Roku boxes receive USB playback and Al Jazeera English

Don’t you just love firmware updates? It can basically introduce a new lease of life into your device, and the Roku box is no different. In fact, its latest firmware update allows Roku boxes to handle playback of media from plugged-in USB flash drives as well as the Al Jazeera English channel. The two boxes in question? The Roku HD-XR and XDS streaming-video, and being able to handle a range of file formats such as MKV, MP4, and MOV which are extremely popular these days. It must be noted that the Roku line of streaming-video boxes does not officially support network media streaming, where it is currently supported by its competitors such as Apple TV, Boxee Box and Sony SMP-N100.