PC version of Boxee 1.5 released, will be the final PC version

Good news and bad news for Boxee fans, today the Boxee team released version 1.5 of the desktop edition but have said that it will be the last version for the PC. Boxee say that the future of the TV will be driven by devices like the Boxee Box and not by the connected PC, while I think its a shame that the there won’t be a PC version but I have to say I hardly even use Boxee and I not convinced that a Boxee Box is the answer either.

So if your a Boxee fan download the new version before its withdrawn at the end of January. Details from Boxee:

We believe the future of TV will be driven by devices such as the Boxee Box, Connected TVs / Blu-Rays and 2nd screen devices such as tablets and phones. While there are still many users who have computers connected to their TVs, we believe this use case is likely to decline as users find better alternatives. People will continue to watch a lot of video on their computer, but it is more likely to be a laptop than a home-theater PC and probably through a browser rather than downloaded software.

New Features on the Desktop client

• New user interface

• • Main Menu
  • Home Screen
  • Browse Screens (Movies, TV Shows) – Now includes filtering options
  • Watch Later including filtering
  • Action/Info Menu
  • New On Screen Display (OSD) and settings
  • Library and Play action
  • Rotten Tomato rating integration into movie info
  • Ability to filter local content by source (USB, Network, SD)
  • Added alphabetical scrollbar for local content
  • Enhanced sorting options in browse screens (A-Z, Z-A, most popular, newest/oldest…)
  • Main menu supports additional filter options
  • Mark items as watched/unwatched from the Action menu
  • Added option for hourly scan of local libraries enabling user flavor selection (online/local inclination) during first login and via Settings > Defaults

• Search functionality
• New HTML5 WebKit based browser allows browsing many popular web sites as well as sites designed for TVs

• • Faster Page Launch & Loading Speed
  • Added ability to “Favorite” web sites for quick access
  • New “Favorites” section in the browser
  • New “History” section for browsing previously visited web pages
  • Current URL is now displayed in the address bar

• Support for HTTP Live Streaming protocol
• Multilingual support (17 languages)
• Networking & File Playback

• • Enhanced support for SMB/CIFS
  • Added support for Boxee Media Manager
  • Consolidated network shares under the server name

• Settings

• • Weather – full integration with Accuweather
  • Added setting to disable full network scan of SMB sources.

Supported platforms

• Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 (32 bit and 64 bit)
• Mac OS X 10.6 and higher (Intel only)
• Linux Ubuntu 11.10 (32 bit only)