7. Conclusion
These new devices help you bring tunes and video files to your TV from your PCs and drives around your house. Which one is best?
All five of the media players in this roundup were capable of displaying Full HD 1080p video and most of them used the same or similar hardware to decode audio and video. That said, there is a clear winner in this roundup.
At the bottom of the pile is the VMP70 from ViewSonic. While the audio issues we had with the HDMI were a glitch and may not be indicative of retail units in general, the lack of Internet connectivity, its mediocre interface, and $130 price tag make the VMP70 a loser. Avoid this unit.
The Popcorn Hour C-200 is a beast. However, the so-so interface, shoddy remote, and lack of WiFi coupled with an MSRP of $300 mean you’re definitely not getting the best bang for your buck if you buy it. If you want to spend serious money on a media player, go with a nettop or low-end HTPC with HDMI-out.
The Box Office from Patriot represents the middle of the media player pack. For the same price as the VMP70, you get Ethernet, a 2.5" hard drive cage, and a decent set of extra features like a BitTorrent client and external hard drive capabilities. However, the Box Office needs a better UI and the video quality was not on par compared to what the other units in our test offer. If you absolutely need the ability to torrent in your media player, the $130 Box Office is worth serious consideration.
That leaves us with the Western Digital TV Live and the O!Play HDP-R1 from Asus. Both media players feature excellent video and audio, as well as network functionality and the ability to copy media from one storage device to another. The O!Play currently has better file support, an eSATA port, and comes with a lower price tag. The WD TV Live supports component video and comes with a suite of Internet services.
The WD TV Live from Western Digital gets the gold. While the O!Play comes with better file support, this is something that WD can easily address with a firmware update. Internet services like YouTube aren’t coming to the O!Play anytime soon, and while the TV Live doesn’t have an eSATA port, we’re guessing that most people are still using USB 2.0-based drives anyway. Lastly, while the WD TV Live has a higher MSRP, you can buy one online for a penny under $120, which brings it within striking distance of the O!Play.
The TV Live earns the top spot in this roundup, but by the skin of its nose. The O!Play is still a very attractive unit, considering that it retails for less than $100.
One thing we would like to see in all future media players is WiFi connectivity. None of the devices we reviewed in this roundup come with built-in wireless and this is something that absolutely needs to be rectified. Asus already has an O!Play available in Europe that features 802.11n, but there’s no word on when it will come to the United States. For the other manufacturers that were included in this roundup, we have one message for you: wireless or bust!
One last note: Some of you might have noticed that we didn't review any media players from Seagate. We couldn't get a FreeAgent Theater + review unit in time to include it in this roundup (our fault, not Seagate's), but we will try and get a review of it up at some point in the near future.
Nice story.
WD Live does support Ralink wireless dongles which work fine in my secured home wireless network.
I have a WDTV 1st gen and love it... picked it up for about $70 and it has the same file support and video quality as the Live. It doesn't have any network support but there is an active custom firmware community out there that has added it (you can also add... ftp, web server, torrent client, etc). Right now I have a wireless N adapter (about $40) attached that I stream movies/videos from another computer in the house (get around 30mb/s from it). It really is a great little unit. The one big draw back is that it doesn't have DTS down mixing so you need to attach it to an audio unit that can handle that... This was corrected in the second gen and the Live.
Just to be clear...several of these players support wireless through the use of external adapters. My comments on the conclusion page are geared towards integrated wireless. 2010 is coming up quick, so I would love to see the next wave of media players come with built-in wireless instead of making consumers go out and buy a $20-$40 adapter/dongle.
I'd like to see the Xtreamer included in the next round up. (http://www.xtreamer.net/) They usually throw its usb wifi 802.11n adapter in for free, and supports WPA2. I was looking at the original popcorn hour until I saw it. I think you should also mention the modding community behind the WDTV as well as the XBMC alternatives.
What about the Netgear EVA9150? Excellent product. Aside from it's weak GUI, it plays most formats and offers Wireless connectivity, internet access to youtube, etc. You ignored a very significant product.
What about the Mede8er? It is definately my ultimate choice. Solid remote, Solid hardware, Network Access(wired and wifi), NAS capability, NFS capability, uPNP, Internet services, etc. Very Very Very cool multimedia player.
Thank you for the review. It was a helpful intro to some of the differences between players. I only wish the review explained in detail which kind of display was used and which type of content was used to assess the differences in PQ. In other words, did the tester(s) notice a difference in 1080p content, 1080i, 480i/p, etc. They didn't explain the test methods or methods for assessing the differences in PQ.
For 1080p all players should strive to just decode the signal and pass it along to the display without extra processing/gimmicks. So in *theory* (although it's never that way in practice) the players should look very similar on 1080p content over HDMI. Noticeable differences in PQ should be more apparent when the players have to de-interlace/upscale content.
The Popcorn Hour C-200 sounds sweet i am going to get this unit hopefully on a right after Christmas sale. Is the drive cage a 3 1/2" or 2 1/2"?
The Popcorn Hour C-200 sounds sweet i am going to get this unit hopefully on a right after Christmas sale. Is the drive cage a 3 1/2" or 2 1/2"?
The hard drive cage in the C-200 is for a 3.5-inch SATA hard drive.
Also, we tested the media players on both 720p and 1080p displays.
i could have sworn C-200 has 10/100/1000 ethernet...
error on the article?
There is a very good reason why wireless has been omitted in these devices, and it's called good business. Wireless is rarely fast enough for playback of HD files.
The previous generation of devices like this (like those from D-Link) saw a lot of returns at retail due to wireless issues (mostly speed related). The current generation devices all take into account the lessons learned and are omitting wireless to cut down on returns and support costs.
Maybe some day when wireless is actually good for something other than browsing the web...
Will my AC3 5.1 sound stay that way on all the players or get mixed to 2 channel stereo? That's very important to me.
Also, I plan on playing my divx plus content (h.264 with Dolby TrueHD sound (preferred since its the unaltered source) or AAC sound in an .mkv container). Will that make it unaltered? I want great picture and great sound. I want the box to go to my stereo for audio surround and then have that passed through to the tv.
Neither the Asus or WD players support ISO files, which make them completely worthless in my mind (like I want to convert my DVDs to AVI or WMV). I have a pair of Xtreamer boxes and they work great, including support for ISOs and VC1-encoded files.
i could have sworn C-200 has 10/100/1000 ethernet...error on the article?
Correct! It has Gigabit Ethernet on board. I fixed it. Thanks!
-Devin
"a decent set of extra features like a BitTorrent client"
promoting piracy?
"a decent set of extra features like a BitTorrent client"promoting piracy?
How is that promoting piracy? There are plenty of legal uses for BitTorrent, including content that is public domain or content that is legally sold through torrent sites.
-Devin
I have both the ASUS O!Play and the WDTV Live. The ASUS O!Play supports the PGS (Blu-ray) subtitles while the WDTV Live does not.
The WDTV Live supports the Dolby TrueHD passthru while the O!Play does not.
The WDTV Live seems to lose the Windows share frequently and drops the connection. The ASUS O!Play has been very stable in this area.
Both the O!Play and the WDTV Live are the latest firmware level.
The O!Play will stay and the WDTV Live will be going back.
Do any of the units support up conversion so that your 480 You Tube feed looks OK on a 42 inch or larger TV?
I would love to see an article that discusses - in Utopia, what are the best components for a Digital Home. What basics should your TV and Stereo have? Upscaling in TV or Stereo feed thru? What should the network look like - wired or wireless (3x3 450n?). DVD/Blueray players with built in YouTube, Netflix, etc? Roku boxes? etc. Also consider Flip (Pure Digital) and their efforts in this area. Cisco did not buy them to sit back and merely sell $100 - $200 HD cameras. Flip Management is now running the Linksys Consumer division - what's next there?
There are so many choices now and more to come - so what should the entire ecosystem look like?
I was disappointed not to see a Mede8er reviewed with the rest. Top of the heap for the Realtek chip based players in my opinion.