Netflix on Monday will begin rolling out its second generation media player that includes support for Intel-based Macs. The company is also adding support for the Firefox Web browser with this release.
Using Microsoft’s Silverlight technology, Netflix’s new media player will allow Mac users to watch movies and TV shows using the company’s “instant watching” feature. The Netflix player will use Microsoft’s Play Ready DRM to protect its content, a feature that wasn’t available for Mac users before the release of Silverlight 2.0.
Netflix says the new Silverlight player will only work on Intel-based Macs. According to Netflix data, approximately three-quarters of its Mac subscribers are on Intel-based machines.
Netflix has 12,000 instant watching movies and TV shows available in its catalog.
The company said the rollout of its second generation player would initially be sent to a small amount of subscribers. All Netflix subscribers will get the new player by the end of year.