[firedog]

Anyone got one of these? Just bought one in the Currys sale - £39.99 - plays everything I've tried, and even has a USB port to play media from an external hard drive.

One thing though - apparently it won't play avi video from a usb drive - is this right? Or has anyone managed it?

[paulsalter]

Thats the one i have, had no problems with playing avi from the usb port (watched a film from my usb stick last night)

[firedog]

yeah it does seem good. the manual says it only supports mp3/jpeg on usb stick.

did you upgrade the firmware?

also, i heard that characters are only around 6 letters for items on a usb stick. anyway to sort this out? the characters are also a bit short with movies and music on dvd discs too.

[paulsalter]

Just straight out the box, one thing i notice, on the general setup page there is a lip sync option, this is not mentioned in the manual so might be later software.

short file names are annoying, but i only have a few items at a time on there, so its liveable, not sure if there is a fix

[Kie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by paulsalter

Just straight out the box, one thing i notice, on the general setup page there is a lip sync option, this is not mentioned in the manual so might be later software.

short file names are annoying, but i only have a few items at a time on there, so its liveable, not sure if there is a fix

I've had that problem for years with philips and samsung divx players. I rename files to "s01e01 Name" using File Renamer. It will automatically rename all the files in a folder.

http://www.sherrodcomputers.com/prod...ilerenamer.cfm

[firedog]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kie

I've had that problem for years with philips and samsung divx players. I rename files to "s01e01 Name" using File Renamer. It will automatically rename all the files in a folder.

http://www.sherrodcomputers.com/prod...ilerenamer.cfm

huh? cant you just rename each file by clicking the filename and overtyping it??!!

i read there is a custom firmware that a user has made which makes filenames on dvd discs longer, but not on usb.

bit annoying as i was going to buy an external and have all my music on there and hook it up to the dvd player, but with 6 characters per item on USB, will be so difficult to find artist and song title.

[Kie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

huh? cant you just rename each file by clicking the filename and overtyping it??!!

Yes, but if you have 24 episodes of family guy to rename before burning to a dvd it can be a bit of a pain doing each one separately.

[firedog]

I suppose your right yeah. Do you have this dvd player too kie?

[Kie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

I suppose your right yeah. Do you have this dvd player too kie?

No, but Samsungs have the same problem. I bought a couple a few years ago and realised that naming files the conventional way like "Desperate Housewives - s01e01", with 12 episodes per disk was a waste of time. It was impossible to see what episode to select.

So I switched to putting the series and episode at the beginning and renamed to "s01e01 Desperate Housewives" etc. which made it possible to read the episode number on screen.

Using file renamer means I can rename an entire directory in seconds, it auto increments the episode number.

I'm using a Toshiba at the moment which shows 14 characters, slightly better for Lost but not for Law & Order Criminal Intent so I still rename all TV series before burning

[firedog]

Yeah. It's a bit poo. Someone made a custom firmware for the philips so you can view more characters on screen which is good, but bit dodgy using custom firmware aint it?

This is my 3rd divx player in 3yrs. I had a yamada 6600 which was amazing, it died after 2yrs, then i bought a £24 one from ebuyer which sucks.

Now this philips - currys £39.99 in the sale today from £49.99. I didnt know this til i paid for it lol

I need an external drive now to plug into the player - this way i never have to use discs. However, usb devices will only display 6 characters!!!
I suppose i could put things in folder, but even then itd still be quite hard for movies.

[Kie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

Yeah. It's a bit poo. Someone made a custom firmware for the philips so you can view more characters on screen which is good, but bit dodgy using custom firmware aint it?

This is my 3rd divx player in 3yrs. I had a yamada 6600 which was amazing, it died after 2yrs, then i bought a £24 one from ebuyer which sucks.

Now this philips - currys £39.99 in the sale today from £49.99. I didnt know this til i paid for it lol

I need an external drive now to plug into the player - this way i never have to use discs. However, usb devices will only display 6 characters!!!
I suppose i could put things in folder, but even then itd still be quite hard for movies.

I wouldn't trust custom firmware.

If you are using an external HD make sure it's formatted as FAT32, it won't support NTFS.

I keep looking at media player enclosures to play from Hard disk but they all seem to have problems, if the philips works with a hard disk then it might be a better alternative even with 6 character filenames. Are you sure it will play AVIs from a Hard Disk? It doesn't say in the instructions.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/RaidSonic-IC...xp_grid_pt_1_0

http://svp.co.uk/product/sumvision_a...enclosure_4482

[firedog]

yeah i have a 128mb (lol) usb stick here so i ripped a 10min segment from an avi and put it on the usb stick, put it in usb slot on my dvd player, and it played it in great quality. usb drive was in fat32 format.

in the manual it says usb supports jpeg and mp3, nothing about video, but it does.

i wouldnt buy a hard drive media player. just buy one of these dvd players and an external and away you go.

i could really do with a cheap external now, but so expensive. I thought i could have got like, a 60gb for say £25. Cheapest I found was £45 for 80gb. Not bad but a bit pricey.

[Kie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

i could really do with a cheap external now, but so expensive. I thought i could have got like, a 60gb for say £25. Cheapest I found was £45 for 80gb. Not bad but a bit pricey.

There's this for £40 from ebuyer but it doesn't have an external power supply, don't know if it will work with the philips.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/143504

Everything with a power supply is 250gb and over and starts at £60

[firedog]

i dont think i need a power supply actually. i can power it from the player itself.

not sure whether to just go for a couple of pen drives or not.

[Kie]

I think these are about as cheap as you will get.

http://svp.co.uk/product/aluminium_u...h_drives_55232

Not as cheap as DVDRs though, 15p a disk and they look nice printed

[firedog]

thanks. i know dvd discs are easier, but this way i can store my entire music collection and use it with my dvd player as a stereo system.

think im gonna keep an eye out for a 80gb external hdd.

[Markynotts]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kie

I keep looking at media player enclosures to play from Hard disk but they all seem to have problems, if the philips works with a hard disk then it might be a better alternative even with 6 character filenames. Are you sure it will play AVIs from a Hard Disk? It doesn't say in the instructions.

Late last year I was looking at buying this DVD player and an external hard drive. I had been looking at Media Players and finally found one that I was willing to try. At least buying it from Maplin, if you dont like it, you can take it back.

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?...221340&doy=6m5

It has played absoluetely everything that I have thrown at it. The latest episodes of all the popular shows from the *ahem* net play happily. Unlike some divx dvd players, this little box recognises the 16:9 flag so that it formats the picture correctly on a widescreen tv. Picture quality is fantastic it upscales up to 720p (a friend thought we were watching Lost in HD).

Its all drag and drop to the player from the pc. I just created 4 folders tv/music/films/pics, and then subfolders in each for individual series.

I never thought that I would fill 320gig, but I am fairly close now. There is a 500gig version which I think is £170.

[firedog]

i want an external to hook up to my dvd player, however, i think i need to be careful when buying one as alot of them are powered by the usb port. How do I find out if my player can handle powering an external and play media off it at the same time?

[Kie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Markynotts

Late last year I was looking at buying this DVD player and an external hard drive. I had been looking at Media Players and finally found one that I was willing to try. At least buying it from Maplin, if you dont like it, you can take it back.

http://www.maplin.co.uk/module.aspx?...221340&doy=6m5

It has played absoluetely everything that I have thrown at it. The latest episodes of all the popular shows from the *ahem* net play happily. Unlike some divx dvd players, this little box recognises the 16:9 flag so that it formats the picture correctly on a widescreen tv. Picture quality is fantastic it upscales up to 720p (a friend thought we were watching Lost in HD).

Its all drag and drop to the player from the pc. I just created 4 folders tv/music/films/pics, and then subfolders in each for individual series.

I never thought that I would fill 320gig, but I am fairly close now. There is a 500gig version which I think is £170.

I'd not seen that one. I was really looking for something without a hard disk as I have a couple of spare 300gb ide drives but might pop down to Maplins to have a look.

What I really want is something, media centre enclosure, DVD player or whatever, that will play HR.hdtv and mkv files on a TV. I think I might end up having to build a media player PC with a decent video card, which is not going to happen for a while. (Wedding to pay for this year & )

[firedog]

Paul, i just tried 'i am legend' and on a usb stick, when alot was going on (the part where will smith is driving the car fast), the picture became quite jerky and skippy. doesnt do this on a disc so i presume its the usb slot. i have upgraded the firmware but no luck. seems like the USB 1.1 slot is a letdown. Any chaotic scenes and the picture can't keep up. discs have no problems.

Anyone got a direct link to the firmware i need to have more characters in filenames for this player please? I found a site with some on however theres so many, and all have some id3 bug thing?? I want safe firmware! Thanks.

[mark2004]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

Paul, i just tried 'i am legend' and on a usb stick, when alot was going on (the part where will smith is driving the car fast), the picture became quite jerky and skippy. doesnt do this on a disc so i presume its the usb slot. i have upgraded the firmware but no luck. seems like the USB 1.1 slot is a letdown. Any chaotic scenes and the picture can't keep up. discs have no problems.

Anyone got a direct link to the firmware i need to have more characters in filenames for this player please? I found a site with some on however theres so many, and all have some id3 bug thing?? I want safe firmware! Thanks.

was it the "Alternate.Cut.WS.DVDRip.XViD-EwDp" version?

[firedog]

no, the first one - 1400mb

[Resident Evil]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

Paul, i just tried 'i am legend' and on a usb stick, when alot was going on (the part where will smith is driving the car fast), the picture became quite jerky and skippy. doesnt do this on a disc so i presume its the usb slot. i have upgraded the firmware but no luck. seems like the USB 1.1 slot is a letdown. Any chaotic scenes and the picture can't keep up. discs have no problems.

Anyone got a direct link to the firmware i need to have more characters in filenames for this player please? I found a site with some on however theres so many, and all have some id3 bug thing?? I want safe firmware! Thanks.

That is caused by a combination of buffering and a slight fault on the actual xvid video, it won't show up on a disc because the player receives the information a lot faster with a lot less work. Once it's caught up it will go back to playing perfectly, you won't find any players that don't suffer from this fault occasionally. If the fault wasn't there, there would be no need to catch up on the buffering.

Overall I've had one of these for ages and have recommended them to at least 8 other people and not one person has had any complaints. For the price this is a fantastic buy, team it up with a play.com 4gb flash drive and it works perfectly.

P.S For external harddives to work they have to be Fat 32 because NTFS (standard these days) doesn't work. Some allow you to convert it but the latest don't

[firedog]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Resident Evil

That is caused by a combination of buffering and a slight fault on the actual xvid video, it won't show up on a disc because the player receives the information a lot faster with a lot less work. Once it's caught up it will go back to playing perfectly, you won't find any players that don't suffer from this fault occasionally. If the fault wasn't there, there would be no need to catch up on the buffering.

Overall I've had one of these for ages and have recommended them to at least 8 other people and not one person has had any complaints. For the price this is a fantastic buy, team it up with a play.com 4gb flash drive and it works perfectly.

P.S For external harddives to work they have to be Fat 32 because NTFS (standard these days) doesn't work. Some allow you to convert it but the latest don't

im put off using the usb port though because if its going to stutter during playback, id rather spend the extra 3mins putting the files to disc.

i was going to go for a 8gb usb flash pen drive i saw on ebay for £12 new, but then again if its going to stutter, whats the point.

dont spose you know of safe firmware to make the player show more characters do you? i know there is a firmware but its a custom mod one.

[Resident Evil]

Quote:

Originally Posted by firedog

im put off using the usb port though because if its going to stutter during playback, id rather spend the extra 3mins putting the files to disc.

i was going to go for a 8gb usb flash pen drive i saw on ebay for £12 new, but then again if its going to stutter, whats the point.

dont spose you know of safe firmware to make the player show more characters do you? i know there is a firmware but its a custom mod one.

The custom ones work perfectly ok and they do sort out the character thing, the usb drive works perfectly 99% of the time and even the other 1% it sorts itself out within a couple of seconds.
btw do not get a 8gb flash drive of ebay, my dad has had about 4 and they all drop information in transfers making avi streams faulty. Play.com has a sale on and you can get their 8gb for about £15