Slingbox maker Sling Media has announced a new version of its Slingbox Pro set-top box that has its own HD TV tuner and can send out a 1080i HD picture over the network.

The Slingbox Pro-HD will be initially aimed at the US market - with no terrestrial HD broadcasts in the UK, there's not much point releasing it over here yet - and provides the same range of analogue and digital, standard and high definition inputs and outputs as the Pro.

Sling's Slingbox Pro-HD: 1080i streaming (with the wind behind you)

However, it doesn't appear to have gained an HDMI output yet, the HDMI-like connector on the back simply being a proprietary port for the box's component-video I/O dongle.

Sling said the Pro-HD's codec chip is capable of converting a TV image to 1080i resolution, but you'll need a high upload bandwidth on your internet connection if you want to stream it out to a remote device, but results on a home LAN for room-to-room streaming should be "near-identical quality", it indicated.

Sling also said today announced a version of its SlingPlayer Mobile app for BlackBerry devices, though it won't appear until later this year, the company admitted.

The Slingbox Pro-HD is expected this Spring for around $400.

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