Zonbu & Digital TVs – Love at first sight?

I noticed in the forums that a few people are using their Zonbu in the living room, attached to their fancy flat screen digital TVs. I think this makes a LOT of sense.

Flat screen TVs are really high resolution monitors with specific resolution settings. The Zonbu, while lacking digital output, can still be easily paired with any TV that accepts VGA input. Add the two together and viola, Firefox and web browsing, light IM and even Internet video & music on your TV…

I recently completed the Zonbu customer survey that was e-mailed out, and figuring prominently was a question about the appeal of an HDMI connection on future Zonbu hardware. This would allow a pure digital connection between the device and a new digital TV, in the same way your cable box or even DVD player will connect in the future (if it doesn’t already). That would be brilliant.

Not only would having HDMI support open up a whole new end user market for the Zonbu as an adjunct to any advanced home theatre setup (which seems to be more and more common in many homes), you might actually see the Zonbu embedded in future TVs. Makes sense, doesn’t it?

You buy a $2000 flat panel TV and it has a Zonbu built in (with Wi-Fi and ethernet options). Potentially, out of the box, you could have an auto-updating Firefox enabled web platform right inside the TV. At $250, why not? Thats around 10% of the cost of most panel TVs at the moment… drive some volume, get that price down…

While I have to confess that I’m current using an “old school” Sony Wega 32″ TV in the living room, when I move to a flat panel I’ll definitely be considering another Zonbu so I can switch inputs and surf the web from the sofa. Moreover, as more and more video goes digital and the world moves towards IPTV, the Zonbu might even make (with some hot-rodding) an idea IPTV set-top-box.

I’m doing a lot of research and work right now in the IPTV space, so expect me to revisit that idea soon…

-Mr. Zonbu

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