The PlayStation 4 is a next-gen gaming powerhouse. It will play gorgeous games like Battlefield 4 in stunning HD. It can also stream movies from services like Netflix or from Sony’s own PlayStation Network. But it won’t stream movies from users’ home PCs.
In a revelatory blog post, Sony covered many of the capabilities of the PlayStation 4 and which games will launch alongside the $400 system on Nov. 15. In that post, the company confirmed that it doesn’t intend for PS4 owners to use the system in conjunction with home-media servers.
In the FAQ portion of Sony’s big PlayStation 4 blog post today, the company said that “the PS4 does not support client functionality for media servers.” That means it also doesn’t have DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) support.
Home-media servers and DLNA are common solution where people can store digital movies or music on a PC inside their home and then play back that content on other devices. Currently, gamers can use the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 to stream movies and music from a media server in full HD.
We’ve reached out to Sony to ask why it went in this direction. We’ve also contacted Microsoft to ask if it will support media-server playback on the Xbox One. We will update with any new information.
It’s likely that Sony is happy to exclude this type of feature because it believes it will encourage PlayStation 4 owners to purchase media through the console’s Sony-backed online stores.