Monsoon Multimedia’s HAVA products are a lesser-known competitor to the Slingbox in the place-shifting market. One of the largest limitations to the HAVA product line has been the limited client platform compatibility, which has amounted to Windows or Windows Mobile (which is still in beta), while Sling Media supports Windows, Windows Mobile, Mac OS, Palm OS, and Symbian OS, with a client for BlackBerry in development. Instead of launching a client for one of these popular smartphone platforms, or even Mac OS, Monsoon has made the interesting choice of developing a client for Nokia Internet Tablets, such as the N810. While the Nokia tablets are certainly interesting gadgets, they’re not exactly a huge market. Internet Tablet Talk got a chance to play with the beta version of the player on a Nokia tablet, and they made a video of it.
I will warn you that the video is, well, slow paced. There isn’t a lot exciting there – it is a new version of the HAVA Mobile Player running on a Nokia tablet. The most interesting thing about that, to me, is that the Nokia tablets run Linux, so maybe this was an exercise to prepare for the growing number of Linux smartphones, etc. I just don’t see support for the N800/810 really selling any HAVA boxes, since the tablet market is fairly small. I’d think Monsoon would’ve gotten more return on investment by releasing a client for Mac OS or Symbian OS.
Picked up from EngadgetHD.
