Intro To Digital Media Players
This is the first of four articles discussing digital media players. The goal of the articles is to provide information to consumers who want to learn more about digital media players as research prior to making a purchase or upgrading. The articles do not assume any technical knowledge and readers do not need to read all of them or in any particular sequence - everyone is invited to get out of these articles what they need.
What's Digital Media?
Digital Media is videos, music, photos, and other types of media content stored in a digital format. For example, music on a cassette tape is not digital media, but the same music as a MP3 song purchased from iTunes is. Similarly, home movies on a VHS tape is not digital media, but a home video recorded with a point-and-shoot digital camera is.
As you can see, digital media contains the same underlying "stuff" as traditional media types, but stored in a digital format. For those who have never seen or used a cassette or VHS tape, a good example is a physical book, which is not digital media; however the same book on a Kindle or iPad is very much digital media.
With videos, music, and photos stored as digital media files, devices are needed to perform playback functions. Therefore, the broad definition of a digital media player is any device or software program that is made to playback digital media.
What's A Digital Media Player?
The definition of digital media player mentioned in the previous section is just too broad to be practical, as most contemporary personal and home audio/video electronics would match that description. Therefore we narrow the definition down by applying limits based on primary use/purpose of the device, and whether it already has a more specific product type already.
For example, even though a laptop can also work as a digital media player, its primary purpose is to be a computer, and not a digital media player. And even though an iPod works as a digital media player, it already has a more specific title of being an MP3 player.
What we end up with, is the definition of a digital media player that describes a device with the following characteristics:
- Plays a wide range of video, music, and photo media files.
- Stand alone device that does not need a computer to function.
- Designed for use with an external TV or large screen display.
- Able to play media files from internal or externally attached storage.
- Can be portable, or designed for use as part of a home theater.
What Can A Digital Media Player Do For Me?
Digital media players are relatively new products, made possible by recent advances in lower cost hardware powerful enough to decode and playback large video files. Digital media players are gaining in popularity as more consumers learn about their existence and capabilities. Here are some of their key benefits:
- Easy to use like other consumer electronics, not complex to setup or use
- Enjoy videos, music, and photos on big screen TV/HDTVs and home theater systems
- Superior media file and format compatibility, top models play just about everything
- Excellent visual and audio playback quality due to optimized hardware design
- Much lower cost than a computer that's capable of similar performance
- Very convenient in terms of compact size, fast start up and shutdown
- Exceptionally energy efficient, drawing only 10 to 20 watts during use