Amazon Video On Demand Blog

CES Roundup

Last week at the Consumer Electronics Show, Amazon Video on Demand announced several initiatives and partnerships to reinvent the way consumers experience digital video entertainment. The announcements centered on delivering top tier movies and TV shows directly into consumers’ living rooms via new internet connected televisions and set-top boxes. 

Here’s a summary:

• Panasonic announced a collaborative relationship that adds Amazon Video on Demand to Panasonic’s line of VIERA Cast internet-enabled HDTVs and Blu-Ray players. Read more

• Amazon Video on Demand provides VIZIO’s new “Connected TV” enabled HDTVs with the ability to browse, shop and instantly watch movies and TV shows. Read more

• Sony is directly integrating Amazon Video on Demand with its line of Internet enabled HDTVs. Read more

• Via the combination of Yahoo!’s Widget Engine and Amazon Video on Demand, customers will be able to purchase, rent and watch what they want using their remote control. Read more

• Amazon will offer customers the ability to instantly purchase, rent and watch digital movies and TV episodes from Amazon Video On Demand, via the Roku Digital Video Player. Read more

We’re really excited to be partnering with these great companies to bring Amazon Video on Demand into more living rooms in 2009.

-- Sam

New Name, New Features!

As you may have heard, our new name is "Amazon Video On Demand", and the big new feature is instant streaming in your browser. Now you can instantly watch TV shows and movies online as well as download to your Unbox player and TiVo. Plus you can access your previous purchases using Your Video Library.

-- Sam

Instant viewing in your browser!

We are currently beta testing a new feature – instant viewing right from the Amazon.com website. This is an addition to the current TiVo/Windows PC download service, and it works on both PC and Mac.

The beta is currently full, but you can sign up here to be notified when more slots are available.

-- Sam

Unbox discussion forum now available

On the Amazon.com website, we have added a customer discussion forum. Feel free to post comments about the Unbox service to that forum as well as to this blog.

The forum is available on all Unbox detail pages, or you can get to it directly by going here.

-- Sam

More Free TV

Even more FREE TV on Unbox. Season premieres of House, Bones, American Dad, and Rules of Engagement. Plus, free bonus content for Prison Break.

With the new season subscription feature, you can subscribe to a season and receive episodes the day after they air, in addition to receiving a discount off the complete season price. Win-win!

-- Sam

Now available on Unbox – free series premieres!

The pilot episodes for four new NBC shows (Bionic Woman, Life, Chuck, and Journeyman) are now available for FREE on Unbox.  Plus all the other great NBC content you already know – The Office, Heroes, and 30 Rock. Check it out here.

-- Sam

Issue with Unbox and Windows Media Player 11 resolved

Microsoft has released a fix for the issue where the Unbox client uses 100% of the CPU when playing certain videos (when Windows Media Player 11 is installed).

The fix is available here.

For more details, you can check the associated KB article.

-- Sam

Unbox 2.0 is now available!

If you visit the Unbox website, you'll notice several exciting changes.

First, our new preview player is center stage on the site. This player allows you to browse top movie sellers, rentals, TV and new arrivals, and watch previews for those videos.

Also, the Unbox 2.0 client is now available for download. See the previous post for the list of new features in this version.

Finally, using TiVo's Universal Swivel Search, you can now purchase Unbox videos directly from your TiVo remote.

It's been a busy few months for the Unbox team, and we're really excited to be making these features available to our customers. Stay tuned for more announcements soon...

-- Sam

Unbox 2.0 Beta Release

The Unbox 2.0 beta client is now available. Click here to go to the install page.

Key features of the new version of the Amazon Unbox Video Player include:

• A fresh, new look: Now it’s easier to view and manage your Unbox videos
• Deeper integration with the Internet Movie Database (IMDb): View pictures, trivia, goofs, and more from your videos
• Reviews, recommendations and streaming previews: Discover new and interesting videos catered to your interests
• Shopping within the player: Find the top movies, top TV shows, and new releases available to buy or rent
• The new Download Status feature: Monitor your download queue, rental-video expiration and available disk space
• And more...

We're really excited about this release! Give it a try and let us know what you think via the feedback form on the install page.

-- Sam

Unbox Video Quality

On the Unbox website, we give some general information about the quality of Unbox videos. Because some videos come in from content owners already encoded, and some are encoded by us, the specifics of each video can vary.

Below are some technical details about our most common video and audio parameters.

DVD-quality PC File

• Video Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
• Video Codec: Windows Media Video 9 Advanced Profile
• Video Bitrate: 2500 kbps avg, 6000 kbps peak
• Video Frame Size: 640x480 (4x3 content), 720x408 (16x9 content)
• Video Frame Rate: 23.98, 29.97 (same as source)
• Video Keyframe Interval: 4 seconds
• Audio Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
• Audio Codec: Windows Media Audio 9.1 Professional
• Audio Bitrate: 192 kbps avg, 1000 kbps peak
• Audio Sample Rate: 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz (same as source)

TiVo "Best Quality" File

• Video Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
• Video Codec: MPEG-2
• Video Bitrate: 2800 kbps avg, 6600 kbps peak
• Video Frame Size: 640x480 - all 16x9 content is letterboxed
• Video Frame Rate: 23.98, 29.97 (same as source)
• Video Keyframe Interval: 4 seconds
• Audio Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate VBR
• Audio Codec: MPEG-2 Layer 3
• Audio Bitrate: 192 kbps avg, 1000 kbps peak
• Audio Sample Rate: 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz (same as source)

Portable Video File

• Video Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate CBR
• Video Codec: Windows Media Video 9
• Video Bitrate: 600 kbps
• Video Frame Size: 320x240 (4x3 content), 320x180 (16x9 content)
• Video Frame Rate: 23.98, 29.97 (same as source)
• Video Keyframe Interval: 6 seconds
• Audio Encoding Type: 2-pass bitrate CBR
• Audio Codec: Windows Media Audio 9
• Audio Bitrate: 96 kbps
• Audio Sample Rate: 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz (same as source)

-- Sam