One of the wonders of the age is the growth of the Internet phone calls market. Led by the massively popular Skype, people all over the world now think nothing of clicking on a piece of software to connect with their loved ones and business colleagues across the world. The fact that so many use Internet calls proves that it’s now ready for almost everyone, except for the fact that you’re usually tethered to a computer when making the call.

This limitation looks like it’s about to disappear with the advent of a new generation of easy to use products which are designed to integrate voice over IP (the techy name for Internet phone calls) into the home. One such product is TelyHD, a very easy to use hardware device which hooks up to your home TV to deliver standard Skype calls at high definition resolution.

The product is small an unobtrusively designed to fit on top of your flat screen, and it contains everything you need for Skyping (is that an adjective yet?), including the Skype program, 4 noise cancelling microphones, an HD camera and speakers and HDMI and Ethernet sockets for connecting to your television and home broadband network (you can also connect via WiFi if you want). You’ll need a fast Internet connection to get the optimum out of the video image in the call, but nowadays you should be able to manage that unless you live out in the boondocks.

Setup is 5 minutes as long as you know what you’re doing, after which you’re ready to chat to the world, or at least to Aunt Edna in Hong Kong. There’s no charges apart from the ones you may incur with Skype, and the product comes in at a reasonable $241.36 from Amazon. The idea is top notch, and you can bet that there’ll be a bunch of other similar products hitting the market over the coming months, as the tech biz starts to take-over the living room in earnest.