More options to see movies under Mac OS X

Attention is a scarce commodity; it can be divided into only so many pieces before it shatters entirely.

Boredom, however, is infinite: there's certainly no limit to how long tedium feels like it lasts.

Mac users can erase boredom by diverting some of their attention now focused on a television to their laptop or desktop monitor. Two new ways to watch movies under Mac OS X could fill slack times, especially while traveling.

Before you accuse me of having time-warped back to 1996, I'm not talking about watching DVDs, or even downloading films via the iTunes Store to your computer. Rather, Mac OS X users have (nearly) joined the Windows world with both Amazon Video On Demand (www.amazon.com/gp/video/ontv/start) and Netflix's "watch instantly" feature. (www.netflix.com/)

Amazon.com launched its Windows-based viewer more than two years ago under the Unbox brand, since replaced with the Video On Demand name. This service offers both rentals and purchases of movies, TV shows, and other video. For purchases, you pay from a few dollars for older or niche titles, up to about $15 for new releases; rentals are typically $4 or $5.

With the original service, you downloaded videos through a Windows program that also played them.

For no additional fee, Amazon later added support for playback on other hardware. This included the TiVo Series 2 and 3 digital video recorders; these models can directly purchase or rent movies, too.

Transferring content

Content can be also transferred to a small ecosystem of portables from Archos, Creative and SanDisk. (Some movies have more restricted playback rights.)

So far, this is very much like the iTunes Store, except that Apple has long offered Windows and Mac playback via iTunes, as well as supporting its own hardware: the Apple TV and any model of iPod or iPhone. (Rentals are limited to iPods released in 2007 or later: an iPod nano 5th generation, iPod touch, or iPod Classic.)

Two months ago, when Amazon changed the name to Video On Demand, it added a streaming option using a Web-based Adobe Flash video player. This extended playback support to Mac OS X but also allowed Windows owners to watch movies instantly, too. (You need a newer Mac: G5 1.8 GHz or faster, or Intel Core Duo 1.33 GHz or better.)

This seems fine, but the quality for streaming movies is far lower than for downloads, and continuous 450 Kbps or faster broadband rates are required. Amazon says it can deliver 480p (typical standard DVD quality) with 1.2 Mbps.

The other fly in the ointment is that when you rent a movie, you have 24 hours to watch it from when you start to stream through the Web player. For downloads, you have 30 days to start watching and then a 24-hour period to view the movie.

Because Apple doesn't allow the Flash plug-in in the version of Safari installed on the iPod touch or iPhone, and because Apple TV works only with iTunes and the iTunes Store, Amazon's content is unusable on these devices.

Netflix launched a streaming-only service more than a year ago, and recently opened a beta-test version for Mac users using — and this may kill some people — Microsoft's Silverlight player. Silverlight is the Redmond company's Flash challenger, and is available for Mac and Windows.

Different model

NetFlix's model is quite different. Where Amazon has 12,000 items available for purchase and 8,500 for rental (with some overlap for those items in both categories), Netflix offers its entire library of more than 10,000 movies and television episodes at no additional cost to its subscribers. (Apple, by the way, has just a few thousand items.)

Viewing is tied to your Netflix DVD plan. With any of the unlimited plans (starting at $8.99 per month for two movies at a time), you can stream however many hours of viewing per month that you want. With the cheapest $5 per month limited plan (two movies per month, one at a time), you get just two hours of streaming video.

Because of this fee structure, Netflix doesn't have many new releases, for which you'd need to turn to its DVD side; it's a reasonable complement. Netflix just started to sign deals with studios to make movies available faster, and some TV programs show up as rapidly as the day after broadcast; this includes shows like "Heroes."

Netflix is just starting to build its device infrastructure. I own a Netflix Player by Roku, which hooks directly into any kind of television, and uses Wi-Fi or Ethernet for a network connection. LG, Microsoft's Xbox, Samsung, and, yes, TiVo, all have or will have Netflix streaming support, too.

I've used (not just tested) both services, and the quality is perfectly fine. NetFlix's source material seems to be much more varied, with older television programs sometimes looking quite low-quality, while newer material is crisp, but not as good as a DVD.

Because Netflix is still testing its Mac OS X streaming service, there are glitches — like sound going out of sync — but those seem to be dependent on the programming. "Heroes" looked terrific via the Roku box and on a Mac.

Amazon's service seems to have consistently better quality of video, but you're paying per film, so it's obvious it has to devote more resources to quality to keep bringing back customers.

I have two children, so my attention is already infinitely divided, and the leisure to be bored a thing of the distant past. Even so, having more options to view movies during my precious time alone or with my wife has definitely been a nice change.

Glenn Fleishman writes the Practical Mac column for Personal Technology and about technology in general for The Seattle Times and other publications. Send questions to gfleishman@seattletimes.com. More columns at www.seattletimes.com/columnists