1 million Google TV solutions expected to sell by end of year

Most are expected to be set-top boxes

GOOGLE TV HAS as yet to launch, but the expected sales numbers are already making their way onto the interweb, despite the fact that no-one has even had time to play with the final product outside of Google. As interesting as Google TV is, it’s going to require quite a lot of consumer convincing from Google’s side to become a product that your average consumer will be willing to spend money on.

Digitimes reports that Logitech is expecting to sell no less than 500,000 of its Revue set-top box with Sony making up the rest of the numbers with a combination of TVs with built in support and set-top boxes. This also means that Intel needs to churn out a fair amount of Atom CE4100 SoC’s  which are set to power all of the Google TV devices and let’s not forget the Boxee Box as well which co-incidentally switched to Intel’s platform a little while back.

As we noticed back at Computex, it looked as if Gigabyte was going to be a Google TV partner and Digitimes has now confirmed that Google and Logitech selected Gigabyte as the OEM for at least the initial batch of Revue boxes. This should add some extra money to Gigabyte’s coffers and might even lead to other Google related projects in the future. Google and Gigabyte have a long running relationship, as Gigabyte has been providing motherboards for many of Google’s search servers and what not in the past.

It will be interesting to see how much of an impact Google TV will have on the market and the way we watch television. One thing that will likely hold things back, at least for the time being, is the fact that Google TV will only be available in North America to start with. It might be a huge market, but it might also allow other players to take advantage of the situation and launch similar products in other markets. Apple is also set to get some competition here, although it all comes down to how well Google TV works and how easy it will be to use in comparison to the $99 Apple TV box, especially as Logitech’s Revue box is expected to retail for a much steeper $299. Sure, the Revue box offers a lot more functionality, but $299 is still a lot of money for something that most people can live without.S|A

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