A growing number of digital media devices for home entertainment are receiving DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) certification. According to a new study from ABI Research, nearly 200 million such products shipped in 2008; that number will rise to more than 300 million in 2012, and the growth curve accelerates even faster in the years that follow. Digital home practice director Jason Blackwell says:

Consumers increasingly desire ways to connect their various home entertainment devices and distribute digital media content around their homes. Without standardization, that is a nightmare. Fortunately, specifications developed by the DLNA, which are based on the UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) standard, enable easy, seamless connections in a wide and growing range of consumer electronics devices.

As of today, more than 5,500 devices, including products bearing many famous brand names, have received the DLNA seal of approval. Digital TV is a huge part of this growth, with more than 170 TV related products certified in the first six months of 2009 alone.

Blackwell expects the inclusion of DLNA support in the upcoming Windows 7 operating system to give DLNA a further push into the living room and beyond.

You could, for example, use a computer running Windows 7 to push a sequence of stored photos out to a digital picture frame,” he says. “Much of this new Windows functionality will be implemented through the new version of Windows Media Player, which will have a ‘Play to’ command, allowing the user to choose among several DLNA-networked playback devices to display a particular video or other media file.

 Windows 7 is scheduled to make its public debut in October.

The next phase of this developing market will see increased participation by broadband service providers, with set-top box, PVR/ DVR models and gateways becoming an important part of the home network. Whilst we are on the subject of the networked home, PVR and set top box manufacturer Humax, will be demonstrating it’s developments in networking/sharing between multiple boxes at this years IBC in Amsterdam.

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IDGs’ Mikael Ricknäs says Humax showed off some of what it has in store with a demonstration of the forthcoming iCORD Hybrid set-top box at the IFA electronics show in Berlin.

The product name comes from the set-top box’s ability to work for both IPTV (Internet Protocol TV) and satellite TV, which will make it possible for satellite operators to add more data services to their offerings. At IFA Humax is, for example, demonstrating integration with YouTube, a feature aimed at a younger audience. “I don’t think anyone will go into a store to buy it just for the YouTube support, but it will be a nice extra when customers are trying to decide between two models,” said Humax spokesman Frank Scheibe.

Other data-centric services demonstrated are video on demand and photo sharing. Humax is also planning to add support for wireless networking (802.11n) and DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance), to make it possible for the set-top box to connect to other devices.

Part of the networking functionality in the iCORD Hybrid is also the possibility of using one central set-top box with the main TV, and several simpler set-top boxes connected to other TV sets in the house. Humax’s goal is to solve the problem of getting digital TV to all sets in a household, according to Scheibe, who didn’t want to go into detail about how that will work.

The iCORD Hybrid will become available in the next nine months, according to Scheibe.