Although there are many people out there (including quite a large number of companies and movie studios) that still stick by physical media as the content delivery format of choice, the truth of the matter is that more and more people are starting to really take advantage of their high-speed Internet connections for accessing (and downloading) various types of contents to their home networks and/or computers for later viewing either on their computer monitors or, preferably, their widescreen Full HD TVs.

Furthermore, there are numerous Internet-connected HDTVs and Blu-ray players out there; unfortunately, most of these products come at some pretty high price points, and they really don't do much good for those who've already purchased a widescreen plasma, LCD or LED TV and are not about to spend a couple of thousands US dollars, Euro, pounds sterling (or whatever currency their country uses) in order to get a brand new one just to enjoy Internet connectivity and enhanced media playback capabilities.

These are some of the reasons why a brand new type of home entertainment-oriented product has made its way onto the market, namely the media tank (or its evolved version, the networked media tank). These usually quite tiny boxes are capable of providing enhanced playback options (video, audio, photos, etc.), typically work with pretty much every format and codec out there and some of them even allow users to access the content stored onto their home networks (or even the Internet) in a very fast and easy manner.

That's exactly the case with the device you'll read about as follows, namely the Egreat EG-R1 networked media tank, which was an extremely pleasant surprise for us, given its extensive level of versatility and functionality, despite its relatively tiny form factor. As far as we're concerned, the EG-R1 can represent a very good solution for the centerpiece of one's home entertainment system, and you'll see just why this “toy” is worthy of attention.