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Ever since Netflix announced their Instant Watch movie streaming capability as an included part of their Unlimited plans I was stoked about using it. Unfortunately, you have to have a Netflix ready device at every TV that you want to stream to for this to work and that gets costly pretty quick not to mention the lack of options. A Netflix ready TV from LG is close to $1500, a Netflix ready Samsung DVD player is close to $500, and an XBOX is a couple hundred, plus I don’t own them or they might be good options. Recently Roku came out with a Netflix ready device for $99 which is pretty close to where I would like to see something but still costly to outfit multiple TV’s in different rooms and yet one more black box the wife won’t be thrilled about having. So I kept on my search to easily and cheaply stream movies from Netflix and other Internet movie systems to various TV’s in my home and that’s when I came across PlayOn from Media Mall Technologies which uses a Nintendo Wii game console to play movies from the Internet and since close to 25M people have them it seems like a pretty useful app, but how does it work?

PlayOn is a software application that you run on your PC that communicates with your Nintendo Wii to play movies through your home network to your TV. It not only supports Netflix streaming but also Hulu, Amazon VOD, CNN, ESPN, CBS, Youtube, and others.

Installation – Total setup time was about 45 mins. This was driven by my lack of ever using the Wii to connect to and surf on the Internet first of all. If you haven’t done it either the PlayOn website has an easy to follow guide to get it set up on your Wii. And your Wii comes standard with WiFi capability as long as you have a WiFi router in your home to get you to the Internet. The PlayOn installation consisted of downloading a software application from their website in less than a minute and then installing it on your PC that is connected to the same WiFi router as you are connecting your Wii over. Once this is set up on your PC you can enter your login credentials for any of the pay services that you have like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon VOD or just stream free ones like Youtube and CNN. You need to leave it running in your system tray of your computer with your computer on for the service to work.

Usability – PlayOn is a breeze to set and just as easy to use. You simply plug your Wii into whichever TV you want to stream movies to, preferably on the big screen in the ManCave and then navigate to the Internet channel in the Wii menu. Once there you type in a web address wii.playon.tv and make it a favorite so you get a fancy little icon in your internet channel on the Wii for future PlayOn use. They have done a nice job with the navigation and menu as well. You just use your Wii controller to navigate to the PlayOn available PC’s in the list and then click on which movie service icon you are attempting to use. Once into a service like Netflix you have multiple choices like checking your instant queue for movies or searching for instant play movies from their database. Once you have the movie you want you can click more info or play with the Wii remote. After you are playing it has a simple stop, pause, fast forward menu but that’s about it. And you may need to press a button on your Wii remote every so often so the screen saver doesn’t kick in for no activity and darken the screen or turn off the screensaver so you don’t have to mess with it.

Performance - I was honestly surprised at how well it plays movies. I have Fios internet (20MB/5MB) into my home and connected the Wii over my WiFi network in the home from my basement ManCave to the 3rd floor of my home on a 52″ LCD TV. I watched several movies and only experienced shaky/jitterry screen a few times with minimal pixelation or graininess. It wasn’t Blue-Ray quality but better than I expected and best of all watchable since it’s included for free in the unlimited Netflix plans. It’s probably not something I would purchase as a standalone due to the smaller/older movie selection for the streaming library and the picture does have a slight jitter to it occasionally but for free service and a small investment its worth it to me for the convenience. Your internet connection plays a big part in the performance too which really isn’t related to a PlayOn review but more related to streaming internet movies in general so keep that in mind.

Price – This is the best part so far. It costs $40 for a one time license fee to activate PlayOn. They also have a 14 day trial for free so you can see how you like it before you buy, which I really like. It may not be for everyone but with a free trial and no risk everyone should be willing to give it a try.

You can get PlayOn at PlayOn

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