Iomega, a company well known for digital storage, data protection and security, has launched a very compact set-top media player, the new ScreenPlay TV Link, which is smaller than a deck of playing cards.  Unlike most set-top media players with built-in hard disks, this has no internal storage, but instead features a USB port to connect an external USB drive. 

While this may seem to defeat the advantage of making the player so compact, this allows the user to hide the external drive such as behind their set-top boxes or even use USB pen drives to play from.  This also lets the user place content on the external drive without having to connect the player to a network or physically take the player to a PC to do so. 

Despite its compact size, this player features the same audio and video quality as its original ScreenPlay HD Multimedia drives, including upscaling to HD and a remote control for easy navigation.  This player's USB port is compatible with flash drives, hard disks and Iomega's REV drives and supports NTFS and FAT32 file systems.
 
Its outputs include HDMI, component and composite video and composite RCA and coaxial S/PDIF audio.  A SCART adapter is available in international markets.  When connected by component or HDMI, the user can choose between 480p, 720p and 1080i, where both 720p and 1080i involve upscaling.  Its supported audio formats include MP3, AC3, WAV and WMA and its supported video formats include MPEG1/2/4 AVI, MPEG2 VOB, DivX 3.11, 4.x & 5.x AVI and XviD.  For photos, it supports JPEG files.

The player is roughly the same dimensions as a coffee cup coaster with a weight of 4oz (113g).  It is now available in the US for $99.95 and will launch in Europe later this month for €79.