I said this once and I will say it again:
2007 is going to be the year of downloadable digital content! The XBOX LIVE Video Marketplace is thriving and iTunes is also doing very well. Movielink has been around for a while with lack luster success as their movie selection consists of many PPV titles leaving their subscription service with much to be desired.
Then along came Vongo in January of 2006. Shortly after they managed to ink a huge deal with Starz LLC, the cable and satellite movie broadcast company. The deal allows Vongo and Starz to distribute movies and specials via the internet in the form of downloadable content. Vongo has an “excellent” subscription model with unlimited movie download for 9.99 per month. That’s right, 9.99 per month. 9.99 per month (with 14 day free trial) gives you access to a large collection of movies (over 2500) that will continue to grow in the future and also allows you to access the content on up to 3 PC’s (PC and devices can be added and removed at will) and or portable devices. The only portable devices that are supported at the moment are devices running “Windows Media Center Portable Edition” but according to Vongo this will change in the future.
The Vongo software requires a Windows XP SP2 system (or Vista – as of today 01/30/2007). Setting up Vongo is very simple. You download the Vongo Setup which is 16 MB in size. Installation is painless and upon first launching the application you will be prompted to name the device (your computer) and create an account (Credit Card is necessary). After creating your account and logging into the service, you can begin your download craze. I immediately downloaded Ultraviolet, Detroit Rock City (I am a huge KISS fan), Underworld Evolution and Mean Guns (killer GUN movie with Ice-T and Christopher Lambert) which are around 1GB is size (widescreen format, except Mean Guns). All 4 titles have good image quality with very little noise. Vongo describes video playback quality as near DVD and I agree with this 100 percent. In fact I believe it is extremely close leaving you with a tough time telling the difference between Vongo title downloads and DVD title playback from DVD disk. The sound quality of the titles is decent. Currently only stereo audio is supported but support for other audio formats “may” become available in the future according to Vongo/Starz along with the possibility of HD digital downloadable content. Currently we must wait and see what the future brings (no Promises).
As I mentioned earlier, the service has Subscription content and PPV (Pay per View) content. The Majority of the content is available via the monthly Subscription price of 9.99 per month. A few new titles such as Ricky Bobby are listed as PPV (3.99 per title). Some of the titles are available for a limited time regardless of whether they are available via Subscription or PPV. For instance Underworld Evolution (Subscription) is available for download until 03/31/2007.
Browsing for titles (movies, music, etc) is fairly simple. Launch the Vongo Software, login and choose from the following categories: TOP PICKS, NEW THIS WEEK, MOVIES, PAY PER VIEW and MORE. Each category (except MOVIES and MORE) will then display a list of titles and or specials to choose from. The MOVIES and MORE categories will expand to show several genres. MOVIE genres include: Action, Comedy, Drama, Kids & Family, Romance, Sci-Fi & Horror and Starz Channel (more on Starz in a moment). MORE genres include: Anime, Music, Series, Shorts, Sports and Westerns. Each title is displayed with a thumbnail with the ability to preview or immediately start a download. Once you start a download the title is placed into your download Queue for immediate download. If you choose to download more than one title, they are downloaded one at a time (see image below). Nothing complicated, no hoops, just the ability to quickly download or preview a title at your leisure whether it is a movie like SIN CITY or music specials from artists such as Phil Collins, Ice-Cube and Alice Cooper. Access is easy and completely painless!
Another excellent feature offered by the Vongo download service is the ability to playback a title while downloading. The requirement to playback while downloading is 300 KB/sec. You will need a 3 Mbps (Megabit per Second) connection or faster (preferable) to watch while downloading. Many DSL connections are barely at 3 Mbps but most Cable connections exceed this bandwidth. I currently have a 10 Mbps Cable connection and a 3 Mbps DSL connection. Using my 10 Mbps connection is no problem but the 3 Mbps connection holds a little under 3 Mbps which means I cannot watch the title until the download completes. My 12 year old son was not happy about this when he was itching to watch Detroit Rock City (he and his mother are on the 3 Mbps DSL connection) but he managed to wait the 45 minutes without shriveling up and dying.
The ability to watch the Starz channel directly from the application (via streaming) is a feature I like very much. Allowing you to watch the Starz channel while working on the PC is NICE as the streaming quality of the video is excellent (I was very impressed) and in my opinion the quality is a tad bit better than the title downloads (Subscription or PPV). The ability to watch the Starz channel was unexpected but VERY welcome (A for extra credit).
The Vongo service has an excellent selection of titles (especially for 9.99 per month) that will only continue to get better. Without a doubt, Vongo is the best Digital Content Download Service for the PC and that is saying a lot considering that several companies have been at this for a while without making any significant impact on the market. With the exception of no 5.1 Audio or HD Content, Vongo is nearly perfect and will probably reach perfection sometime in the next year.
Vongo has already started the New Year off right with the addition of Vista and XBOX 360 support (as of today 01/30/2007). The XBOX 360 support is for viewing content already downloaded to your PC and the Vista support includes the ability to access Vongo from directly within Vista Media Center. I strongly recommend this service to anyone looking to download titles to systems in the home for playback on the PC or in the living room (via PC or XBOX 360). Had enough from me? Check out Vongo at
Vongo.com - Choose Now. Watch Now..
Stay Tuned for a review of the Vista and XBOX 360 support…