At first sight, the Kiss DP-600 looks like it's trying to take complete control of your video-entertainment requirements.
It plays standard DVDs, will connect to a nearby PC (wired or wirelessly) in order to stream audio, video and photos, and will also play HD (high definition) content.
The rear of the sleek-looking but rather bulky DP-600 is littered with ports. You get Scart, HDMI, composite, component and S-video outputs while audio is taken care of by analogue stereo/5.1 and digital optical/coaxial.
A rather unstylish remote control is included, but it's relatively easy to navigate around the menu system.
Kiss includes its own PC Link software with the package. Once installed on your PC, this will hunt down any supported media and make it available to stream to the DP-600.
At least, that's the idea. During testing, we found that it wouldn't pick up wmv files. However, by entering the file names manually and individually, we managed to get it to accept them. Quite why it doesn't pick up wmv files in the automatic search is a mystery to us.
We tested the DP-600 with various video formats (including DivX, wmv, mpeg2/4) and were impressed with its streaming performance.
As long as the DP-600 and the PC with the content on are situated close to your wireless router, you should find the likes of DivX running smoothly over a wireless connection.
Kiss has placed two wireless antennae at the rear of the device and, unfortunately, these can't be detached. If you were able to place the antennae on, for example, the top of your TV, wireless reception would be far better.
An Ethernet port is also available should you start to suffer problems with dropped frames.
Thanks to its HDMI output, the DP-600 is able to play HD content. You will, of course, require an HD display in order to take advantage of this.
Furthermore, we wouldn't recommend trying to play HD video over a wireless connection.
In our tests, the video soon started dropping frames and the audio became disjointed. Even if you purchase one of the new draft-N wireless routers (such as the Buffalo Nfiniti), the fact that the DP-600 houses a standard 802.11g wireless connector will render any enhanced draft-N speeds useless.
Over a standard wired Ethernet connection, however, HD content streamed perfectly.
Despite the DP-600's HD capabilities, it's not able to upscale standard DVDs to 720p or 1080i in the same way as many DVD players currently on the market.
Don't forget, it also won't be able to play Blu-ray or HD-DVD discs when they finally hit the market.
Sadly, there's no UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) support with the DP-600 so it isn't able to scan any NAS (network attached storage) drives you might have.
This is a shame, since it means your PC has to be switched on if you want the DP-600 to be able to play any digital content stored on it.
Despite the rather misleading HDD button on the remote, there's no hard drive on the DP-600. Including one would have pushed up the price, but it would have also allowed you to store movies and music direct on the device itself.
A USB port is provided, so it is possible to play files directly from a USB memory key.
If you have an Internet connection, the Kiss Online button on the remote takes you to a selection of extra tools including access to thousands of Internet radio stations.
Other online features are available, but these are limited to a TV guide, a selection of fairly poor games, weather reports and a particularly dull stock-market checker.
Another issue with the DP-600 is the noise it generates. For the most part it's reasonably quiet, but when it starts getting hot under the collar a fan leaps into action.
It's unlikely to bother you too much if the DP-600 is housed in TV cabinet with a door, but it could become irritating during quiet points in films.
The DP-600 from Kiss is an interesting idea, but it's by no means a must-have gadget. That said, if you're not fussed about UPnP, the noisy fan or the various other glitches, it's worth taking a look at.
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