Enhancing PopCorn Hour and NMT

MediaTank

It seems that quite a few of you own an NMT player. I've been having fun tweaking my Istar. The most interesting thing was to add a movie jukebox to it, this takes it to a new level of user friendliness. Has anyone else tried it?

Details here: http://code.google.com/p/moviejukebox/

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

It seems that quite a few of you own an NMT player. I've been having fun tweaking my Istar. The most interesting thing was to add a movie jukebox to it, this takes it to a new level of user friendliness. Has anyone else tried it?

Details here: http://code.google.com/p/moviejukebox/

Is this >> THE ISTAR That you have?
I am concidering one shortly :cool:

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

Is this >> THE ISTAR That you have?
I am concidering one shortly :cool:

That's the one, the HDMI 1.3 model. I bought it direct from the manufacturer https://www.istarhd.com/order/index.asp it's cheaper that way

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

That's the one, the HDMI 1.3 model. I bought it direct from the manufacturer https://www.istarhd.com/order/index.asp it's cheaper that way

Would you reccomend it ?
or would you go the extra mile and get the PCH ?
Personally I think I would prefer the Istar

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

Would you reccomend it ?
or would you go the extra mile and get the PCH ?
Personally I think I would prefer the Istar

I looked at all of the media players in the market not just NMT models, and concluded that the Istar HD was both the best NMT player and the best media player. The 1.3 model provides support of HDMI 1.3 and has better connectivity than the PCH in a smaller footprint. The only real alternative to the NMT players are the TVIX models which look cool but do a lot less for more money. YMMV. Check out the reviews at www.mpcclub.com. Both Istar and PCH have announed new models recently, and there are a couple of new NMT players now available from eGreat and HDX which I'm not familair with.

Having said all that these devices are not 100% user friendly right now. They require some technical knowledge to use and firmware upgrdades are relatively frequent.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

I looked at all of the media players in the market not just NMT models, and concluded that the Istar HD was both the best NMT player and the best media player. The 1.3 model provides support of HDMI 1.3 and has better connectivity than the PCH in a smaller footprint. The only real alternative to the NMT players are the TVIX models which look cool but do a lot less for more money. YMMV. Check out the reviews at www.mpcclub.com. Both Istar and PCH have announed new models recently, and there are a couple of new NMT players now available from eGreat and HDX which I'm not familair with.

Having said all that these devices are not 100% user friendly right now. They require some technical knowledge to use and firmware upgrdades are relatively frequent.

Looks like the Istar will be in my house then,
Just looked at their home page there and am I right in saying that it has to have an external HD attached?
I thought one could be fitted inside the case?

No problem with the User Friendly-ness.
I would be well ino that.
Also firmware flashing... I make some people nervous with all the flashing I do with my PC drives and Bios etc... so that would be a piece of Pi$$.
Currently I have an xbox networked to my PC-Laptop- And a NAS drive, I assume the Istar will slip into this setup easily enough?

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

Looks like the Istar will be in my house then,
Just looked at their home page there and am I right in saying that it has to have an external HD attached?
I thought one could be fitted inside the case?

No problem with the User Friendly-ness.
I would be well ino that.
Also firmware flashing... I make some people nervous with all the flashing I do with my PC drives and Bios etc... so that would be a piece of Pi$$.
Currently I have an xbox networked to my PC-Laptop- And a NAS drive, I assume the Istar will slip into this setup easily enough?

.

You're all set then. It will work fine without a hard drive, however if you want to use the NMT applications (BitTorrent client, myIhome media server, etc...) then you need to attach a SATA drive. To keep the footprint small you attach it externally via a special cable. It looks kinda ugly though, so you can optionally order a matching case to put it in from their web site.

vectra

What about the EGREAT EG-M31B NMT HDMI 1.3 1080P H.264 Player
It takes an internal HD and I had planned on installing a 500 or 1TB drive anyway to load up.
I was reading this article HERE, What you reckon ?

MediaTank

Sounds great - I like the USB slave idea as copying large media files over the network is slooooow.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

Sounds great - I like the USB slave idea as copying large media files over the network is slooooow.

Yes,
I was just looking over the specs of both,
The EGreat seems higher spec than the Istar..:

EGreat Hardware Specifications :

Hardware

* CPU:SIGMA DESIGNS SMP8635

* DDR DRAM :Hynix 64-bit 512Mb

* External NOR Flash :Spansion 16-bit 256Mb

* LANCHIP: REATEK RTL8201CP

* Audio D/A CHIP: AKM AK4420

* HDMI 1.3 CHIP: SILICON IMAGE SIL9134

* SATA TO USB: JMICRON JM20335

* ESATA HOST: SUNPLUS SPIF225

* USB HOST: GENESYS GL850A



Istar Specs:
Hy 256 DDR

Spansion 32Mb Flash Memory

MediaTank

Twice as much RAM. Looks good to me.

MT

vectra

Thanks for all your help :cool:

Wolff

Just interested - what can the istar do that the Tivx players cant do ?

MediaTank

Good question, both are based on the same (or similar) chip set. The iStar (or other NMT) can also act as a media portal, is extensible, has a suite of applications like BT and supports more media formats than the Tvix models and at a lower price.

Wolff

whats BT ? and what media formats can the istar support that the Divco cant ?

The brother is interested in getting one and was looking at the Divco as I have one

but if the Istar is cheaper and does more - great - what size is the hard disk in it ?

MediaTank

Wolff wrote: »

whats BT ? and what media formats can the istar support that the Divco cant ?

The brother is interested in getting one and was looking at the Divco as I have one

but if the Istar is cheaper and does more - great - what size is the hard disk in it ?

BT = BitTorrent. It doesn't come with a HD you have to add one, any size as long as it's SATA. Check out the reviews at www.mpcclub.com for the differences.

Wolff

http://www.mpcclub.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=18105

great thread - see the post from the guy who had all 5 players and rates the Tvix as the best for HD the cheaper units are allright at the HD end of things but better for streaming off the internet.

He is into the HD end of things so it looks like he would be better off spending the extra - the Tivx is a nice looking unit as well

MediaTank

Yes, great thread. Most of my content is either DVD rips into either ISO files or H.264 in MKV files and some 1080P BluRay rips to H.264 in MKV. The iStar handles these extremely well.

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

whats BT ? and what media formats can the istar support that the Divco cant ?

The brother is interested in getting one and was looking at the Divco as I have one

but if the Istar is cheaper and does more - great - what size is the hard disk in it ?

BT = Bit Torrent

As for media formats that both play I am unsure but could almost certainly gaurantee that the Istar would be a lot cheaper :cool:

Wolff

Yeah its cheaper allright but from what ive seen of it it looks cheap as well

also seems to be a lot of problems with it on those forums - not the the tivco players are without there problems as well !

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

Yeah its cheaper allright but from what ive seen of it it looks cheap as well

also seems to be a lot of problems with it

Looks arent the most important aspect of it

Can you elaborate the problems please?

Wolff

http://www.mpcclub.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewforum&f=191

this is the istar thread - most of the posts seem to be problems with the player

now they all have problems in one way or another - on the Divx plus side they do come up with fairly regular updates and Ive had no issues with mine

Looks do matter by the way the divco is a nice solid well built unit all the connectors are solid too - the popcorn hour on the other hand looks like an old external hardisk with the build quality to match

good little player though

MediaTank

I guess it's a case of whatever works for you. The Divco players have been around longer than the NMT ones and as you'd expect are more mature and hence stable. The NMT players are catching up, but firmware updates are frequent right now. BTW, I don't agree about the look of the players, the ISTAR looks pretty cool to me.

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

http://www.mpcclub.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewforum&f=191

this is the istar thread - most of the posts seem to be problems with the player

now they all have problems in one way or another - on the Divx plus side they do come up with fairly regular updates and Ive had no issues with mine

Looks do matter by the way the divco is a nice solid well built unit all the connectors are solid too - the popcorn hour on the other hand looks like an old external hardisk with the build quality to match

good little player though

LOOKS and BUILD QUALITY are two differnet things :cool:

Just looking at your link there.
Most of the issues with the Istar look trivial.
Firmware bugs
Heat
I plan on ripping my one apart once I get it and repalcing any fan(s) with high quality quite ones as I normally do with all my gear.
also use some artic silver paste instead of the manufacturers rubbish

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

LOOKS and BUILD QUALITY are two differnet things :cool:

Just looking at your link there.
Most of the issues with the Istar look trivial.
Firmware bugs
Heat

agree

Wolff

Yes but there is an awfull lot of minor niggle with the player - as there ae with all these units

As for build quality and looks - usually they go hand in hand in electronics
and all the fans in the world arent going to do anything if the unit uses cheaper components

As I have learned to my cost in the past

but as I always say - you get what you pay for

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

Yes but there is an awfull lot of minor niggle with the player - as there ae with all these units

That seems to be the issue with most media players i have read about.. and it always seems to pioint to Firmware issues.. Can you show me other issues that your one does not have and that the Istar or otherwise ?

Wolff wrote: »

As for build quality and looks - usually they go hand in hand in electronics
and all the fans in the world arent going to do anything if the unit uses cheaper components

Again not really,

Build quality and looks have got nothing to do with each other.. Have you ever heard the old saying "You can never judge a book by its cover"

Then again you could have the ugliest looking unit in the world with high spec components installed
Do you know for sure the build quality is made up of cheaper components?


As for all the fans in the world..?
Give me one top class fan over a "Good enough" one which every manufacturer will most likely choose to put in their units as they "sufficiantly" cool them.
Like I said
Off with the heatsink(s) and use artic silver along with high grade almost silent fan(s) and that alone is a major improvement over ANY unit.
I did this with my sons Xbox360 and it has never given him any heat issues,

Dont get me wrong,
I am not knocking what you are saying.
I am merely pointing out that YOU came along to this thread as I did enquiring about one of these for your brother. then went to another forum and read a few threads and suddenly you have become and expert critic in these matters.
I am only pointing out my views of these "Issues" you are referring to and giving my opinion on the solution for them.

So unless you have hard evidence that these are rubbish as you say please do not knock them until you have tried them

Wolff

I aint professing to anything more than anyone else - but I have a popcorn hour - very similar to the istar - and I have a Divco 6500a

So I can compare one to the other - Ive looked at the Istar and its my opinion the Divco is the best unit - actually its the admins of the club mpc websites opinion too - see the thread

I came to this thread as another poster stated the Divco unit could play less formats than the istar - a claim thats still not backed up btw

And was interested if this was true,as if it could and it was cheaper then Id recommend it.

But what ive seen of it - its a cheap player again like the popcorn hour - which in itself is a good player but not a patch on the Divco.
So you pays for what you get

And I never said the istar was rubbish BTW

Still intrigued by the formats it can play that the Divco cant...

Ill leave the last word to Obama - you can stick a fancy fan on a pig - but its still a pig !

MediaTank

You are correct the 6500 model can play exactly the same formats as the iSTAR (and other NMT) players. Other TViX models cannot. Why? Because they are based on exactly the same chip set - Sigma Designs SMP8635. However the 6500 is way more expensive than an iSTAR, but it does look more visually appealing.

One further thing is the huge user community for NMT and the applications and tweaks they produce such as the juke box way back in the first post of this thread.

Check out HiJacks NMT round up article from today http://www.mpcclub.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=669

Wolff

How much is the Istar now ? - I paid about 400 euros for the 6500 but that included a 1gb Harddisk as well

MediaTank

Wolff wrote: »

How much is the Istar now ? - I paid about 400 euros for the 6500 but that included a 1gb Harddisk as well

The HDMI 1.1 version is $168 (€119), and the HDMI 1.3 version $205 (€145). Factor in a 1TB drive and it's around half the price.

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

How much is the Istar now ? - I paid about 400 euros for the 6500 but that included a 1gb Harddisk as well

1gb hard disc ?? :eek:

That would not even hold a movie

But
when all is said and done..
Which do I buy now?

MediaTank wrote: »

HDMI 1.3 version $205 (€145). Factor in a 1TB drive and it's around half the price.

That looks like what I will be getting

But still not sure if to go with the Istar
OR
the
Egreat

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

1gb hard disc ?? :eek:

That would not even hold a movie

But
when all is said and done..
Which do I buy now?

m

LOL, assume he meant a 1TB HD. Here's how I see it:

TVIX 6500: expensive, looks good, big footprint, mature system
NMT boxes: affordable, small footprint, maturing system, great userbase and community support, extensible systems, Web Browser and MSP support

What's important to you?

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

1gb hard disc ?? :eek:

That would not even hold a movie

But
when all is said and done..
Which do I buy now?



That looks like what I will be getting

But still not sure if to go with the Istar
OR
the
Egreat

Read HiJack's lates news article. The USB slave on the eGreat makes it more attractive IMHO, although I own an iSTAR 1.3 version.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

What's important to you?

1) Play MKV files perfectly

2) Music

3) Play AVI files perfectly

Currently have an xbox Networked and am thrilled with it.
Does exactly what it says on the tin.

EXCEPT... Wont play MKV

I am upgrading my TV this week hopefully and want to do all of this as a job lot and get shut of it.>> POSSIBLY THIS ONE
Is it important to have gigabit networking to stream MKV files??

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

1) Play MKV files perfectly

2) Music

3) Play AVI files perfectly


Is it important to have gigabit networking to stream MKV files??

Check for all 3 of those. You don't need a gigabit network. All of these boxes only have 100Mb ethernet ports. The important thing is the the H.264 or VC1 encode in the MKV file do not exceed profile High@L4.1 which is the BluRay and 1080P profiles.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

Check for all 3 of those. You don't need a gigabit network. All of these boxes only have 100Mb ethernet ports. The important thing is the the H.264 or VC1 encode in the MKV file do not exceed profile High@L4.1 which is the BluRay and 1080P profiles.

Ah yes,
I forgot the H.264 files. I want thoe to play as well

But are you saying only thr 1080P files will not play?

1080i are fine?

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

Ah yes,
I forgot the H.264 files. I want thoe to play as well

But are you saying only thr 1080P files will not play?

1080i are fine?

I'm saying that if you use BT to download MKV files or create them yourself then make sure they are profile [EMAIL="High@L4.1"]High@L4.1[/EMAIL] and no higher.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

I'm saying that if you use BT to download MKV files or create them yourself then make sure they are profile [EMAIL="High@L4.1"]High@L4.1[/EMAIL] and no higher.

Wont be using BT at all.
Looks the biz for me
Now to decide to get the Istar OR The Egreat.
Would the extra ram make much of a diffeence in these?

MediaTank

vectra wrote: »

Wont be using BT at all.
Looks the biz for me
Now to decide to get the Istar OR The Egreat.
Would the extra ram make much of a diffeence in these?

Advantage of the eGreat AFAICS is the USB slave funtion, which means you can plug it into a PC and transfer files directly, rather than having to FTP them otherwise.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

Advantage of the eGreat AFAICS is the USB slave funtion, which means you can plug it into a PC and transfer files directly, rather than having to FTP them otherwise.

OK
with you having experience of the Istar.
If you were buying again
would you buy
Istar
or
Egreat
Egreat having usb and extra ram ?

Wolff

Sorry yes 1tb Disk

and the 6500a is only about 7 inches wide by 5 inches deep -
also has the best HD playback mkv files of any player ive seen - up to 1080p
has the usb slave functionality too -

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

Sorry yes 1tb Disk

and the 6500a is only about 7 inches wide by 5 inches deep -
also has the best HD playback mkv files of any player ive seen - up to 1080p
has the usb slave functionality too -

Link ??

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

How much is the Istar now ? - I paid about 400 euros for the 6500 but that included a 1gb Harddisk as well

OK

I was reading a post over on mpcclub

This reply froma 6500 owner

Just to say it in two words, let's say that TVIX is more HD oriented (not an NMT player), and the others (NMTs) are more internet oriented.

This means that with the TVIX you'll have more speed and ease to watch great quality HD movie (better response of the remote, better tools to moving through the movies, etc., but no webserver, torrent, online streaming and so on), and with the NMTs you'll have less comfortable watching of HD movies, but more flexibility to see online contents, plus web server, torrent client, etc.

There are people (like me) that aren't interested to have a machine with hundreds of features of poor quality (for example Youtube -looow quality- videos from a FullHD player is a controsense by my watch), and prefer less but more useful features instead.

Now
what he is saying about the 6500 it fits into my needs more than the egreat

Also
Egreat inc shipping is around €290 +

The 6500 PLUS shipping is around €380

BUT
Is it really worth the extra cost?
All I really want it to do is play HD files { H.264/.MKV }

Wolff

I used to have a p4 3 GHZ dell xps - lovely machine and couldnt play 1080p files to save its life

Then I got a quad core something or other and played the 1080p files very well with the odd stutter

then I fecked both in the bin (dramatic license) and got the 6500a - its plays everything ive thrown at it flawlessly - not to say there arent some dodgy mkv files around that dont play well but 99 % play great

And Im watching these on a 50" kuro and the quality is great

is it worth the extra money - probably not but if you want to watch mkv files and not be worried is it going to stutter at some point then it is - also its a nice little unit - I have a 1 tb installed and another 1tb as a usb so I have 2gbs of movies to choose from - iso's avis and mkv and it plays them great

Another great feature is the goto where you tell the play to skip to 30mins in or 2 hours in - especially on a mkv its great

vectra

Wolff wrote: »

I used to have a p4 3 GHZ dell xps - lovely machine and couldnt play 1080p files to save its life

Then I got a quad core something or other and played the 1080p files very well with the odd stutter

then I fecked both in the bin (dramatic license) and got the 6500a - its plays everything ive thrown at it flawlessly - not to say there arent some dodgy mkv files around that dont play well but 99 % play great

And Im watching these on a 50" kuro and the quality is great

is it worth the extra money - probably not but if you want to watch mkv files and not be worried is it going to stutter at some point then it is - also its a nice little unit - I have a 1 tb installed and another 1tb as a usb so I have 2gbs of movies to choose from - iso's avis and mkv and it plays them great

Another great feature is the goto where you tell the play to skip to 30mins in or 2 hours in - especially on a mkv its great

I wouldnt take any notice of the PC's to be honest
I have an AMD 64 - 4000 San Diego cpu
2 gigs of Mushkin Extreme edition Black DDRram
And a Geforce 7900 GTX Graphic card
Plays everything i throw at it.

Dont know what to buy now as everyone of the media players have their own issues

MediaTank

I use my iSTAR to play exclusively SD and BluRay rips in H.264, MKV, AVI, MP4 and ISO format and do not have any issues. I don't use the music playback or internet features of this unit, just video playback.

vectra

MediaTank wrote: »

I use my iSTAR to play exclusively SD and BluRay rips in H.264, MKV, AVI, MP4 and ISO format and do not have any issues. I don't use the music playback or internet features of this unit, just video playback.

Sounds good to me.

Now
Egreat
or
Istar

The only thing Egreat has over Istar as I said befoe is
extra Ram ---- { Which I love }
and usb

MediaTank

eGreat

vectra

Well,
went ahead and got the Egreat.

Cant use ut till saturday.. Part of my Birthday pressie :cool:

Also got a Humax HD Freesat receiver.
Will report back on both asap

Static M.e.

Hi Vectra,

How are they going for you?

Im looking to get something very soon but Id love to hear what you think about them.

Thanks