After appearing in an FCC filing last November, Walmart's streaming media dongle is now available for purchase online and at select retail locations.

Much like its competition, the Vudu Spark is an HDMI dongle that connects to your television using HDMI and draws power via USB. Hopefully your telly has a USB port as there isn't a USB power brick included in the kit. You also get a wireless remote that looks sufficient enough for the job.

Priced at $24.95, the Vudu Spark appears to be a steal as it supports 1080p video playback and up to 7.1 digital surround sound. And for a limited time, buyers also get a $5 credit each month for the first five months which essentially makes the dongle free of charge over the long haul.

So, what's the catch?

With the Vudu Spark, you don't get access to Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, Hulu Plus, HBO Go or any other service you can think of. That's because the Spark only connects to Walmart's Vudu network. Sure, you'll find over 100,000 titles on Vudu but the lack of functionality will likely be a deal-breaker for many.

What's more, Vudu is already available as an app on several existing platforms so it's hard to see why anyone would be interested in the Spark over a do-it-all solution like Chromecast, Amazon Fire TV Stick, Roku Streaming Stick, etc.