Apple TV, you have company. The Logitech Revue with Google TV is finally here, and while, at $299.99 direct, it's three times as expensive as ($99 direct, 4 stars), it offers more features. Apple TV streams video, music, and photos, and both systems offer integrated Netflix and YouTube, but that's where the similarities end. The Revue's Google TV interface controls your DVR, surfs the Web (via the Chrome browser), streams content from your computer and the Internet, and can even video chat. (You'll need the $150 Logitech TV Cam for the latter.) Despite some operational flaws (more on those later), the Revue is a worthy competitor to the Apple TV. Which of the two, if either, is best for you depends on the hardware and services you already have in your home-entertainment arsenal.

Hardware Design and Remote Control

The Logitech Revue box measures 9.7 by 6.7 by 1.4 inches and weighs 1.3 pounds. There's not much to look atit's a black, glossy, flat plastic box meant to blend into, not stand out from, your entertainment system set-up. As a logo on the top panel attests, it's powered by Intel's Atom processor. The connections on the back panel, from left to right include: a Pairing/Reset button (to pair with other Logitech products), HDMI In (to connect to your DVR's output), two IR blaster ports (the included IR sensor plugs in here), two USB ports, an Ethernet connector (necessary for setting up your DISH network DVR to work with the Revue), HDMI Out, SPDIF, and the connector for the included power supply. Notably absent, as is the case with the Apple TV, are analog audio outputsso if you have an older AV receiver, you're going to need to buy adapters to connect the Revue to your existing audio set-up. The Revue integrates 802.11n Wi-Fi.

The bundled remote control has a full-sized QWERTY keyboard, a laptop-like touchpad with click buttons, directional arrow buttons for navigation, a Home button, and playback controls for navigating audio and video. Almost all of these controls sit to the right of the QWERTY section, while up top, a row of controls offer short-cuts to specific functions, like TV or DVR. Probably the most useful button is the magnifying glass-labeled Search button, which brings up a Google search window and can take you to any content via Google TV in one click. The remote has a Power section rather than just a Power button; once you've introduced your television and other components to the remote by entering their names, you can control them all from the same remote. There are, thus, separate power buttons for AVR (if you connect an AV receiver), STB (for your set top box), and TV (for the television itself).

Sometimes using the remote is a bit confusingfor instance, there is an OK button that you'd assume lets you select a menu optionand it does, except for when it doesn't. Eventually, you'll learn that some options, like a Playback button on an Internet video, might require a touch of the nameless click button underneath the touchpad in order to be selected. It all becomes second nature eventually, but it does seem that the controls could have been streamlined. Regardless, the built-in Harmony remote-control technology is excellentthe Harmony database of products is vast and impressive, and it almost definitely can control every component of your home-theater set-up.

You can also buy a more compact, clam-shell-style $130 QWERTY remote that does everything the bundled large one does. It might be a mistake for Logitech to assume that people would prefer the full-sized keyboard remote that ships with the Revue rather than the smaller, optional one. Using the large keyboard is nice when you're sitting down typing, but not when you're, say, standing up.

If you have an Android phone or an Apple iOS device (iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad), you can download a free Harmony app for Google TV that works quite well. My guess is, in most households that have both a Revue and an Android or iOS device, the full-size keyboard will be eventually cast aside.

Set Up and DISH Integration

The set up process for the Revue is not nearly as simple as Apple TV, but that's partially because the Revue does a lot more. Aside from Netflix, YouTube, and some photo services, which are built right into Apple TV, Apple basically only streams your content from your computer and from the iTunes cloudin both cases, it's an Apple product dealing with Apple software. Because of the Harmony remote line, Logitech knows a thing or two about making products from a variety of manufacturing sources play nice together. In the end, everything works, but the process of introducing your particular television, DVR, and AC receiver (if you have one) to the Revue can be a bit tedious at times. It's never confusing, but in my tests, getting everything going took more than a half-hourmuch of which was spent downloading firmware updates and rebooting the box.

If you subscribe to the DISH Network service, the Revue is specially made to incorporate your device into its interface. That said, the only DVRs that currently have full Google TV support are the ViP 622, ViP 722, and the ViP 722k. The newer ($200-$649, 4.5 stars), like any DVR from another provider, can still be controlled by the Revue remotethanks to the built-in Harmony technologybut its content isn't integrated into the Google TV user interface.

What does that mean? If you have a supported DISH DVR and you perform a search for the term "NFL" on your Revue using the Google search windowthe results can include the NFL's site and other popular Web search results for NFL, but also any NFL game you may have recorded with your DVR, along with YouTube videos, upcoming TV events for the NFL, and more. If you don't have one of the fully-supported DVRs, your video recordings and television listings will not appear in the search window. It's not necessarily a dealbreaker for non-DISH Network users, but the Revue is definitely a more complete experience if you're using a supported DISH DVR.

User Interface

Google TV's user interface is good looking and simple to use. It's based on the Android 2.1 operating system. Like apps on an Apple iOS device, all of your apps and menu options on the Revue are essentially always "on," which means two things: clicking on them requires zero start-up time and you are immediately transported to the screen in the app you were last using. Accessing these apps can be achieved in a variety of ways. On the Home screen, there is a left-side menu with several sub-menus. From top to bottom, they include: Bookmarks, Applications, Spotlight, Most Visited, Queue, What's On, Amazon VOD, and DISH Cinema. Selecting any of these presents on-screen iconssay, a movie or a Web site, depending on what you've selected. Highlight what you want to navigate to and press OK on the remote, and you're off.

Calling up the Google search window to peruse your media or accessible content on the Web is an excellent experience. Like the recently updated Google Web site, it's a live search that whittles down your results with each letter you type in. Thus, if you want to watch a Yankees game on your DVR or television, you probably don't need to type more than "Yan" to call up the result you're looking for. One click on the desired result, and you're watching in no time. My only gripe with the search tool is that it's incredibly useful when you're on the main menu, but if you are looking at an appsay, the Logitech Media Player (which handles your streamed PC media)it will only search terms within the Media Player itself. If you happen to be in the Media Player but want to check on the Yankees game, you'll have to go to the main menu to perform that search first. Of course, you can always press TV or DVR on the remotethere are many paths to the same destination on the Revue.

Similarly, I found some aspects of the interface to be top-notch, but only in certain scenarios. I love being able to tap a button and minimize a TV program to a small rectangle while I surf the Web. It's too bad you can't swap the images in the minimized boxpressing the button only brings the TV back to full-screen or minimizes it, there's no making your Internet window small and the TV-screen image full screen. I wish I could minimize Netflix or other video functions with the same button, but it only works for the actual television.

No matter what you're watchingbe it a video on ESPN's Web site (yes, the Revue supports Flash) or a DVR recordingit continues to play if you navigate to the main menu, and just fades into the background as you move around. I can see how this would be annoying if you didn't want to lose your place in a movie, but you can always pause first. The interface and navigation is something Apple does only slightly better, but both of these boxes have much more palatable interfaces than the ($99.99 direct, 2.5 stars).

DVR and Streaming Video

Presumably, you already know how to control your DVR. If so, it'll look and feel the same within Google TV, only now you will be using the Revue's Harmony-powered remote. Thus, explaining how the DVR works here is a bit impossibleit works however your particular DVR works once you set it up to communicate with the Revue. The seamless integration of DISH Network content into the search window is impressive, but the rest of you non-DISHers will be forced to do what you've been doing already (navigate directly to your DVR's recording list) in order to watch your recorded content.

Streaming video via your wireless network is always going to depend on the strength of your Wi-Fi and its speed. Ideally, you have an 802.11n routerand have it somewhere near the Revueor you connect via Ethernet. Proximity to the router could be the difference between watching a Netflix stream with decent-to-good resolution, and seeing a message from Netflix that your signal isn't strong enough to stream video. The streaming content available on the Revue isn't as sharp as the HD footage you'll get from your cable or satellite provider, but it's certainly watchable. Whether it's Netflix, Amazon Video On Demand, YouTube, or Web video, the experience will vary depending on the actual resolution of the file and how the software that's playing it handles your connection. Netflix will automatically upgrade or downgrade your resolution to give you an uninterrupted stream depending on your signal, for instance, whereas a Web site will just try to play, despite stopping and starting to buffer.

Obviously, you'll need a Netflix account to access on-demand content there, and most streaming video on Amazon is priced similarly to iTunes, which is generally $2.99-$4.99 for movies and 99 cents for TV shows. When the Android Market for Google TV opens up sometime next year, your app and content selection could drastically improve, but for now, the mix of Internet videos, Netflix, Amazon VOD, and on-demand content from DISH (for subscribers) is already fairly robust. Hulu Plus subscribersas with the Apple TVare currently left out in the cold with the Revue. If the Roku XDS has one leg up on these boxes, it's the recent addition of Hulu Plus to the Roku arsenal of apps and channels.

Streaming Audio and Photos

Included audio apps like Pandora and Napster all require accounts, but some, like Pandora, are free. The audio quality for these apps is about what you'd expect from an Internet radio streamthrough your computer, it sounds fine, but on your nice home stereo system, you might notice the artifacts that taint most streaming audio. This isn't to say it's not listenablethough your Wi-Fi signal should be strong or you're in for stutteringyou're just not going to get lossless, audiophile-level sound quality.

The biggest annoyance: Learning that the playback and volume controls on the keyboard wouldn't control the app. With the remote configured to control my AV receiver, the volume never changed when I tried to adjust it on Pandora, and I had to manually select on-screen Play and Pause buttons, rather than use the dedicated buttons on the remote. It's a symptom of having so many third parties to deal with on a single remoteit's hard to make one device work perfectly with all of them. That said, you'll never see an issue like this on an Apple app or Apple TV's integration of Netflix, for instance. It's a lesson Google and Logitech should take to heart, as these are the little annoyances that can build and lead to customer revolt.

You can also stream audio, video, and photos from your computer, but setting it up is not quite as simple as it is on Apple TV, which quickly finds your iTunes library and offers you access to it. On the Revue, you have several different options. If you have a Mac, you can download programs from Twonky or TVMobili that will stream content to the Revue via your Wi-Fi connection. On a PC, probably the easiest option is Windows Media Player 11 (or higher). Under the Library menu, enable Media Sharing, and your Logitech Media Playerthe streaming content app on your Revueshould show up as an option. Of all the dead-simple processes the Revue walks you through during set-up, this, unfortunately, isn't one of them and is likely to annoy some people who aren't familiar with the process of content sharing on a Windows systemor on a Mac to a non-Apple product. Setting up the streaming between my computer and the box was a breeze on the Apple TV and easily the most annoying part of the set-up process for the Revue. First my computer couldn't see the Revue, and then once the "unknown device" finally appeared in the sharing devices window and I selected it, the Revue had trouble finding the music loaded in my Windows Media Player. Eventually, I settled upon using Twonky, which worked like a charm.

Codec support for the Revue is decent for video, and a bit weak on the audio side. For video, the box supports MKV, DivX, MPEG4, various flavors of H.264 and even H.263, MPG/MPEG, MPEG 2, AVI, and XVid. Image support includes JPEG, PNG, and GIF, and audio codecs supported are MP3, MPEG-1 Layer 3, MP4, AAC, MP4A, and OGG. Surprisingly, there is currently no support for WAV, AIFF, or WMV audio files. The Revue outputs full 1080p HD when the content is available.

The Web on Your TV

Google TV is truly the full Internet on your television. If you've never used Google's Chrome browser before, it requires very little training or getting used to. It will remember the sites you visit most often and save them as thumbnail bookmarks you can navigate directly to with one click. As mentioned earlier, it supports Flash, so sports highlights at ESPN, YouTube videos, and a variety of animated sites will load and play properly. The mouse arrow appears out of nowhere when you trace your finger across the track pad and disappears after it has been inactive for a short while. The aforementioned annoyance with the remote's two Enter and OK buttons are the only real gripe I have with this experience. If you're armed with reasonable expectationsfor instance, don't expect Web videos to look great on your huge HDTV screenthis is a great experience. Whether the entire Internet really needs to be on your television is a philosophical debate and beside the point. If you want it, it's there.

We were unable to test the video chat app, Logitech Vid HD, because we did not receive the Logitech TV Cam in time for the review. Logitech is sending a review unit out soon, so expect an update to appear here soon.

Conclusions

With Sony's recent announcement of Google-TV HDTVs along with a $400 Blu-ray player with Google TV, Logitech may be in trouble. You'd be hard pressed to find a quality Blu-ray player for $100 alone, so adding $100 to the price of the Revue and essentially adding support for Blu-ray discs, CDs, and DVDs is a great deal. hat said, we haven't reviewed the Sony Google TV Blu-ray player, we just got a , and it remains to be seen how similarly all of these new Google TV devices will behave.

For the time being, we can recommend the Logitech Revue with Google TV as an excellent alternative to Apple TV. The Revue is not better than Apple TV, it is simply different and well-conceived in its own right. Apple TV is for iTunes-focused consumers, and the Revue is for those who want more contentlike Internet, live TV, and DVRall rounded up into one interface. The other recent competitor, the Roku XDS, on the other hand, despite a low price, feels like a product of yesteryear when compared with Google TV or Apple TV.

Sooner or later, Google TV will be bundled into a plethora of devices, from televisions to Blu-ray players from various manufacturers. For now, Logitech can say it's first, and the Revue is a giant leap forward for home entertainment. It definitely needs some tweaks to better integrate apps and make streaming from computers a simpler process, but if you have the patience, the Revue offers plenty of rewards.

More Media Hub Reviews:

