Network Media Players

[mrbleu500]

Courtesy of the wife, who works for the manufacturers, I'm testing a new media player at the moment, and I must admit that it's an impressive little box of tricks. It's not a full HD unit as it doesn't support H.264, but it handles Divx/Xvid encoded AVI/TS/MKV files up to 1920x1080.

It sits next to your TV, connected via HDMI and with an optical audio output to hook up to an AV system, and can play any digital media on a connected USB hard drive, or inserted media card and hooks up to your network to play any shared content. It handles movies, music and pictures in all the usual formats (apart from H.264 video).

The onscreen interface is functional, but not particualrly exciting, with a simple browser to select what you want to play.

The best thing about this tiny little box (about the size of a paperback book) is how easy it is to play ripped and downloaded movies. Just download or rip, and provided the box can see it on the network, it will play. No burning to disk or faffing about with memory sticks or external drives.

I don't know how much these will end up costing in the shops, but something less than £100 is likely.

Do you guys think this unit should ship with an internal HD (up to 1TB is supported) or leave it as only working with external media?

(BTW: it will also record via composite inputs at SD quality)

[Chui]

Sounds similar to the Freecom MediaPlayer I have just purchased. That has an internal Hard Disk, 320Gb in my case, though I think 500Gb would be useful. The advantage of an internal HD is that it provides a cheap and convenient backup for media files, especially digital photos, and ensures availability even if the network/PC/other device is down.

A great product to have, especially at under a 100 quid and something everybody should consider.

[Burnham]

The trouble with these Media Players is that they claim to play all files but often do not. You need good support from the manufacturer to release firmware updates to keep up to date.

In the UK, AVforums is the place to go to get in depth information. The current low cost favourite is the WD TV HD Media Player at £80, but doesn't have network connection.

[mrbleu500]

I've been throwing every type of file I can find (within the spec limits) at this box, and not had problems with anything yet.

I'm always reading the AV forums, but often you don't find out stuff because it is borderline legal (ahem) like most things on here :) I watched a 720p BR rip of the Indiana Jones 4 movie last night, and it was superb, with excellent audio, all for the cost of a 2.5g download (movie was **** by the way...)

The target for this unit would be more the mass market segment than techie types, so my view was it would be better with an internal HD, as it is unlikely to be connected to a LAN. The WD TV does not have an internal drive (WD only got into this market to help the sales of external drives...) but for the average non-tech punter, a one box solution must be the more attractive option...?

Thanks for the feedback guys :respect-055:

[Burnham]

I would not advise buying anything like this in the UK that has not been thoroughly gone over by AVforums. There are a lot of duds on the market.

Have you got any more details like product name and manufacturing source. I would be surprised if they can do what you have described for under £100 (with the current exchange rate), similar products start at £150.

[jimmyboy]

I have a popcorn A100 media player imported from USA (cost appx £110) had it nearly a year and plays all formats so far. I suspect this is similar to your toy and has room for internal HD or via USB (much quieter using notebook HD). Problem with heating issues as no internal fan!
It can stream from PC or NAS. 1080p upscaling/ plays most HD formats/divx/avi/mpg2/4/avc etc.
It has good support.
There are already others on the market but not always with good support.
I look forward to using a cheaper Linux box in the future- perhaps the AZbox hd?

[mrbleu500]

There are a lot of new units coming on the market at the moment. At the CES show Seagate, D-Link, Iomega and a host of others announced new media player products. The latest generation of Samsung TV's are even incorporating this technology.

Also a lot of Chinese OEM factories are churning out these units too, as they are very cheap to produce due to the availability of single chip solutions from Realtek and Sigma. The unit I'm testing is based on the Realtek chipset, and while it is an OEM unit not directly manufactured by the company my missus works for, they are in the process of developing their own unit. The way they tend to work is to reverse engineer other companies products rather than developing their own kit from scratch ;)

Quite often my missus has to buy some new bit of kit that appears on the UK market and ship it over to Taiwan so it can be "evaluated"...

For hobbyists, I guess the best solution is going to be an open source Linux based unit, which allows for customisation and "enhancements". I guess you can probably do most of what these units cover with a dreambox 800?

[Jim Dale]

Do you have a picture of the network media player or a link because i dont seem to find one that your talking about, im very interested in seeing one thanks,:sifone:

[mrbleu500]

Sorry I don't have a big picture, only a low res image from the product PDF.

[Jim Dale]

thanks