We’ve come a long way in home entertainment products. HDTVs and Blu-ray players now often come with streaming media services, the ability to play media files over USB drives, and even built-in Wi-Fi. If you want to access those services with an older HDTV, the Roku LT ($49.99, 4 stars) can be found for just $50, and the Western Digital WD TV Live Hub ($199.99, 4 stars) offers both a ton of storage and plenty of online services. The Netgear NeoTV NTV 550 tries to offer a similar service, but at $199.99 (list) with no storage, no Wi-Fi, and no Netflix, it falls short as a media hub .
The NeoTV does let you access both local drives and networked devices and play movies, music, and pictures from them, but onboard storage or a better service selection would better justify this device, which effectively does little more than many HDTVs and Blu-ray players with USB ports and DLNA networking. If you have a huge library of media on your networked computer, USB hard drive, eSATA hard drive, or NAS, it can be a worthwhile way to get your content to your HDTV (that is, if you can run an Ethernet cable or spend extra on a Wi-Fi adapter). But if you just want to access a few files over a network or with a USB key, it’s too much.
Performance
At first glance, the NTV550 looks like a router, measuring a flat 1.4 by 8.5 by 5.7 inches and weighing just 15 ounces. The front panel holds a Power button, a USB port, and an SD card slot. There’s another USB port, an HDMI output, component outputs, a 3.5mm A/V output,
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