you didn’t use BluRay, and so their new TVs aim to provide BluRay-esque quality without the need for a BluRay player.
• LG Scarlet LG7000 – with super clear picture quality, the LG7000 features a response time of just 2.7ms,full-HD, and the ability to tweak its parameters to a “professional level”. Better still, it’ll come with Bluetooth, so you can listen to your programmes through Bluetooth headsets, or display photos on the TV from your phone or camera.

Video, Home theatre and DVD

Naturally, BluRay was all the rage this year, particularly after Toshiba dropped the competing HD-DVD technology.

There were many firsts, with competing manufacturers battling it out to shove BluRay into virtually any device in order to secure their own personal firsts.

Among the more impressive gadgets this year were the following:

• JVC NX-BD3 BluRay player with DLNA – the world’s first DLNA-equipped BluRay player,which means it’ll sync seamlessly with your PC and other DLNA-equipped devices such as cellphones and PMPs in order to share music, photos and videos. It also comes with an internal amp rated at 4x55W,and will pump out 200W of bass through its subwoofer.
• Sony Bravia BDV-IT1000 Blu-Ray home theatre system – finger-thin speakers and a devastating 700W of power, this new Blu-Ray home theatre system looks gorgeous and should be capabale of seriously upsetting your neighbours.
• Philips CinemaOne iPod speaker and DVD player (below) – combines a 1080p upscaling DivX-compatible DVD player iwth an iPod dock, so you can listen to yours tunes loudly without needing any extra gadgets.
• The Loewe network media center is a 32″ or 42″ TV with a whole host of internal gubbins that’ll suck up your video wherever it’s stored. Each TV has a built-in USB port, Ethernet port, WiFi and HD tuner, and a new model will be out in 2009 with a hard disk drive as well.

Super-smart Camcorders

BluRay wasn’t just evident in DVD players, either. Take a look at these camcorders coming soon.

• The Sanyo Xacti HD is the world’s camcorder that can record at 1080p (that’s full-HD)
• Hitachi DZ-BD7H, the world’s first BluRay camcorder. With a 30GB hard disk and BluRay recorder, you can record four hours of full HD video, and can even copy from the hard disk to the BluRay recorder internally without using a computer.

Hi-Fi

The Philips Streamium MCi-500H is a new Wi-Fi Hi-Fi designed to stream music from your PC and to other wireless speakers around your home.

With 50Wper channel output, it also comes with a USB connection and a 160GB hard drive for ripping music from CDs.

There wasn’t much in the way of Hi-Fi news at IFA, but that’s because all the hi-fi manufacturers will be presenting at the CEDIA event in a few days’ time.

Portable Audio

Of course, there was a seemingly endless stream of MP3 players, iPod docks and the like, but here are some of the highlights:

• Logitech Squeezebox Boom – the next-gen Squeezebox with its own wireless speakers that lets you stream your tunes to any music in the house. Comes with its own amp as well, so you don’t need to plug it into a HiFi.
• Sony Walkman S series – a 7.5mm thin MP3 player with 2″ LCD screen that also lets you watch content from the BBC’s iPlayer. Top Gear on your Walkman? At last!

Random oddness

As well as the usual lust-worthy gadgets, there were one or two other gadgets that made you wonder what their inventors were smoking thinking when they designed them:

• Compositor media streamer – Take a WiFi digital photo viewer. You know, the small LCD screens that wirelessly pull in pictures from your PC or from Flickr. Then give it the ability to play not just static photos like any old photo display, but er, movies as well! That’s what the Compositor Media Streamer will do for you! They want you to buy dozens and distribute them liberally around the house so you can have your very own set of unremitting attention hoovers wherever you look! Great guys, great idea!
• Samsung UbiSync digital photo frames – not quite so mad as the Compositor frames, the new Samsung UbiSync frames are wireless 8″ and 10″ photo frames with 1GB of memory and the ability to act as a secondary PC monitor. Set one up in your home office with a picture of your girlfriend next to your PC, then use it as a second screen when you’re working. OK, so it is as mad as the Compositor!

Summary

So there you have it – 16 of the most drool-worthy home entertainment gadgets coming up for 2009. Hope you’ve got your chequebooks ready (or maybe even your second mortgages!)

Note: This post is taking part in the ProBlogger writing competition, so feel free to check out all the other entrants.

You can see the complete top ten after the jump.

To be fair, this list comes from AdvancedMP3Players, a somewhat niche UK-based online store, and so shouldn’t be seen as representative of the MP3 player market as a whole. However, the store caters to people who want their MP3 players to be more than just clones; players that really stand out and add something a little bit extra. In other words, the type of people you’d expect to buy an iPod Touch, but who clearly aren’t.

Maybe the iPod has lost its touch, at least with the early adopters?

The complete top ten follows below:

Top 10 MP3 Players

1. iRiver Clix 2 8GB MP3 Player
2. Cowon iAudio 7 16GB MP3 Player
3. Cowon iAudio D2 4GB MP3 Player with DAB Digital Radio
4. Cowon iAudio D2 4GB MP3 Player
5. Cowon iAudio D2 16GB MP3 Player
6. NU Dolphin Waterproof 1GB MP3 Player
7. SumVision M18 4GB FM MP3 Player
8. Samsung YP-K3 1GB MP3 Player (Samsung Reconditioned)
9. Cowon iAudio D2 8GB MP3 Player with DAB Digital Radio
10. Apple iPod Nano 8GB MP3 Player (New)

[Source: Advanced MP3 Players]

So we’ve done the hard work for you and compiled a list of the top Bluetooth MP3 players on the market today, together with links to the all the Bluetooth MP3 players from the major online stores.

Yes, we’re very very good to you people!

Why buy a Bluetooth MP3 player?

A Bluetooth MP3 player is a must-have couch potato gadget who prefers listening to their tunes without moving, rather than having to fiddle about with wires to hear their tunes. A Bluetooth MP3 player will let you do some or more of the following:

• listen to your tunes wirelessly, either through a Bluetooth headset or an external Bluetooth speaker. No wires, no fuss, just stream your music from the MP3 player to the speaker, no matter where it is in your lounge.
• stream your tunes to your car stereo wirelessly – a number of car radios now also come with Bluetooth, meaning you can listen to your tunes from your MP3 player in your car without having to use headphones (dangerous and, er, illegal!) or one of those annoying FM transmitters.
• take calls from your mobile phone via your MP3 player – never get up to answer the phone again!
• wirelessly copy your tunes to and from your PC – no more fiddling about with USB cables.

Wired MP3 players are so lost year, while Wi-Fi ones are still a bit pricey. If it’s a decent MP3 player you’re after, you might as well throw Bluetooth into the mix as well – you won’t regret it.

We’ve come up with the following list showing five of the best Bluetooth MP3 players on the market today. If these don’t tempt you, check out our links to the Bluetooth MP3 players from the major online stores.

1). The Samsung YP-T10 Bluetooth MP3 player

Looking not unlike a mobile phone, the Samsung YP-T10 lets you stream your music from the device to a Bluetooth earpiece or a Bluetooth wireless speaker using Bluetooth A2DP technology.

Nothing flash or fancy, the Samsung simply lets you play MP3 tunes with or without wires. It comes in several variants, from 2GB up to 16GB, and also features an intriguing “character animation” user interface, to stop you getting bored from looking at a dull list of tunes! Good value too, with prices starting from just