| Windows Mobile app plays YouTube, streamed media |
Aug. 25, 2008
 Kinoma has announced a Windows Mobile media player touted as "the first true mobile media browser." Kinoma Play can access media stored on a user's home PC, online radio stations, downloaded or streamed audio books from Audible.com, and most types of unprotected music files, says Kinoma.
(Click here for a larger view of Kinoma Play)
Kinoma was previously associated primarily with Kinoma Player 4 EX, a popular media player for the Palm OS. Kinoma Play, apparently the company's first Windows Mobile application, is an ambitious player that runs on Windows Mobile 5 and 6 devices, targeting organization and playback of video, audio, and pictures.
 
Kinoma Play includes an online guide (left) and can locate and play YouTube videos (right)
(Click either to enlarge)
The application's audio player is said to work with "all popular formats," including MP3, WMA (Windows Media Audio) 9, and AAC. Notably, the software includes Coding Technologies aacPlus v2, which is said to let it play even music files purchased from Apple, as long as they are in the DRM-unprotected iTunes Plus format. Other audio capabilities, according to Kinoma, include playing the "thousands" of radio stations streamed worldwide in Shoutcast format, plus audio books stored or streamed in Audible.com formats.
On the video side, Kinoma Play supports MPEG-4 Video SP and AVC/H.264 codecs, 3GPP, Flash video (Sorenson Spark codec), QuickTime movies, and WMV (Windows Media Video) 9 (WMV9 codec) formats, according to Kinoma. Depending on chosen levels of compression, a Windows Mobile device can support "PC quality" video, or allow up to 20 full-length movies to be stored on a single 4GB memory card, the company claims.
For still images, the program supports both JPEG and PNG formats, either stand-alone or as part of RSS-based photostreams, says Kinoma. Kinoma Play is also said to be able to search, browse, and view images from online services such as Flickr, SmugMug, and MobileMe.
As a streaming media client, Kinoma Play works with the HTTP, RTSP, and MMS protocols. In addition, it is touted as being compatible with third-party software from Orb Networks that lets owners of Windows XP or Windows Vista PCs share locally stored pictures, audio, and video files over the Internet.
Finally, Kinoma Play comes with its own, regularly updated database of streaming broadcasters and podcasters called Kinoma Guide, according to the company. Like a web browser, the application also lets users bookmark interesting content when they find it.
Further information
Compatible with Windows Mobile 5 and 6 devices, Kinoma Play costs approximately $30. It is also available for free in a version called Kinoma FreePlay. While differences between Kinoma Play and Kinoma FreePlay were not fully detailed, the latter apparently includes only trial use of aacPlus v2, and has a more limited Kinoma Guide feature, according to the company.
More information may be available on the Kinoma website, here.
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