Very cool. Could someone post their impressions on subtitle support.

My philips 642 had srt subtitle support buut subs were white with no border so it became hard to read on scenes with light/bright backgrounds.

Originally posted by cj2003
New Apr 14 firmware is available.

1. Rhapsody with Advanced Server 1.9b.
2. Subtitle support (SRT).
3. 2 GB file issue.
4. Screen Saver.

I'm heading home to give them a try. CYa

"Captain, there be subtitles here!"

I'm sure that's how Scotty would have said it. Anyway, I had to turn subtitle support on in the Setup->Options section before it would work.

I've tested a few bits of divx movies so far and it seems to work great. Nice, easily readable transparent background. Appears very well done. Bravo again to iodata.

it would be nice to be able to make them larger and support .sub as well :)

Latest firmware update:

http://myibox.net/update/local-bus/06-20-050406-02-IOD-234-000.bin April 14


Updated server files:

Originally posted by cj2003
New Apr 14 firmware is available.

1. Rhapsody with Advanced Server 1.9b.
2. Subtitle support (SRT).
3. 2 GB file issue.
4. Screen Saver.

Wow ! That's a huge advance ! Unfortunatelly, I could speak today with IO Data tech support and the did confirm that IO Data has not plans for new firmware update for AVLP2/DVDG netiher AVLP2/DVDLJ that support srt subtitles. Since AVLP2/DVDLA engineering team is on a separeted department, it seems they don't coordinate the upgrades for the japanese versions.

WMV-HD playback is still not fixed with April 14. Audio and video 1-2 seconds out of sync.

They changed one of the zoom modes in HD mode browser.

OK, so how do I get to Rhapsody? I can't figure this out.

A previous post indicated Advanced server 1.9b, which is confusing since the Advanced server isn't at that rev. level. Which is it? Advanced server OR Link Server 1.9b.

I have installed both and can't see how to get to Rhasody.

-- OK, found this on the IOData forum. Haven't got it working yet but at least I have a place to start. This should be on their website.

I don't know if you are familiar with Rhapsody or not so I will try to explain the best I can. First of all, you have to either subscribe to it (9.99 per month) or try the 14 day free trial. After downloading and installing, go to options, user settings, and click on the UPnP tab and check the box that says start UPnP server once logged in. Log out and log back in. Get familiar with the interface and click to add your favorite songs, alblums. or radio stations, make sure they show up in the My library box in the left hand corner.
On the Avel Linkserver software, go to edit, preferences, highlight general, and make sure the suport for UPnP media sever is checked, I think it is by default. If it is not, check the box and restart the server software. Now on your Linkplayer menu, go to your music folder and it should show the Rhapsody server, if not, power off the Linkplayer, then back on. If it does show it hit enter on your remote, and Alblum, Airtists, Radio Stations, etc., should show up. It should show everything that you put in your My library box. It works great. When you get it up and working, a nice feature on the Radio station is if you do not like the song that is playing, hit the next button on your remote and it will skip to the next song in the que. Hope you get it working.

Tom, others,

Do MP3s still stutter in the beginning of each song with the new firmware?

That got broken in April 1 firmware, and was the major reason for me to go back to the previous release. Has that been fixed in April 14 update?

If you have a directory with several MP3 files (either on UHDL, or on Wizd), can you try to hit "Play", listen and see if the sound stutters for 1-2 seconds in the beginning of each song?

Thanks!

Originally posted by Tom Roper
WMV-HD playback is still not fixed with April 14. Audio and video 1-2 seconds out of sync.

They changed one of the zoom modes in HD mode browser.

Any hope yet of playing lossless audio?It may support FLAC in the future. I have been told by IO Data that they think it is possible. They do not believe that it will be possible to add WMA Lossless.

Hey, I re-ripped everything in FLAC only a few months ago. That would be nifty.

- Tom

With the new firmware release, subtitles (.srt's) are working great. I tried both a feed from the Mac version of LinkServer (1.4), as well as a Divx encode on a CD-R. Both worked great!

mp3's still stutter

Newest version:
Seem to have issues at the transitions in several of my DivX and XVid files where I had removed commercials.

It used to sit at some of these point for 5 to 10 seconds before (even though my TP file edits were just a few frames of black. Now with newest version it seems to sit for up to a few minutes (however a pause/play cycle will continue right where it should).

Also FF thru DivX/XVID seems to be majorly broken.

I think I am going back one before rhapsody fo now....

Seems that most of my .TS files now play without the pause/play issue, a few still dont but better than previous firmwares.

snoots, anyone, have you seen that I-O is now saying the new PC version of Advanced Server supports .ty files? Has anyone tried it yet with our hacked Tivo files? I have not had a chance to install it yet to play around since I have relatives visiting, but it sure sounds promising.

Originally posted by Kermee
I doubt WMA Lossless will ever be natively supported by the EM8620L nor the upcoming SMP8630 series chipsets from Sigma Designs. IIRC, WMA Lossless is an entirely different beast than WMA or WMA Pro. What's stopping them from natively supporting WMA Lossless? I'm not entirely sure...

I am getting quite fustrated by the lack of support for WMA lossless, especially
as this Sigma 8620 product brochure specifically states it will decode it...

www.sigmadesigns.com/pdf_docs/EM8620L_brochure.pdf

I'm gonna start calling Sigma tomorrow and attempt to track down a straight
answer for WMA lossless support. I will report what I find out.

Originally posted by istreamdvds
I am getting quite frustrated by the lack of support for WMA lossless, especially
as this Sigma 8620 product brochure specifically states it will decode it... Yes it must be very frustrating for you guys... But as you can also see from Sigma's specification, they mention DVD-Audio and WMA9 Pro too: -

http://img231.echo.cx/img231/1608/em8620lchipsetspec5ts.png

It's really quite sad because, as I've reported before, many of these problems could have been avoided if I-O DATA had had the presence of mind to install 6No analogue RCA/phono sockets...

Using 6No analogue RCA/phono sockets is a tried and tested method of passing DVD-Audio (DVD-A) and Super Audio CD (SACD) signals to an DSS amplifier... So by not including them you can't help but feel a real opportunity has been missed to provide WMA 9 Pro and other multi channel audio streams!

Anyway... that's my 2 cents... again ;)

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Yes it must be very frustrating for you guys... But as you can also see from Sigma's specification, they mention DVD-Audio and WMA9 Pro too: -

DVD-A works just fine at least on my box it does.

Originally posted by webboy10169
DVD-A works just fine at least on my box it does.

I didn't know it supports DVD-Audio. How? I thought DVD Audio had to be output on 6-ch analog outputs (or firewire), which this player does not have. I know most DVD-Audio discs also have a SPDIF lower res audio track playable on standard DVD-video players, but that is not true DVD audio. Is that perhaps what you meant?

Also, speaking of lossless, has anyone had any luck with Apple Lossless codec? This .m4a container of MPEG4 lossless shows up as "unsupported codec" using the normal server. I have not tried to transcode it with the Advanced Server. Anyone know if that works? I do not have access to my player now so I can't experiment until at least this weekend.

Originally posted by webboy10169
DVD-A works just fine at least on my box it does. Can you confirm how the DVD-Audio streams being outputted by your player and decoded by your amplifier?


Cheers

Originally posted by mikemav
I didn't know it supports DVD-Audio. How? I thought DVD Audio had to be output on 6-ch analog outputs (or firewire), which this player does not have. I know most DVD-Audio discs also have a SPDIF lower res audio track playable on standard DVD-video players, but that is not true DVD audio. Is that perhaps what you meant?

I will double check the disc i was playing later today (NIN:The Downward Spiral)

Im stairing at the disc now its marked as dvd-a but then yet its a dualdisc.

I know there is a debate as to weather dual disc's are actually dvd-a or not.

Originally posted by webboy10169
...I know there is a debate as to weather dual disc's are actually dvd-a or not. Most, if not all, the DVD-Audio disc's I have contain both, a full 6Ch DVD-Audio element and an 6No DolbyDigital element (usually encoded at 320Kbps or 448Kbps), as mikemav suggested ;)

In my case the 6Ch DVD-Audio streams are passed via my players (Pioneer DV-575A) analogue outputs to my DSS amplifier. The 6Ch DolbyDigital element is passed via my players electrical or optical digital connection...


Cheers

n/m

Hi Ja Phule,

Looks like an interesting player... but at $199.00 I would assume it can only spin content from standard-def sources...


Cheers

heh, i was reading the wrong thread. Edited :)

Originally posted by Ja Phule
heh, i was reading the wrong thread. Edited :) And it appears the player uses a MediaTek chip-set: -

http://img137.echo.cx/img137/4268/oppoopdv971hchipsetinfo4kp.png


Cheers

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Most, if not all, the DVD-Audio disc's I have contain both, a full 6Ch DVD-Audio element and an 6No DolbyDigital element (usually encoded at 320Kbps or 448Kbps), as mikemav suggested ;)

In my case the 6Ch DVD-Audio streams are passed via my players (Pioneer DV-575A) analogue outputs to my DSS amplifier. The 6Ch DolbyDigital element is passed via my players electrical or optical digital connection...


Cheers

Well call me crazy or just plain stupid but popped dual disc in dvd side up.
press play chose dolby surround playlist it started playing threw digital output in dolby digital. I pulled out the analog outputs which are only hooked up to my zone 2 just to make sure. (denon 3803)

Originally posted by webboy10169
Well call me crazy or just plain stupid but popped dual disc in dvd side up.
press play chose dolby surround playlist it started playing threw digital output in dolby digital. I pulled out the analog outputs which are only hooked up to my zone 2 just to make sure. (denon 3803) If you chose the "Dolby Surround" play list then what you are listening to will DolbyDigital (or even a Dolby Pro-Logic down-mix) and not DVD-Audio :eek:


Cheers

Yeah, sounds like you're getting the DD track. The problem is with SPDIF. This is a relatively old standard and CANNOT be used for newer, higher-bitrate digital standards like DVD-Audio or SACD. Too bad.

I really don't understand why there hasn't been an update to this standard to handle the new high-res audio standards. ("SPDIF II" or something) Then we'd have the option of doing the decoding externally in the AV-amp, where it belongs. (as most people do today with DD and DTS)

Having said that, DD/DTS tracks CAN sound remarkably good if encoded carefully. But you'll never get full DVD-Audio quality out of SPDIF.

New sigma chips are Pin Compatible. Kinda nice to know that an upgrade path may be available later on."The EM8622L is a direct pin- and software-compatible upgrade to the EM8620L, while the EM8624L extends functionality for high-definition display products". "The EM8622L enables customers to effortlessly upgrade their existing EM8620L based products with H.264 and VC-1 decoding," said Ken Lowe, VP of strategic marketing."
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/050418/185489.html?.v=1

OK, sign me up. Where can I get one?

Originally posted by Vat_else_dya_hav
New sigma chips are Pin Compatible. Kinda nice to know that an upgrade path may be available later on."The EM8622L is a direct pin- and software-compatible upgrade to the EM8620L, while the EM8624L extends functionality for high-definition display products". "The EM8622L enables customers to effortlessly upgrade their existing EM8620L based products with H.264 and VC-1 decoding," said Ken Lowe, VP of strategic marketing."
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/050418/185489.html?.v=1 Yes... this has been mentioned a few times before ;)

However, it's not all good news as the new chip-sets also offer new methods/possibilities of encryption :eek:


Cheers

Also, it would be my guess that IO Data would have to reprogram the firmware to take advantage of any new features. They're not likely to do that since the chips are surface mount soldered onto the board and they obviously won't support people soldering the new Sigma chip in. The only possibility would be if they stayed with the same reference board design for their next product (AVLP3?) using the new Sigma chips, and the new firmware would be compatible with our AVLP2 boards.

IMO, they seem to have enough work to do with just fixing all the new problems that arise with each AVLP2 firmware 'update.' I just tried playing a wmv file (Star Wars Revelations free download) and definitely have the 2 second audio lag.

Is wmv audio lag depend on server software, as music stutter with last 2 firmwares (wizd has no stutter issue)?

Originally posted by lmengel
Is wmv audio lag depend on server software, as music stutter with last 2 firmwares (wizd has no stutter issue)? How well do these files play when burned to disc?

I am playing the file over the network, using the same version of Momitsu Media Center as before the firmware (1.3 I think). I'll try burning the file to disk tonight and see if I have the same problem. I didn't try playing the file before upgrading to the 1Apr firmware, so I don't know if it used to work, but do know it has a 2 sec delay right now.

(I asked before and looked though the messages but cannot find the help i need)

I have the dlink 624 and now the cable modem is back up and running.

I cannot get the servers to run. wizd shows up by itself but on selecting it I get the white screen of death.

I have ports 1900, 8000 and 8004 open for both udp and tcp i thought thats all i need but it doesnt work.

localhost 8000 and 8004 works fine.
zonealram and windows firewall off.

any ideas thanks. any recommendations for a diffent cablemodem router, tired of trouble shooting

Firmware and RSS work fine.

Originally posted by catware
...I'll try burning the file to disk tonight and see if I have the same problem. I didn't try playing the file before upgrading to the 1Apr firmware, so I don't know if it used to work, but do know it has a 2 sec delay right now.

Mine have the 2 sec delay, whether played from LinkServer or disk.

I have to roll back to March or previous firmwares to get audio sync fixed on WMV9.

Is it just me or the latest firmware has really screwed up the aspect ratio of the picture ?

Originally posted by lifeisfun
Is it just me or the latest firmware has really screwed up the aspect ratio of the picture ? Do you notice this when spinning disc's or when playing files over the network?


Cheers

I use 99% DivX over network but just tested home made DVD and having the same problem :(

Originally posted by lifeisfun
I use 99% DivX over network but just tested home made DVD and having the same problem :( I'm curious....

Is it happening with all your DivX encodes. What are their pixel frame sizes?


Cheers

Yes, all of them since the latest firmware upgrade.
(640x352 576x240 576x302 .....)

Before it wasn't perfect but nowhere near as bad.

Originally posted by lifeisfun
Yes, all of them since the latest firmware upgrade.
(640x352 576x240 576x302 .....)

Before it wasn't perfect but nowhere near as bad. 640x352 as a cropped and resized square pixel encode equates to an AR of 1.81:1. And likewise, 576x240 equates to an AR of 2.40:1 and 576x302 (do you mean 304) equates to an AR of 1.9x:1...... So yes, they would have looked a bit out ;)

I had my suspicions that the networking software may have had something to do with it but I must admit I'm at a bit of a loss now :confused:


Cheers

Why it wasn't problem before ?

No isues here w Apr 14th firmware and Wizd software as server.

Tried several DivX and VOBs and several Xvids.

(16:9 display set in wide mode, 1080i output setting, HD browser on, DVD setting for 16:9 tv. -- what are your settings when having problems? )

Has it been mentioned that bookmarks for .vob files played over the network would be nice? I do not frequent the IO forum much. Anyone know if this has been a requested feature over there? I often watch only partial movies with my son (kids stuff, shorter attention span) and it would be nice to pick up where left off, like with the DVD discs. All my movies are .vob files on a server.

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
No isues here w Apr 14th firmware and Wizd software as server.

Tried several DivX and VOBs and several Xvids.

(16:9 display set in wide mode, 1080i output setting, HD browser on, DVD setting for 16:9 tv. -- what are your settings when having problems? )


HD browser, 480i to Zinwell scaler 1024x768 to NEC projector

480i -- I'll try that tonight -- I know several people have talked about aspect issues with both this and the LT with non-HD sets. I bet this is why we aren't hearing more about this one.

Thanks !

Originally posted by mikemav
Has it been mentioned that bookmarks for .vob files played over the network would be nice? I do not frequent the IO forum much. Anyone know if this has been a requested feature over there? I often watch only partial movies with my son (kids stuff, shorter attention span) and it would be nice to pick up where left off, like with the DVD discs. All my movies are .vob files on a server.
I stopped asking for things from IOData if I can have it done in Wizd. Maybe I should.

You can also delete that bookmark.

Hi:
I just downloaded the 3 newest firmwares and now when I display my photos on my widescreen TV there is a black bar all the way around and the photos are only about 65% as large as they could be. Do I need to change a setting somewhere?

Have any of you guy's had a look at using Elecard's/Moonlight's Xmuxer (http://www.elecard.com/products/xmuxer.shtml), as a possible cure?


Cheers

At the risk of shameless self-promotion . . .

If you are looking for content for this player, check it out:

http://www.prodigem.com/torrents/torrent_454.html (WMV HD)

http://www.prodigem.com/torrents/torrent_473.html (MPEG4 HD)

We use the LinkPlayer as part of our testing. You can also buy the physical HD DVD (version of your choice) from http://www.onourwayup.com.

No DRM or WMA Pro Audio to worry about.

As an aside, don't know why there is the delay on the DRM version of the firmware (we were beta testing it a month ago); all it does it just allow compatibility with Windows Media Connect so you can stream DRM content from your computer to the LinkPlayer. I'm sure the WMA Pro Audio support is much trickier, the beta version we tested didn't even touch that yet.

Later,

Ben

Could have atleast posted your prices with that shameless plug.

it says 5.99

anyhow

I saw the website thanks. One would lead to believe that was free content by his post. Let me know how the movie is.

Originally posted by lowmazda
I saw the website thanks. One would lead to believe that was free content by his post. Let me know how the movie is.

The torrent links he posted are probably to the trailers and therefore free, I imagine.

Ben, may I ask what tools you used to encode the movie/trailers?

Originally posted by epsilon
The torrent links he posted are probably to the trailers and therefore free, I imagine.

Ben, may I ask what tools you used to encode the movie/trailers?

BZZ. I don't see any trailers for the movie in either of those links. Try DL'ing the torrents and you get a message about purchasing.

Originally posted by lowmazda
BZZ. I don't see any trailers for the movie in either of those links. Try DL'ing the torrents and you get a message about purchasing.
wonderful... I stand corrected.

Is anybody else having problems with the beta 3 version of advanced server ?
It works with TIVO .ty files on one of my machines but the audio and video are out of sync. On the other machine it says "buffering" then brings up a white screen with red text that says the trascoder could not create intermediate files and maybe the file is not playable, and to try playing in windows media to get a codec. I originallly got the same message on the now working machine and it began working after I manually "registered" the transcoder filter using regsvr32, I attempted a manual unregister and re-register on the non working machine with no success.

Looks like the ty file playback is REALLY CLOSE

Snoots

I'm not sure I understand the advantage of the advanced server. If it is decoding the video and sending it in some intermediate form then it might be easier to just view it on the PC, possibly with some hardware accel from the video card. What is gained here?

- Tom

Well, assuming that the LinkPlayer is the means by which you play content on your A/V system, (TV, projector, whatever..) the advanced server allows you to play content that is not otherwise supported natively by the LinkPlayer... At least I think this is the advantage... Otherwise, you would either have to convert the files, or drag your PC down and hook it up to your A/V system...

Originally posted by potus
Well, assuming that the LinkPlayer is the means by which you play content on your A/V system, (TV, projector, whatever..) the advanced server allows you to play content that is not otherwise supported natively by the LinkPlayer... At least I think this is the advantage... Otherwise, you would either have to convert the files, or drag your PC down and hook it up to your A/V system... So you're in effect saying the advanced server offers "real-time" transcoding... and the other server software does not?


Cheers

Correct.

Does the advanced servers GUI look similar to the standard server GUI?

I've noticed that the standard server GUI is poping up in quite a few devices, such as: -

http://img225.echo.cx/img225/9382/networkingguis4ep.gif


Cheers

For me the advanced server transcoding would allow my linkplayer to play the ty files WITHOUT me having to multiplex them to mpeg first. So my pc's can all play them using the tyshow directshow filters which works now, and my bedroom tv can display them from my linkplayer once the bugs are worked out. Just one less step to perform for me.

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Does the advanced servers GUI look similar to the standard server GUI?

I've noticed that the standard server GUI is poping up in quite a few devices, such as: -

[images omitted]
Cheers

Those Screen shots are not anything to do with the server software -- thay are images of different brands of players setup screens -- what you get when you press setup/config on the remote. The reason the setup ui is so similar they all start with a sample ui from Sigma Designs that they modify in firmware.

When you press the server button on the remote you instead get a list of available servers from your network.

When you select one the server ui displays in HTML/PHP pages served accross the network usually with a top page of buttons for music files, picture files, video files, etc.

When you drill in, the ui shows list of folders or media to play and som options such as shuffle, slide shows, sort by album, artist, etc (as appropriate to the type of media picked on the top page).

Since the server ui is html each manufacturer does much of its personalization at this level. Pinnacle does the most with the prettiest ui, momitsu and iodata are pretty similar, so is Buffalo. The original server ui was designed by Syabas who licenses it and provides the source to the manufacturers.

So far IODATA is the only one I have seen with Advanced Server UI which transcodes the Windows Media stuff if the Sigma chip doesn't know that codec. Its ui is very basic but it can play some media no one else does.

The WIZD server is based on a Japanese reverse engineering of the html/php of standard server software which FlipFlop has ported to English and enhanced. It has some of the best things of each server except transcoding and it does some things none of the other do since it lets you cutomize its config.

I assume the images I posted relate to "configuration/set-up" GUI of server software?


Cheers

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
I assume the images I posted relate to "configuration/set-up" GUI of server software?No, as Paul said, they are setup screens of the players themselves.

Originally posted by epsilon
No, as Paul said, they are setup screens of the players themselves. Jeez!

Without having one of these devices myself, I'm finding this element of the player rather interesting...

I wonder... could someone PM or email me the players "Options" and "DVD Player" display windows please?


Cheers

Not having my player handy right now here are some comments:

I-O-DATA LinkPlayer2 Options screen is real close to the mitsumi one in your screen shots -- main difference is a check mark for HD browser mode so that the HTML renders for a Higher resolution when you connect to one of the servers (alloes smaller text and more on the screen).

"Video setting" for the I-O-DATA are the power on defaults for output to the set: 480i NTSC, 525i JPN, 480p, 720p, 1080i. Native unfortunately is not one of the choices. Remote can cycle this setting after power on.

"Internet Security" is missing on the I-O-Data

"Video Zoom" is the default scaling to use at the start of each video play. Settings: Actual Size, Fit to Screen. Remote can cycle this setting after power on -- some choices come and go depending on time of media.



The "DVD Player" Page contains parental controls, (S)Video-CDs options, and a setting for 4:3, 4:3 Pan Scan, 16:9, or leterbox for adjusting how anamorphics display on a 4:3 set or non-anamorphic on an HD set.
Unfortunately the remote does not contain a toggle for this setting and you must stop a DVD to change this.

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
"Video Zoom" is the default scaling to use at the start of each video play. Settings: Actual Size, Fit to Screen. Remote can cycle this setting after power on -- some choices come and go depending on time of media. There are 2 more settings: Full Screen and Square Pixel.

Thanks for the confirmation guys... And my apologies Paul_PDX for not absorbing the contents in your previous post correctly...

...Doh!

This thing F'ING rocks, it's like having a HD-DVD player with my .ts files, playback on regular DVDS is nice as well. got mine over the weekend.

Well, except for all the current glitches...

I think this thing has the potential for being really great.. Just not quite there. The continuous updates from iodata are great, but lately it's been a case of two steps forward, three steps back with each "upgrade"...

I got my LinkPlayer2 in the mail yesterday, and it is DOA. The power light comes on, but that is all. No LED display and not even the DVD tray will open. I went to the website to put in an RMA, and the first thing it asks for is your serial number and the date you ordered. I do this and it says my serial number cant be found! :mad: I called customer service and all you can do is leave a message. I also filled out another form on their site, and it shot me an email saying to fill out the RMA online....At least the email had a persons name and phone nubmer. I have left her a couple messages as well. All I want is a working player.

Originally posted by mikekask
I got my LinkPlayer2 in the mail yesterday, and it is DOA. [...] All I want is a working player. Sorry to hear your unit is DOA. When you get the replacement, I expect you'll be very happy with it and I look forward to your review!

Originally posted by mikekask
All I want is a working player. The DVD door only opens on my player when I use the remote. The LED display also only comes on using the remote or when the unit is unplugged and replugged. Make sure you got some good batteries in the remote and try again.

Originally posted by lmengel
The DVD door only opens on my player when I use the remote. The LED display also only comes on using the remote or when the unit is unplugged and replugged. Make sure you got some good batteries in the remote and try again.
Huh? Sounds like you may have a defective player, too. On mine, I get the LED display and eject function WITHOUT using the remote. The only "glitch" is that the front panel eject button sometimes appears to be playing practical jokes on you. Sometimes, it ignores the first press, and requires another. Other times, it ACTS like it is ignoring the first press, but then starts to eject the tray just as you press it again. Then it immediately retracts the tray as you reach for the disk! Very annoying...

Originally posted by potus
Sometimes, it ignores the first press, and requires another. Other times, it ACTS like it is ignoring the first press, but then starts to eject the tray just as you press it again. Then it immediately retracts the tray as you reach for the disk! Very annoying... Yes, that's the way mine works too. GRRRR!!!

The Eject button behavior you're describing was happening with the original firmware. After the 1st(?) update (the one that introduced the drive speed option, I believe) the problem went away and hasn't happened since.

With all the disk space that all our media is taking up i have a few thoughts for everyone. My interest now is to do away with the pc side of all this and the avel solution isnt worth the money for such small disk size and no raid capability.

With momitsu releasing this http://www.momitsu.com/r5.html what appears to be just a readynas rebranded, Is/does any one use a snap server in there setup? I am running 2 snaps and soon to add more.

The snap servers have the ability to run Java apps on them. Im wondering if anyone out there can port the software needed to run the avel to java?

Just some random thoughts...

Just build a linux-based box and use software raid. That's almost certainly what is inside the Momitsu product anyway ... although it is a fair bet that it might have a non-X86 CPU in there.

If you do it this way, you can run any of several different UPnP server programs.

Originally posted by epsilon
The Eject button behavior you're describing was happening with the original firmware. After the 1st(?) update (the one that introduced the drive speed option, I believe) the problem went away and hasn't happened since.
I've got the latest firmware.. It still happens.

Just as an update, IO data is overnighting me a new player along with pre-paid shipping lables for the return of my DOA player.

Originally posted by psg
Just build a linux-based box and use software raid. That's almost certainly what is inside the Momitsu product anyway ... although it is a fair bet that it might have a non-X86 CPU in there.

If you do it this way, you can run any of several different UPnP server programs.

Its running a RISC 32 processor so yes most likely linux.

Software raid is slower in read access than hardware is it not? How many drives are we talking or better yet how big of an array? And i plan on adding 2 more players to the mix any day now. Im enjoying stocking the closet with 1U snap servers over any kind of tower It looks cleaner and more impressive then computers. I really dont want the added support of linux at this point. Im already supporting 5 desktop pc's 3 win servers and 2 snaps (not much support needed there).

Linux and xbox modders always quick to say "do it this way" when the real answer is i dont know but my way seems good...

Heres a question that may help you understand, Can you add another raid box to it and expand the array by 1 terabyte in seconds like a snap 4500?

OR do i need to add another linux box or pc for that matter when i cant add any more drives to it. This way when i turn on the dvd player i see 3 computers instead of 1 snap drive.

Id like to UTILIZE the hardware i have not add to it.

I for one am not interested in the Momitsu piece my clients might be seeing how most of them cant do more then send email or type a letter in word with a computer.

Porting the software to Java was what i was interested in and judging if there were others with snap devices using this player.

Webboy -
Software raid is just as fast as hardware nowdays unlessyour are using one of the raid 5 or similar types with parity generation/reconstruction. Anyway if you are only copying data to and from across 100bt or even 1000bt ethernet the difference will never really be encountered compared with network time.

My only problem with these nas units is that none of them run a ui for UPNP as good as WIZD.

I have been using Linux based software RAID-5 at work for 5+ years.

On a 5 Year old system, we get about 10MB/sec writing (this involves parity checks) and 60MB/sec reading. This is with basic ATA-Ultra100 drives available back then.

The cpu on hardware raid cards can't compete with the CPU in your computer. I would only recommend hardware raid if you CPU needs to do other things.

I believe SNAP is linux based anyway.

You can get a 1U or 2U computer chasis that you can stuff a motherboard/ram/harddrivers. But, snap is a nice turn key solution.

I would be most grateful if some of you guys could play the following High-Def "Over-Scan" test files in your set-up's and post your findings please: -

16.9 1280x720 Over-Scan Test in AVI (http://82.2.167.237/Uploaded_Files/AVS_Forum_files/16.9_1280x720_Over-Scan_Test_in_AVI.zip) "video only" file.

16.9 1920x1080 Over-Scan Test in AVI (http://82.2.167.237/Uploaded_Files/AVS_Forum_files/16.9_1920x1080_Over-Scan_Test_in_AVI.zip) "video only" file.

If you can, please check to see if there are any differences in over-scan area, when the same file is (burned and) spun on a disc, or played over the network?

Also... please remember to "turn off" any/all forms of up-scaling and over-scan correction options your player and/or display may have.


Cheers

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
I would be most grateful if some of you guys could play the following High-Def "Over-Scan" test files in your set-up's and post your findings please: Why do you want us to play sample clips of yours all the time? Are you still undecided about buying an AVLP2 or do you already own one and want to compare how yours functions to other people's?

Originally posted by catware
Why do you want us to play sample clips of yours all the time? Are you still undecided about buying an AVLP2 or do you already own one and want to compare how yours functions to other people's? As I live in Euroland, we don't have access to any high-def capable players yet (apart from the very new ShowCenter 200... which does not have a DVD drive), so until we do... I have no alternative but to bug you guys!

After years working with Mpeg1 and Mpeg2 (for commercial applications) my primary interest currently lies with the Mpeg4 codec, Mpeg4 decoding (and encoding) chip-sets and high-definition images.... which is why I'm here!

However, while I've been participating on various threads within this forum, my interest has also moved onto the high-def display equipment some of you guys use... most if which, is not available over here in Euroland either (although I do happen to have a couple of high-def plasma displays ;) )..... which is why I'm now enquiring about over-scan!


Cheers

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
I would be most grateful if some of you guys could play the following High-Def "Over-Scan" test files in your set-up's and post your findings please: -

16.9 1280x720 Over-Scan Test in AVI (http://82.2.167.237/Uploaded_Files/AVS_Forum_files/16.9_1280x720_Over-Scan_Test_in_AVI.zip) "video only" file.

16.9 1920x1080 Over-Scan Test in AVI (http://82.2.167.237/Uploaded_Files/AVS_Forum_files/16.9_1920x1080_Over-Scan_Test_in_AVI.zip) "video only" file.

If you can, please check to see if there are any differences in over-scan area, when the same file is (burned and) spun on a disc, or played over the network?

Also... please remember to "turn off" any/all forms of up-scaling and over-scan correction options your player and/or display may have.


Cheers

I will be glad to do this later tonight when I get home, but I am curious how you will determine whether any reported overscan is due to the player, or the display? It has been my experience that overscan is almost always "corrected" at the display. I have done some overscan measurements myself, but the only output resolution that I can be sure of is 480p, because I have a 480p projector that I KNOW allows for zero overscan correction. And in this case, the LinkPlayer seems to pass all scanlines. (i.e. it doesn't seem to add any of its own overscan "correction"... I can see everything out to the very edges of my test patterns.)

Dunno about 720p or 1080i, though. On my HD display (A Sony tube..) I measured about 5% of overscan correction at all resolutions. But I am pretty sure this is being applied by the display. And there is no way to easily disable it. (AFAIK)

I assume that since the player does not correct for overscan for 480p, that it probably doesn't for any output resolution. But I can't be sure.

Without a display KNOWN to be able to display with zero overscan correction, how can anyone tell if the LinkPlayer is handling overscan correctly? Do most fixed-pixel displays (plasmas, LCDs...) allow for zero overscan correction?

I will try these samples tonight also (Samsung 720p DLP).

Observations I have made previously --

Watching HD material that I record myself I have noticed moderately more overscan in 480p and 1080i modes on the LP relative to the same materal being played by my MyHD card at 1:1 out on DVI.

720p on the other hand is shifted left by a large amount on the LP(example at the start of every show here in the states there is a TV Rating code displayed in a box at the upper left of the screen. With every tv I have that box is completely surrounded by background screen and is floating. When played by the LP at 720p the box is 2/3 cut off by the left edge of the screen. At 480p or 1080i it displays fairly normal.

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
I will try these samples tonight also (Samsung 720p DLP). Any news yet.... Same goes for all you other guys with HD capable displays!


Cheers

ok its not the router its my home pc. two lap tops work fine.
pc works fine in safemode with networking but not in startup.

thing is all three machines seem about the same.
Ideas on what would block the ports....
if it matters ipconfig give a dns for the two laptop connection specific dns but on pc its blank. otherwise home pc works fine on internet.
Ideas?
THANKS.

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Any news yet.... Same goes for all you other guys with HD capable displays!


Cheers

Oh, sorry... Yes, I did try out your overscan pattern. Sorry to say, though, that the information I have is probably not worth much. My HD capable display is a Sony HS420 32" tube-based TV, and seems to apply 5% overscan adjustment. There does not seem to be an easy way to turn it off.

With ALL the output resolutions of Linkplayer, I am seeing about 4-5% overscan all around, though I _think_ most of this is due to the display. One other thing I noticed was that the picture seems to be uncentered when linkplayer zoom mode is set to "fullscreen". It seems to be shifted to the left about 1%. (i.e. I get 6% overscan on the left, and 4% overscan on the right... ) For the other zoom modes, it seems to center it properly, with equal amounts of overscan on both sides. The "square pixel" zoom mode seems to ADD some blank overscan to the image, because in this mode the picture squeezes down vertically, and I can see clear to the top and bottom edges of the image. (the horizontal seems unaffected by this setting, and retains about 4-5% overscan...)

One question I have for you: How did you generate that test pattern? It is REALLY nice and clear, in spite of low bitrate. I have been trying to convert some .jpg test patterns to .avi or .mp4, and my results are horrible. Really bad compression artifects all over the place. I have been using iMovieHD on a Mac, since this is the only HD-capable movie editing software I have access to. I tried divx and MPEG-4 encoding. The divx seemed a little better, but still nowhere near as clean as your sample. What's the secret?

- Frank

By the way, for those interested in making your linkplayer2 wireless...check out today's woot.... www.woot.com for those who don't know. :)

Originally posted by potus
One question I have for you: How did you generate that test pattern? It is REALLY nice and clear, in spite of low bitrate. I have been trying to convert some .jpg test patterns to .avi or .mp4, and my results are horrible. Really bad compression artifects all over the place. I have been using iMovieHD on a Mac, since this is the only HD-capable movie editing software I have access to. I tried divx and MPEG-4 encoding. The divx seemed a little better, but still nowhere near as clean as your sample. What's the secret?

- Frank Well.... "If I told you that Frank.... I'd have to kill you!"

That said, you could give a little UK "shareware" application called JPGAvi (http://www.ndrw.co.uk/) a try.... But remember... I'm watching you!


Cheers

The following several posts will demonstrate my results using smd's overscn test avi on a Samsung DLP with the LP2?

My apologies the shots aren't the greatest so I will try and describe also.


SHOT 1 -- my setup's best results possible without using the LP2
(this is using my PC to play over DVI at 720p 1:1 pixel mapping to my set at 720p in the Expand mode which is Samsungs 1:1 720p mode.

Unfortunately I forgot to hide the media player bars top and bottom which are covering the near perfect top and bottom alignement of the video but the following shots will show the LP2 doesn;t really have problems top and bottom.

Shot 2: LP2 playback of SMDs 720p video on my set with the LP2 set for 720p output and display mode FULL SCREEN, The samsung was set for Wide mode..

Notice the entire diaomond on the Left is missing and one extra tick mark on the right is missing. Top and bottom are near identical to what my set displayed in 1:1 DVI mode.

Shot 3 - part 1: LP2 playback of SMDs 720p video on my set with the LP2 set for 1080i output and display mode FULL SCREEN, The samsung was set for Wide mode.. (unfortunately my large pic is not good so I will post this as two closeups of left and right).

Notice at 1080i half of the missing Left diamond from 720p mode is now visible

Top and bottom are near identical to what my set displayed in 1:1 DVI mode and to what was displayed at 720p.

Shot 3 - part 2: LP2 playback of SMDs 720p video on my set with the LP2 set for 1080i output and display mode FULL SCREEN, The samsung was set for Wide mode.. (unfortunately my large pic is not good so I will post this as two closeups of left and right).

Notice at 1080i about a quarter less of the right diamond is lost compared to LP2 play at 720p.

Top and bottom are near identical to what my set displayed in 1:1 DVI mode and to what was displayed at 720p.

Shot 4: LP2 playback of SMDs 720p video on my set with the LP2 set for 720p output and display mode FULL SCREEN, The samsung was set for Wide mode..

One more shot at 720p mode to show how well the LP2 did top and bottom overscan. At 1080i behaviour was near identical for percent of screen but the small text was less legible due to 1080i to 720p conversion.

Final comments:

I also tried this with SMD's 1080i version of the AVI with practically the same results.

Later in the day I also tried the same tests with the LP2 set for square pixel instead of full screen with interesting results. Unfortunately I don't have pictures.

What I discovered was that square pixel improved 720p overscan on the left, Unfortunately it also added a grey line to the bottom of the screen when playing 1080i material.

My conclusions:

if you are playing 720p video:
Best picture on the LP2 is at 720p output mode with square pixel.

If you are playing 1080i video:
Best picture on the LP2 is at 1080i output mode with full screen.

If you dont want to swithch back and forth:
The best compromise with the LP2 is output set at 1080i with Full Screen as the setting.


Of course this is all in my environment:

Samsung HL-P5674WX DLP with 720p native DMD.

People with 1080i sets or in sets with more overscan adjustments (DLPs don't have many) may have other results.

Since you used DVI for HTPC hookup, and component for LP2, we still don't know where the problem lies. It could be that the Samsung DLP is the culprit. You might be able to adjust the dot clock on the Samsung to recover the missing pixels... I'll bet the Linkplayer is sending out all the source image pixels, but it may be doing something weird or non-standard with the "front-porch"/"rear porch" or other scan-related details of the analog component output signal..

Since you aren't able to view all 1280 pixels, this means you aren't getting "pixel-perfect" display on the Samsung.. (i.e. the Samsung is scaling fewer than 1280 image pixels to fit into 1280 output display pixels. It will result in some amount of scaling artifacts, which may or may not be significant, depending on the quality of the scaler in the DLP set.)

I guess this is why a DVI connection would have been nice on the LP2...

Note : I pointed out this will be different with different sets. Your CRT is probably native 1080i and CRTS do have overscan adjustments in the service menus so your results will be different.

However about my 720p shift impressions. My PC can output 720p over component as well as over DVI and although it is not true 1:1 it is properly centered. Note:Samsung DLPs only do 1 :1 720P with DVI/VGA.

The LP2s output of both 720p and 1080i material at 720p is shifted left on my set compared to playback thru both DVI and Component coming from my PC.

It is reasons like this that Momitsu includes an advanced menu in their players to allow timing adjustments to let you shift the picture and adjust sigma's scaler settings so any set can get 1:1 over component with an Momitu. I bet that settings menu is right out of Sigma's reference design so it could be included by I-O-DATA in our players as well..

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
Note : I pointed out this will be different with different sets. Your CRT is probably native 1080i and CRTS do have overscan adjustments in the service menus so your results will be different.

However about my 720p shift impressions. My PC can output 720p over component as well as over DVD and although it is not true 1:1 it is properly centered. Note:Samsung DLPs only do 1 :1 720P with DVI/VGA.

The LP2s output of both 720p and 1080i material at 720p is shifted left on my set compared to playback thru both DVI and Component coming from my PC.

It is reasons like this that Momitsu includes an advanced menu in their players to allow timing adjustments to let you shift the picture and adjust sigma's scaler settings so any set can get 1:1 over component with an Momitu. I bet that settings menu is right out of Sigma's reference design so it could be included by I-O-DATA in our players as well..

Yes, you are right about the shift. It is a Linkplayer oddity. I noticed this too on my crt. But I can get rid of it by using one of the other scale modes.. I think "Actual Size" centers it correctly...

And it would be really great if a Momitsu-like adjustment could be added. This is obviously the best possible solution. Then everyone could fine-tune to their particular display devices. And we wouldn't have to debate whether the LP2 or the display were to "blame" for any overscan problems.

The Roku HD1000 had a very nice implementation of this. I was able to achieve ZERO overscan even on my CRT-based display! (But Roku had other problems that forced me to return it and get the LP2 instead.) I am SURE this sort of adjustment would allow everyone to achieve pixel-perfect alignment on ANY fixed-pixel display (plasma, DLP, LCD, etc..) This would really be a great thing to have, and would make up almost completely for lack of DVI. I really hope IOdata adds this feature.

Thanks very much for providing your information Paul ;)

Over-scan has always been an issue with player TV and DVD player manufacturers... and I support your "advanced menu" suggestion ;)

You guys might be interested to know, over the last few days I've tested several stand-alone DVD players hooked up to the same display by playing my "Std-Def 720x576 Mpeg2 .VOB Test Card" encode, and I was quite alarmed at the difference in over-scan each player produced and how well centred the image was :eek:

So who's to know how accurately the I-O DATA (and Buffalo) players are set-up, prior to leaving the factory... for all we know, the players are not even checked using an HD display. We don't even know if these high-def players and chip-sets, offer separate over-scan adjustment for std-def (anamorphic) and high-def (square pixelled) content!

EDIT:
Originally posted by potus
The Roku HD1000 had a very nice implementation of this. I was able to achieve ZERO overscan even on my CRT-based display! (But Roku had other problems that forced me to return it and get the LP2 instead.) I can achieve zero over-scan too, with my Xcard and TVedia software. Which is quite handy considering most commercially released 16:9 anamorphic DVD's contain "wall-to-wall" image pixels nowadays, instead of a thin slither of vertical black matte!

That said, when it comes to 720p and 1080i "square pixelled" HDTV images, as far as I know they have always been broadcast with "wall-to-wall" image pixels. So the question of "how much picture am I missing" is a valid one.

This kinda makes me I wonder why the high-def player/device manufacturers did not set them up for "near zero" over-scan in the first place!


Cheers

OK guys, my wife wants me to return the LinkPlayer. She is fed up with the lock-ups, pauses, and general glitches with this player. And yes, I'm on the latest firmware. She just wants a "it just works" player. When I was in the market for a new player, it came down to a DVD mega-changer (too bulky in my opinion) or the LinkPlayer. I decided on the LinkPlayer and for the most part, it has exceeded my expectations. Lately my LinkPlayer has been locking up a lot more than what is acceptable. Right now it doesn't want to play discs in the tray player which is weird because I've probably only watched about 3 movies from the tray. I have almost exclusively used the network features of the LinkPlayer. When I put a disc in the tray, it will start playing and then lock the player so that I have to physically power off the device. It has done this with multiple discs. I know others have swapped out the DVD drive for the higher quality drive, but I'm not willing to void the warrantly. Have others had this problem? I'm hoping IOData will give me an RMA to swap out a new LinkPlayer.

Also, has anyone seen garbage show up on the VFD display. I powered it on today and I got total gibberish, then I pressed the Server button and it returned to normal. Weird!

Does this just sound like a player gone bad?

Thanks,

Dan

I would call them for an RMA.

I've seen the occasional lockup and garbled VFD. For me, it seems to happen when I leave a disk in there too long.

I love the LinkPlayer because I know how to get around the idiosyncrasies, but my wife would probably have little patience for it.

Yes, I have seen lock-ups and garbage on the VFD display on mine.

Based on my experiments and experiences, here is what I found out regarding my LinkPlayer. Just my 2 cents on how to avoid lock-ups:

1) I observed that my LinkPlayer either locks up or behaves in a very strange way if it receives a playlist that contains more than 500 items. So even though I have over 1800 songs in my MP3 collection, I had to set the playlist limit to 500 in wizd.

2) I observed that if I try to play MP3s with my own photos in the background, the player refuses to show any photos if the slideshow contains more than approximately 400 items. So I had to delete some of my photos to get the list of photos in a single directory to less than 400. Now the LinkPlayer plays the photos properly in the background while playing my MP3s.

3) I observed that the player behaves in a very strange way when I try to use navigation keys "prev" or "next" to go to the previous or next song while playing MP3s from a playlist. In particular, when I hit "next" or "prev", the player often proceeds to play audio from both songs (the old one that it was playing earlier and the new one that I just selected) intermixed and the audio is garbled. If I use "next" or "prev" buttons while playing music, there is an 80-85%% probability that the player will lock up, and the next time I power it up it will lit up everything on the VFD display (which looks like some kind of test mode after a system crash). To avoid these lock ups and crashes, I try not to use "next"/"prev" buttons while playing music.

4) I noticed that the "bookmarking" function while playing from the local DVD drive in the player is very inconsistent and loses memory frequently. If I watch a movie from the local DVD drive, then hit "stop" in the middle and power the player down (by hitting "stand by" on the remote control) with an intention to watch the rest of the movie tomorrow, in 50% of cases the playback starts from the beginning of the DVD the following day. And in the other 50% of cases it starts from the place where I stopped it. That is very inconsistent, annoying and seems unpredictable. To avoid that, now I rip all the movies to my UHDL drive first, then play them back from wizd, which has a properly working bookmark and allows me to stop the movie and to continue from the same point, then I delete the movie from the UHDL drive once I finished watching it. Pretty much I gave up on the built-in DVD drive in this player because of its inconsistent bookmark behaviour and occasional lock-ups if I leave the movie in the drive for too long. The drive is very noisy, too. So I don't use it.

5) Another thing that seems to be causing random lock-ups and garbled audio is if a movie has multiple audio tracks and I try to switch between then by using the "audio" button on the remote control while playing the VOB file from the network. I get garbled audio in 95% of cases. So when ripping a movie, I have to make certain that I only rip one audio track. The combination of #4 and #5 allows me to watch the movie (finally!).

Even by applying the above principles, I still get occasional lock-ups followed by a full VFD display "light show" every once in a while, but that is mostly when I try to push the player to do something new (i.e. to play a 501-song playlist, for example, or to go go forward or backward while playing a WMV file, etc). The basic functions, though, is something that I can manage to get to work for me in most cases, but only after some "talking" to the link player and "massaging" it with the above work-arounds.

My wife likes the LinkPlayer, but she still gets scared every now and then when she presses a button and the player starts to exhibit some new form of weird behaviour (strangely mishaped objects on the screen, or garbled audio), which is usually followed by a crash. I just had to teach her to recognize the symptomps and to reboot the player promptly and to try to work around the problem by using a different combination of the keys. She is getting better at it now.

Unfortunately, because of the above problems and the required workarounds, LinkPlayer is not something that I would recommend to buy for a user without an engineering degree.

As for I-O Data, I think they should really re-look at the memory management in the LinkPlayer. From what I can tell by seeing the symptoms of most crashes that I have experienced, a lot of them appear to be caused by memory corruption inside the LinkPlayer.

Just my 2 cents. Sorry for the long post.


Originally posted by Steely
{snip} ... Also, has anyone seen garbage show up on the VFD display. I powered it on today and I got total gibberish, then I pressed the Server button and it returned to normal. Weird!

Does this just sound like a player gone bad?

Thanks,

Dan

Wow, thanks for the in-depth reply. I emailed IO-Data to see what the chances of an RMA would be. I have not heard back from them yet.

The last few days, I took the LP out of my cabinet to eliminate any heat related issues. It gets pretty hot in there, but I have a fan blowing right on the LP. The problem is there is no air intake in this cabinet. I'm contemplating cutting some holes for some muffin fans to try to move the air around better. Right now the LP is sitting on the floor in front the cabinet and cool as a cucumber. Since my last post, I have had pretty good luck with network playback. Anyone know what the acceptable operating temperature range for this device is?

Here is my process for ripping DVD's to Divx:
1. Rip DVD to one .VOB file using DVDShrink and keep only DD 5.1 track and Main movie. I don't compress the movie at this step.
2. Convert to DivX with Dr. DivX using HD profile. I shoot for about 5,000 kbps and keep the AC3 track.

Anyone using a 300GB Maxtor OneTouch II drive with the LinkPlayer? I know that it won't work directly with the LP, but I'm just wondering if there are any performance issues related to USB2 or Firewire 400. I would probably attached it to my server running AVel Link Server 1.9b.

Also does the UHDL drives still have the 2GB file limitation?

Thanks,

Dan

Anyone using a 300GB Maxtor OneTouch II drive with the LinkPlayer?

Yup, I have the USB2 only version of it and I love it. It streams to the linkplayer via the PC I have the linkserver software installed on without any problems. I can even reliably capture HD streams directly to it from my MyHD 130 (now that I have one that actually records HD streams correctly). Be warned, I made the mistake of installing the software that came with the drive, and that somehow screwed up my router's ability to do DHCP! I reverted to a previous system restore point, then simply formatted the drive in NTFS, the onetouch backup feature is useless for what I wanted it for . . . namely storage for my HD streams . . .

I was planning on doing exactly as you said, format to NTFS. I won't have much use for the onetouch backup feature. Thx for the reply.

Originally posted by Steely
Anyone using a 300GB Maxtor OneTouch II drive with the LinkPlayer? I use the 300GB Maxtor OneTouch drive -- don't know if it's 'II' or not, but it's USB2. It worked fine when formatted to fat32 and plugged directly in the front of the AVLP2. Now I converted it to NTFS and have it plugged into my computer which uses the Momitsu software to serve the files.

The only problem is when I pause something I'm watching for more than a minute or two. The drive will spin down. If I return, and try to unpause and play normally, I'll get 5-10 sec of video and then the whole thing will lock up. So I unpause, then pause again -- allowing the drive in the other room to spin up, and usually then I can continue playing like normal.

-m

On the IODATA forum IODATA USA Team just posted the following:

"Aaron's comment is correct. Please check your receiver setting first. But if your problem is WMV playback, it may be different. Check the WMV video status. If the audio codec name is Windows Media Audio Professional, it's no sound even if it's not 5.1ch surround. Please wait for the next firmware update.

BTW, WMA 5.1ch audio play needs a supprted AV receiver. Like this:
http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/p...DetailComponent
Thank you."


From thread:
http://www.iodata.com/usa/forum/showthread.php?p=1505#post1505

It looks like our fears are correct these players are just going to pass the WMA PRO Digital 5.1 out the coax/toslink ports so there is no way to hear audio from them unless you own one of the very few WMA compatible receivers.

What a waste ... looks like the Zensonic next October may be our best bet for playing WMV-HD movies . . .

Anyone using a 300GB Maxtor OneTouch II drive with the LinkPlayer?

I have a Maxtor OneTouch (not II). I've had it for maybe 8 months or so. Last week it completely failed, and it was only then that I discovered on-line that that is not a completely uncommon occurrence for this model. I bought a WD external drive to replace it and was (thankfully) able to recover 300G of divx files from the failed Maxtor using recovery software.

I'm still hunting for the receipt. :-(

When I first formatted the drive, I used NTFS. I reformatted the Maxtor after I got the files off with NTFS again and it was unable to hold the format for more than a couple days. Interestingly, I reformatted with FAT32 and it hasn't failed for a week. (I'm not actually keeping any data on it, though!) I don't know enough about drive hardware to speculate why that would be.

Perhaps the OneTouch II was a response to whatever design flaws existed in the first version. Nevertheless, I'm reluctant to purchase another one.

Originally posted by KeithAdv
I have a Maxtor OneTouch (not II). I've had it for maybe 8 months or so. Last week it completely failed, and it was only then that I discovered on-line that that is not a completely uncommon occurrence for this model. I bought a WD external drive to replace it and was (thankfully) able to recover 300G of divx files from the failed Maxtor using recovery software.

I'm still hunting for the receipt. :-(

When I first formatted the drive, I used NTFS. I reformatted the Maxtor after I got the files off with NTFS again and it was unable to hold the format for more than a couple days. Interestingly, I reformatted with FAT32 and it hasn't failed for a week. (I'm not actually keeping any data on it, though!) I don't know enough about drive hardware to speculate why that would be.

Perhaps the OneTouch II was a response to whatever design flaws existed in the first version. Nevertheless, I'm reluctant to purchase another one.
Would Avg antivirus work with it? Its got a free version,one of my pcs had the "F1" boot sector virus,(maxtor hd)no one on the maxtor strings could solve it then I got infected with about:blank and when I fixed the about blank I got turned on to Avg. Avg will do a boot sector scan every boot if its set up that way. If it somehow got a boot virus then good chance you need to put some more protective measues in your pc. That ad-aware by Lava soft is good too.
http://www.dbforums.com/showthread.php?t=705228&page=13&pp=15
I dunno just an idea....

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
It looks like our fears are correct these players are just going to pass the WMA PRO Digital 5.1 out the coax/toslink ports so there is no way to hear audio from them unless you own one of the very few WMA compatible receivers.Bummer!

One would also assume that if WMAPro (5.1) can't be catered for then neither will AAC-LC (5.1)....

I feel as though I've just been kicked in the nuts.... And I have not even got one of these players :(


Cheers

So, what's the big deal about WMAPro? Is there really gonna be any significant content (not just trailers from Micro$oft) using this audio format? Seems to me like most of the "real" high-def material out there right now is using DD.

Put another way: Wouldn't content providers stick with DD for a MUCH broader market segment? It's ubiquitous.

Originally posted by catware
I use the 300GB Maxtor OneTouch drive -- don't know if it's 'II' or not, but it's USB2. It worked fine when formatted to fat32 and plugged directly in the front of the AVLP2. Now I converted it to NTFS and have it plugged into my computer which uses the Momitsu software to serve the files.

The only problem is when I pause something I'm watching for more than a minute or two. The drive will spin down. If I return, and try to unpause and play normally, I'll get 5-10 sec of video and then the whole thing will lock up. So I unpause, then pause again -- allowing the drive in the other room to spin up, and usually then I can continue playing like normal.

-m

I'm using the 300GB Maxtor OneTouch drive with Firewire interface. Works fine. I actually have another Maxtor 120GB external daisy chained to the 300GB then hooked to my PC and both work fine with the Linkplayer except I have noticed the same pause issue experienced by Catware where my linkplayer will lockup waiting for the drive to spin back up. Catware, is it possible to disable the spin down on the 300 GB drive? How? This is not an issue with my older 120 GB Maxtor One Touch.

Originally posted by potus
So, what's the big deal about WMAPro? Is there really gonna be any significant content (not just trailers from Micro$oft) using this audio format? Seems to me like most of the "real" high-def material out there right now is using DD.

Put another way: Wouldn't content providers stick with DD for a MUCH broader market segment? It's ubiquitous.

In Europe there are quite a few major movies shipping in WMV-HD on standard dual-layer DVDs. They look tremedous compared to regular DVD and currently can only be played by PCs -- this is what the WMV-HD support in the link player is all about. You can even buy a few here in the states but they aren't theatrical releases as of yet.

Several online companies also do video on demand of WMV-HD titles using the network version of DRM (cinema now). If more players became available we would expect more titles.

Also microsoft's audio format has been approved for future HD-DVD formats by both the Bluray and DVD-HD camps (as one of two or three competing formats).

Originally posted by potus
So, what's the big deal about WMAPro? Is there really gonna be any significant content (not just trailers from Micro$oft) using this audio format? Seems to me like most of the "real" high-def material out there right now is using DD.

Put another way: Wouldn't content providers stick with DD for a MUCH broader market segment? It's ubiquitous. Whether we like it or not, the world of high-def audio and video is changing!

HDTV broadcasters (especially in Europe) are preparing to take advantage of the increased compressibility offered by Mpeg4 and WMV video, together with their associated audio (ie: AAC 5.1 and WMA Pro 5.1, 6.1 and 7.1) streams. Technically it's possible to broadcast high-def Mpeg4 or WMV content using around the same bandwidth as a current std-def Mpeg2 TV channel.... so the cost savings are enormous!

Personally I'm not a big fan of Micro$oft's WMV (AVC1) video codec but I have to say their WMA Pro (multi-channel) audio codec does sound rather good at low bit-rates.

That said, as I dislike the intrusiveness of DRM I will not be rushing out to purchase truck loads of HD-WMV DVD's. And should WMA Pro (surround sound) audio disc's ever appear with DRM... I wont be buying those either!


Cheers

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
That said, as I dislike the intrusiveness of DRM I will not be rushing out to purchase truck loads of HD-WMV DVD's. And should WMA Pro (surround sound) audio disc's ever appear with DRM... I wont be buying those either!
Windows Media, in and of itself, does not mandate any kind of DRM. Whatever DRM any particular file has is specified by the producers of the content. Blame the producers, not Microsoft.

Personally I have no reluctance to purchase WMV-HD discs with disc-based DRM (other than the fact that I don't have a WMVHD player and don't really enjoy watching movies on the computer). I don't bother ripping DVDs today, so there's no loss of convenience for my use.

Call-home DRM is another story. If such beasts ever become widespread I will only rent them. I'm not going to pay for a license that becomes worthless when the studio's website goes down.

Originally posted by oxothuk
Windows Media, in and of itself, does not mandate any kind of DRM. Whatever DRM any particular file has is specified by the producers of the content. Blame the producers, not Microsoft. I agree partially in what you say, the content providers have a lot to answer for!

But the fact is the content providers main requirement should be to prevent people from copying their product... not playing it... And certainly not requiring you to dial up to a server to obtain a license for a product you've already paid for!


Cheers

The question I have, is if my receiver won't playback WMA9 5.1 passed-through the SPDIF, how come it plays back WMA9 2 channel stereo?

Originally posted by Tom Roper
The question I have, is if my receiver won't playback WMA9 5.1 passed-through the SPDIF, how come it plays back WMA9 2 channel stereo? Over S/P-DIF or 2Ch RCA/phono analogue connection... or both?

Either way, the player should be able to convert most types of 2Ch content (including AAC, WMA9, WMA Pro, MP3, MP2, AC3) to 2Ch PCM audio!

With some alterations to the firmware, this player should also be able to offer down-conversion of multi-channel content, such as AC3, AAC and WMA Pro to 2Ch PCM audio too - instead of crashing or passing silence!


Cheers

T"he S/P-DIF is the only connection I use. Right now, WMA9 2 channel stereo plays fine. I don't know if it's being passed through to my receiver as is, or if it's being converted to PCM. But it plays. So however it's happening, why couldn't the same happen with WMA9 5.1 or Pro?

Well, unless you have a WMA9-compatible receiver, it MUST be getting converted to PCM by LinkPlayer.

It could theoretically also convert multi-channel WMA9 5.1 to Dolby Digital. This is what I was hoping for. But it sounds like they have decided already to just pass the raw WMAPro digital through the S/P-DIF. Perhaps the Linkplayer cpu isn't powerful enough to do the trancode on the fly? I suppose they could theoretically build this transcoding into the Advanced Server.. We will have to see what happens..

Originally posted by Tom Roper
T"he S/P-DIF is the only connection I use. Right now, WMA9 2 channel stereo plays fine. I don't know if it's being passed through to my receiver as is, or if it's being converted to PCM. But it plays. So however it's happening, why couldn't the same happen with WMA9 5.1 or Pro? It's being converted to an 2Ch PCM stream ;) Unless you have an Pioneer DSS amp fitted with a chip-set offering WMA Pro decoding and flash upgraded your player to puke out WMA Pro audio signals via S/P-DIF.

There are such things as 6Ch WAV streams, however it's very unlikely that your DSS amp will be able to correctly decode/map the channels!

Here's (http://82.2.167.237/Uploaded_Files/AVS_Forum_files/WAV_6Ch_Speaker_Test.zip) one for you to try.


Cheers

High def play back is way cool, server-software is ok, but the dang thing struggles with commercial dvd playback!

The last 2 DVDs I've tried to watch have proven too frustrating. Lockups, audio drop outs at startup & pauses....argh! I'm now ashamed to suggest watching a movie on the big screen!


Is there ANY hope? I'm glad I haven't reprogrammed my pronto yet, as I'm strongly considering putting my RP91 back in the rack.

I have a question. For those who have replaced the EPO DVD drive with the Lite ON drive, has anyone experienced lockups or any other problems with the Lite On drive that are mentioned in this forum with the factory drive? Just trying to figure out if it is a DVD drive issue or a firmware issue.

JRad

Originally posted by highgrovemanor
High def play back is way cool, server-software is ok, but the dang thing struggles with commercial dvd playback!

The last 2 DVDs I've tried to watch have proven too frustrating. Lockups, audio drop outs at startup & pauses....argh! I'm now ashamed to suggest watching a movie on the big screen!


Is there ANY hope? I'm glad I haven't reprogrammed my pronto yet, as I'm strongly considering putting my RP91 back in the rack.

There's more than hope...there's a fix. Replace that balky EPO-306D loader with a Lite-On SOHD-167T. Problem gone.

SeeMore, I don't have the Pioneer receiver so it must be converting WMA9 2 chan stereo to 2-chan PCM. Why couldn't the LinkPlayer2 convert WMA9 5.1 to 2 chan stereo via SPDIF also? Then with ProLogic you would at least get some surround out of 6 speakers. I believe they will make that happen, and give you an audio selection choice in the setup menu, as they do now for Dolby, so you could choose WMA9 5.1 pass through or 2 chan PCM. Not ideal, but better than silence.

Originally posted by Tom Roper
... Why couldn't the LinkPlayer2 convert WMA9 5.1 to 2 chan stereo via SPDIF also? Then with ProLogic you would at least get some surround out of 6 speakers. I guess only I-O DATA (and Buffalo) can answer that question. I can't imagine that the chip-set will not allow you to do this.

As a matter or interest, is there an option anywhere in the players GUI menu's for DolbyDigital (AC3) audio down-mixing?

Like you... I agree, any option is better than silence


Cheers

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital


As a matter or interest, is there an option anywhere in the players GUI menu's for DolbyDigital (AC3) audio down-mixing?


Yes. Well, you can choose between "stereo" and DD for the digital output. I assume the "stereo" is actually Dolby Surround. In addition, the analog stereo RCA audio jacks are active even when you choose AC3 for digital.

Originally posted by potus
Yes. Well, you can choose between "stereo" and DD for the digital output. I assume the "stereo" is actually Dolby Surround. In addition, the analog stereo RCA audio jacks are active even when you choose AC3 for digital. Well this confirms that the player does offer 6Ch to 2Ch down-mixing!

When you play this (http://82.2.167.237/Uploaded_Files/AVS_Forum_files/AC3_6Ch_Speaker_Test.zip) 6Ch AC3 test file, what can you hear out of the 2Ch analogue outputs?


Cheers

I don't think the linkplayer understands .ac3 file format. Maybe you can interleave it into an .avi file?

Originally posted by potus
I don't think the linkplayer understands .ac3 file format. Maybe you can interleave it into an .avi file? Good point!

I've changed the file to 6Ch AC3 in .VOB


Cheers

ok.. I tried it. Out of the analog stereo rca jacks, I get downconverted dolby-surround, regardless of the "audio" setup.

On the S/P-DIF, I get Dolby Digital if "audio" set to DolbyDigital, and I get dolby-surround PCM stereo if "audio" option set to Stereo.

So it DOES seem to be doing the downconversion from DD to dolby suround. (Unless, perhaps, your file also contains an explicit stereo stream, like commercial DVDs do?)

Originally posted by potus
ok.. I tried it. Out of the analog stereo rca jacks, I get downconverted dolby-surround, regardless of the "audio" setup.

On the S/P-DIF, I get Dolby Digital if "audio" set to DolbyDigital, and I get dolby-surround PCM stereo if "audio" option set to Stereo.

So it DOES seem to be doing the downconversion from DD to dolby suround. (Unless, perhaps, your file also contains an explicit stereo stream, like commercial DVDs do?) It's good to know that you can hear all 6No "channel mapping" announcements via the 2Ch analogue (and S/P-DIF) outputs during down-mixing :)

Thanks for confirming that... Now if only I-O DATA (and Buffalo) could do the same with 6Ch WMA Pro and 6Ch AAC-LC streams ;)


Cheers

Looks like next gen player will be shown next month ---

InfoComm 05
- JVC "ProHD" MPEG2-TS encoding/edting/decoding professional concept
- New model AVLP2/DVDPA (engineering sample) working demo
Las Vegas, NV June 8th to 10th (Exhibition: JVC Booth # 1222)
http://infocomm05.expoexchange.com/


On the iodata boards several answers from the admin have been implying wait and see the next gen player ...

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
Looks like next gen player will be shown next month ---

InfoComm 05
- JVC "ProHD" MPEG2-TS encoding/edting/decoding professional concept
- New model AVLP2/DVDPA (engineering sample) working demo
Las Vegas, NV June 8th to 10th (Exhibition: JVC Booth # 1222)
http://infocomm05.expoexchange.com/


On the iodata boards several answers from the admin have been implying wait and see the next gen player ...

I'm going to Infocomm anyway. I'll be sure to check it out and report back. If I take my laptop I'll post from there.

The IODATA Forum confirmed today that a JVC branded IODATA player will be available in Sept with DVI-I+HDCP for DVI Upscaling.

Originally posted by Paul_PDX
The IODATA Forum confirmed today that a JVC branded IODATA player will be available in Sept with DVI-I+HDCP for DVI Upscaling.

I'll bet it will not upscale copy protected commercial DVDs via component anymore. Maybe not even .vob files from the network (or may not even upscale those via DVI.) I got the feeling from Jack at Sigma that it was a mistake on the chip design that this version did not have those features locked out.

I bet it will upscale protected DVDs via HDCP.

Is there a waiting list I can get on?

I hope the box will look the same so my wife will not notice the switch.

Well, my biggest complaint about the current player is the "immature" software. It is more like prototype-grade, if you ask me. Which I am not really complaining about, given the "bleeding-edge" nature of the product. But is there any reason to believe the software on the next machine will be any better? And shouldn't we expect roughly similar software to become availible for the current player via firmware upgrades? Unless you need DVI, I don't expect the new model to be a big improvement over the current one. But we shall see, I guess.

It could be that the pace of fixes and updates to current model's firmware is suffering because of the development effort on the new model. That pretty much always happens.

Originally posted by psg
It could be that the pace of fixes and updates to current model's firmware is suffering because of the development effort on the new model. That pretty much always happens.

You are probably right, but what a slap in the face to early adopters! I was hoping that the architecture of the machines was close enough that most software improvements would be "backward compatible", and we would inherit them. This is one of the rationalizations for buying into this known-to-be-flaky product in the first place. The firmware upgrade feature is supposed to fix the early-adopter (beta testers) problems and reduce obsolescence. We shouldn't be forced to buy the next model.

I'm not feeling my face slapped yet. The new one isn't even out until September, and all we are doing is making assumptions.

With such a late release date it will be interesting to see if this player might use the 8622 or greater chips. If this is so, it would be the first player to my knowledge that would have this. Also on IOdata forum they mention of getting a SuperG connection for network use. I am wondering if they are going to be releasing this as a third gen player?
It will be interesting to see what they have at infocomm and that will tell me if I should wait because that extra H.264 support is pretty big for future proofing.

Lets also hope that the JVC player includes 6No RCA/phono analogue audio outputs, so people can enjoy 6Ch WMA Pro and AAC audio ;)

The inclusion of an DVI (HDCP) output socket is a bit strange... I've got a feeling this will most probably be changed to HDMI.


Cheers

HDMI and DVI are close enough that an adapter will get you there. I don't really care which they choose.

Originally posted by lmengel
I hope the box will look the same so my wife will not notice the switch.

If not -- hopefully similar enough looking so we may be able to swap out the front plate ;)

Originally posted by SeeMoreDigital
Lets also hope that the JVC player includes 6No RCA/phono analogue audio outputs, so people can enjoy 6Ch WMA Pro and AAC audio ;)

The inclusion of an DVI (HDCP) output socket is a bit strange... I've got a feeling this will most probably be changed to HDMI.


Cheers

The I-O-DATA support guy hinted there may be something new in audio for us as well but he wasn't clear on that.

There was also a hint about some form of 108mbit wireless.

I also expect the final product will be HDMI.

and I expect it will use the Sigma 8630L so H264 and DVD-Audio become possible (Sigma says the 8630 is pin compatible so a switch to that processor would mostly involve newer firmware for a hardware manufacturer.

The I-O-DATA board has been getting more I-O-DATA traffic lately -- it's worthwhile now to have an account over there so you can click new posts and see whats up since your last visit.

I just want the existing product to actually play commercial DVDs w/o lockups & skipping! The machine wouldn't recognize an older NEC DVD drive I had laying around, and a new Samsung got WORSE.


No more iodate products for me, my family, and any of my friends until this thing actually works.

Wow, just got through reading/skimming this entire monster thread (took me around 4 days to do). I'm very interested in this product, but had a few questions I was hoping to get answered for me.

The main things I'm looking for this player to do is upscale DVDs (commercial and ripped ones) to HD quality. I would also like be able to watch downloaded divx HD programs on my main TV. Streaming MP3s over the network would also be nice.

Originally posted by mabrym
Do you think I would have success streaming live baseball from mlb.tv?
This is another thing I'm interesting in doing, but didn't read anybody having success in the posts (might have missed it). Has anyone had success watching the MLB.tv?

To Tom and those that have upgraded the stock drive to the Lite-On drive, did you find this pretty easy to do? I have upgraded drives in my PC, but am a little leary of doing this to a DVD player. Is it basically the same process (w a few extra steps) that a newbie could do?

I remember reading posts that it has problems w some commercial DVDs. How often did you guys have problems? Was it a disc every once in a while, or some what regular.

Also, I see you guys lately have been wondering about if the upconversion will be turned off w new firmware. I know I'm speaking out of bounds, but shouldn't this unit be hackable? I'd think people would be all over this unit and not just relying on IOData's firmware.

Originally posted by yanksno1
Wow, just got through reading/skimming this entire monster thread (took me around 4 days to do). I'm very interested in this product, but had a few questions I was hoping to get answered for me.

The main things I'm looking for this player to do is upscale DVDs (commercial and ripped ones) to HD quality. I would also like be able to watch downloaded divx HD programs on my main TV. Streaming MP3s over the network would also be nice.

Upscaling DVD will not get you HD quality. It may get you a better picture if your TV's internal scaler is not so good. The AVLP2 does not officially upscale anything. That said, DVD looks great on my 50v500 with the AVLP2 and is a definite improvement over my old junk player.

I only listen to MP3's very rarely on my player so I can't really speak to how it handles MP3 at this time.


This is another thing I'm interesting in doing, but didn't read anybody having success in the posts (might have missed it). Has anyone had success watching the MLB.tv?

I have not tried it. Judging from the sample on MLB.com it uses streaming wmv so it may be possible.


To Tom and those that have upgraded the stock drive to the Lite-On drive, did you find this pretty easy to do? I have upgraded drives in my PC, but am a little leary of doing this to a DVD player. Is it basically the same process (w a few extra steps) that a newbie could do?

It is almost exactly the same as upgrading your PC. 3 things are different. You need to temporarily mount the drive in a PC and set the region code before installing in the player. There is no existing mounting for a PC DVD drive so some creativity is necessary to mount the drive. For a professional look you need to swap the drive tray face plate from the existing loader to the new PC DVD drive.


I remember reading posts that it has problems w some commercial DVDs. How often did you guys have problems? Was it a disc every once in a while, or some what regular.

The stock loader is extremely picky. I have had brand new out of the box DVDs not play well. A quick cleaning usually fixes the problem. I have run into some extras discs that wouldn't play correctly but that has been fixed in firmware updates. I have a new DVD drive to mount in mine but keep using the player instead of ripping it apart to upgrade the loader.


Also, I see you guys lately have been wondering about if the upconversion will be turned off w new firmware. I know I'm speaking out of bounds, but shouldn't this unit be hackable? I'd think people would be all over this unit and not just relying on IOData's firmware.

Since the AVLP2 does not officially upscale anything it would be hard to remove a feature that doesn't exist from the firmware.

While almost anything is hackable you have to get the right people interested in hacking something and that has not happened with this player yet. We have done some very simple hacks like the ability to load any firmware version but it will take much bigger brains than ours to do true firmware hacking.

I've successfully set up the Linkplayer Linux server on Knoppix but in setting it up on Fedora (core2) it points to the files it created in the root directory. Editing the config.xml file did not help as I wanted it to point to directories in my user directory (as it does with Knoppix). Anyone have any experience with this?

I just got my AVLP2 Friday. Set it up, networked, updated firmware, etc.
DANG is this sucker LOUD while playing a DVD!!!!!!!!!!
I assume that I have to upgrade the loader to make it quiet.
Has anyone successfully used a Sony DDU1621 in a AVLP2? I have one laying around.
I realized this was just going to be a toy to tinker with before I bought it. Otherwise I would be very disappointed.

Originally posted by Brian Conrad
I've successfully set up the Linkplayer Linux server on Knoppix but in setting it up on Fedora (core2) it points to the files it created in the root directory. Editing the config.xml file did not help as I wanted it to point to directories in my user directory (as it does with Knoppix). Anyone have any experience with this?

Brian,

I haven't tried the Linux server, so I don't know how you may change the directory. I have worked with Linux and Unix for many years though, and one very useful feature in Linux is the symbolic link. You can simply replace the directory the Server currently is pointing to with a soft link to the directory you have your data. The command is ln -s

/Anders

Thanks Anders, soft links work but I was wondering why the server isn't using the config.xml file to get the correct directories. The config file works on Knoppix.

okay just found out garfield does not work with this machine at all, can someone else test this dvd for me if any of you guys own it. this is the dvd with jennifer love hewitt. My daughter is getting angry that it doesn't work. I've tried all the firmwares and this dvd does not work!! please can someone else test this?? it locks up for a minuter or 2 at the attention screen and then totally locks up at the choose your aspect ratio screen. Also notice that freak friday with lindsay lohan locks up too. I'm guessing that there is some type of problem with movies that you choose the aspect ratios for!!

Just read on IODATA forum that the next player will be named AVLP3 and will be completelly different from the AVLP2. Much bigger ROM for firmware has been cited.

I hope the new player get to be more like a media extender for MCE (like the XBOX 360 will be).

I recently upgraded to the 5Apr firmware from the 27Dec firmware. Now I am unable to watch a DivX file over the network for more than ~35min without the file locking up. I have to power cycle the AVLP2 with the remote, and then go back to the file I was watching and fast forward to the point I was at.

I think the AVLP2 is losing the network connection. I've been using the Momitsu server all along. This is off an internal hard drive on the computer that is serving so it isn't spinning down or anything.

Anyone else experience this? It's really frustrating!

-michelle

I recently upgraded to the 5Apr firmware from the 27Dec firmware. Now I am unable to watch a DivX file over the network for more than ~35min without the file locking up. I have to power cycle the AVLP2 with the remote, and then go back to the file I was watching and fast forward to the point I was at.

Anyone else experience this? It's really frustrating!



I have not noticed any problems with my DivX files with the most recent firmware. Does it only happen with certain files or with all of them?

Hi,

Some newbie questions.

I'm currently using the AVLP2 with a regular TV (27" CRT from 1997) with S-Video. It's nice.

Would buying a HDTV (I'm considering one of the Toshiba 16:9 CRT HDTV) and connect the AVLP2 with D4->component improve the image quality to play regular DVDs? Or would the resolution of the DVDs prevent any improvement?

Thanks in advance,

Janus

Yes. You bet! That's pretty much this device's whole reason for being ---

Paul

Hi,

Some newbie questions.

I'm currently using the AVLP2 with a regular TV (27" CRT from 1997) with S-Video. It's nice.

Would buying a HDTV (I'm considering one of the Toshiba 16:9 CRT HDTV) and connect the AVLP2 with D4->component improve the image quality to play regular DVDs? Or would the resolution of the DVDs prevent any improvement?

Thanks in advance,

Janus

I have not noticed any problems with my DivX files with the most recent firmware. Does it only happen with certain files or with all of them?All of them, but it's not a firmware problem. I went back to 27Dec and still had the problem. Then I pulled the network link from the switch that both the computer server and the AVLP2 are connected to, and the problem went away.

Odd, I don't know what is causing it -- it must be something with the computer going to the web or something. It's definitely a broken network link, though. The AVLP2 completely loses the ability to browse files on the server, but a simple power cycle with the remote on the AVLP2 will reestablish the link, for the next 35 min or so. And it's worked flawlessly since I pulled the network uplink.

-m

Michelle,

If the switch has updateable firmware, you might try that. Otherwise, replace the switch. If it was functioning properly, it would be transparent.

One other outside possibility that occurs to me is the possibility of a trojan on your computer that when connected to the net, gets busy enough to break the connectivity between the computer and the LinkPlayer.

Paul

All of them, but it's not a firmware problem. I went back to 27Dec and still had the problem. Then I pulled the network link from the switch that both the computer server and the AVLP2 are connected to, and the problem went away.

Odd, I don't know what is causing it -- it must be something with the computer going to the web or something. It's definitely a broken network link, though. The AVLP2 completely loses the ability to browse files on the server, but a simple power cycle with the remote on the AVLP2 will reestablish the link, for the next 35 min or so. And it's worked flawlessly since I pulled the network uplink.

-m

One other outside possibility that occurs to me is the possibility of a trojan on your computer that when connected to the net, gets busy enough to break the connectivity between the computer and the LinkPlayer. Actually, I'm thinking it's that. It was working fine for many months. And I just got hit BAD with spyware last week :( --although the problem was present before. I'm always good at clicking 'NO' on websites that ask to install something, but I'm thinking that when I clicked 'NO' some site installed something anyway. Now despite Ad-Aware's best efforts I get a pop-up every thirty seconds. If I leave my computer idle for a while, I'll have the maximum # of IE windows within a short while, around 40-50 popups I think. Grrrrrr!!! Time to reinstall WinXP.

Ad Aware is rarely sufficient on it's own. When I have to clean up a mess on a customers machine I use Ad Aware and Spybot Search & Destroy together and it usually fixes the problem.

Glad it is not a LinkPlayer problem though :)

Add in Hijack This, and you just might get rid of all of it. But HijackThis just gives you info, it leaves it up to you to remove the bad stuff. For a number of virii, trojans and other malware, you'll need to reboot in safe mode in order to successfully remove all traces ... without having it reappear.

A reinstall without wiping the drive clean may not help.

Here's a simple way to avoid 99.99% of the problems: never use IE (except for the few brain-damaged sites that absolutely require it), and never, ever use Outlook or Outlook Express. Substitute Firefox and Thunderbird for browsing and email, and you will be MUCH happier. (Not to mention, much less of a risk and liability to the rest of the internet!) Outlook must be completely *removed* from your system.

Catware ... are you listening ????? Friends don't let friends use IE!

Paul

Ad Aware is rarely sufficient on it's own. When I have to clean up a mess on a customers machine I use Ad Aware and Spybot Search & Destroy together and it usually fixes the problem.

Glad it is not a LinkPlayer problem though :)

:) Thanks, Paul! I do use IE and OE. Didn't think OE caused any problems but what do I know! I'll look at those two programs -- not too impressed with OE anyway.

Here's a simple way to avoid 99.99% of the problems: never use IE (except for the few brain-damaged sites that absolutely require it), and never, ever use Outlook or Outlook Express. Substitute Firefox and Thunderbird for browsing and email, and you will be MUCH happier. (Not to mention, much less of a risk and liability to the rest of the internet!) Outlook must be completely *removed* from your system. I 100% agree with you!

I have not run Outlook or Outlook Express for over 4 years now... I use "Hotmail" instead, because it scans all your incoming (and outgoing) messages for viruses automatically, using fully up to date software!

Athough I have FireFox installed I do however still use IE :eek:


Cheers

Just got an e-mail about a new firmware:

Date: June 03, 2005
The latest Version: 06-35-050430-02-IOD-234-000
[ Update Info ]
- WMA Pro (Windows Media(R) Audio Professional) supported *2ch out only
- Microsoft Media(R) Connect supported
- Microsoft Media(R) DRM for SD implemented (PC's DRM video streaming)
- PAL TV Video Output
- DLNA compliance
- DVR-MS file supported (w/ LinkServer or Windows Media(R) Connect)
*We are planning one more minor update in this month


However I don't see it listed under "FW Update" -- Do I need to update first?

MMMMmmmm. WMAPro Audio support.

Correct link for new firmware download

http://myibox.net/update/local-bus/06-35-050430-02-IOD-234-000.bin June 03

Updated server files

Quick news so far -- seem to fix MP3 playback issues (noise at start) and fixes JPG display size during slide shows.

On to checking out some WMA files ....


I think I am really going to like this firmware

New firmware seems to rock. No pause/play bug on the ts files I have checked so far.

The 2 Microsoft WMV HD clips I have do NOT have audio over the digital connection though.

Quick news so far -- seem to fix MP3 playback issues (noise at start) and fixes JPG display size during slide shows.



Hi:
I can't get the slideshow thing to work right with the 6/3 firmware - I still have big black borders all the way around my photos on my widescreen TV - Since I had to re-enter all the setup data I may have done something wrong - On the player setup for "Video Zoom" you can pick full screen, fit to screen, or actual size and on the LinkServer software under "preferences" , "photo" for "photo scale" you have the same three choices. How do you have yours set?? I also set my "DVD setup" to 16:9 on the player setup menu.

On the same subject - I have never been able to get music to play with my slide show - how does that work? (I am going to check the manual but I don't remember seeing it there)

Right now I am trying to install Microsoft Media Connect so that I can play the "Ray" trailer with DRM that is available on the microsoft website on the LinkPlayer

Also, for everyone who uses a signal sensing switchbox with the Linkplayer, they have corrected the bug that put out an audio signal even after the player was switched off with the remote control.

Joseph

New firmware seems to rock. No pause/play bug on the ts files I have checked so far.


I second that. No audio drops on any of the ts files I've tried. And, FF and REW now work on ts files. Don't think I've seen that mentioned yet.

This is a MAJOR improvement!!

I second that. No audio drops on any of the ts files I've tried. And, FF and REW now work on ts files. Don't think I've seen that mentioned yet.

This is a MAJOR improvement!!

I wasn't going to mention it yet because it locked up my player on the first file I tried. I have lost the TV to the family until later tonight so no more testing for me until after bed time.

irgaac,

Sounds like my household... So far so good on the update except it shows 2 UPnP servers running now on the main screen which I can access but nothing will play. (Snapstream and Music Match)

JRad

does upconvert still work with the latest firmware?

does upconvert still work with the latest firmware?
what are you talking about it never did work ;) , but yeah it still does.

In the limited testing i've done, mostly WMA Pro/WMV files:

1. Only the analog outputs give me any sound w/ WMA Pro.
2. If I FastForward a WMA Pro/WMV file the sound becomes scrambled.
3. A WMV wouldn't play at all (ASF error) on a file that played in pervious firmwares (without sound)
4. In the limited .TS testing I did, I encountered no issues

Overall i'm pretty disapointed. I had to hook analog audio cables to my DVD player for the first time since I've owned one (1998). And not being able to fastfoward really bites.

In the limited testing i've done, mostly WMA Pro/WMV files:

1. Only the analog outputs give me any sound w/ WMA Pro.
2. If I FastForward a WMA Pro/WMV file the sound becomes scrambled.
3. A WMV wouldn't play at all (ASF error) on a file that played in pervious firmwares (without sound)
4. In the limited .TS testing I did, I encountered no issues

Overall i'm pretty disapointed. I had to hook analog audio cables to my DVD player for the first time since I've owned one (1998). And not being able to fastfoward really bites.

1) If your receiver only accepts DD-AC3/DTS via digital you won't be able to digital WMA Pro playback -- Digital out of WMA requires that your receiver supports WMA Native in (IODATA has a list of receivers they have tested with -- newest Pioneers for example).

2&3) didn't encounter any issues with either of these.

4) My favorite new firmware improvement.

Hi:
I can't get the slideshow thing to work right with the 6/3 firmware - I still have big black borders all the way around my photos on my widescreen TV - Since I had to re-enter all the setup data I may have done something wrong - On the player setup for "Video Zoom" you can pick full screen, fit to screen, or actual size and on the LinkServer software under "preferences" , "photo" for "photo scale" you have the same three choices. How do you have yours set?? I also set my "DVD setup" to 16:9 on the player setup menu.


I was testing with Wizd when I did my first post yesterday -- later I tried with the IODATA servers and noticed the letterbox issue again so I am not sure what is going on -- at least Wizd is looking great.

Only the analog outputs give me any sound w/ WMA Pro. My guess is that this is a Microsoft DRM requirement. When I had a Prismiq, they added Rhapsody with only 2 channel analog access. Rhapsody has changed that requirement, but I would be surprised if Microsoft followed that direction.

I was testing with Wizd when I did my first post yesterday -- later I tried with the IODATA servers and noticed the letterbox issue again so I am not sure what is going on -- at least Wizd is looking great.


Paul_PDX,

You answered my question that I posted over in the I-O Data Link Player forum here. Guess I have to learn WIZD in order to get my slide shows to work. Anyone have instructions on how to load and then build folders in WIZD? I checked flip flops thread in the I-O Data forum and although very good, I was only able to get WIZD to appear as a server, but did not know how to build the folder list. I really like the new firmware and Avel link server software for music and video, so I will only need to run WIZD for photos. Thanks!

--Michael

Paul_PDX,

You answered my question that I posted over in the I-O Data Link Player forum here. Guess I have to learn WIZD in order to get my slide shows to work. Anyone have instructions on how to load and then build folders in WIZD? I checked flip flops thread in the I-O Data forum and although very good, I was only able to get WIZD to appear as a server, but did not know how to build the folder list. I really like the new firmware and Avel link server software for music and video, so I will only need to run WIZD for photos. Thanks!

--Michael

You have to edit the wizd.conf file to specify where your media files are:

Lines like

moviealias HDFiles c:\hdtv
moviealiss DVDs d:\DVDs
photoalias Pictures c:\documents and settings\username\My Documents\My Photos
musicalias MP3s e:\music\my mp3 files


etc

you need to restart wizd every time you change settings
there are lines farther along to specify your tv settings (my example for 720p
Samsung set)

target_jpeg_width 1280
target_jpeg_height 720
widen_ratio 1

Hi all,

So far I think the latest firmware update is the best yet, I love being able to FF/RW through .TS files, so the files I save from my MyHD card don't have to be converted into program streams so I can have that funtionality on the Linkplayer2 anymore.

Now that I have the linkplayer2 and a MyHD 130 with DVI out, I think I've put together the perfect HDTV viewing/capturing/archiving setup for myself, but I'm still experimenting with the best way to convert HDTV .TS files to AVI or WMV so that they can fit on a DVD5 disc(these streams are taking up my 800gigs of space fast!), yet still have picture quality that's almost as good as the original stream. I used Dr. Divx initially, but that only worked well for me half the time, the other half there were audio sync issues, and the video didn't always play back smoothly. Now I'm using Gordian Knot, and that works very well, but when I convert to XVID and set the target file size to 4gigs, the resulting file plays back fine on my PC, but the audio sync is gradually lost during playback on the Linkplayer2. If I set the target size to 2gigs, then it still looks good and plays back well on the Linkplayer2, so now I'm wondering how high I can go with the bitrate before it gets too high for the Linkplayer2 to handle. I am still experimenting, but it's taking many hours to convert each file to XVID, so I'm hoping someone else has already determined what works best with the Linkplayer2, so they can clue me in.


Thanks!

Brian

I updated my firmware and for whatever reason I now do not have any video signal on the D4 output. I thought it was completely dead until I plugged into the analog video and saw that it was alive. I decided to try and downgrade to an older version and after it downloaded the older image it said "Wrong Signature" and gave a "System Error: 0xDead15". I can't change the firmware to any other version and my D4 output is toast.

I've sent in a problem report to I-O Data. Any other thoughts on things I might be able to do?

Thanks
Rob

From the IOData Forum:

Therefore, after updating, your TV may be black out because this update is not minor, it's a major update! Also as we mentioned, this firmware can support PAL output.
As a result, anyhow you need to push "TV MODE" button to be back to your TV input. Try it by checking VFD monitor. Somebody may need to push 5 to 6 times because you need to go through PAL TV outs. Thank you.

That was it. Thank you for such a quick response. Much appreciated.

Rob

Great! hopefully it will help a few others. I got lucky and happened to read the forum message just before upgrading, so I was expecting my display to be dead post update.

Kelly

Besides needing to cycle tv modes the other thing IODATA said was that you need to go in setup and reset all your options as this build doesn't preserve your setting on the player.

I did noticed that my settings were blitzed. I am still concerned though that I cannot change the firmware to an another version. I have the Abyss setup with all of the various firmware, which has been great. I wonder if they've "tweaked" something so that you cannot get firmware from anywhere except their server now?

Rob

1) If your receiver only accepts DD-AC3/DTS via digital you won't be able to digital WMA Pro playback -- Digital out of WMA requires that your receiver supports WMA Native in (IODATA has a list of receivers they have tested with -- newest Pioneers for example).

Oh, I see. So the reason we don't get the 2-ch downmix as PCM is because it is sending the raw WMA Pro digital stream out the digital port. (i.e. the port is occupied) They should make this configurable. I'd rather have the PCM downmix in this situation. Do you suppose the 2-ch downmix is dolby-surround encoded?

hi there,
Im live on Mallorca, spain.Im like to know if any of yours can buy one of this for me, or where buy one from web.
The main page dont let me buy anything because im from outside usa.
im very interest in hd playback, i build a htpc with mega 651, but dont play upscaled dvd, and hd very well, so i want buy one of this.
Can your help me?

Thanks.

Has anyone else found that you can no longer change the firmware to an older version?

I have been using the Abyss server with the files provided by irgaac and I can't load anything. The Roll Back to previous firmware is also gone. I have been trying the new firware versions as they came out and always went back to Feb 4th version since everything worked properly, now it seems I'm stuck with this version and small pictures. :mad:

Rob

...I'm wondering how high I can go with the bitrate before it gets too high for the Linkplayer2 to handle. I am still experimenting, but it's taking many hours to convert each file to XVID, so I'm hoping someone else has already determined what works best with the Linkplayer2, so they can clue me in.
Brian you may want to try the latest AutoGK v2.09b, and select the "ESS/Sigma" compatibility option. Although this is, I believe, for the earlier generation of Sigma chips it may be worth a shot.

I have an MDP file myself that I'm going to try this with, but I only have a Sigma-what, 8550? device (the ShowCenter 1000) so couldn't corroborate results w/you. I think though that my next-gen device is gonna be an ALP2!

p.s. The older chip has a bitrate limit of 2500Mbps for Divx/Xvid files; maybe the new chip has this published somewhere?

p.s. The older chip has a bitrate limit of 2500Mbps for Divx/Xvid files; maybe the new chip has this published somewhere?Which older chip are you talking about?


Cheers

THIS should have been what they released to manufacturing.

This week I started researching HTPC components, as I was ready to throw in the towel!

thankyou io-data, but shame on you io-data.

Which older chip are you talking about?OTTOMH I had said the 8550, but that is the "family". The chip in the ShowCenter 1000 is actually the EM8551.

Honestly it is not clear to me at this moment where the "2500Mbps bitrate limit" for the 8551 came from for Xvid files. Maybe that was just something that fell-out of Pinnacle's testing. I will look a little harder for documented Xvid bitrate limits on the 8620. A quick search of the IOData forum on "Xvid bitrate" suggests no one has found the upper limit yet for the ALP2!?

Has anyone else found that you can no longer change the firmware to an older version?

I have been using the Abyss server with the files provided by irgaac and I can't load anything. The Roll Back to previous firmware is also gone. I have been trying the new firware versions as they came out and always went back to Feb 4th version since everything worked properly, now it seems I'm stuck with this version and small pictures. :mad:

Rob


F@!K YOU I-O DATA!

Not only can you not roll back firmwares (they've changed the signature), they've shut down my Lite-On SOHD167T DVD loader which I used to replace the crap EPO306D loader.

I cannot play DVD's at all now.

I noticed that the new firmware chops a little bit off the top and the bottom of each picture. At first I did not notice it, but then observed that some of my pictures looked "weird". Upon further testing, sure enough - I noticed that LinkPlayer was trimming some of the image off each picture (an overscan problem?).

In order to compensate for that, I adjusted the target picture height in wizd from 1080 to 988. That fixed and and my pictures are displayed without any "trimming" off the top or the bottom now. I run LinkPlayer in 1080i mode with Sony KDF-42WE655. My wizd settings are as follows:

## For 1080i output
## Note: "height 1080" was causing LinkPlayer to trim the top and
## the bottom off each picture. Changing the height to 988 fixed that.
#target_jpeg_width 1920
#target_jpeg_height 1080
#widen_ratio 1
target_jpeg_width 1920
target_jpeg_height 988
widen_ratio 1


there are lines farther along to specify your tv settings (my example for 720p
Samsung set)

target_jpeg_width 1280
target_jpeg_height 720
widen_ratio 1

Tom,

I switched mine to the Liteon loader a while back. I just tried mine after reading your post and mine seems to work fine. I tried one store bought DVD (SharkTale) and it fired right up. The problem about not being to rollback firmware is a major bummer though. They should of announced that BEFORE it was released!!!

JRad

OTTOMH I had said the 8550, but that is the "family". The chip in the ShowCenter 1000 is actually the EM8551.

Honestly it is not clear to me at this moment where the "2500Mbps bitrate limit" for the 8551 came from for Xvid files. Maybe that was just something that fell-out of Pinnacle's testing. I will look a little harder for documented Xvid bitrate limits on the 8620. A quick search of the IOData forum on "Xvid bitrate" suggests no one has found the upper limit yet for the ALP2!?I have the European version of the ADS Media-Link MXL-851 which also uses Sigma's EM8551 chip-set.

Over on the Doom9 forum I was asked what it's "top-out" bit-rate was... And I reported the following: -Bit-Rate Test Results for ADS Media-Link

All samples were encoded at 1:1 (ie: 720x576 = 414,720 total pixels) using the XviD codec in SP mode, with MP3 audio at 96Kbps CBR using the Radium codec. At 4000Kbps 2pass VBR, the video was rock solid with no stuttering.
At 5000Kbps 2pass VBR, the video was rock solid with no stuttering.
At 6000Kbps 2pass VBR, the video paused briefly twice during very high motion scenes
At 6000Kbps 1pass CBR, the video was rock solid with no stuttering.
At 9000Kbps 2pass VBR, the video paused multiple times
At 9000Kbps 1pass CBR, The video paused briefly twice during very high motion scenes
Preliminary Conclusion
It would seem 6000Kbps is the chip-sets safe "top-out" limit for 720x576 resolutions.

People generating Mpeg4 encodes at 720x480 (NTSC DVD) resolutions, might be able to raise the bit-rate a little more... And the same goes for people using even lower resolutions (but why they would want to raise the bit-rate any higher than 6000Kbps is beyond me).

When I have some more time I will generate some more high bit-rate encodes using ASP implementations. I did manage to do some more tests with ASP implementations. When I find the results I'll post them ;)


Cheers

FVCK YOU I-O DATA!

Not only can you not roll back firmwares (they've changed the signature), they've shut down my Lite-On SOHD167T DVD loader which I used to replace the crap EPO306D loader.

I cannot play DVD's at all now.

(Keith Jack, you SUCK too!)

Tom:

What do you mean that they've shut down your Lite-on loader? Mine works fine with the new firmware.

Tom,

Next time don't hold back, let us know how you really feel :)

All kidding aside, what did you have the region set to on your Lite-On drive?

Guys and Gals,

I should have figured out earlier we wouldn't be able to roll back firmware after this last update, the previous file sizes were all approx. 1.5 meg and the new one is 4 meg. Sorry it didn't register sooner.

The upside is this newest firmware is definitely the best one so far, Tom's drive problem not withstanding.

The downside is the hack, and yes it is a hack, allowing us to rollback firmware is not possible since the new firmware re-writes the entire ROM. We should get it back going forward with the next updates until they do an entire re-write again. If not, well, technically we haven't lost anything because I am sure it was not supposed to work in the first place. At this point the only way to go back to a previous firmware version would be with a EPROM burner and a copy of the original firmware to burn to the EEPROM. Definitely not something for the average user to play with.

irgaac, with all due respect, I don't agree that this is the best firmware yet. To me the Feb 4th firmware was the best. Every version since then has had problems with the photos being displayed small and various other issues including MP3 playback, etc. I guess the only saving grace for me is that VOBs over the network still play properly.

Rob

I guess I need to cool off about the Lite-On loader then, since it's working for some of you.

In my case, when I go to the setup page under options at the bottom, the Lite-On is no longer listed as a DVD Rom drive, and where the Lite-On firmware version was listed before is now blank.

My region code is 1.

Thanks for replying...

I have the European version of the ADS Media-Link MXL-851 which also uses Sigma's EM8551 chip-set.

Over on the Doom9 forum I was asked what it's "top-out" bit-rate was...Very interesting SMD, cuz over at the Pinnacle forum one SC1000 owner posted the following (excerpt):
I used DivX DRF Analyzer ... Sure enough, right where the SC stutters, there is a period of several seconds where the framesizes are all above average, peaking at about 2.5x (so perhaps 6,000 kps instantaneously) and averaging about 1.5x (or perhaps 4,000kbps) for several seconds.

I don't know what the SC h/w is theoretically capable of (does anyone know?) but it seems to be less than this...To which Pinnacle's engineer replied:
The maximum bitrate for MPEG4 AVI files is in the range of 2.5 to 3 Mbit/sec. The exact value is somehwat difficult to specify, because the peak bitrate also matters and this depends to some degree on the contents of the video.

thanks for [the above] analysis, which is right-on. Exceeding the limit for more than a second or so will indeed cause problems. Divx seems to have a good limiting algorithm, while Xvid does not (yet). Then again, some people feel that Xvid has the better quality compression in general.

For "typical" average bitrates of 1.5 to 2 Mbit/sec, all this is generally not a problem. In my personal view, the quality gain with higher bitrates is all but invisible, anyway. What I would recommend is a dual-pass compress to squeeze the maximum out of the selected bitrate.I never did my own testing (shame on me), but took the above as fact (!) and thus have tried to keep my Xvid encodes for the SC1000 averaging only about 1000Mbps. I guess the "bottom line" for me is that the AVLP2 seems to play anything you throw at it, thus I need to raise my standards in re: ripping DVDs for playback over my (future) LinkPlayer.

BTW I would LOVE to see some information (links, guides) for encoding Xvid for LP playback to an HDTV. I saw some STUNNING pictures over at digital digest but it's not clear to me how this is done!

Can we have the link at digital digest please?

Can we have the link at digital digest please?Sure, I was referring in particular to post #3 here (http://forum.digital-digest.com/showthread.php?threadid=37566&perpage=15&pagenumber=1) which appears to my eyes to be better than the original non-anamorphic DVD it came from (Titanic). I would love to know exactly what steps are involved in making an Xvid copy of a DVD that is actually better than the original (as this one clearly is). Those guys have not responded to my requests for advice... :(

Hi Laserfan,

To follow on from my previous post, the main reason why I conducted a bit-rate test for the ADS Media-Link device was because I had received several e-mails from annoyed Pinnacle ShowCenter owners!

But I think it's important to underline that the performance of any device is not solely reliant on the chip-set it's fitted with. Much has to do with the firm-ware and middle-ware not to mention the build quality and its component parts!

With regard to the "Titanic" images. Unless you compare before and after images (ie: source and encode) of the same video frame, it's impossible to pass an accurate comment on how good the encode is....

Plus "Titanic" is not a very good DVD to make such comparisons with, because (as far as I know) it only ever been available as 4:3 wide-screen print and not as a 16:9 wide-screen anamorphic print.


Cheers

I still can't get copy-protected videos to play. It's starts buffering when it reaches 100% the screen goes back to the menu. I think the message that flashed said "DRM not supported" but it's only on screen for about 1/10 of a second so I can't be sure.

With regard to the "Titanic" images. Unless you compare before and after images (ie: source and encode) of the same video frame, it's impossible to pass an accurate comment on how good the encode is...Ummm, yeah, I wasn't going to post that because I was thinking I was missing something, but I sure didn't understand how people were saying it was such a great job when the original frame wasn't shown... :rolleyes:

Also, for those who performed unauthorized mods to the AVLP2 that voided the warranty, and then are upset when you were one of the first to install a massive firmware rewrite which negatively affected those mods... :confused:

Sure, I was referring in particular to post #3 here (http://forum.digital-digest.com/showthread.php?threadid=37566&perpage=15&pagenumber=1) which appears to my eyes to be better than the original non-anamorphic DVD it came from (Titanic). I would love to know exactly what steps are involved in making an Xvid copy of a DVD that is actually better than the original (as this one clearly is). Those guys have not responded to my requests for advice... :(


See this:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=478263

...With regard to the "Titanic" images. Unless you compare before and after images (ie: source and encode) of the same video frame, it's impossible to pass an accurate comment on how good the encode is....

Plus "Titanic" is not a very good DVD to make such comparisons with, because (as far as I know) it only ever been available as 4:3 wide-screen print and not as a 16:9 wide-screen anamorphic print.Well, sorry SMD, but... I wasn't looking for your opinion of the encode, I was asking how the conversion was done! :rolleyes:

Further, I know "Titanic" is non-anamorphic (I said that first) and is grainy to boot (I own it); doesn't it seem like a good test case for trying to improve upon the original DVD? I won't speak for brianvann, who asked how to make the best encodes for LP2, but SMD you are clearly smarter than *I* am about this stuff, so could we have the benefit of your knowledge/experience please.

Douglas, thanks for that link, I had seen it before but forgot about it. Could that possibly be the be-all, end-all solution? There is another thread around here about "encoding for HD" that reads like a mystery novel, though I'm damned if I can figure-out "whodunit" in the end, i.e. there is still no clear process that I could make sense of. SMD I think you were all over that thread--did there result a roadmap for conversions that a mere hobbyist like myself can follow...

irgaac, with all due respect, I don't agree that this is the best firmware yet. To me the Feb 4th firmware was the best. Every version since then has had problems with the photos being displayed small and various other issues including MP3 playback, etc. I guess the only saving grace for me is that VOBs over the network still play properly.

Rob


If you use WIZD there are no problems with small photos on my player at 720p out.
I saw the small photo issue with Advanced Server but it seeming to work fine with Standard server for me also.

MP3 playback and the WMA changes on this version has been great.

Are you using the newer versions of the server software or are you using the February versions of them?

When generating encodes from say PAL or NTSC Mpeg2/DVD sources is very subjective. What might look acceptable to me might look awful to you!

We have people who's priority is to store say a 120 minute movie onto a 700MB CD~R. People who prefer to generate encodes with "anamorphic" signalling. People who prefer to crop away the black mattes, people who don't.... Then we have people who prefer to generate encodes using "square pixels" at resolutions far lower than the DVD source because they will be viewing it on a small PC screen or TV. People who have stand-alone players that don't support GMC or Qpel... and so on and so forth. And then we have people who want to generate encodes that are as close in quality to the original source as possible... and are not concerned about the bit-rate... Which category do you fall into?


Cheers

If you use WIZD there are no problems with small photos on my player at 720p out.
I saw the small photo issue with Advanced Server but it seeming to work fine with Standard server for me also.

MP3 playback and the WMA changes on this version has been great.

Are you using the newer versions of the server software or are you using the February versions of them?


Hi Paul_PDX.

I've tried LinkServer 1.9, Advanced Server 1.3 beta, Momitsu 1.3, and Windows Media connect. I have also tried the LinkPlayer in standard browse mode as well as HD browse mode, 1080i.

Rob

Yes, it looks like the new firmware requires a lot more room in the flash memory. Since there is no room to store two versions in the flash now, it makes sense that the "immediate rollback" function has been removed.

HOWEVER what does NOT make much sense is why I-O Data changed the signature of the firmware files and made it so that the new firmware would not even understand the old signatures?

Afterall, even though they no longer have room in the flash memory to store 2 versions of the firmware, they could have at least allowed the code to understand the old signatures and to load previous versions.

My guess is that they changed the format of the internal flash memory completely, and the new flash file system support code does not know how to load previous versions of the firmware. That is my guess.

They could have made it work. But it looks like they specifically decided not, maybe simply because of lack of time. Shame.


I should have figured out earlier we wouldn't be able to roll back firmware after this last update, the previous file sizes were all approx. 1.5 meg and the new one is 4 meg. Sorry it didn't register sooner.

Yes, it looks like the new firmware requires a lot more room in the flash memory. Since there is no room to store two versions in the flash now, it makes sense that the "immediate rollback" function has been removed.I wonder how much of the flash memory was needed to accommodate the WMA9 Pro fix?

EDIT: By-the-way, the Zensonic Z500 will have 16MB of flash memory compared to the Linkplayer's 8MB ;)


Cheers

Yes, it looks like the new firmware requires a lot more room in the flash memory. Since there is no room to store two versions in the flash now, it makes sense that the "immediate rollback" function has been removed.

HOWEVER what does NOT make much sense is why I-O Data changed the signature of the firmware files and made it so that the new firmware would not even understand the old signatures?

Afterall, even though they no longer have room in the flash memory to store 2 versions of the firmware, they could have at least allowed the code to understand the old signatures and to load previous versions.

My guess is that they changed the format of the internal flash memory completely, and the new flash file system support code does not know how to load previous versions of the firmware. That is my guess.

They could have made it work. But it looks like they specifically decided not, maybe simply because of lack of time. Shame.

There is still room to store 2 versions of the rom in flash memory, the player has 8 megs of flash memory. The problem with flashing back to the previous versions of the firmware is they are incomplete compared to the current version. To flash back to a previous version you would need a copy of the entire 4 meg bin from one of the previous versions and all of the download updates were only 1.5 meg partial updates.

Folks, this is sad news ....:
http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/11914

This was just posted on the I-O Data forums

DVD Playback Problem with 06-35-050430-02-IOD-234-000

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear All,

Few commercial DVD movies may have skipping / suttering problem on playing. Our team is focusing to fix this problem as the first priority. Please give us a couple of days. We'll release the minor update soon. Thank you.

Am I correct in assuming that Window Media Connect is of no real use to those of us that are interested in using the Linkplayer for viewing TS or TP files? WMC seems to support other extensions, but TS or TP are not included. Bummer!!

When generating encodes from say PAL or NTSC Mpeg2/DVD sources is very subjective. What might look acceptable to me might look awful to you!

We have people who's priority is to store say a 120 minute movie onto a 700MB CD~R. People who prefer to generate encodes with "anamorphic" signalling. People who prefer to crop away the black mattes, people who don't.... Then we have people who prefer to generate encodes using "square pixels" at resolutions far lower than the DVD source because they will be viewing it on a small PC screen or TV. People who have stand-alone players that don't support GMC or Qpel... and so on and so forth. And then we have people who want to generate encodes that are as close in quality to the original source as possible... and are not concerned about the bit-rate... Which category do you fall into?Well, this is a nice little rant/lecture I guess, but what on earth has it to do with the topic? Brianvann asked how he might re-encode his MDP HD ts files to best LP2 effect using Xvid, and I was trying to help with the bitrate part of his question. How about at least TRYING to stay with the topic here???

I guess I need to cool off about the Lite-On loader then, since it's working for some of you.

In my case, when I go to the setup page under options at the bottom, the Lite-On is no longer listed as a DVD Rom drive, and where the Lite-On firmware version was listed before is now blank.

My region code is 1.

Thanks for replying...

Just wondering, but are you on master or cable select?? but whatever you are on try the other and see if that works?? Just a thought!!

Well, this is a nice little rant/lecture I guess, but what on earth has it to do with the topic? Brianvann asked how he might re-encode his MDP HD ts files to best LP2 effect using Xvid, and I was trying to help with the bitrate part of his question. How about at least TRYING to stay with the topic here???Why not have a look at this thread (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=515917).


In short, anybody converting 1080i NTSC content needs to decide a couple of things before they start encoding, because this will effect the bit-rate they will need: -
Whether they want to de-interlace
Whether they reduce the 1920x1080 resolution to 1280x720

Then they need to understand a few things -
De-interlacing 30fps "video" sources to 30p will create encodes with motion blur
De-interlacing 30fps "video" sources to 60p should create encodes without motion blur
De-interlacing 30fps "film" sources to 24p should create encodes without motion blur

Cheers

Although the transport streams that used to freeze at edit points now play through those points, they then speed up for a few seconds and the audio is way out of sync after normal speed resumes. This happens at the first edit point.

Anyone else seeing this?

Zach

I was expecting to have little to no problems with most of my .ts files after this update, but thats not the case. So my question to everyone is are you "downloading" .ts files from those seceret places? And are they playing fine?

Maybe this is a conversation to take off line as i dont want to get into the where can i download ts files from? its been discussed before in this thread.

For example Alien Planet wont play threw with out studdering and audio sync issues, either will Cathedrals of the Game Safeco Field. Has anyone downloaded these and had issues with them?

Feel free to email me responses...

Although the transport streams that used to freeze at edit points now play through those points, they then speed up for a few seconds and the audio is way out of sync after normal speed resumes. This happens at the first edit point.

Anyone else seeing this?

Zach

I typically don't edit within a show, however last week I recorded the Eagles concert. Then last night I edited out all of the commercials and watched it through Linkplayer with the latest firmware. I watched about the first 15 minutes, which included at least two commercial edits, and it played fine. Then I purposely FF to remaining edit points, and all except one of them went through just fine. I think it was the very last one, near the end of the program, that it sped up, but then it resumed and seemed to be fine.

Unfortunately, that's the only one I tried, so nothing else to compare it to.

I updated my firmware and for whatever reason I now do not have any video signal on the D4 output.

I noticed that this guy's question got resolved when iodata said he needed to reset his video mode after the update.

I don't know if tech support said this (but they should have)--ALL of your settings are returned to default after the latest firmware update. (Mine were). Make sure you go through each page on the setup menu and restore your favorite LP2 settings the way you like them! Save at each page.

Well, it looks like the Linkplayer is a step closer to a Windows Media Plays for Sure device. :) I loaded the windows media connect server along with the Avellink server software and was able to play my downloaded DRMed wmas from Yahoo Unlimited from my server. I could navigate to a song and play it from a folder, but could not skip to the next one or back. It looks like navigation does not work. I did not try creating a playlist in Windows Media Player to see if that is a work around for now. The other strange thing is rather than showing the name of the song playing on the screen, it only shows what looks like the license number of the song. At least it is a step in the right direction. :rolleyes:

The Linkplayer2 has 4Mb Flash

I dumped the firmware a while back, and the flash chip they used is a AM29LV323.

The first part of the firmware is some sort of bootloader, can be disassembled (based on a ARM core), the firmware itself is compressed and/or encrypted and unpacked in memory when powering up.

The reason why i did this, is because i was looking for a way to make the player regionfree, and see if somehow a RGBHV output would be possible.

Flashing a japanese firmware makes the player region 2. a DVI output is however not visible in the setup menu, so must be enabled/detected? by the player somehow.

Btw if you are wondering why the picture looks somewhat soft.. They used 2 electronic video switches which were placed on the board at the most unlogical places i have ever seen..


[picture removed]
Hmm a picture or URL is not possible until i have made 5 posts.. :(
I have attached the picture instead.

Not really a straight video path imho :confused:

The yellow lines indicate the videopath for the component signals.
The two small lines at the right are for switching the output video filter on/off. (switched off at the current firmware)

A bridge here and there can clearly shorten the videopath and therefore increase video quality.

The Linkplayer2 has 4Mb Flash

I dumped the firmware a while back, and the flash chip they used is a AM29LV323.

The first part of the firmware is some sort of bootloader, can be disassembled (based on a ARM core), the firmware itself is compressed and/or encrypted and unpacked in memory when powering up. Wow... only 4MB of flash... I'm sure I remember reading that Sigma's reference board had 8MB... No wonder you guys are having problems up-grading and down-grading your firmware now.... Cheap-skates!

The reason why i did this, is because i was looking for a way to make the player regionfree, and see if somehow a RGBHV output would be possible. Did you find a way?

By-the-way, Buffalo are starting to distribute their player in Europe and according to their UK website they are offering an RGB scart via an adaptor... which is very similar to what you require: -

http://img188.echo.cx/img188/1724/pcp3lwgdvdeuspec0hp.png


Cheers

Hey Fuzzy Logic, did you actually implement the bridge to improve the quality over Video Component ?

With the new firmware (July 6th) disabling the video filter, is the improvement quite visible even without any jumpering ?

Thanks !

What July 6th firmware is this?

Sorry, the right date is June 3rd...

I started a thread on the JVC PROHD SRDVD-100U (made by IODATA)

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=547592

Did you find a way?

By-the-way, Buffalo are starting to distribute their player in Europe and according to their UK website they are offering an RGB scart via an adaptor... which is very similar to what you require: -

Cheers

Unfortunately, no. :(

Region is not that important for me, but 720p or 1080i in RGB would be perfect for the CRT projector i'm currently using. It doesn't accept YUV signals, so i have to use a external converter for that.

Deciding if the picture quality improves is difficult, as the converter is still there.
But bypassing two switches and a lot of traces zig-zaging across the mainboard should result in a better picture quality imho.
A dedicated RGB output (on the DVI-I connector), which the Japanese version has, would be a lot better.

Therefore i'm still interested in someone who can make some board pictures of a japanese unit. There could be jumper settings, different resistor values etc , which might tell the firmware what hardware is on the board.
On the other hand, it could also be all in the firmware of the Japanese player.

@ affs:

The june 3rd firmware has the filter setting to off, but the previous versions also had this switched off, so it doesn't make any difference what version you are running.