Wal-Mart’s Vudu and Amazon are likely potential partners for Coinstar’s Redbox as the movie rental kiosk operator readies a digital video download/streaming service for 2011, analysts said. Coinstar executives declined to identify possible partners during a conference call with analysts late last week. But Coinstar is conducting a “deliberate and rigorous” review of companies that could give it content and technology, CEO Paul Davis said. Coinstar chose to partner after deciding against launching its own service and based the belief that its Redbox brand and list of 21 million e-mail addresses would be attractive to other companies, Davis said. Coinstar began laying the groundwork for forging a download/streaming service alliance earlier this year (CED May 13 p3).

With D-Link due to launch the much-hyped Boxee streaming video player Nov. 10, Roku and Netgear have teamed up on a midrange streaming player that began selling through Best Buy, Radio Shack and Fry’s late last month. The $89, 1080p video box delivers content from Amazon Video on Demand, Netflix, and MLB.TV and will start streaming Hulu Plus as a premium service later this fall, Roku said.

Sony swung to an $827 million Q2 operating profit from a year-earlier loss on a 4.3 percent sales increase to $20.9 billion, the company said Friday. The company’s Networked Products & Services segment, which includes the videogame business and Vaio PCs, “contributed significantly” to the improved results, Sony said. Figures assume $1 = 83 yen. Meanwhile, Panasonic’s operating income nearly doubled, but the company said it’s leaving its full-year forecast unchanged, citing the “uncertain business environment” that’s expected to persist well into the second half.

LONDON -- Viewsonic gave Consumer Electronics Daily hands-on demos of a new bundle of products that let novices make and play 3D movies at budget cost. Viewsonic previewed some of the products at IFA in Berlin, and showed us a full working kit last week, a few weeks ahead of worldwide shipping.

Building on its acquisition of Palm, HP will extend its WebOS operating system software from smartphones across a range of products including netbook and tablet PCs, Palm Senior Product Manager Timothy Pettitt told us at Showstoppers in New York.

Digital camera manufacturers we polled at PhotoPlus Expo in New York Friday said they were upbeat about the coming holiday season due largely to strong, growing demand for digital single lens reflex cameras (DSLRs). Sales of compact digital cameras are flat versus last year, but they said certain features and models, including waterproof cameras targeted at outdoor enthusiasts, are helping to spur demand for some of their compact products.

States continue to watch billions of dollars in taxes on e-tail sales slip through their fingers more than 15 years into the commercial Web boom, officials said. Sales and use taxes owed but not collected on e-commerce will total at least $11.5 billion in 2012, one-quarter of the obligation, economics Professor William Fox and University of Tennessee colleagues have predicted. The problem has been getting e-tailers that don’t have stores in a state to collect taxes that purchasers owe, officials said.

Xbox 360 console sales grew 38 percent to 2.8 million units in Q1 ended Sept. 30 compared to the 2.1 million sold in Q1 last year, Bill Koefoed, Microsoft general manager of investor relations, said in an earnings call Thursday. Xbox 360 “momentum continued,” with the console “outselling every competing console in the U.S. for the fourth consecutive month,” Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Peter Klein said.

All manufacturers and private labelers of products now in the Energy Star program must “recommit” by Nov. 30 to “avoid partnership interruption” as third-party testing and certification procedures take effect in January, the EPA said. But retailers, utilities and other program sponsors, and cable, satellite and telecom providers are exempt from “this recommitment effort,” the agency said. It last week released final changes to Energy Star qualification criteria for carrying out third-party certification requirements for product qualification and verification testing.

Global cumulative Wii shipments grew to 75.98 million, while worldwide shipments of the DS handheld system reached 135.58 million as of Sept. 30, Nintendo said Thursday. Cumulative shipments of Wii software hit 610.04 million, while total DS software shipments grew to 773.34 million, it said. But it said shipments of both platforms were weaker in the first six months of its fiscal year, ended Sept. 30, than the same period of 2009, and it reported weaker results.