The much anticipated ApeXtreme, a cool little DVD-like device designed to let you drop-and-play computer games on your TV, has drifted into vaporware.

The ApeXtreme uses something called DISCover technology which is basically an enormous database that automatically recognizes a computer game, installs it and then sets everything up to play the game with little or no user interference.

Alienware came out with its own, much more expensive, model earlier this year. I had a chance to review the DHS-5 and loved it. But it was still very much a computer experience.

The Apex was designed to look and operate like a DVD player. Sadly, it won t look like anything anymore.

"Cancel is a pretty finite term," Marietta Schoenherz, Apex spokeswoman, told me when I asked her if the ApeXtreme had been canned. "The project is on hold."

The news comes as Apex deals with some pretty bad money problems and the arrest of their co-founder in China.

The folks at DISCover were a little more to the point about the future of Apex and a DISCover Console.

"I don t think we will be working with them on a product," said Curt Kaiser, spokesman for Digital Interactive Systems Corporation. "We thought Apex had a great product with the ApeXtreme. There was a lot of consumer demand and industry excitement for the product and we are disappointed they were unable to bring it to market, however we are even more excited about Alienware s DHS line of media center PCs that make use of DISCover console technology."

And word has it that along with future, less-expensive models of the DHS from Alienware, will come a truly consumer electronic DISC device from a still unnamed company.

DISCover Game Consoles [DISCover]

Send an email to the author of this post at .