Blockbuster presented on Tuesday a digital media player that offers instant access through television sets to on-demand content of recently released movies. The service practically reflects the evolution of Blockbuster’s Movielink.com, which offers 10,000 on-demand movies for download to personal computers. Some 2,000 of those titles can be downloaded to television via Blockbuster OnDemand.

The 2Wire MediaPoint digital media player is available at no charge, but the customer must rent 25 Blockbuster OnDemand movies in advance, at a cost of $99 through the company’s online service. Afterwards, a subscriber can get a movie starting at $1.99 each, each movie staying on the player for 30 days. Once a movie is started, it must be viewed within 24 hours. Blockbuster will begin shipping the players just in time for the holiday season.

On the other hand, rival Netflix has a free “Watch Instantly” feature, which streams movies to subscribers’ TVs or personal computers, but users must subscribe to its unlimited monthly service. Netflix offers its users around 12,000 titles and, furthermore, members can have thousands of movies and TV episodes streamed to the TV via the Xbox 360, when the new Xbox Experience premieres nationwide tomorrow. The Netflix player is built in partnership with Roku, a company specializing in digital streaming media technology.

Even if each company says its offer is better, it remains to be seen what the customers decide. Each service presents its own advantages and disadvantages, and this will certainly be an interesting battle. Blockbuster and Netflix also compete with the Apple TV, which connects via the Internet to Apple’s iTunes. Through the device, people can rent movies and TV shows. The Apple TV has been available since last year.