What in the HD World?

This item was in my Inbox today.

"Starting today at vudu.com, you can watch movies you've rented or purchased on VUDU directly from your browser. Instantly watch movies from your computer, with no additional hardware or software downloads required."

If you are not familiar with Vudu, it has become one of the most popular streaming movie services. Unlike Netflix, which is subscription based, you rent or buy movies from Vudu individually.

When Vudu was begun, the only way that you could access their streams was with a Vudu box. (I reviewed the Vudu XL a couple of years ago.) Since then, Vudu transitioned to offering their service via a Vudu app to Internet connected Blu-ray players and TVs.

The capability to stream through your PC is brand spanking new. I tried it today from my Firefox browser and playback was smooth.

Now, before you become too excited, let me point out a couple of items.

One of the reasons that Vudu has become a favorite with videophiles is that Vudu offers three levels of streams, SD (standard definition), HD, and HDX (which they claim is as good as Blu-ray quality). The cost of renting a movie in HDX is more, but from my tests, the difference between it and SD is quite noticeable.

Ah, but Vudu states, "Due to restrictions by content providers, playback is limited to SD quality when viewed in a web browser." Not the ideal scenario, but you can rent or buy an HD or HDX version (for viewing on your HDTV) and stream it as SD on your PC.

Also, they note, "Browser based playback requires Adobe Flash Player installed (version 10.1 or later)." This got me to thinking, iPad doesn't play Flash, but I am reviewing the new Motorola Xoom tablet and it is now Flash 10.2 compatible.

Therefore, I thought, let's turn on the Xoom, open the integrated Browser and see what we can see. Or more to the point, what we can't see.

The image below is a screen grab of the Vudu interface on my PC. If you look above the North by Northwest thumbnail, you'll notice the Watch SD tab. When I clicked on it, the movie started streaming on my PC's monitor, in SD.

From the Xoom browser, this page loaded but it did not include the Watch SD tab. No tab meant no way to start the stream. In other words, no luck.

I called Vudu tech support to see if they had any suggestions. After checking, their response was to try loading Firefox. I did without success, but that is a story for another time.

Until I hear differently, Vudu is not available on tablets. But for mobile access to this browser streaming feature, remember that your laptop is a PC and if you haven't thrown it over for a tablet, it can be your on-the-go solution.

In the near future, I plan to write longer reviews on Vudu and Xoom.

Stay tuned.