INTRODUCTION

   Network media players may not hold the same share in the market such as DVD and Blu-Ray players but as long as we keep getting larger storage capacity drives available to fit every bit of media owned by people there's simply no doubt it my mind that it will not take long before there's at least a single network media player in every house (personally i have 5). So if you've been following my media player reviews who should remember saying that Sigma Designs has yet to release their top-end HD decoding chip (i have no idea when they will) but since even their latest base solution the SMP8670/71 works like a charm many of the top manufacturers have decided to introduce more than just 1 solution based on it. Almost a month ago we reviewed the very good TV-301A network media player by Dune HD and today with us we have its little brother, the TV-101AW.

   Dune HD GmbH is a global manufacturer of cutting-edge digital media players and hybrid media player products which combine broad IPTV/VOD support with excellent DMA (Digital Media Adapter) functionality. The company maintains corporate offices in the United States, Russia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Germany, and its distribution network covers over 60 countries. The company employs high-class engineers who design its products on the basis of cutting-edge A/V and digital media technologies. Our Software development team located in Moscow Russia and Kiev Ukraine develops dedicated software that supports all Dune HD media players. Because of this the Dune HD brand enjoys a tremendous worldwide reputation in the premium segment of Consumer Electronics.

   As the name suggests (101/301) the TV-101AW is a cut-down version of the TV-301AW lacking the internal 2.5" drive bay, side card-reader and most of the available A/V outputs. Because of that however the TV-101AW is amongst the smallest units in the market and less than half the size of the TV-301AW making it the ideal network media player to move around inside the house or carry with you on the go. Except for the extra features however the TV-101AW has the same specifications with its larger brother including 256MB or RAM, 128MB of flash memory, HDMI 1.3 and support for pretty much every media file type out there (MKV, MPEG-TS, MPEG-PS, M2TS, VOB, AVI, MOV, MP4, QT, ASF, WMV, DVD-ISO, VIDEO_TS, MP3, MPA, M4A, WMA, FLAC, APE (Monkey's Audio), Ogg/Vorbis, WAV, AC3, AAC, JPEG, PNG, BMP, GIF). Unfortunately support for BD-ISO and FLV is not yet implemented by Sigma Designs something which i am not so sure will change anytime soon.