Back in November of 2011, Roku announced their intentions to begin selling their popular (and diminutive) media players in the Great White North. At the time, they didn’t announce when, exactly, they’d start accepting our Loonies and Twoonies and shipping product. Now, the time has come: the Roku 2 XD and Roku 2 XS are now up for sale in Canada.
Because of the way those annoying content deals work, Canadians won’t have access to the same number of channels as their neighbors to the south. While Roku provides access to more than 450 in the U.S., Canucks will be limited to just over 100. Roku says they’re dedicated to increasing that number as quickly in Canada as they did in the U.S., however, which is good news.
Canada’s two big must-haves are already available: Netflix and NHL Gamecenter Live. Music aficionados can listen to the millions of tracks in Rdio’s vault, and Sony’s Crackle service is supported as well — so enjoy those episodes of The Tick featuring Patrick Warburton.
Roku’s lower-end models are not yet available, and the XS and XD are priced slightly higher than they would be in the U.S — at $89.99 and $109.99 CAD respectively. Still, at least you’ve finally got a way to stream video content from the web in HD and play Angry Birds on your massive flatscreen TV if you live in Canada. Surely that’s worth paying a few extra dollars for, right?
If you’re not interested in ordering from the Roku website, you’ll be able to purchase the boxes soon at Walmart and London Drugs. You may also see the boxes popping up at your favorite little computer shop, as Synnex is handling distribution for Roku in Canada.
Now if they’d just hurry up and release that snazzy little HDMI dongle…
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