Walking around the main show floor at CEDIA, you see hundreds of glitzy HD video displays, and one obscenely large TV even has a Victoria’s Secret show looping ad infinitum. Those are all fine and well, but for me one of the most exciting new products was stashed away on the basement floor — a nondescript black box made of heavy-duty aluminum with two-inch heatsinks flanking each side. Yes, welcome to the world of network attached storage (NAS) devices.

The new Infrant Repertoire Digital Media Server is a compelling alternative to the world of commercial media servers from the likes of Escient and ReQuest, or Windows Media Center PCs, and can store and stream three terabytes of audio/video files to your home stereo/theater rig. The Repertoire contains four Seagate drives and has foolproof backup built in via the RAID parity configuration. That is, if one drive should fail, the other drives can reconstruct the files asap. You even get email alerts from the Repertoire if a drive fails, overheats, or loses power. Try finding that feature on a Windows Media Center PC.

As a media server, the Repertoire may seem like an odd choice – NAS devices mostly live in the IT world — but consider that this 3TB monster has no fans (only heat sinks) and low power consumption (65W), so you can leave it on 24/7 and it will silently hum along on a stereo cabinet or rack. The custom microprocessor was engineered specifically for large media files, and a 1 GB network port allows for smooth and speedy streaming, either wired or wireless. AV server software is built into the Repertoire, so it is compatible with a wide range of playback devices from companies like Slim Devices, SONOS, and Roku, or you can also use software such as iTunes and Windows Media Player.

Not bad for a big black box with no buttons or knobs, eh.

The Repertoire will be available in October 2006 at $3,999 for the 2TB version and $4,999 for the 3TB version.