Are you using the media server software that came with it?

No, I'm using PyMedS, a python media server that I wrote (w/ some code Tim Potter abandoned). It's nothing fancy, and doesn't support things like search or the additional metadata yet. It just presents the data as the same as on the file system.

resnet.uoregon.edu/~gurney_j/jmpc/pymeds.html

The Jump function finally seems to be working with Windows Media Connect 2.0 and the v1.02 firmware. I've now switched back from TVersity, since I prefer the WMC user interface and its ability to detect changes in shared folders without scanning at scheduled intervals.

Awesome to see the new firmware finally. I've also tried v1.07 of the media server software with M4V and TS files support (don't have any M4V files to test), however I've tried Mpeg2-TS files at bitrate over 19Mbps and resolution of 1920x1088 (that's what the file details says), it doesn't appear that the Dlink520 can keep up. It works fine for 2-3 seconds with audio, then the audio cuts out, and the frame rates starts to drop. After about 2-3 mins, the play reports that it's the end of the video file, then stops. Though the video isn't done yet. CPU usage on the media software is about 2-5% on the PC with the media software.

However, is it me, or is the player able to play more frames with the new software? I remember it being more choppy in the past when it came to TS files.

ATSC TS standard is 19.xxx Mbps isn't it? Maybe the files I got aren't coded properly..

Yeah, Mpeg2 files are limited to 8Mbps. Kinda lame, since it is advertised as an HD media player, and 8Mbps isn't even enough bandwidth for full-rate DVD.

I've wondered about that. (Hoped that the published spec was wrong.) Haven't some reported success with .TS files? Perhaps thay were not really HD?

Most ATSC stations broadcast at 8VSB, the datarate of which is ~19.39mbit/sec, but not all of it is audio/video data. There are things like EPG, PAT, PMT (to tell it where the video/audio channels are located) along w/ the other channels. In most cases there are padding frames to keep the data rate correct and not overflow the buffer on the receiver.

The TS files that I tried are definately true HD. As some of the TS files are from overseas, so I don't know the DVB-T datarate.

I've wondered about that. (Hoped that the published spec was wrong.) Haven't some reported success with .TS files? Perhaps thay were not really HD?You certainly have a right to expect it (success w/TS, that is). I have a Pinnacle SC200 which is based on the same chip (EM8620L) and it plays both original broadcast TS (both 1080i and 720p) at 19.2Mbps, and "filtered" TS at 15Mbps (i.e. less padding & other extraneous material) without any trouble at all.

Can't imagine what DLink is doing in firmware to hobble the 520?

I have a 500gb NAS ready Net Center hard drive from Western Digital with a lot of videos on it. Does any one know if I can run the Dlink server or some other compatable server directly from the NAS hard drive so I don't have to use my computer at all. Also, I want to run this through a router to other media centers. Anyone know if there is a way to do this?

Does your NAS support UPNP AV or is it DLNA certified?

No I don't see UPNP on DLNA listed. All it says it supports NFS and CFS file sharing. Am I screwed for this to work with the DSM-520

I just bought one of these and have a couple of questions:

1) When I play Live365 stations, I get output from the analog cables (that go to a Russound amp for the rest of my house) but I get no sound in my HT. The 520 is hooked up to my Denon AVR-3300 via optical digital cable. Someone said the Denon is ignoring the lower bitrate that Live365 sends through. True? Anyway to get around this?

2) Anyone using the UPnP? How did you get it working? I have it showing up in "My Network Places", but it just gets me a 404 page not found error in the browser.

My player has been upgraded to 1.02 and my server to 1.07. My server is running on a Win2000 Server box, and 520 is wired. Network is 10/100. Machine I am trying to control 520 from is WinXP Pro SP2.

Any input/help is greatly appreciated!

I Have An Adstech Usb Harddrive That Is Formatted Ntfs, Is It True It Needs To Be Fat32 To Work W/the Dsm-520? If Not, How Do I Get The 520 To Talk To The Usb Drive That Is Connected Directly To The 520?

I have the DSM-520, I am very happy with it for the most part but there is ONE small problem that just drives me up the wall, let me know if I am just doing something wrong. The system has Shuffle, Repeat/Repeat All, etc..
what is the point of these when it seems the system will not automatically play the next thing in a given folder.. lets say I have a tv series, I look by folder and in said folder there is 10 files, if I put shuffle or repeat all I would expect it to either shuffle amongst them or repeat all to go through them all endlessly.. instead all I can do is repeat one file or nothing at all.

it's frustrating.. are playlists possible to overcome this?

also I see it can now be controlled by a remote software, what software is capable of this?

The software that can control the DSM-520 is MediaController from cidero. I have been using this quite a bit these days. I use it with Rhapsody and MusicMatch. The best thing about is I can control the DSM-520 with my laptop wirelessly over my network from my deck. You can also make playlists on the fly. In addition, MediaController can control the volume of the DSM-520. You can get the software from www.cidero.com

Yes, I have also used Cidero Media Controller software for music, but I have had no luck with video. Have you tried video? If so, how did it work for you?

I downloaded and installed it, but it is INCREDIBLY SLOW. Any ideas of why that might be?

Dlink Media Server 1.07 is running on a Win2000 Server machine. Media Player is 1.02 and is wired. Machine I am running Cidero from is XP Pro SP2, has Java 1.5 and Cidero 1.5.

Yea, I tried it too, worked good but locked up on some videos..
there has to be a better program out there..
Still a bit pissed you can't make it play a group of movies where it just goes to the
next one on it's own... being fast forward acommplishes it you know its capable of seeing the next file.

Yes, I have also used Cidero Media Controller software for music, but I have had no luck with video. Have you tried video? If so, how did it work for you?
I haven't tried video yet with Cidero. I will give it a try tonight. I won't be using my wireless network though. I have heard too many issues with streaming video over wireless.

I have the DSM-520, I am very happy with it for the most part but there is ONE small problem that just drives me up the wall, let me know if I am just doing something wrong. The system has Shuffle, Repeat/Repeat All, etc..
what is the point of these when it seems the system will not automatically play the next thing in a given folder.. lets say I have a tv series, I look by folder and in said folder there is 10 files, if I put shuffle or repeat all I would expect it to either shuffle amongst them or repeat all to go through them all endlessly.. instead all I can do is repeat one file or nothing at all.

it's frustrating.. are playlists possible to overcome this?

also I see it can now be controlled by a remote software, what software is capable of this?

Are you pressing Enter on the remote or the play button? If you go the the main folder and hit the play button while it is selected, it should play every video file inside of it in order. Same trick used top lay VOB movies in order.

-Aaron

Oh, I have been hitting enter, good trick to know thanks for the tip.

I haven't tried video yet with Cidero. I will give it a try tonight. I won't be using my wireless network though. I have heard too many issues with streaming video over wireless.
Tried video last night with cidero over my wired network. It did not work for me. I got sound, but no video. I'm not sure if I am doing something wrong. I'm running the following:

Dlink MediaServer 1.07
Cidero MediaController 1.5
DSM-520 Firmware 1.02

TVersity question. Thinking maybe Magendanz has my answer, but wanted to know if everyone is have a bit of a hard time getting this media server to show up over a wireless connection to the server computer. I have to restart TVersity each time I goto use the 520 for it to see it. It will then work, but that is the only way. Also finding that only Twonky will show up concurrently with the other servers. Just want verification this is similar to everyone elses experince with wireless setup.


I am using TVersity, and I have this same problem; but it only seems to appear when I'm playing XVID files that were encoded in 2004 or 2005. These files actually can make my 520 say "Unable to open file", then my TVersity server has to be restarted and I (seemingly) have to reboot the DSM520. Very strange.

Yea, I used to use Tversity, but I find lately I am having much better playback with Dlinks official software, and Windows Media Connect also works well.

I did use TVersity w/ DSM-520. But lately I seem to have the best luck with DLink's media server. Especially when playing HD content.

I also dropped TVersity for WMC after they resolved the Jump mode issue with the v1.02 firmware update.

TVersity is on this big development push to serve up Internet streaming content every imaginable way, when I believe they still need to work on their basics. For example, instead of using the ReadDirectoryChangesW API to detect when changes are made to a shared folder and refresh the media library immediately, they use a scheduled polling interval and brute force directory scan that can thrash your hard drive for minutes (always at the worst possible time, of course). When I submitted feedback on this issue, their response was that they were developing cross-platform and couldn't "rely on Windows-specific APIs." (What ever happened to good 'ole #ifdef?) Of course, they're giving TVersity away for free, so it's hard to be too critical.

The one thing I have noticed with WMC on the DSM-520 that seems somewhat similar is that it's having to re-verify the device for DRM playback at the beginning of practically every session. However, according to the WMC spec, this only should be occurring every 48 hours.

Will the 520 work with a Yellow Machine NAS? Will I be able to install the software on my Windows MCE machine and point to the directories on my NAS and have them stream to my home theather?

Thanks.

Yes, if you have the directories mapped on your MCE machine you can share those mapped directories through the D-link Software.

Tried video last night with cidero over my wired network. It did not work for me. I got sound, but no video. I'm not sure if I am doing something wrong. I'm running the following:

Dlink MediaServer 1.07
Cidero MediaController 1.5
DSM-520 Firmware 1.02
I figured out how to get the video to display on the DSM-520 with cidero finally. I found this link that described my problem under the DSM-320 section

http://www.cidero.com/mediaController.html

I followed the "4. Undesirable menu overlays" instructions and it worked. I tried a bunch of files and they all worked with a wired connection. It is somewhat of nuisance , but it does work.

Has anyone had trouble getting their TV to recognize the DSM-520 when using HDMI? I have a Philips 42pf9630a/37 and have had a DSM-520 since April. A month ago the original unit quit working (after the firmware update) and D-link just sent me a replacement model. I plugged it into 1 of my 2 HDMI inputs (my Oppo 971 occupies the other) and still no picture. I replaced the HDMI cable today and still nothing. Tried swapping the HDMI connections around and nothing (the Oppo works in either one). Finally, I plugged it in using the RCA video jack and I get a picture there (so I at least know the unit is working).

Philips wasn't able to help me, and the thought of spending another hour on hold with D-link support is really getting me down! I am going to try it on a friend's TV tomorrow, but thought you guys might have some insight.

just to be sure, you did hit the video out button several times when checking it?

I finally found the problem (and want to post it here in case future owners experience it). The HDMI output should be auto-sensing. IOW, the DSM-520 should know by default that the HDMI output is being used and transmit information that way. Wasn't working though.

What I ended up doing was plugging in via RCA jack and going into the setup screen (General options->Audio/Video) and then changing the output to HDMI. Once I did that, I could plug in the HDMI cable and the TV would show it via HDMI. So it is just a matter of manually adjusting the settings. I am going to let D-link know so that can add it to their crappy toll-free customer support.

My problems turned out to be entirely TVERSITY related -- I switched to the DLINK Media Server 1.07 and everything works great now --- very weird --

Anybody have a very large MP3 collection and have things working? I have almost 11,000 mp3s and can't seem to get things working.

If I add a couple of folders, I can browse and play just as I would expect. But when I put in the entire collection (I pick the top folder, "My Music Collection") when I go to browse from the device in my TV room, I get the timer thing for a bit and then a message that says unable to browse folder (or open or something). If I remove the big folder and add the couple back, it works (after I stop and restart the media server).

Anyone have any ideas? I have upgraded to 1.02 on the player and 1.07 for the server and my 520 is wired to my network with a static ip.

I finally found the problem (and want to post it here in case future owners experience it). The HDMI output should be auto-sensing. IOW, the DSM-520 should know by default that the HDMI output is being used and transmit information that way. Wasn't working though.

What I ended up doing was plugging in via RCA jack and going into the setup screen (General options->Audio/Video) and then changing the output to HDMI. Once I did that, I could plug in the HDMI cable and the TV would show it via HDMI. So it is just a matter of manually adjusting the settings. I am going to let D-link know so that can add it to their crappy toll-free customer support.

This information is clearly stated in the user manual. Perhaps you should have started there.

Hi,

Many of the new EM8260L based media boxes (I have a Buffalo linktheater) have a limitation when it comes to playing audio. You select the track you want and start it playing. While it is playing, you can't browse the audio library - in fact you can't do anything without stopping the playback first.

I noticed in the DSM-520 manual that you can play music while browsing photos, but can you play music while browsing your music library? i.e. like a real jukebox.

One player that can do this I believe is the Kiss DP-600 but I'm put off by it's lack of support for many NAS servers - something where the DSM-520 is better supported.

Thanks, Ade.

Hi,

I noticed in the DSM-520 manual that you can play music while browsing photos, but can you play music while browsing your music library? i.e. like a real jukebox.

Thanks, Ade.
Yes, you can browse while listening. In my tests of a small amount of MP3s, I was able to play one, then back up and browse through the others while the first still played. If you press the "I" button on the remote, it gives you current song info on the bottom of the screen.

I am liking everything about the DSM520 so far, except it can't seem to handle my 11,000 mp3s! (see post above - any help/input is appreciated).

ok if i break them up into 1 gb chunks, is there a way to get rid of that black 2 sec pause between vob switches, also have you seen the video speed up for a second, and then the sound is off during the rest of the movie, or when it is in 1 gb chunks, when it switches vobs it changes to spanish or directors comments? thanks in advance

This information is clearly stated in the user manual. Perhaps you should have started there.

Gosh, perhaps! Shame that they didn't ship a manual with my replacement DSM-520. Or that it took 3 calls to customer service (2 of which were diconnected due to their VoIP service perhaps), and two calls from their product specialist to help me. Goodness, thanks for your input! :rolleyes:

Gosh, perhaps! Shame that they didn't ship a manual with my replacement DSM-520. Or that it took 3 calls to customer service (2 of which were diconnected due to their VoIP service perhaps), and two calls from their product specialist to help me. Goodness, thanks for your input! :rolleyes:
You could have also downloaded the manual off of their website. ;) For their part they should have shipped you the manual and there is no reason that such a simple problem would take more than 2 seconds with their tech support (shame on them).

Any new or hints of the DSM-520 being able to display video/music cover art?

Thanks.

As far as I know it is not currently a feature on the DSM-520. Would be nice though =\.

-Aaron

ok if i break them up into 1 gb chunks, is there a way to get rid of that black 2 sec pause between vob switches, also have you seen the video speed up for a second, and then the sound is off during the rest of the movie, or when it is in 1 gb chunks, when it switches vobs it changes to spanish or directors comments? thanks in advance

You will need to create 1 vob to get around this problem. I had the same problems when I had multiple vob's.

Anybody have a very large MP3 collection and have things working? I have almost 11,000 mp3s and can't seem to get things working.

If I add a couple of folders, I can browse and play just as I would expect. But when I put in the entire collection (I pick the top folder, "My Music Collection") when I go to browse from the device in my TV room, I get the timer thing for a bit and then a message that says unable to browse folder (or open or something). If I remove the big folder and add the couple back, it works (after I stop and restart the media server).

Anyone have any ideas? I have upgraded to 1.02 on the player and 1.07 for the server and my 520 is wired to my network with a static ip.

I don't have this D-Link, only my Snazio but why would you keep 11.000 mp3s in one folder? :) I know mine is a diff box but I have around 15K music files on my NAS box - mostly 320k mp3 and FLAC files - but I didn't have any problem (organized like /album artist/album title (year)/track# song artist - song title.xxx under //nas/music share)...
I'm interested in this D-Link as additional player but this would be a big issue.

I don't have this D-Link, only my Snazio but why would you keep 11.000 mp3s in one folder? :) I know mine is a diff box but I have around 15K music files on my NAS box - mostly 320k mp3 and FLAC files - but I didn't have any problem (organized like /album artist/album title (year)/track# song artist - song title.xxx under //nas/music share)...
I'm interested in this D-Link as additional player but this would be a big issue.
Sorry, my bad. I have one folder at the top "My Music Collection". Under that is a folder for each artist. In each artists folder is a folder for each album.

If I pick a few artist folders to add to the media server, no problem. They show up on the player and I can select, play, browse, etc.

But if I pick the top folder ("My Music Collection"), well, it takes a while for it to read/catalog all the files, but after that, the player doesn't want to show them. The server sees them fine and I can go to the tab for media files and drill down through the tree to find a song.

The player just says "Unable to open folder." (after waiting for a short period of time).

Has anyone noticed that when hooked up via a toslink (optical) cable to a reciever you must now set the DSM-520 to analog under sound output rather then digital as prior to 1.02 firmware? Odd thing is with Live 365 if I set to digital it works on optical out but no sound with video or music library files. However when switched to analog I get sound on videos and music library but nothing on Live 365 service. Very buggy firmware IMO. Just curious if others are experiencing same issue.

Did they implement anything that will allow you to skip forward/backward by time increments (30sec, 1min, etc)? I'd like the ability to skip commercials in 30 sec intervals or something like that. I do that on my MediaMVP, so it seems something like the 520 should do it easily. Will it?

Did they implement anything that will allow you to skip forward/backward by time increments (30sec, 1min, etc)?
No, and it's incredibly frustrating.

The Jump feature requires you to enter the exact time index, so you have to use the Info button to first figure out where you are and do the math yourself. And remember, the Jump and FF/REW features are mutually exclusive. To switch modes, you have interrupt playback to go to Setup.

Honestly, this is my single biggest frustration with the product right now, and I'm not optimistic about a firmware fix because it would mean significant changes to the documentation.

Dang, that would be a key feature for me as well. I may look into something else instead. Doesn't Linksys have one?

Anybody here talked to D-Link people about removing the stupid 8Mbps bitrate limitation for Hi-Def ? I wonder if it is in their roadmap somewhere or not ?
Thanks
Patrick S.

I bought this primarily to stream audio from my computer where I store a bunch of uncompressed wav files from my CDs (and LPs). I have it connected via digital coax to my receiver. Until I get an HD set, I have it hooked up to a standard TV. I am using the Windows Media Connect server. It's hard wired to my LAN (I did not try wireless).

Pros:
Easy to hook up and configure

Played the DIVX AVI file I downloaded without a problem and it looked great

Plays ReplayTV mpg-2 files

Has smooth FF and RW

Has a Jump mode that works (but the button sequence is odd)

Cons:
The first second of every song is cut out
- I read of others having this issue too (regardless of which media server they use)

Does not play 24 bit wave files

Photos look stretched a bit wide
- The DSM-520 may not have any compensation for square vs rectangle pixels

It would be nice to have it display all photos in all the subfolders

A leveler option like Volume Logic would be nice

Can use only Jump mode Or FF mode. The mode is selected on the set-up menu screen. Not sure why this is. The functions don't even share the same keys on the remote.

If you are playing audio from your computer and leave the play screen (the screen that shows the details of the song currently playing) there is no way to get back to that play screen.

Those are my initial thoughts.

I may look into something else instead. Doesn't Linksys have one?Linksys has a Wireless-B Media Adapter (WMA11B) that can't stream video and they have a Windows Media Center Extender (WMCE54AG). I actually owned the WMCE54AG for a year before purchasing the DSM-520, and wouldn't recommend it. Even setting aside that it's not HD and wouldn't directly play DivX/XviD video, I prefer the UPnP approach over media extenders because it scales better, putting less load on the PC to process the media and serve up remote UI. And of course, you need to have a Windows Media Center PC to drive a Windows Media Extender.

I figured out how to get the video to display on the DSM-520 with cidero finally. I found this link that described my problem under the DSM-320 section

http://www.cidero.com/mediaController.html

I followed the "4. Undesirable menu overlays" instructions and it worked. I tried a bunch of files and they all worked with a wired connection. It is somewhat of nuisance , but it does work.

Can you expand on this?

I tried this by displaying a photo using the remote, and then using Media Controller to play a video, but it doesn't work for me.

I have the same setup, except for Media Controller 1.5.2, which has some "fixes" for the 520. Maybe I should try 1.5.0.

Thanks --Joachim

Can you expand on this?

I tried this by displaying a photo using the remote, and then using Media Controller to play a video, but it doesn't work for me.

I have the same setup, except for Media Controller 1.5.2, which has some "fixes" for the 520. Maybe I should try 1.5.0.

Thanks --Joachim

I did it in a different order than you. I had the DSM-520 at the Video Menu. I used the Media Controller to play the video. I waited to hear the sound of the video, then selected the photo button on the remote. The video finally appeared on my TV.

If this doesn't work for you, I would try the 1.5.0 version.

cjcote

I did it in a different order than you. I had the DSM-520 at the Video Menu. I used the Media Controller to play the video. I waited to hear the sound of the video, then selected the photo button on the remote. The video finally appeared on my TV.

If this doesn't work for you, I would try the 1.5.0 version.

cjcote

Got it working, thanks.

Still a little hokey- videos submitted via UPnP cannot be controlled by the remote,
e.g. I cannot pause streams sent externally.

I am looking at this for a demonstration only, so it should do the trick.

Thanks --Joachim

I just set up my DSM-520 and I'm happy so far. My file server is an old Athlon 700 MHz Slot A with 256 MB of RAM and a 160GB HDD running XP Pro and TVersity. The firmware version on the 520 is 1.02. About the only things that haven't played so far are my X264 HD files and my FLAC bootlegs. My SD and HD XVIDs and MP3s all play perfectly. Transcoding has been turned off in TVersity because of the slow CPU, but I've found videos play better with it off anyway. I'm sure with a more powerful CPU and transcoding turned on, the FLAC and X264 files would play. The wireless connection with WPA works beautifully, but I have a router with a very strong signal (Zyxel X-550 802.11g with MIMO).

All in all, it only cost ~$242 out of pocket to put together the system (520 + HDD), so I'm quite pleased with its capabilities.

I got a DSM 520 yesterday & want to stream music from the Napster service through it. I had confirmed with DLink that this would be possible before buying.

The device turned up yesterday, I started it all up & went to Online Services, no Napster, only TotalVid & Live365.

When I called DLink they said that it was a faulty machine, but this seems a little odd to me.

The firmware is 1.01EU, what I suspect is that they don't include these additional services outside of the US, can anyone confirm ?

Has anyone ever used the 520 with Napster ?

Thanks

I don't have Napster, but I use my DSM-520 with the Yahoo unlimited music service. Also, I am in the US and my firmware is 1.02. Are the songs from Napster on your hard drive on your computer? With yahoo, I download the songs to my computer. These songs are DRM protected and I have two options for playing them:

Option 1: I have to use windows media connect (you can download this from microsoft). I have to choose this server when I connect to my network. Or you could go into setup and look for your available servers on your network. Once I connect to this server I can play DRM music.

Option 2: I open up yahoo music and in preferences I go into network music and enable playing music on my network. Yahoo music needs to be running and then on the DSM 520 I look for the yahoo server and select it and then I can find my music.

In my setup, I use option 1 when playing playlists and option 2 when I want to play an album. When I play an album in windows media connect, the songs are listed alphabetically and I prefer to listen to my album music in the order it is on the album.

I hope this works for you with Napster. Let us know.

Hi!

Your problem is that You have got the wrong firmware.
All firmware for DSM-520 ending in "EU" is stripped of Napster connectivity.
If the player is supposed to be "US", return it to the store and get the right one.

//Leffe

Quick background: I've had the 520 for a while and don't recall having any problems before BUT I lost a disk drive and long-story-short ended up reinstalling my apps. Therefore, I went a while without using my 520.

Now though when I punch up a video file, the screen goes black as the timer icon appears, I can hear the audio come through but the video display delays by, oh, five seconds or so. Ergo I end up missing the title and first few seconds of the first scene.

It happens both with Dlink Server 1.08 and Windows Media Connect.

Anyone with any similar problems and hoepfully a solution or something to check?

Thanks.

Anyone with any similar problems and hoepfully a solution or something to check?

Thanks.

I would check to see if you have the latest firmware. The latest firmware version is 1.02. There were some changes for improving video playback.

cjcote

If you've been using WMC 2.0 and just upgraded to WMP11, you may be in for an unpleasant surprise. While I like the theory of integrating WMC into WMP 11, in practice there are some serious issues that everyone should consider before upgrading. Of course, there are the usual bugs like freezing for several seconds when scrolling through file lists, but I assume these will be eventually addressed. The more serious issue for me has been syncing with the WMP library.

As I've pointed out earlier in this thread, one of the great benefits of WMC over the other UPnP media servers was that it detected changes to files in the shared folders immediately rather than relying on periodic polling. Not only was this more efficient with CPU cycles, but it allowed users to delete, rename or copy new files into a directory and play them from the remote device immediately rather than waiting for the next polling interval, which could be hours later. With WMP 11, WMC now shares the same media library as WMP and no longer detects changes immediately. In fact, to bring the published file lists up to date you've got to launch WMP and manually sync the database or wait for the sync to be completed in the background. In my opinion, this makes the product now significantly less usable than competing UPnP media servers that poll the directories. Gone are the days when you could leave a file to download to a shared directory and expect to have it ready to play as soon as it completes.

However, you can make WMP 11 and WMC 2.0 coexist, if you're careful. First, you need to open a command window to the c:\Program Files\Windows Media Player directory and type "wmpnetwk.exe uninstall" to uninstall the WMP11 media sharing service. Then, you need to delete the c:\Program Files\Windows Media Connect 2 directory and reinstall WMC 2.0 from Microsoft's Download Center. (You might want to hurry, since it's not clear how long they'll leave this on the download site.)

When you're done, you've got the responsive old WMC 2.0 and a nice new Windows Media Player with no compromises.

Hi!

Your problem is that You have got the wrong firmware.
All firmware for DSM-520 ending in "EU" is stripped of Napster connectivity.
If the player is supposed to be "US", return it to the store and get the right one.

//Leffe

There is no way to load any other firmware in Europe, the device will only look to a Euro update site & try to put the US firmware on does not ensure that it will communicate with an English Napster account, in fact I'm sure it won't.

I sent it back ......

Any ideas about hooking up an XBox360 HD-DVD drive via usb and playing HD-DVDs? I plugged one in to see what would happen, but the dsm-520 did not recognize it as a usb device.

The drive has to be formated Fat 32, not NT to be recognized.

Alan

Has anyone had problems with the audio not working after stopping a video? It works fine when I watch a video, however if I stop the video and try playing another video, the sound doesn't work anymore. All of my videos are recorded using Audio MPEG-1 Layer 2, 48Khz, 384Kb/s 2 channel.

Again, the videos work fine until stopped, then I have to restart the device to get the audio top work again.

BTW, I have the latest firmware and DLink Media server installed.

Thanks,
Steve

Try Tversity rute. It's free so you have nothing to lose.

Try Tversity rute. It's free so you have nothing to lose.


Same problem. It's got something to do with the DSM-520. I guess I'll try Dlink's support.

Steve

I'm sure with a more powerful CPU and transcoding turned on, the FLAC and X264 files would play.

FWIW, I just bought the 520 and tried it out with TVersity setup to transcode my H.264 matroska files and playback was pretty terrible with a 2.8GHz P4 HT. I think the CPU requirements are pretty hefty for H.264 encoded content. FWIW, my files are not "HD" resolutions. I store my DVDs on disk using H.264 video and AC3 (or DTS) audio in Matroska containers. The resolution is usually 720xwhatever (<= 480) depending upon the aspect ratio of the original.

For some reason, the files I produced using Nero Recode 2 (which are basically H.264 in MP4 containers with AAC sound) played much better, even though they were also being transcoded on the fly. The other problem seems to be that whenever I have a video being played which is transcoded on the fly, I seem to get a black border all the way around. I don't know if this is a TVersity problem or a DSM-520 problem.

I just bought my 520 (in the UK) and am sending it straight back. I posted this in another forum :
===========
* Fails to correctly stream HD content. Stutters too badly to use.

* No sound on some content – particularly wmv9 and vob files.

* When trying to stream HD content, if I use the “jump” feature – instead of FF/RW, you can specify a time to which you wish to jump – it continues to play stutteringly badly as before, then after 6 seconds or so, it just freezes.

* The USB port is on the front and this obviously spoils the lines of the unit if you have it on the top of your hifi stack.

* The blue network LED flashes its silly head off while you are streaming media ! Most disconcerting and distracting.

* When playing photos, you must select “stretch to fit” otherwise the photos will only half fill the screen, and even then they are only played at 480p.

* I even tried to plug in a USB HDD to see if I could get around the stuttering issue by not having to rely on the links bandwidth (if indeed that is the problem) – However, none of my USB devices were even recognised. A 4GB microdrive, and 40GB USB HDD and a 1GB USB pen drive.

* The D-Link media server is actually not as bad as some other reviews make it out to be. One very minor niggle though, was in playing MP3 files from one artist – it showed me the list of tracks, with all Track 1s first, then all Track 2s, and so on. Using the album feature got around this, but the interface is still just very slightly clunky on MP3. The TwonkyVision server seemed to have some good and some bad points too but I’m not reviewing that today.
==========

So - duff or useless ? I'm hoping for a refund, then it's back to square one for me and HD streaming. UK doesn't have the best of choices for this type of thing, with only the SC200, Freecom/Mediagate 3.5" kit being readily available at a decent price.

David Harris

"* No sound on some content – particularly wmv9 and vob files."

If the file has WMA audio, make sure your receiver can actually play back streamed WMA. My Pioneer 1014TX can't.


"* The blue network LED flashes its silly head off while you are streaming media ! Most disconcerting and distracting."

I covered my LED with a small square of electrical tape.

Yeah-sell it or return it if you can and get something better.
The DLink media streamer product line is junk and poorly supported.

Well, there is no such thing like ideal media player, the technology just started to evolve. In my view, DSM520 provides pretty decent functionality and hopefully we can expect some fixes with the next firmware release. Speaking about HD content I tested DSM520 playing .TS file (12 Mbit bitrate) and it ran pretty smoothly. To avoid stuttering you should have your HD media file on the same computer that runs Media Server. Other options (remote NAS or External USB drive connected to your computer) don't work well, at least with the current firmware.

True there is no such thing as an ideal player as it depends on each individuals requirements and expectations. However there is such a thing as a functional player which can and does playback high bitrate transport streams over a wired network without requiring server side software, playsback ISO or Video_TS folder ripped DVD's with full interactivity, and also playsback each of these formats off the optional internal hard drive. Finally, there is a device that will be adding an add on ATSC HD tuner for recording HD OTA channels.

And it costs around the same as the dsm500, maybe 50 bucks more and guess what is supported by the manufacturer also.

Just my 2 cents.

Cheers.

I just got off the phone with D-link support(they are clueless about this device)But they are telling me that the internet radio(live365) will output only analog signal and won't be able to play through my hdmi cable.
My hdmi works fine with mp3's and video's,is this true or is there a workaround?

I found that if the station is 128 or higher bitrate ,you get audio from the hdmi cable.Anything lower you must use analog cables.Anyone get any different results?

I'm shopping around for one of these media players.

I'm looking at the D-Link 520 and the Mvix MX760HD.

The Mvix has a hard driver encloser so it will suppose a local hard drive and that could be a plus on it's side.

However it's about $100 to $150 more.

I'm not looking to spend a lot and have a low budget.

Here is what I'm looking to do and would appreciate some advice and direction:

I love to watch a few video podcasts of my favorite tech shows, specifically DL.TV and Diggnation and Crankygeeks.

Ok maybe it's not your thing but that's what I watch.

I just got a Samsung LN-S5096D which is a 40 inch LCD 1080p. It has two HDMI and two Component plus a few of the older regular inputs.

I wanted to hook up one of these media players and so far the D-Link is the only inexpensive model available today that has the HDMI.

The more expensive Mvix has only the Component but it supports 1080p (or so they say).

I don't remember if the D-Link supports 1080p but I do remember it supports 1080i.

So I will be trying to play via the network from my main computer (either wirelessly or wired it doesn't matter, so wire is preferred by me), these files and they come in .AVI, MP4 and WMV format. I already have software to convert the files if necessary and hopefully I won't need to.

I've read some bad issue about the D-Link being slow.

I don't really care if the choosing the file is slow but if it is slow in playing the file then of course there will be problems such as jittering etc.

From reading on this forum and thread it seems that most people are using this device (D-Link) to play mainly audio files.

Can anyone comment on the kind of video files I will playing and if the D-Link can do this fairly well.

It does look like the firmware upgrades do improve things as time goes on and that's a good thing to know that it will be continually be improved and updated.

So that's it any comments or suggestions.

Should I buy now, D-Link or Mvix?

Thanks

Rob

what model number?

Is that question to me?

The model numbers I'm looking at are the DLink DSM-520 and the Mvix MX-760HD.

Rob

I'm shopping around for one of these media players.

I'm looking at the D-Link 520 and the Mvix MX760HD.

...................

From reading on this forum and thread it seems that most people are using this device (D-Link) to play mainly audio files.
Rob


I'm doing just opposite, use D-Link for playing mostly video files and it does it fairly well. Playback issue is the only exception. Other than that D-Link appears to be a decent player.

Can anyone comment on the kind of video files I will playing and if the D-Link can do this fairly well.

I use the D-Link to play AVI/XVID and have also used it to play MP4 files (converted from FLV) without a problem. The AVI files are around 350MB/hr and work just fine on a wireless connection.

The AVIs are xvid encoded HD streams, and they look very good on my 60" front projector screen.

For me, the HDMI helps a lot with colors and brightness (AE700U). It is pretty much a requirement for me for any device like this.


The 520 does have some problems with FF/RW, I have to restart the video from time to time because of it.

For what you are looking at using it for, I think it would work well. Plus you can get it at best buy- great return policy if it doesn't work out.

--Joachim

Does this thing display jpeg photos in true HD yet?

Does this thing display jpeg photos in true HD yet?

I haven't fiddled with it, but my experience displaying photos on the 520 has been awful. Very slow and bad quality.

So that would be a no.

I use the D-Link to play AVI/XVID and have also used it to play MP4 files (converted from FLV) without a problem. The AVI files are around 350MB/hr and work just fine on a wireless connection.

Joachim, are you using any software to transcode (on the fly) your MP4 files to something which the D-Link box can accept? Or does the box natively handle those files?

To the original poster, your WMV files are probably okay, but for your AVI files, you need to know what the codec is. AVI is just a container. The D-Link will handle xvid/divx quite well.

I had problems with H.264. I had two cases of H.264 files which I was trying out. In my case, the H.264 files, both Matroska (.mkv) and MP4, had to be transcoded on the fly and resulted in very poor quality transmission to the device. The box says that it supports Nero Recode 2 SE. I have no idea what that means.

Does anyone know what codecs/containers come under the Nero Recode 2 support for this box?

Hmm... looking at this mvix box looks like it is basically running linux, which means it is likely using something like ffmpeg for codec support? which means it might actually support H.264 natively? anyone know anything about this. if so, i would be all over it.

I know this has been asked before, so sorry.

When playing a video/song, you can go back and look at other files on your server. How do you go back to the original video (that is still playing) and continue it on the full screen. Everything I try, just causes the song or video to restart.

Joachim, are you using any software to transcode (on the fly) your MP4 files to something which the D-Link box can accept? Or does the box natively handle those files?

I can play a couple mp4 files I've downloaded, as well as some FLV->MP4 that I transcoded by hand. This was a couple months ago, but as I remember the 520 handled MP4 pretty well. As with any transcoding for these types of devices, it is a little hit-or-miss trying to get things like bit rates correct, especially when coming from FLV.

I have not experimented with on-the-fly transcoding.

--Joachim

I know this has been asked before, so sorry.

When playing a video/song, you can go back and look at other files on your server. How do you go back to the original video (that is still playing) and continue it on the full screen. Everything I try, just causes the song or video to restart.

For video, you can hit the PIP button on the remote.

I couldn't sleep last night over this and in the morning ordered it from Best Buy and picked it up about 2 hours ago. I haven't openned the box yet, but installed the Media Server software. Set up my folders that I wanted to share.

I'm just now getting things setup. I only have a short HDMI cable and am ordering a longer one.

So just for testing I might have to use the component hookup till I get a new HDMI cable.

So I'm getting excited and hope I'm not too disappointed, and as you said I can return it if I'm totally disappointed.

One thing however, I keep reading about .AVI files that they will most likely not work.

How can they say all the media types work and then when you get the box openned there is a gottacha.

As I mentioned, I download 'dl.tv' and 'diggnation' and they are in .AVI (I can get them in a different format but I usually watch them on my Treo 650 while on the subway going into Manhattan for work).

Does this mean those files won't work after all, without recoding them?

Thanks, I'll let you know what I think and what happens.

Rob

.AVI as a container is supported however there are many different codec's out there that use it and all are not supported by the DSM-520. An if all else fails get a codec checking software like Gspot and post the data here so that we can see what codec it is using. Most XVID's/Divx encoded files will work pending they are not using any type of GMC or Quarterpixel encoding etc.

-Aaron

I use mine to pretty much only watch xvid/divx movies and tv shows. They all work fine, and support the 5.1 surround sound audio codecs.

I tried several different media server programs out there, and I find that the Windows Media Connect works best. It continually updates the files on your computer that are being shared. So as soon as you move a file in the folder you are sharing, it becomes instantly available to watch on your TV.

Well, I got it hooked up and working.

I'm not jumping up and down over it, but it works.

It does play the .avi file that I wanted, so I'm good there.

The unit is slow (as everyone states) well let me clarify that. It seems the commands from the remote are not getting picked up right away. I seem to have to hit the remote key over and over again for it to pick up the signal. Maybe the IR eye is not a sensitive one.

I manged to get it working wirelessly and wired. I tried both. I will probably just stick with the wired (to avoid issues) but it work on the wireless network and setup was a breeze.

When I first attempted to play my .avi file it started to play it but then when I tried again it said file format not recognized. It said that for every file I selected. And then the box just froze and I had to unplug the power cord to get it to reset.

But as soon as it came back up, it started to download the new version of firmware (1.02) and did that flawlessly as well, I was impressed with that. I like the idea of the box taking care of itself with auto updates.

I was disappointed in the video quality but recognize that the files I was attempting to play were sized for my Treo 650 and they were a smaller file size hence less resolution.

I don't seem to understand one setting. I'm using the HDMI and it won't let me change the resolution. It's stuck at 480 interface. Does anyone know why it can't be changed.

It's located in the system setting under Audio/Video.

I will next be trying to hook up a hard drive via the USB port, not sure that will work. I will also test a SD media flash card in the usb port.

One thing that I keep reading about; what's this Window Media Connect. I can't find that software at Microsoft. I don't have a Windows XP Media Center PC. Just a good notebook with lots of memory and lots of external hard drive space. I use it as my main computer.

So if someone can tell me what the Window Media Connect can do or is supposed to do I'd appreciate it. I am running Windows Media Player version 11.

What else, mmm... I guess I have to fiddle around with it a little bit more. But this was my first impression.

Ok I'll get back to playing around with it for now.

Thanks again

Rob

just search google for windows media connect.

this might be a place to download it.

http://www.softpedia.com/get/Internet/File-Sharing/Windows-Media-Connect.shtml

One thing that I keep reading about; what's this Window Media Connect. I can't find that software at Microsoft. I don't have a Windows XP Media Center PC. Just a good notebook with lots of memory and lots of external hard drive space. I use it as my main computer.

So if someone can tell me what the Window Media Connect can do or is supposed to do I'd appreciate it. I am running Windows Media Player version 11.

Microsoft moved Windows Media Connect functionality into Media Player 11. You don't need anything else. Media Player 11 is UPnP AV media server. You can use it instead of D-Link supplied software. It's even better in term of indexing your media files and provides much more categories.

One more thing: upon enabling Player 11's media server looks around, recognizes DSM-520 as legitimate client and allows to play DRM-protected songs.

If you are connecting via HDMI, the DSM-520 will auto-sense your tv's HDMI settings aka if you are at 1080i, the DSM-520 will run at 1080i and so on. This can not be changed manually on the DSm-520.

WMC questions were answered below so ill skip that.

If you are going to hookup and use a USB drive with the DSM-520 make sure you are using FAT32(VFAT). The DSM-520 does not work well if at all with a NTFS formated drive.

Thanks for the info.

What I don't understand about the resolution setting. I'm using a Samsung LN-S4096D which is capable of handling 1080p.

I don't remember anything that I can do at the TV side of things to be at either 480 or 1080.

You say the DSM-520 is auto-sensing the settings. But from what? The TV is going to play or better display whatever is thrown at it.

I feel stupid right now, because I'm not getting what is tell the DSM-520 to set itself at 480.

The TV is not sending a signal, isn't it the other way around.

I just checked and there is nothing I can set on the TV to say be in 1080 mode versa 480 mode.

I know that I can do that with the cable box. And that's a good example, the cable box is sending the signal to the TV and the TV is just displaying the resolution that the cable box is delivering.

Ok, so I'm not a rocket scientists, I just don't get this at this point. I think I've been at this too long tonight and probably should give it a rest.

Oh yes, I formatted a USB drive in FAT32 and the DSM-520 could not recognize it, so I have a feeling that hard drives are off the list. It was an 80GB drive.

Rob

Ok I got!!!!

I see what happened. And it's along the lines of what you said.

When the DSM-520 turned on for the first time connected to the HDMI port the box defaults to 480i. Then the TV's HDMI sees that and sets itself accordingly to the same and then locks it. I guess there is some kind of communication between the ports.

Well, I managed to switch it to1080i.

I had hooked up the DSM-520 with both HDMI and Component to check out the display with both hookups.

So I switched the DSM to component, doing that allowed me to switch the display resolution on the DSM to 1080i. Then I switched back to HDMI and the setting held.

I guess there is no communication with the component hookup and there is no means to lock the setting by TV. So with the switch back to HDMI the HDMI on the TV side saw the incoming signal as 1080i and then locked itself again but this time at that setting (1080i).

OK, am I making sense now. Solved and now the whole process makes sense to me. I wasn't getting it before.

Thanks again.

I just seem to be figuring this thing out little by litte.

One thing I am finding, depending on a video, I guess how it was coded, some files end up playing with jitters and pauses because it can't keep up. But then another file just as large will play fine. It seems that the real issue with the working correctly for most people is how they code their video files.

I wonder if D-Link has a chart to let us know what are the best performance settings to use when I go to recode a video file.

I'll go online and see if they don't have any info on that.

Thanks again.

Rob

By the way, now that I've got the whole pretty much fine tuned, I can tell you that it is operating pretty well now. And it's not behaving a slow as it first did.

I think the slow part is due to the remotes commands not getting to the unit. I have to aim it directly at the IR port and then it work smoothly.

Rob

Rob-

Yep...the remote is pretty finicky. You pretty much have to aim right at the unit . I think you have 20 degress +/- to work with but it's tight.

You didn't state which type of video you are trying to view / recode. The D-Link Media Server 1.08 does not work well with transport streams (HDTV files - tp or ts). You will have better luck with Windows Media Connect 2 and renaming the files as .mpg. In my case I always have to recode with Streamclip because the 520 can't sync up video wise. Takes about 20 minutes with a one hour file.

Other notes...4 gig limit on file size, FAT32 only on the USB port in front.

I played with this thing all night. One of those 'can't stop till I figure it all out' nights.

Seems everyone is talking about this Window Media Connect 2. But I've read that with Windows Media Player 11 it's no longer needed or something like that. Or WMP11 breaks WMC 2?

Is more info on Windows Media Connect 2 somewhere in theses forums that I can read about?

Thanks

Rob

Microsoft seems to have removed WMC2 from their site now that they have integrated the UPNP AV server with Windows Media Player 11. Im sure someone has the download if you want it but I prefer the WMP11 server to regular WMC2. Alot more browsing options and def seems to work quicker.

-Aaron

Thanks guys again.

I just did the reading about WMC2 and yes it's now built into WMP11. I turned it on and the DSM-520 saw it instantly. I'm cataloging my media files right now. I had not done that before.

Here is a question: Everyone seems to think that WMC is better than the DSM's Media Server software. I personally at this point don't see anything different.

What makes using WMP11 (formally known as WMC2) the better option. What can it do that the Media Server that came with the DSM can't do?

I see that you said it reads or works faster.

Also, I'd like to try out the AOL Radio stuff has anyone played with that. AOL is a free service now and after reading the doc on it that came with the box it said the 'trial' will expire on July 2006, that was 4 months ago! What do I have to do make that work if it's even possible.

I wanted to test out some of that online stuff, but I'm not really interested in paying any montly fees for services, and I guess that's what they are hoping to get people to do.

Can you recommend things to try out, I'm mostly interested in what I can with videos.

That vTuner, does it do videos, is it free?

I'm sorry, just asking questions.

Thanks
Rob

Here is a question: Everyone seems to think that WMC is better than the DSM's Media Server software. I personally at this point don't see anything different.

I have found the DLink server software to work fine, even better/faster than WMC.

One reason to use WMC is that xbox360 will stream video from it (WMV only).

Other UPnP servers (TVersity? I forget which) do a much nicer job of presenting folders- for example by date or by title.

Joachim

Alas, I'm not a gamer! So there is no X-Box in my life!

I wouldn't actually say WMC is better than the D-link Media Server overall for what it is intended to do. Bottom line is D-link Media Server actually supports more video/audio codecs than WMC offers. It is also designed to work with the box better however diff people have diff preferences and the D-link Media Server does have its bugs sometimes.

As far as AOL Stuff, AOL Radio was removed from the devices firmware since the service was discontinued by AOL for DMA clients. As of now it only offers AOL MUsic Now which is just another DRM music service which you can use WMC to stream files to the DSM-520. Which brings up another point, the D-link Media server can not play protected content, WMC can.

Live365 is free but your selection will be limited without higher access.

vTuner is worldwide RADIO only, no video and has a free trial for...like 60 days or so i can't remember.

HOpefully these answer some of your questions,

Aaron

Here is a question: Everyone seems to think that WMC is better than the DSM's Media Server software. I personally at this point don't see anything different.
Media Player 11 allows to play WMDRM protected WMA files and provides much more categories, at least.

Thanks those were great comments!

I did notice that the D-Link Media Server will display the photo icons and WMC is unable to!

So if you want to search thru photos WMC will only give you file names, not especially handy. It turns out that I like icon view better since I haven't done a good job naming my photos.

This was an interesting, I would have thought first hand that everyone would be jumping up and down for WMC or WMP!! server instead of the very simple and easy to use D-Link Media Server.

I'm going to see if I can test out Live365, they do have video right?

And if I wanted to setup AOL Music, do you know were I would get the info on doing that?

I guess I just want to test out all the features and options.

Thanks

Rob

Sorry yet another question. I could not find the answer to this in the documentation, I went through the whole thing.

There is an option in 'setup' under 'additional settings' called 'control device from' and the options are 'remote' or 'other'.

I can find in the documentation what the 'other' would be or how to use it.

Does anyone know what that is for?

Thanks

Rob

What makes using WMP11 (formally known as WMC2) the better option. What can it do that the Media Server that came with the DSM can't do?
I actually believe that WMP11 is a step backwards from WMC2, due to the Media Library integration. As casino187 mentioned, WMC2 instantly updates the UPnP catalog when files are moved into (or deleted from) the shared folders. WMP11 and other UPnP servers like TVersity, however, have to wait for a polling period or application to be launched until their libraries are synced up with the file system change. (For instructions on making WMP11 peacefully coexist with WMC2, see my earlier post.)

The DSM-520 and WMC2 really shine with uTorrent, which has an RSS feature that automatically downloads TV shows from a RSS feed like EZTV <http://tvrss.net/feed/eztv/> or VTV <http://tvrss.net/feed/vtv/>. When a new episode is available, it automatically starts downloading and is ready for playback on the DSM-520 as soon as the download is complete. This effectively makes the DSM-520 into an HD TiVo at a fraction of the cost.

Now, if only playback were as seamless on the DSM-520 as a Tivo.

D-Link media server provides one very interesting feature, it allows playback while downloading, so you can watch the beginning of the show and make a decision, "should I stay or should I go". Another good feature, D-Link server plays AVI files with corrupted index, WMP doesn't.

Sorry yet another question. I could not find the answer to this in the documentation, I went through the whole thing.

There is an option in 'setup' under 'additional settings' called 'control device from' and the options are 'remote' or 'other'.

I can find in the documentation what the 'other' would be or how to use it.

Does anyone know what that is for?

Thanks

Rob

This option changes the control point of the device. Default control point is on the device(DSM-520) and is controlled by the remote. If you change this to other, then the unit goes into slave mode allowing commands to be sent from the network. IE if you have control point software i believe one is called cidero on your PC, you can 'send' video/music/photo's from your PC to the device and change them via your PC instead ofa remote control.

This also turns off the device's UI and will show only the Media source on a black background.

-Aaron

Thanks, I just went to the web site and download 'Cidero' there is now a beta that better handles the D-Link DSM-520.

I downloaded beta version 1.5.2!

I have not yet installed it or played around with this kind of software but I was asking the question and Aaron_LC answered it and now I will try it out.

Thanks

Rob

The DSM-520 and WMC2 really shine with uTorrent, which has an RSS feature that automatically downloads TV shows from a RSS feed like EZTV <http://tvrss.net/feed/eztv/> or VTV <http://tvrss.net/feed/vtv/>. When a new episode is available, it automatically starts downloading and is ready for playback on the DSM-520 as soon as the download is complete. This effectively makes the DSM-520 into an HD TiVo at a fraction of the cost.

Now, if only playback were as seamless on the DSM-520 as a Tivo.

I just went to the links you suggested and then realized that I need a bit torrent client to get the files.

Does any have a recommendation on a client I should use?

Thanks

Rob

Does any have a recommendation on a client I should use?
The URL for uTorrent is <http://www.utorrent.com>, but there are lots of forums that discuss bit torrent clients in excruciating detail. My point was only that the WMC2 instant library update is critical for an automated subscription system like this.

Just got my DSM-520 from costco online. I was extremely excited to get this item as it would finally solve the hassel of getting pictures and videos from my computers to the 57" DLP TV.

I have to say, after about 6 hours playing and testing this thing, I am disappointed.

This thing was extremely easy to setup, it grabbed an IP from my dhcp server, already had the latest firmware and found my newly installed Dlink media server with no issues.

I am running D-Link Media Server 1.08 and firmware 1.02 and connected via ethernet cable and HDMI.

Here are my issues with this device:

1. My 10.1 megapixel pictures from my Canon XTi digital camera look like crap on this thing.

2. If you set picture scaling to "keep as original" it fills barely 30% of my 1080p display.

3. If you set picture scaling to "Fit to Screen" then the picture is distorted and the aspect ratio is not correct, and using "Scale with distortion" is even worse.

4. I cannot get 5.1 to work over HDMI, if I add a digital coax cable and use that instead then 5.1 works fine??? wtf? Why would using many of the same source files not work over HDMI for 5.1 sound but works fine with the digital coax cable?

5. This thing plays a lot of video types but is missing some of the criticals. For instance I cannot play ifo or ISOs of dvds to keep the menus. I cannot play mkv files.

6. In the few tests I have done, I am already seeing this thing hang on playing some large TS files. I have The Polar Express in a
7.4GB .ts file that is 1280x720
Video: MPEG2 Video 1280x720 59.94fps 38810Kbps [Video]
Audio: Dolby AC3 48000Hz 6ch 384Kbps [Audio]
Subtitle: DVD Subpicture [Subtitle]

The thing plays fine up to about 30 minutes in then hangs at the same spot every single time, then is starts up again about 10 minutes later and continues. It does this over and over. I assumed this was because it was getting network clogged or something but even after a clean reboot of this box and setting the video to start 15 seconds before these spots it still hangs. So I assumed it was a bad TS file and tested by playing on my computer it each of these spots and it played perfectly fine. I double checked the md5 hash for this file and it checked out as well. I have 3 other TS files that do the same thing but it different spots.

7. I don't like the fact that this thing finds pictures in my music and video folders. I want the ability to say only look for pictures here and only look for music here etc. Otherwise you end up with a bunch of useless pictures mixed in with family pictures.

8. The fast forward rewind is a freaking joke, no patience at all dealing with this slow POS function, and why it wont work if you have jump on is rediculous.


So all in all this thing is going back to costco. I am comparing this with my current setup with is litterly a long DVI cable from my computer to my TV and a long fiber optic cable from my computer sound card to my receiver. When comparing pictures I have taken with my Canon XTi using picasa via my computer over DVI to the back of my TV, it is night and day the quality difference. When using my computer the pictures have the correct aspect ration and look like works of art. When using the D-Link they look like crap and are distorted. When I double click ANY video file known to man, media player classic pops it up in perfect aspect ratio, and my fiber optical cable feeds the 5.1 sound with no issues. I can run iTunes for all my music and anything else I want to do.

This thing has too many issues and the quality of pictures is a joke. The limitation to 8mbit for video, no HD pictures, poor aspect ration for pictures, is enough for me.

Dennis

I just got the dsm-510 . It is kinda clunky too, but the pictures are shown in the correct aspect and HD!The pic's on my 1080p lcd look astonishing, this is the best they have ever looked. I haven't messed around too much with the videos yet.I have tried different servers,Tversity,twonkyvision,nero mediahome(comes with the 510) and the dlink server from my 520.I think that tversity is the easiest to configure and has a huge support forum,but the dlink server and the nero produced the very best picture quality,I don't know why the picture quality would differ so much.
Circuit City has this for sale online only for easy return,this product is getting close to being a keeper.

dlevens-

I find that the D-Link Server Software isn't the sharpest tool in the shed. You may want to give Windows Media Connect (which is now in Media Player 11) a try.

From others that I have corresponded with on this forum there is a 4 gig size limit on files. That may be why you are hanging on the 7.4 gig .ts file. It is interesting that you were able to see the D-Link continue playing the file 10 minutes after it hung up. You have a lot more patience than I do.

I believe the 8 Mbps limit is for wireless. I have played 19 Mbps .ts files without any problem when using the wired connection.

Can't address your image issues as I don't use it for that. It is too bad that this device has so much potential and appears to be limited by poor engineering support. From other postings I have read it seems that many devices similar to this one suffer from the same issues. It does what I need (play recorded transport HDTV files) but could be a lot better.

Return it and get something which actually works. I , unfortunately, went down the DLink route and eventually ended up selling them(2) on ebay. Thenit was mediagate, but alas no HD and I suddenly found myself with mostly HD material. FINALLY I got the Tvix 5000's which playback everyhting I need, especially IFO/ISO and HD ts's all stored on several Infrants. Now I have a system that works. I picked up a second 5000 in October for the office TV, and will probably end up ordering a 4000 for the main TV.

Does anyone use the integrated media server within the new Windows Media Player 11?

I've always used Windows Media Connect, and liked it. Now it is integrated in the new media player. I had to redo all my settings and don't find it real user friendly. My main question is, has anyone noticed this causing the media server to be extremely slow when browsing through the files?

I don't like the fact the for some reason in photo mode WMP11 doesn't show icons of the pics when searching and D-Link's Media Player does. And yeah, does look like WMP11 is slower and more problematic!

Quick question on the DSM-520 - song playing - use menu buttons to navigate around music library - how does one return to the song playing screen???

4. I cannot get 5.1 to work over HDMI, if I add a digital coax cable and use that instead then 5.1 works fine??? wtf? Why would using many of the same source files not work over HDMI for 5.1 sound but works fine with the digital coax cable?

5. This thing plays a lot of video types but is missing some of the criticals. For instance I cannot play ifo or ISOs of dvds to keep the menus. I cannot play mkv files.

6. In the few tests I have done, I am already seeing this thing hang on playing some large TS files. I have The Polar Express in a
7.4GB .ts file that is 1280x720
Video: MPEG2 Video 1280x720 59.94fps 38810Kbps [Video]
Audio: Dolby AC3 48000Hz 6ch 384Kbps [Audio]
Subtitle: DVD Subpicture [Subtitle]

The thing plays fine up to about 30 minutes in then hangs at the same spot every single time, then is starts up again about 10 minutes later and continues. It does this over and over. I assumed this was because it was getting network clogged or something but even after a clean reboot of this box and setting the video to start 15 seconds before these spots it still hangs. So I assumed it was a bad TS file and tested by playing on my computer it each of these spots and it played perfectly fine. I double checked the md5 hash for this file and it checked out as well. I have 3 other TS files that do the same thing but it different spots.

7. I don't like the fact that this thing finds pictures in my music and video folders. I want the ability to say only look for pictures here and only look for music here etc. Otherwise you end up with a bunch of useless pictures mixed in with family pictures.

8. The fast forward rewind is a freaking joke, no patience at all dealing with this slow POS function, and why it wont work if you have jump on is rediculous.


So all in all this thing is going back to costco. I am comparing this with my current setup with is litterly a long DVI cable from my computer to my TV and a long fiber optic cable from my computer sound card to my receiver. When comparing pictures I have taken with my Canon XTi using picasa via my computer over DVI to the back of my TV, it is night and day the quality difference. When using my computer the pictures have the correct aspect ration and look like works of art. When using the D-Link they look like crap and are distorted. When I double click ANY video file known to man, media player classic pops it up in perfect aspect ratio, and my fiber optical cable feeds the 5.1 sound with no issues. I can run iTunes for all my music and anything else I want to do.


4. The culprit is HDMI standard. HDMI checks capabilities of all devices in a chain. Say you have HDMI cable between DSM and receiver and between receiver and TV. TV is stereo. HDMI falls back to the least common denominator, which is stereo in this case.

5. It's a common "problem" of most media players. The thought is they might get into troubles with MPAA. I would blame MPAA first.

6. 38810Kbps is roughly 38Mbps.
Manual p.31 clearly says 8 Mbps is the max, so you've been warned. Well, DSM is based on Sigma Designs EM8620L chipset. Actually, it can handle more than 8, I saw 18, 19 , 20, but 38! I surprised it even started playing. This limit applies to all players based on the same chipset, which include most discussed on these forums.

7. Their software is not the best, but they have to supply something to get started. You can find plenty of UPnP A/V server around for free. This is at least not hardware fault.

8. This is again a common problem (a real one) of most media players.

Computer always was and always will be faster, more adaptable, more versatile and more powerful than any of these players. But how much money you spent on it and how much time you invested in it. It's not fair comparison. When you buy Toyota Corolla you cannot expect it to run 180 mph, you need to invest more, much more. But Corolla is still useful for some simple tasks like get you to a place where you need to be.

Quick question on the DSM-520 - song playing - use menu buttons to navigate around music library - how does one return to the song playing screen???

Good question, I don't think it's possible. Maybe someone else will have the answer, but I've tried several things, and it appears once you leave that screen, you can't get back to it.

Good question, I don't think it's possible. Maybe someone else will have the answer, but I've tried several things, and it appears once you leave that screen, you can't get back to it.


does the PIP button work?
Does anyone use this with the Logitech Harmony remotes? specifically, the 880

Quick question on the DSM-520 - song playing - use menu buttons to navigate around music library - how does one return to the song playing screen???
It depends where you're:
- if you're in setup hit Setup button a few times until you get out;
- any other place use Left and Right buttons.

This is one of the DSM-520's major flaws actually. once you have left the now playing screen, you can not bring it up until you select a new song and play it.

-Aaron

This is one of the DSM-520's major flaws actually. once you have left the now playing screen, you can not bring it up until you select a new song and play it.
Oh, I see. I misunderstood the original question. I've noticed that too, but just thought that I've not been able to figure out how to do it.

Does anyone use this with the Logitech Harmony remotes? specifically, the 880
Yes, I have both these devices. Given the quality of the DSM-520 remote, I'd say it's almost a requirement to invest in a decent universal remote like the Harmony 880.

Other than the fact that the DSM-520 seems to have no discreet On/Off or Play/Pause, configuration was pretty straight forward. I noticed an issue with the default timings generating multiple button hits, but a run through the Harmony 880 online troubleshooter solved the problem.

Of course, boot times on this unit are obscenely long, and you can't really set the startup delays long enough to queue commands after startup.

This actually brings up another feature request: Could there be an option to preserve the navigation state between sessions?

I find that 99% of the time I'm playing back videos from the same folder, and it takes way too many button clicks to navigate back to that location at the beginning of every session. (And this is aggravated by the WMC bug that requires users to discover the server and revalidate the device to play protected Windows Media content at the beginning of every session. In my opinion, validation should only occur just before the first DRM-protected content is played in the session, since most users don't even have any protected content.)

Of course, boot times on this unit are obscenely long, and you can't really set the startup delays long enough to queue commands after startup.

This actually brings up another feature request: Could there be an option to preserve the navigation state between sessions?


I just keep it on always - this takes care of boot time as well as state between sessions. :D

Yes, I have both these devices. Given the quality of the DSM-520 remote, I'd say it's almost a requirement to invest in a decent universal remote like the Harmony 880.

Other than the fact that the DSM-520 seems to have no discreet On/Off or Play/Pause, configuration was pretty straight forward. I noticed an issue with the default timings generating multiple button hits, but a run through the Harmony 880 online troubleshooter solved the problem.

Of course, boot times on this unit are obscenely long, and you can't really set the startup delays long enough to queue commands after startup.

This actually brings up another feature request: Could there be an option to preserve the navigation state between sessions?

I find that 99% of the time I'm playing back videos from the same folder, and it takes way too many button clicks to navigate back to that location at the beginning of every session. (And this is aggravated by the WMC bug that requires users to discover the server and revalidate the device to play protected Windows Media content at the beginning of every session. In my opinion, validation should only occur just before the first DRM-protected content is played in the session, since most users don't even have any protected content.)


I have a Harmony 880 with this and find that the button response time is extremely slow. How do I fix this problem? Do I increase the response time or decrease it? Or is this just the way the unit is.

I also find that my remote will turn the unit on fine, but will never turn it off for some reason (if I press the power button manually on the remote it works). I think I'm going to fix it to where it just stays on all the time anyways.

I also don't understand why WMP11 won't let me browse through my files quickly. When I try to go to the next page of files, it just sticks there for like 10 seconds, then goes to the next page. WMC2 didn't do this.

I have a Harmony 880 with this and find that the button response time is extremely slow. How do I fix this problem? Do I increase the response time or decrease it? Or is this just the way the unit is.

I also find that my remote will turn the unit on fine, but will never turn it off for some reason (if I press the power button manually on the remote it works). I think I'm going to fix it to where it just stays on all the time anyways.

I also don't understand why WMP11 won't let me browse through my files quickly. When I try to go to the next page of files, it just sticks there for like 10 seconds, then goes to the next page. WMC2 didn't do this.

Read the sticky in the Remote Control forums that addresses the slow response issue:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=623320

Guys,

Can anybody help me on 2 problems I have with the d-link dsm-520

1) Can't get HDMI to work with Pioneer 436FDE.

I have changed the setting in the setup menu to hdmi, activated the HDMI setting on the pioneer plasma. ALso changed the video out (using the video out button on the remote) to use hdmi. Also tried unplugging and replugging the cable a few times so that the 520 recognizes the hdmi. No luck sofar with all of this. Any tips ? The unit works currently using the scart output (i have the european version). Version of firmware is 1.01r2EU

2) Is there any way of streaming internet radio ? I am using On2share pro as a media server and there is an option to stream a url in there. It shows up in the dlink menu under 'media url' but then it won't play :( . No error given either. Of course I can use live365 but that costs money :)

ANy help is appreciated!

Thanks

Yvo

I don't have an HDMI monitor so I can't really help too much here other than to say that some people have been able to get it to work after they power the unit off, then on again. Apparently the HDMI detection takes place during boot up.

The D-Link Server software will handle playlists using the .pls format. I have been successful in streaming one Internet radio station that is an .mp3 so I know it's possible. It does depend on the format of the stream itself.

Windows Media Connect 2 states that is capable but I haven't been successful. Which station is it and I can check to see if it is capable.

Not aware of the On2Share Pro software.

I went from WMC to Windows Media Player 11 and finally last night to TwonkyMedia - TwonkyMedia does not have the speed issue of Windows Media Player 11 and also allows streaming of Internet Radio URLs. It is not free but it is not expensive either. www.twonkyvision.com

fccgrant, paul_j_ghosh, many thanks for your quick replies! Will try the hdmi again with the reboot tip, although I am not very hopeful..

As for the internet radio streaming:
Can't post the url's yet as the forum restricts this for me until I have made 5 posts. In any case the extention is often .asx, so I don't really know the format it returns..

I am considering buying twonkyvision (damn, just bought on2share..). Paul, did you get the INternet Radio streaming to work then ? Any other tips on the HDMI are welcome. Does it actually make too much difference, am using Scart (rgb) now..?

Thanks

Yvo

Internet Radio stations from shoutcast are configured out of the box in TwonkyMedia and it is working for me. Others can be added as follows:

For client devices which do not directly support Internet Radio, the MediaServer acts as a proxy and translates Internet Radio Stations. For these clients each Radio Station looks like one never ending MP3 song which can be selected and played like a normal locally available piece of music.

Tom-

You can save .asx files on to your hard drive. They are only text files that are viewable in notepad if you rename them with a .txt extension.

If the href portion in the renamed asx file starts with http then you may be able to play them after you put the link into a playlist (m3u or pls file). If the href portion starts with mms then I don't believe so. I'm still looking at this issue and haven't determined if this is impossible.

Does the aspect ratio need to be changed for HDMI on the D-Link?

Does anyone happen to have some IR Codes for the DSM 520 for the Palm? I don't care what software it uses.

hey guys

i bought this a month ago and have been generally satisfied with it - maybe because i dont use it too much...watch some tv shows downloaded via torrents and listen to music...

anyway - i have a question, and would really appreciate it if someone could answer it for me...

i have been hearing a lot about this new gadget called - Creative Xmod...basically improves the sound quality of mp3's and all the reviews i have read so far have been rave...this has been made for laptops and connects to a laptop via a usb port..

so what i would like to know is: can i connect this to my dsm-520?

if anyone has tried this, or has some knowledge of this - please comment.

thanks a ton!

Does anyone happen to have some IR Codes for the DSM 520 for the Palm? I don't care what software it uses.

Sorry, I don't but our Harmony 680 controls the 520 quite well.

I do a lot more reading than posting here guys and have found a lot of useful info. Am hoping somebody can help me with my problem. :)

I Recently purchased the dlink 520 and am generallly satisfied with it. The problem i have is with backing up dvds and recoding with Nero Recode 2. (ultra 7). When I encode a file with 5.1 digital, the 520 doesn't play it, I get video but no audio. Any help? I get 5.1 when streaming a VOB file to the 520. but not with the Nero Digital file. Don't know if the problem is with the file or the 520, any help?

The problem i have is with backing up dvds and recoding with Nero Recode 2. (ultra 7). When I encode a file with 5.1 digital, the 520 doesn't play it, I get video but no audio. Any help?

My original goal was to use Nero Digital format, but you can't get 5.1 since the audio is AAC. The DSM520 does not support 5.1 AAC.

I use handbrake for windows instead to create mpeg4(video) with ac3(5.1 audio). I find handbrake to be very fast and works well with DVD43.

cjcote

My original goal was to use Nero Digital format, but you can't get 5.1 since the audio is AAC. The DSM520 does not support 5.1 AAC.

I use handbrake for windows instead to create mpeg4(video) with ac3(5.1 audio). I find handbrake to be very fast and works well with DVD43.

cjcote
thanks I'lll give that a try. How does the video look using Handbrake btw?

thanks I'lll give that a try. How does the video look using Handbrake btw?

The video looked great on my 43" Pioneer Plasma. I didn't see any video artifacts.

cjcote

Back to WMP11.

Everything is now working fine, except when I browse through my larger files. I have a folder with all Divx movies and it seems to be the only folder that takes forever to go to the next page.

When I try and go to the next page (page down), it takes about 8 seconds to show up. Why would it take so long on the larger video files?

Back to WMP11.

When I try and go to the next page (page down), it takes about 8 seconds to show up. Why would it take so long on the larger video files?

I unfornuately upgraded to WMP11 from WMP10. I was using Windows Media Connect 2.0 with WMP10 before I upgraded. Now that Windows Media Connect is part of WMP11, I noticed that it is much slower. Other users have noticed the slowdown as well. Another annoying thing is that I have all my music and video on a Dlink G600 network drive. When I upgraded to WMP11, it did not carry over and I had to add it again. That was a PITA.

I unfornuately upgraded to WMP11 from WMP10. I was using Windows Media Connect 2.0 with WMP10 before I upgraded. Now that Windows Media Connect is part of WMP11, I noticed that it is much slower. Other users have noticed the slowdown as well. Another annoying thing is that I have all my music and video on a Dlink G600 network drive. When I upgraded to WMP11, it did not carry over and I had to add it again. That was a PITA.

I just don't understand why it is slower on the larger files. I tried to go back to the Dlink server/software, but I forgot that it always duplicates and triplicates the list of files for some reason.

I guess I'll just hope that wmp will get fixed.

Quick question on the DSM-520 - song playing - use menu buttons to navigate around music library - how does one return to the song playing screen???

bump!

anyone have an answer for this...such an annoying problem! just hate it...

another question...for some reason - all my songs in an album appear alphabetically...any reason why this is happening and how can i correct it?

thanks a ton!

Hi, I am looking to purchase this however am not quite sure about its functionality.

Will this enable me to watch live streaming video on my tv? I usually use winamp to watch streaming video and would like to watch it on my TV. I currently have a low cost pc to tv connector but it doesn't have a remote or anything. The streams are in H.264 format which i believe is also called MPEG4. I am very new to this so please do let me know if this information isn't sufficient to answer my question.

In addition to the above I also have some movies stored that I downloaded which I would like to be able to watch on my TV. Can someone please confirm if all this would be possible with the DSM-520 or if there is another device out there that can do any of this. Thanks

additionally, does anybody know if the DSM-520 can natively decode dvix and Xvid. In other words, can one hook up an externall HD to the USB port on the 520 and play dvix right off the HD????????????

Thanx much

additionally, does anybody know if the DSM-520 can natively decode dvix and Xvid. In other words, can one hook up an externall HD to the USB port on the 520 and play dvix right off the HD????????????

Thanx much

yes you can do this!

Just got my DSM-520 from costco online. I was extremely excited to get this item as it would finally solve the hassel of getting pictures and videos from my computers to the 57" DLP TV.

I have to say, after about 6 hours playing and testing this thing, I am disappointed.

This thing was extremely easy to setup, it grabbed an IP from my dhcp server, already had the latest firmware and found my newly installed Dlink media server with no issues.

I am running D-Link Media Server 1.08 and firmware 1.02 and connected via ethernet cable and HDMI.

Here are my issues with this device:

1. My 10.1 megapixel pictures from my Canon XTi digital camera look like crap on this thing.

2. If you set picture scaling to "keep as original" it fills barely 30% of my 1080p display.

3. If you set picture scaling to "Fit to Screen" then the picture is distorted and the aspect ratio is not correct, and using "Scale with distortion" is even worse.

4. I cannot get 5.1 to work over HDMI, if I add a digital coax cable and use that instead then 5.1 works fine??? wtf? Why would using many of the same source files not work over HDMI for 5.1 sound but works fine with the digital coax cable?

5. This thing plays a lot of video types but is missing some of the criticals. For instance I cannot play ifo or ISOs of dvds to keep the menus. I cannot play mkv files.

6. In the few tests I have done, I am already seeing this thing hang on playing some large TS files. I have The Polar Express in a
7.4GB .ts file that is 1280x720
Video: MPEG2 Video 1280x720 59.94fps 38810Kbps [Video]
Audio: Dolby AC3 48000Hz 6ch 384Kbps [Audio]
Subtitle: DVD Subpicture [Subtitle]

The thing plays fine up to about 30 minutes in then hangs at the same spot every single time, then is starts up again about 10 minutes later and continues. It does this over and over. I assumed this was because it was getting network clogged or something but even after a clean reboot of this box and setting the video to start 15 seconds before these spots it still hangs. So I assumed it was a bad TS file and tested by playing on my computer it each of these spots and it played perfectly fine. I double checked the md5 hash for this file and it checked out as well. I have 3 other TS files that do the same thing but it different spots.

7. I don't like the fact that this thing finds pictures in my music and video folders. I want the ability to say only look for pictures here and only look for music here etc. Otherwise you end up with a bunch of useless pictures mixed in with family pictures.

8. The fast forward rewind is a freaking joke, no patience at all dealing with this slow POS function, and why it wont work if you have jump on is rediculous.


So all in all this thing is going back to costco. I am comparing this with my current setup with is litterly a long DVI cable from my computer to my TV and a long fiber optic cable from my computer sound card to my receiver. When comparing pictures I have taken with my Canon XTi using picasa via my computer over DVI to the back of my TV, it is night and day the quality difference. When using my computer the pictures have the correct aspect ration and look like works of art. When using the D-Link they look like crap and are distorted. When I double click ANY video file known to man, media player classic pops it up in perfect aspect ratio, and my fiber optical cable feeds the 5.1 sound with no issues. I can run iTunes for all my music and anything else I want to do.

This thing has too many issues and the quality of pictures is a joke. The limitation to 8mbit for video, no HD pictures, poor aspect ration for pictures, is enough for me.

Dennis

I used this unit about a week and returned it also. The HDMI output is limited to 640x480, in opposition to what's mentioned on the box. That fact alone is a total joke.

I used this unit about a week and returned it also. The HDMI output is limited to 640x480, in opposition to what's mentioned on the box. That fact alone is a total joke.
Get the dsm-510 will output HD photo in the original aspect.Mine looks awsome on a 1080p display.I did not like the 520 either.

Hi there.

Had a DSM-520 for about 2 weeks - just found this forum so thanks for all the pages of advice!

A couple of queries:

If you connect a USB memory device to the DSM-520, is there any way of accessing it over the network? ... would save me buying a NAS :confused:

I have my DSM connected by ethernet to my wireless router - which is then wireless to my PC.

Also I have turned on library sharing on WMP11 and it sees both my DSM-520 and a Phillips streamium... however neither device detects WMP11 as a server.
This means I have to run both the phillips software and D-Link for both devices to work.... while wmpntwk.exe is running in the background anyway!!!! Grrrrrr.
Thinking it might be a firewall problem but open to suggestions!

Cheers

Ben

I used this unit about a week and returned it also. The HDMI output is limited to 640x480, in opposition to what's mentioned on the box. That fact alone is a total joke.

You are referring to pictures, not video, right? I can play hi-def videos at 720P, or 1080i, and the picture is great.

cjcote

Hi there.


Also I have turned on library sharing on WMP11 and it sees both my DSM-520 and a Phillips streamium... however neither device detects WMP11 as a server.
This means I have to run both the phillips software and D-Link for both devices to work.... while wmpntwk.exe is running in the background anyway!!!! Grrrrrr.
Thinking it might be a firewall problem but open to suggestions!

Cheers

Ben

Your problem could be a lot of things.

Try the dlink FAQ

http://support.dlink.com/products/view.asp?productid=DSM%2D520

And then the WMP11 FAQ

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/faq/sharing.mspx

These sites should solve your problem.

cjcote

I Emailed D-Link a large list of bugs that need to be fixed and here is what they said:

Thank you for you input we are currently working on a new firmware that will be released shortl and is in beta. I will forward this to the proper department to have these issues worked on for the next firmware release

Thank you

Here is the list, which was compiled by Regis at the TVersity forum:

1 - Impossible to go back to the "now playing" window
2 - If you use a preset to play a list, there is no way to play the songs
in random order
3 - If you use a preset to play a list, there is no way to skip to the next
song in the list
4 - Why the fast forward/rewind is "exlusive" with the jump feature???
5 - Finding a server in wireless mode is way too long!
6 - There should be a way to see long titles
7 - It would be nice to be able to see information about a file before
playing it (don't know if the server supports this)
8 - The presets should work for any items : video, folders, tags, etc.
9 - It would be nice to be able to select other skins
10 - Fast foward and rewind need to be improved and need a better user interface
11 - The screen saver does not start while in the "now playing" page.
Combined with the fact that you can not return to this page if you
go up in the hierarchy this is very annoying. You have to turn off
you TV set if you don't want to burn the screen!
12 - While zooming a picture, after the last zoom level, it goes to the
first one. While unzooming, it stops on the first level. This is very
annoying because there is no indication of the zooming factor.
13 - Maybe I am wrong but it seems to me that zooming a picture
does not show a better resolution. It seems that the pizels get
bigger and bigger. (I am not sure about this one, I have not done
a lot of tests)
14 - It would be nice to be able to change the font size

I used this unit about a week and returned it also. The HDMI output is limited to 640x480, in opposition to what's mentioned on the box. That fact alone is a total joke.




No S*it Man... I just got one too, that pissed me off big time. The Tech guy said, the Unit will change resolutions with the files... LOL... BS... it scales them to 480i.... thats a joke..... The Component can be scaled but the HDMI dosent, WTF?????????? Dlink are real morons....

Anyone ever intercept a firmware update? Be nice to mod the firmware ourselves, thats just total ********. Now i have to get a Component to BNC to use with my projector in Analog :(

I've also noticed that the DSM-520 plays some DivX/XviD videos with the video lagging the audio by over a second. I haven't been able to identify the characteristic of the encoding that triggers the problem, but the same AVIs play with perfect sync from the PC.

Has anyone else seen this problem?

It could be wireless issue if you're using that, hehe, but i havent tried it too much yet until i get my 720p. I wonder if all these problems is related to the Sigma chip, of if its somthing just firmware related. Also seems like the Next chip up is pin for pin compatable with the currnet one, and it says it does H.264. that would be nice :)

I think i might just end up building a HTPC eventually. these media players seem to be design with money and a "first on the market" approach. I know i could do a much better job, and if any of these companys where smart, they would open source at leat part of it, and put out documentation on building diffrent codecs and stuff.

bump!

anyone have an answer for this...such an annoying problem! just hate it...

another question...for some reason - all my songs in an album appear alphabetically...any reason why this is happening and how can i correct it?

thanks a ton!

That's just the way it is :-( However, if you hit "Play" when selecting the album (instead of > to select the album) it will play the album in the correct order. "Playing" a folder _only_ works if the folder contains songs.

There is a trick to changing the DSM-520 resolution on the HDMI output. Try searching this thread. Apparently it can be done.

Alan

Just change to component output, then change the resolution to what you want. You can then leave it on component as it still sends a signal out HDMI, or just save then change back to hdmi and save again and the resolution will stay.

Dennis

Just change to component output, then change the resolution to what you want. You can then leave it on component as it still sends a signal out HDMI, or just save then change back to hdmi and save again and the resolution will stay.

Dennis

Does the 520 upscale to 720p over Component or just 1080i or 480p?

Does the 520 upscale to 720p over Component or just 1080i or 480p?

I see all 3 in my choices when I switch to component. 480p, 720p and 1080i.

Dennis

Thank you, sir. Probably buying one tomorrow.

I purchased mine from Costco, knowing that I could return it at any time. I am not sure I would want to own this unit long term. It does not play mkv files and it studders on 1080p files I have sent at it. It is not the end all solution and so far not one update in firmware since I bought this unit. I would hesitate at best to recommend this to anyone. Pictures suck on this thing as they wont show in full quality and are distorted. Music is decent but still not a pleasure to use. Video is hit and miss depending on how it is encoded. This thing wont even play my wmv files from my canon digital camera.

Dennis

DMS-520 help requested!

If the answer is already here please let me know, I tried to look.

I just started to get this problem.

When I try to view photos, with D-Link's Media server software, I'm getting that there is NO CONTENT.

I've rebooted the box and refreshed all the folders. I'm not sure what else to try.

Shouldn't I see the file names while in the Media software? When I try and drill down the directories I don't see the individual files names.

I've rebooted my XP computer several times. Is there a way to blow away the database

Is there some sort of limit on the amont of files that the Media Servers software can deal with

whoops keyboard problem now, have to send this message now and reboot (and no this is a different computer I'm sending this message from a very old one).

Thanks for the help

Rob

Question:

I would like to get more use out of my 520. I want to be able to stream to the box.

I'm not sure what steps I'm suppose to take.

Actually, if I want to stream video from You-Tube or other flash type players is that possible?

Thanks

Rob

Question:

I would like to get more use out of my 520. I want to be able to stream to the box.

I'm not sure what steps I'm suppose to take.

Actually, if I want to stream video from You-Tube or other flash type players is that possible?

Thanks

Rob

Umm...when you have it set to a media server on a PC...you ARE streaming to the box.

You cannot stream video from the web to the 520. You have to have a supported type of video stored on a PC running a media server.

I have my HDMI output on the 520 working great at 1080i.

I 'stumbled' on how to do it because I originally had it set up through component...then bought an Onkyo 674 receiver and simply switched to HDMI. The resolution settings stayed the same and it's working great.

Umm...when you have it set to a media server on a PC...you ARE streaming to the box.

You cannot stream video from the web to the 520. You have to have a supported type of video stored on a PC running a media server.


OK this is actually for anyone.

After reading through this thread forum, I kept reading about TVersity, so I downloaded it and am trying to make it work but am having trouble.

First, is this product worth my time to learn how to make it work correctly. Is it going to get me to be able to make more usage out of my DLink 520. I noticed that you can set up RSS feeds (hopefully video feeds).

The setup seemed simple, but after playing around with XP's firewall, and realizing that I had to turn off DLink's Media Server (you can't have both running at the same time), I still had problems.

I can see the server from the DSM-520 and I can scroll thru the folders that I have set up. But after selecting something to play (I was just testing a simple .avi video, that works with Dlink's software) it would give me the clock and never play the video.

Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong at this point?

Is TVersity's support good, it seems to be a free product at this point, so I'm sure they offer phone support?

Thanks

Rob

I am a new member of these boards and would like to thank everyone for the great information contained at AVS. I recently purchased the DSM-520 and am generally very happy with the unit. There are a number of things that I would change, however, it does the job of steaming video and allowing me to review pictures and listen to music from my computer or attached hard drive. I have a couple of questions that I was hoping you could answer.

1) I thought I had read that there was a size limitation for the USB connected drives. Is there a limitation or did I misinterpret what I read? I have a 500GB WD Mybook drive and it appears to work fine. The drive even turns on/off when in conjunction with the DSM-520.

2) I have been converting my videos to XVID using Ripit4Me and AutoGK. Using this combination there has only been one video that I couldn't properly convert. This process is time consuming for me (about 6 hrs on my computer) and I was wondering if there was a way of playing the VOB files that come from DVD Decrypter? Also, is XVID a good format to use or is there some other format that I should be using?

3) Although I don't buy music from Apple, I have been using iTune to manage my music. In converting my CD's I must have used the Apple format (ACC?) in the convertion and can't see those on the DSM. Can anyone recommend a convertion program which would allow me to convert the ACC files to a file format that the DSM-520 can read.

4) Has anyone had problems with the unit locking up? During the first couple of week of use, I didn't have this problem, however, now I am having to do a hard reboot every couple of days. This problem has occured using both the D-Link server as well as using the USB connection.

Thanks for your help.

Mike

Rob, check out the TVersity forum. I don't know if they have phone support but they do support the boards. Also check out the FAQ, a lot of your questions may be answered there. I also go with Xvid files. I had some trouble when I first got it making VOB's play correctly. There are some work arounds reported if you look in the forums, but found XVID to work well. As far as your firewall issue I haven't run into it mostly because I don't use the DLink software. I use WMV 11 or TVersity on my computer. Mostly though I run off my infrant which has a simple uPnP server built in.

Mike, check out Tversity. It will transcode your AAC files on the fly to something the DSM will support. There is a 2 GB limitation on file size using DLink software. Tversity has expanded it to 4 GB. My problems with lockups are limited to when I hit the remote to fast and it confuses the machine. Sometimes I can power down and that fixes it. Sometimes I have to pull the plug. These are very infrequent though.

Alan

I am considering getting a 520. For awhile now, I've wanted to take all of my DVDs (about 100-150) and store them on a Hard Drive and then play them on my tv (50 inch sony). So I've heard good and bad things about the 520, and for what I want to do, it appears that it would fit the bill. So my question are:

1. I am a laptop user primarily, so can I use an external HD to save movies to and then plug the HD into the 520 and play movies from there? If so, what kinds of software do I need to use to do this. Mostly, I just copy and burn DVDs right now, so I'm not sure what it is I need exactly to do what I want to do.

2. If I can't do #1, then what other "stuff" do I need?

As you can see, I'm not very well versed with this stuff. It seems like there are so many options out there, it's hard to filter out what is actually needed. So I would really appreciate any help that you could offer.

1. Yes you can connect a usb drive to the 520. I believe it must be formated fat32 though. I've never used it that way, so perhaps someone else can comment on their experience.

2. Assuming you have WMV11 or the dlink software on your portable, so long as the portable is on you can stream music, video and photographs directly from the portable.

3. I mostly use Xvid to stream my movies. I use DVD Decrypter or Ripit4me followed by autoGK to get to Xvid. Takes a while. The 750 doesn't play VOB's well in my hands which is why I went this route.

You might want to wait for a month or two. DLink has a new box coming out in March or April and new firmware for the DLink DSM-520 around that time also. Depending on your needs you might prefer the new box or the DSM 520 if the price is low enough.

Just some thoughts.

Alan

I am a new member of these boards and would like to thank everyone for the great information contained at AVS. I recently purchased the DSM-520 and am generally very happy with the unit. There are a number of things that I would change, however, it does the job of steaming video and allowing me to review pictures and listen to music from my computer or attached hard drive. I have a couple of questions that I was hoping you could answer.

1) I thought I had read that there was a size limitation for the USB connected drives. Is there a limitation or did I misinterpret what I read? I have a 500GB WD Mybook drive and it appears to work fine. The drive even turns on/off when in conjunction with the DSM-520.

2) I have been converting my videos to XVID using Ripit4Me and AutoGK. Using this combination there has only been one video that I couldn't properly convert. This process is time consuming for me (about 6 hrs on my computer) and I was wondering if there was a way of playing the VOB files that come from DVD Decrypter? Also, is XVID a good format to use or is there some other format that I should be using?

3) Although I don't buy music from Apple, I have been using iTune to manage my music. In converting my CD's I must have used the Apple format (ACC?) in the convertion and can't see those on the DSM. Can anyone recommend a convertion program which would allow me to convert the ACC files to a file format that the DSM-520 can read.

4) Has anyone had problems with the unit locking up? During the first couple of week of use, I didn't have this problem, however, now I am having to do a hard reboot every couple of days. This problem has occured using both the D-Link server as well as using the USB connection.

Thanks for your help.

Mike
As far as whether or not the 520 can play VOBs directly - Yes it can - No Problem. Just make sure you have it the movie/whatever all in one VOB and that you are not storing it on a FAT32 drive (because of size limitations). Much easier than converting to Xvids, although you will need more space. Plus you will have no reduction in quality.

If you need subs though, even if they are just forced subs in certain parts of the movie, you will not be able to use VOBs. Go Xvid for those and force the subtitles.

1. Yes you can connect a usb drive to the 520. I believe it must be formated fat32 though. I've never used it that way, so perhaps someone else can comment on their experience.

2. Assuming you have WMV11 or the dlink software on your portable, so long as the portable is on you can stream music, video and photographs directly from the portable.

3. I mostly use Xvid to stream my movies. I use DVD Decrypter or Ripit4me followed by autoGK to get to Xvid. Takes a while. The 750 doesn't play VOB's well in my hands which is why I went this route.

You might want to wait for a month or two. DLink has a new box coming out in March or April and new firmware for the DLink DSM-520 around that time also. Depending on your needs you might prefer the new box or the DSM 520 if the price is low enough.

Just some thoughts.

Alan


Thanks for the information. So if you don't have your external hard drive attached to the 520, how is your stuff setup? What is the new box that Dlink is coming out with? Thanks so much for your help. I feel pretty dumb about this stuff sometimes. Jen

I purchased the 520 last Thursday after months of researching. I set up the unit via my wireless network which was fairly is to get running. The unit streamed music files without flaw and I was very pelased with this, especially using WMP11 as the server and the ability to play protected wma content.

The 520 had huge problems playing videos over my wireless network however. My router is 1 room away and the 520 only connected at 67% of strength which may have been part of the problem. I rip my movies w/ dvddecrypter and use autogk to convert to xvid. Every file I tried stuttered badly and/or dropped the sound. The only video files I could play were max resolution of 320x240.

I reluctantly returned the unit yesterday. The search continues...

I purchased the 520 last Thursday after months of researching. I set up the unit via my wireless network which was fairly is to get running. The unit streamed music files without flaw and I was very pelased with this, especially using WMP11 as the server and the ability to play protected wma content.

The 520 had huge problems playing videos over my wireless network however. My router is 1 room away and the 520 only connected at 67% of strength which may have been part of the problem. I rip my movies w/ dvddecrypter and use autogk to convert to xvid. Every file I tried stuttered badly and/or dropped the sound. The only video files I could play were max resolution of 320x240.

I reluctantly returned the unit yesterday. The search continues...
You are looking for something that does not exist yet...perfect video over wireless.
If you want an networked media player and you want piece of mind and robust streaming then go wired.

After using the DSM-520 for three weeks, I wouldn't recommend relying on wireless for video streaming. I've tried it both with Draft-N and G routers and I found the G router worked best. My computer is 30+ feet from the router with no walls. I am able to stream, however, when you do encounter a problem, the video and audio ussually go out of sync and you have to restart the video. My recommndation would be to get a set of Powerline adapters if you don't want to use a cable. I tried the adapters and didn't have any problems with video.

I have tried using the DSM-520 both on the network as well as connected directed to my USB hard drive. I'm really liking the hard drive route much better. Don't need to keep the computer running and its easier for my wife to use. The USB drive powers on/off with the DSM-520 which is very nice. I would recommend going this route if you don't mind the occational unhooking the USB drive to update with what you have on your computer. I wish the USB was on the back of the unit. Maybe the DSM-750 will put a USB on both front and back.

Regards,
Mike

After using the DSM-520 for three weeks, I wouldn't recommend relying on wireless for video streaming. I've tried it both with Draft-N and G routers and I found the G router worked best. My computer is 30+ feet from the router with no walls. I am able to stream, however, when you do encounter a problem, the video and audio ussually go out of sync and you have to restart the video. My recommndation would be to get a set of Powerline adapters if you don't want to use a cable. I tried the adapters and didn't have any problems with video.

I have tried using the DSM-520 both on the network as well as connected directed to my USB hard drive. I'm really liking the hard drive route much better. Don't need to keep the computer running and its easier for my wife to use. The USB drive powers on/off with the DSM-520 which is very nice. I would recommend going this route if you don't mind the occational unhooking the USB drive to update with what you have on your computer. I wish the USB was on the back of the unit. Maybe the DSM-750 will put a USB on both front and back.

Regards,
Mike


Ok, so you would recommend connecting the external hard drive directly to the DSM-520. Would that mean that I would need to have a FAT32 formated harddrive? If so, then how do I make my videos smaller than 4G without losing movie quality? Is there some software out there to do this? Thanks for your help!

Ok, so you would recommend connecting the external hard drive directly to the DSM-520. Would that mean that I would need to have a FAT32 formated harddrive? If so, then how do I make my videos smaller than 4G without losing movie quality? Is there some software out there to do this? Thanks for your help!


I'm converting my videos to XVID so the file size is usually under 2GB. I have one or two videos on which I used a VOB2MPG converter. On those the file size is about 4GB and they seem to work fine. I'm not really familiar with hard drive formating,or its limitiations. I believe the MyBook drive is formated FAT32.

Mike

DLink has a new box coming out in March or April and new firmware for the DLink DSM-520 around that time also.

I'm happy to hear there's new firmware for the 520 coming out. Where did you hear this ablevy? Do you know what will be fixed or included with this upgrade?

Someone posted the info about the firmware on the TVersity forums if I remember correctly. There are a lot of DLink users over there. There wasn't much info on what's in it. That said, DLink seems to be upgrading (very slowly) the 320 and 520 in rough sync. I'm hoping that the new firmware will give us most of the potential of the new DLink 750 when it comes out. It appears at least possible because the introductin of the new box in the next month or so seems to correspond with the new firmware. At least I can hope.

I'm serving mostly off of an Infrant XNas. Highly recommended. They support their users with new firmware frequently. I use uPnP, but it supports Itunes and Sybase. As far as streaming videos, I have pretty good luck streaming movies even wireless. I'm using a Linksys G speedboost router though and my computer is about 8 feet directly above the router. I have an excellent signal so that's probably why it works. HD doesn't work unless you use a wired network, which is why the Infrant is on a wired connection.

I had trouble with VOB's and certain movies with very fast action. One example is the first scene in matrix. I never got that to show correctly without going to XVid.

AutoGK can shrink the XVid to any size you want. If you run off of TVersity the file can be as large as 4GB. If from most other software the file size is limited to 2 GB. I am hopeful that the next firmware revision will fix this problem, but not holding my breath.

Good luck

Alan

I'm happy to hear there's new firmware for the 520 coming out. Where did you hear this ablevy? Do you know what will be fixed or included with this upgrade?

<cough>

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=9516121&&#post9516121

Hi,
I know this has been discussed throughout the thread, but I'm having issues
not being able to get hdmi to output 1080i. I've tried the trick where you switch to component and then select 1080i and that works fine with component. As soon as I switch back to hdmi, I get 480p output no matter what I do. Has anyone confirmed that they are indeed getting 1080i output to their tv. My tv tells you
what is coming in and it's always 480p. If I use time warner's hd8300 dvr on hdmi, I'm getting 1080i. I wonder if this is a firmware bug, an issue with the box itself, or an issue where it can't get a good handshake with my tv to determine what to output.
Thanks,
Brian

Hi,
I wonder if this is a firmware bug, an issue with the box itself, or an issue where it can't get a good handshake with my tv to determine what to output.


Brian,

It could be a handshake issue. I would set the DSM520 to HDMI output and 1080i. Make sure you save your settings. I would power the TV and DSM520 off. Power up the TV, then power the DSM520.

Another thing to try is set the DSM520 to 720p instead of 1080i.

Good Luck,

cjcote

is there a way to stream RealOne SuperPass with this unit?

What is everyone using to convert mkv containers to something the 520 can play? When I use winAVI, I get a real low volume.

Thanks!

I just got a new 520 and I have a set-up question. My network consists of a cable modem connected to a Linksys cable router in my office - one of the ports from the router is sent to a Linksys 16 port workgroup switch - the outputs of that switch are routed all over the house. So, the 520 works great when it's connected to the cable router but doesn't work when connected to the workgroup switch.

Has anyone else found a way around this?

Thanks!

or I feel that way...

I have a dsm 520 running hardwired to a dlink n router with tversity loaded on my computer. Sharing is on, service starts, I can see it on my network from the computer. But, when I start the dsm the only server ti finds in my pc server which is the dlink server. What am I doing wrong? I think i need step by step with this product

What do you mean you can see it on your network from your computer? Try the Tversity forums. There are a lot of DSM-520 users there. Many of the problems seem to be that the Tversity server doesn't start. Try turning on WMV 11 or Windows media connect and see if the DSM can see them. That will tell you whether it's TVersity or the DSM.

Alan

Update on the new firmware:

Date of Reply: 3/16/2007
Products: DSM-520
Operating System: Windows XP Pro

I do not have a date of release at this time

Great, just great :confused: :mad:

Has anyone gotten the DSM-520 to work with Sligbox Pro? That would be sweet to be able to stream my files anywhere!

Ok, so I'm finally ready to buy my 520. Now I have to figure out how to configure it to work with my wireless network, or to just plug an external HDD to it directly.

I have a g wireless router. It has 3 extra ethernet ports on it, so I thought I would maybe get a network hard drive enclosure and an internal HDD then plug it into the router which the 520 would access wirelessly. Will this work? Would I need to install anything on the new drive other than my video files?

I have roughly 300 movies to store (they are burned on DVDs now) and I want to store them in the same place. I am using a laptop as my primary machine and I do not have any "spare" desktops to use as a server or anything. and I don't want to keep my laptop on all of the time... AND since I'm certainly not very smart when it comes to networking, I'm posting this question.

I think my other alternative would be to get an external drive and plug it into the USB port on the outside of the player. I assume that I wouldn't need to put anything else on the drive besides the media I want to play in that case.

So in a nutshell, I have 300 movies I want to convert to Dvix or Xvid and store on a Harddrive. I do not want to keep my laptop on all of the time to serve up these movies. How should I configure my storage to server up to the player? And is there anything else I need to know before I pull the trigger and spend some bucks on the 520 and "stuff".... Please help with some advise, as I've read all 15 pages of this post and I'm still rather confused. Thanks!

So in a nutshell, I have 300 movies I want to convert to Dvix or Xvid and store on a Harddrive.

Do you know how long it will take to convert 300 movies to XVID? Good luck!

Do you know how long it will take to convert 300 movies to XVID? Good luck!

Long term goal... but thanks for the sentiment.

Long term goal... but thanks for the sentiment.

I'm really not trying to harass you, so I apologize if this sounds snotty, but what is the justification for such a project? Is it that hard to put in a DVD that will have (arguably) better video quality? I've had this discussion on other boards and I've yet to hear a compelling argument for having an XVID video library that large. Unless I'm missing something, at roughly 2 hours per movie, you're looking at 600 hours of conversion time just for the luxury of choosing a video from a menu instead of from a book case. Just seems like a lot of work.

I have a g wireless router. It has 3 extra ethernet ports on it, so I thought I would maybe get a network hard drive enclosure and an internal HDD then plug it into the router which the 520 would access wirelessly. Will this work? Would I need to install anything on the new drive other than my video files?It depends: you need to make sure your enclosure has embedded AV UPnP server. You can buy such enclosure or assembled NAS with the server. Or you can buy enclosure, which allows the server to be installed. But the latter is available only through open source projects: error-prone, unreliable and time-consuming. (now I hear all kinds of angry messages and insults flying my way)

I think my other alternative would be to get an external drive and plug it into the USB port on the outside of the player. I assume that I wouldn't need to put anything else on the drive besides the media I want to play in that case.You assume correct, but drawbacks: unsightly cable sticking out of in front of the 520 (USB connector only in front) and hard drive whining next to AV receiver and it does not go away even when you turn everything else off.

I'm really not trying to harass you, so I apologize if this sounds snotty, but what is the justification for such a project? Is it that hard to put in a DVD that will have (arguably) better video quality? I've had this discussion on other boards and I've yet to hear a compelling argument for having an XVID video library that large. Unless I'm missing something, at roughly 2 hours per movie, you're looking at 600 hours of conversion time just for the luxury of choosing a video from a menu instead of from a book case. Just seems like a lot of work.But when you tried such luxury once you're not going back: my wife had exactly the same argument. :p

and hard drive whining next to AV receiver and it does not go away even when you turn everything else off.

Some USB HDD enclosures have spindown technology so that wouldn't be an issue.

But when you tried such luxury once you're not going back: my wife had exactly the same argument. :p

So, your wife actually says "Wow, this is SO much better than putting a DVD in the drive." :p I'm just curious how she shows her gratitude for your uberness. Mine complains that it takes too long to navigate TVeristy to play a CD. Movies would probably be more of the same.

I'm just curious how she shows her gratitude for your uberness. Mine complains that it takes too long to navigate TVeristy to play a CD. Movies would probably be more of the same.She fires up 520 herself every time we have guests, good enough for me. :D
It's not the same for movies because it's just 300 of them and you, probably, have a few thousands MP3s. It's well known problem with all media players on the market today.

It's not the same for movies because it's just 300 of them and you, probably, have a few thousands MP3s. It's well known problem with all media players on the market today.

Nah, try TVersity and you'll see what I mean. It takes several clicks to get to the proper folders. It drives her nuts. Customization of the navigation tree is supposed to come in a future version. Then she'll be happy.

She fires up 520 herself every time we have guests, good enough for me. :D

I understand HOW it's used and why it would look cool to guests, but that's a superficial reason for doing it. I understand the navigation is improved. I'll give you that. It's probably faster to find a disc you want, but honestly, do you save as much time as you put into making the file? Is the quality the same as the DVD? Are you going to regret not waiting for H.264? I could also understand doing it to prevent wear and tear on discs, but you could also make copies to prevent that. I can also think of a few illicit reasons for creating such a library (Netflix dumps or selling originals), but nothing legal would inspire me to take on that kind of project when I have the perfectly good original discs sitting around. Especially when we have a never-ending stream of discs coming from Netflix.

I see this issue on a smaller scale with our music collection. I spent two weekends dumping every CD we have on the file server and I bet in the 5 months since we haven't played 80% of the files. The ratio would be even worse with video since we can't watch hours of video (if we had 300 DVDs) in the background while doing something else. The files would also take hundreds of hours longer to dump and convert. No thanks.

I'm really not trying to harass you, so I apologize if this sounds snotty, but what is the justification for such a project? Is it that hard to put in a DVD that will have (arguably) better video quality? I've had this discussion on other boards and I've yet to hear a compelling argument for having an XVID video library that large. Unless I'm missing something, at roughly 2 hours per movie, you're looking at 600 hours of conversion time just for the luxury of choosing a video from a menu instead of from a book case. Just seems like a lot of work.

I have a lot of burned DVDs and DVDs laying around in cases and I want to clean up the clutter, and just putting them on a piece of furniture wasn't really appealing to me, plus it's still not very organized and certainly not out of sight (let's face it, a bunch of DVDs sitting on shelves is not all that attractive in a media room..atleast not to me). Plus I like my DVR when I have movies or tv saved down on it. It's on demand... and now my video collection will be onDemand as well. It's that simple, and it's cool :-) Good enough justification for me.

I have a lot of burned DVDs and DVDs laying around in cases and I want to clean up the clutter, and just putting them on a piece of furniture wasn't really appealing to me, plus it's still not very organized and certainly not out of sight (let's face it, a bunch of DVDs sitting on shelves is not all that attractive in a media room..atleast not to me). Plus I like my DVR when I have movies or tv saved down on it. It's on demand... and now my video collection will be onDemand as well. It's that simple, and it's cool :-) Good enough justification for me.BTW, out of desperation, I found another interesting usage of 520: I brought back from Europe a few DVDs my DVD player absolutely refused to recognize. I ripped them to hard drive and voila. My friends were ecstatic, and not because of technology I used, but because they were seeing and listening to beautiful (and unique in USA at the time, I may say) Italian concerts on a big screen TV. That's way beyond luxury.

I have been struggling with this whole media center -send it to your tv- play it the living room thing for about 6 months. I am embarrassed by the amount of money and all the stupid choices I have made. I thought I had found my answer in the dlink 520. Major not! At first, I was tickled I could finally get some of my computer media to play on my plasma Tv and stereo. But I found the 520 to be so damned slow that I might as well went into my computer room to operate it with the use of the 520. I ran into limitations of far down the alphabet I could go (G) on my playlists. Major frustration. Then, I found if you only played albums or artists within the A-E or the Z-S range it was find. But figure on about 15minutes to get to M (Half way through the A-Z

This is not a plug! It is the reality of what I have tried. I bought an xbox 360, coupled with vista ultimate, and now it functions the way I expect. It is fast and allows me to access all my media.. I get album art, time, artist, genre, etc. I get all of my playlists without freezing after g in the alphabet. I can create playlists, control volume, and access what I need. So, I just want to share my ecperience s and frustrations, money spent, and outright futility I have felt. So far, the Xbox 360 lives up to media center demands to my specifications (by the way, I do not play video games nor have any desire to) All I have ever wanted was my MTV

Wisardd1

BTW, out of desperation, I found another interesting usage of 520: I brought back from Europe a few DVDs my DVD player absolutely refused to recognize. I ripped them to hard drive and voila. My friends were ecstatic, and not because of technology I used, but because they were seeing and listening to beautiful (and unique in USA at the time, I may say) Italian concerts on a big screen TV. That's way beyond luxury.

They were PAL DVDs, right? It is pretty cool that the DSM-520 will play PAL material on NTSC screens. The few times I've tried it the audio was out of sync by the end of the material. Did that happen to you? I imagine the timing gets thrown off because of the different framerates.

wisardd: You should have tried TVersity with the DSM-520. It takes a few clicks to get to your folders, but once you're there it's very easy and fast to navigate material. TVersity works with the XBOX 360 as well. Check it out.

They were PAL DVDs, right? It is pretty cool that the DSM-520 will play PAL material on NTSC screens. The few times I've tried it the audio was out of sync by the end of the material. Did that happen to you? I imagine the timing gets thrown off because of the different framerates.PAL - ? I'm not sure, there was nothing on a box or disc saying PAL, NTSC or whatever.
Lip-sync was perfect all the way to the very end, not a single hiccup. And each DVD was 2 - 2.5 hours long. Usually PAL material looks black-and-white on NTSC equipment, but all colors were in place.
What was unusual about them - it took about 1 - 1.5 hours to rip each of them, where normally it takes 8 - 15 mins. Ripping software reported control sum error for almost all blocks. I guess their mastering software did not write them.

I bought and returned my DSM-520 the same day.

I record OTA HDTV with a pcHDTV HD-3000 and mythtv. The unit found the mythtv upnp server and could list the available recordings. However it could not play any of them without trouble. All 720p recordings played only audio. 1080i recordings could not play without dropping frame.

All in all, a very disappointing experience.

any firmware upgrade coming up for the 520 anytime soon?

When last I chatted with D-Link tech support--always an adventure--I was told 1.09--U.S. systems only--is the last of the line.

FWIW, I found that with 1.09, a 100 MB Ethernet connection, the D-Link media server and MP4s, usually rendered from other formats by Nero Recode, the system worked decently. Not good, certainly not great, but decently.

After spending far too much time on it, I think that's the best anyone can expect from the DSM-320. I recently started using the Apple TV, and it is so much better it's not even funny.

Steven

Despite its many limitations, I've been a big fan of the DSM-520 since I purchased it back in '05. In fact, it's pretty much the only way we watch TV since we discontinued our cable TV service. However, I recently purchased a DSM-510 for the TV in our exercise room and it really puts the DSM-520 to shame. In addition to the smaller footprint and lower cost, the user interface has improved significantly. Specifically,

- Powering up the device is much faster
- Connects automatically to last accessed server
- Resumes last screen from standby
- No longer has exclusive modes for FF/REW and Skip
- Video playback may be resumed from where it was last stopped
- FF/REW modes are smooth and ramp from 2x to 100x speeds
- There's a +/- 15 second "commercial skip" feature
- Text quality and transition effects are much smoother

If it weren't for the fact that my 50" plasma only has one HDMI port that I currently have attached to my DVD player, I'd be ordering another DMS-510 right now for the family room. In fact, the only reason I can think of to buy a DSM-520 is if you don't have an available HDMI connection, and even in that case I'd recommend waiting for the DSM-750 or EVA8000 where you'll also get support for H.264 and VC-1.

Really, unless I can figure a way to adapt the DSM-510 firmware for the DSM-520, it's destined for eBay.

How did you get the 1.09 firmware for the DSM-520. When I try to update all I see is the 1.02 code.

How did you get the 1.09 firmware for the DSM-520. When I try to update all I see is the 1.02 code.

He's talking about the 320.

any firmware upgrade coming up for the 520 anytime soon?

I just sent another message to D-Link asking for an update. This is what they told me in March:

Date of Reply: 3/16/2007
Products: DSM-520
Operating System: Windows XP Pro

I do not have a date of release at this time

============Begin of Original Message============
Hi,

Two months have passed since you said a new firmware for the DSM-520 would be released &quot;shortly.&quot; When is the new firmware being released?

New firmware this week (or next)!

Date of Reply: 4/25/2007
Products: DSM-520
Operating System: Windows XP Pro

Andrew

It should be released live this week I have been told if not next week it should be released.

New firmware this week (or next)!

Date of Reply: 4/25/2007
Products: DSM-520
Operating System: Windows XP Pro

Andrew

It should be released live this week I have been told if not next week it should be released.

awesome! cant wait...does anyone know if it does anything userful, or does it merely fix non-issues...

cool! -- hope it doesnt break anything! -- it streams hd divx/xvid awesome at the moment--

hope it doesnt break anything!

Me too since they apparently go a year between firmware releases....

i feel a new firmware coming!!! wooohoo!!

Any updates on the firmware? I haven't heard anything from Dlink tech support yet!

For what it's worth, here is Dlink's reply

"I do not have a date for release I am very sorry it will however add support for DVR.ms
file formats and greater bitrate support on files also album art will now be displayed
while playing music files. There are more but I do not have the release notes for the
firmware at this time.

Thank you"

I would love for them to support album art while playing music files. Hopefully, it happens with this "new firmware release" :rolleyes: It never made sense to me that you could slideshow pictures while playing music, but could not display album art when playing music.

Has anyone else tried the DSM-520 with MythTV? kenberland's report earlier in this thread did not sound very promising, but I see the 520 is listed as one of the working clients in the MythTV wiki.

Or, if not MythTV, any experiences using the 520 with broadcast HDTV files from other servers (MPEG2 streams with 1080i or 720p video, and DD5.1 audio)?

Has anyone else tried the DSM-520 with MythTV? kenberland's report earlier in this thread did not sound very promising, but I see the 520 is listed as one of the working clients in the MythTV wiki.

I'm 7 days into using the DSM 520. it does see MythTV and play its files. I'm using MythDora, PCHDTV, and am transcoding per instructions at myhdbox com mythtips
tuning OTA HD content. The Myth content after transcode is all under 4.5 Mbps

The only MythTV-specific problem I am having is what you might call "cracking" or "popping" in the audio. That -may- be in my source file, I'm not sure yet. I just built the MythDora Box.

My other means of UPNP is a DLINK DNS 323 storage device. BTW I have a wired connection to the DSM 520 through a gigabit switch.

My video freezes pretty often, more often when I am attempting FF. The DNS-323 has video in MPEG-2@5Mbps, and MPEG-4@3Mbps. The higher bit rates freeze the DSM unit more often than lower bit rates, however all my bit rates are lower than the 8Mbps limit set by DLINK. (waz up with that?)

I watched most of a 2 hour movie only to have the system freeze with only 10 minutes left, that's without any FF activity. woof. Thats a total disaster given the limited FF functionality (when it works at all).

Is Nero Re-Encode a panacea? I might take the time to use the demo to transcode files with it, and see if the DSM 520 is any smoother operating.

Thanks for the response, MDCanoy. I'm not the most patient guy, so I stopped at Best Buy this afternoon and picked up a DSM-520 for testing. I can always take it back if it doesn't work out.

My initial impression is a bit of a mixed bag. It was very easy to set up, it found MythTV and just worked. The HD programs look great. The playback is smooth, and looks at least as good as my Myth box.

But, some of my HD recordings would not display at all. They would play the audio, but not the video. They may be at too high a bit rate for the DSM-520. They were all 1080i files (but some 1080i files did play okay). All my 720p files played back perfectly. I also ran into a couple freezes, like you mentioned, when trying to FF.

My biggest problem is the lack of any jump fwd/back ability, or reasonable fast forward. Along with no bookmarking, it makes anything but straight linear viewing difficult. I absolutely hate sitting through commercials, so there is no way I can tolerate the 520 without some better playback controls.


I also had mixed results with connecting to a Mac OS X system to access the music/pictures via the EyeConnect UPnP server. My large photo library didn't display at all. Music worked okay, but not great. I'll continue to test it with other UPnP software..

My biggest problem is the lack of any jump fwd/back ability, Under General Setup -> Audio/Video you can configure FF/REV to Jump.

Under General Setup -> Audio/Video you can configure FF/REV to Jump.

When I had it in that mode, I got an error message telling me to use FF/REW instead. So, apparently that's only supported with some video types. That's a shame.. you would think skip ahead would be much easier than a scanning FF.

Has anyone else successfully used skip ahead with HD MPEG2?

For what it's worth, here is Dlink's reply

"I do not have a date for release I am very sorry it will however add support for DVR.ms
file formats and greater bitrate support on files also album art will now be displayed
while playing music files. There are more but I do not have the release notes for the
firmware at this time.

Thank you"

That totally contradicts their response to me.

they're probably confusing it with the dsm-750 :rolleyes:

re: ff/rw i've learned to live with the skip method, i view info on the playing file, then skip... i'm good at it now... ff/rw doesnt work well at all, i never use it-- and yes mpeg2, dvd etc,-- better just watch them straight thru-- :rolleyes:

When I had it in that mode, I got an error message telling me to use FF/REW instead. So, apparently that's only supported with some video types. That's a shame.. you would think skip ahead would be much easier than a scanning FF.

Has anyone else successfully used skip ahead with HD MPEG2?

I ran into this problem at first myself. Instead of using the FF/RW buttons when it's in skip mode, you need to use the "Search" button, and then enter in a time to jump to... Works much better than the RW/FF.

I have some 720p HD video files in Matroska containers (.mkv). The video is MPEG4/ISO/AVC and the audio is AC3 48kHz (according to CCCP-Insurgent). I'd like to watch it on my DSM-520 via TVersity but I don't think my PC (or ANY PC) can transcode this real-time.

I'm thinking about using SUPER to convert my MKVs to AVI with Xvid and PCM or something. Has anybody else tried this? What's the best way to view 720p video on a DSM-520?

Hi I just purchased the DSM-520 from DLINK and have a couple questions. The first one is why can't I get surround sound to work on this unit? What am I doing wrong? I have the unit on a wireless network with security set on it. The unit plays videos and sounds just fine but I do not get the surround sound on my videos. What do I need to do to get this to work correctly?

I am using the 520 on a Sony HDMI stereo receiver and using the HDMI cables to connect to the Sony.

What I want to do is take all my dvds and put them on hds and serve them on the dsm520. I used dvdfab to decrypt the dvds and then put them in a file on the hard drive of my computer as the VOB files. If I use Roxio to copy these files they play with surround sound on the dvd player. But the DSM-520 doesn't play the surround sound. Why?

I sure hope you can help me as the DLINK tech support is terrible! The first person said my sound card on my computer was bad! Right I am using the sound card on my pc for my hd tv. The senior level support person was no better they told me my stereo didn't have a high enough bit rate! LOL what a laugh.

After we get this to work right I am hoping some of you folks will also help me deterimine the best method, file type, etc to archive the dvds onto the network hard drive and be able to use them with the DSM. Thanks Ray

UPDATE: I thought that maybe the problem was with the wireless connection. So I took a file from a dvd that was encoded with the ac3 surround sound and put it on a usb drive and tried that. Still no surround sound. The sony displays the sound as being linier pcm 48 mhz Ray

Is there a limit to the size of the usb drive that you can connect into the front of the DSM-520? If I connect a flash drive 2 Gb size it works just fine. If I try to plug in a 200 GB external hard drive it doesn't detect the USB device. The harddrive is NTFS format if that makes any difference.Ray

^^^
Yes, it does.

^^^
Yes, it does.
Do you know the limit of the size?

I've isolated my audio problems to HDMI output of the DSM 520. The audio crackles and sometimes shifts the tone to a lower frequency. I believe I read someone calling this "everyones sounds drunk". Analog (component, rca, etc.) output does not suffer this problem, nor does HDMI output from my CD player. I have used MPEG2, MPEG4, at low 1.1Mbps up to 8 Mbps, and they all suffer some level of audio distortion. Anyone familiar with this problem? Anyone getting clean audio with HDMI outputs?

Does anyone know why I can't get my dsm-520 to play surround sound? I have tried to connect it to another HDMI cable and another HDMI input on the stereo and it still doesn't work. The problem is not in the cables nor the stereo. I am about ready to return this thing. I do not want to waste a couple hundred bucks on something that doesn't work right Ray

Hi I just purchased the DSM-520 from DLINK and have a couple questions. The first one is why can't I get surround sound to work on this unit? What am I doing wrong? I have the unit on a wireless network with security set on it. The unit plays videos and sounds just fine but I do not get the surround sound on my videos. What do I need to do to get this to work correctly?

I am using the 520 on a Sony HDMI stereo receiver and using the HDMI cables to connect to the Sony.

What I want to do is take all my dvds and put them on hds and serve them on the dsm520. I used dvdfab to decrypt the dvds and then put them in a file on the hard drive of my computer as the VOB files. If I use Roxio to copy these files they play with surround sound on the dvd player. But the DSM-520 doesn't play the surround sound. Why?

I sure hope you can help me as the DLINK tech support is terrible! The first person said my sound card on my computer was bad! Right I am using the sound card on my pc for my hd tv. The senior level support person was no better they told me my stereo didn't have a high enough bit rate! LOL what a laugh.

After we get this to work right I am hoping some of you folks will also help me deterimine the best method, file type, etc to archive the dvds onto the network hard drive and be able to use them with the DSM. Thanks Ray

UPDATE: I thought that maybe the problem was with the wireless connection. So I took a file from a dvd that was encoded with the ac3 surround sound and put it on a usb drive and tried that. Still no surround sound. The sony displays the sound as being linier pcm 48 mhz Ray

you have to use the coax/optical connection for audio -- I was never able to get more than 2 channels out of the HDMI connection... maybe they have fixed this in the new firmware--

Does anyone know why I can't get my dsm-520 to play surround sound? I have tried to connect it to another HDMI cable and another HDMI input on the stereo and it still doesn't work. The problem is not in the cables nor the stereo. I am about ready to return this thing. I do not want to waste a couple hundred bucks on something that doesn't work right Ray

Check you firmware version number first. I beleive, there were issues with the surround sound in early releases.

As a workaround you can use digital coaxial outut from D-Link instead of HDMI.

is the new firmware out yet?

No the firmware is not available yet. I spoke with Tech Support and they informed me that the firmware is still going to QC and may take another few weeks.

-Aaron

Check you firmware version number first. I beleive, there were issues with the surround sound in early releases.

As a workaround you can use digital coaxial outut from D-Link instead of HDMI.
I had the latest updated firmware first thing I checked. I took the thing back to bestbuy and got a refund. No sense keeping something that doesn't work right. I think I will wait till the new one comes out and try that one. Why have HDMI outputs if they do not work properly? Surround sound is supposed to come out of the HDMI outputs. Thanks for your help. Wish it worked for me. I had no problems with the wireless streaming of movies or slowness or anything else that was wrong other then the surround sound problems. Oh the slow so called fast forward was bad also.

Anyone hear when the new unit the DSM-750 will come out? I hope they will have their act together on this one. Ray

I ran into this problem at first myself. Instead of using the FF/RW buttons when it's in skip mode, you need to use the "Search" button, and then enter in a time to jump to... Works much better than the RW/FF.

Thanks, I'll give this try. I'm currently rebuilding my Myth backend, once I get done I'll check it out. It sounds a bit slow, if you need to enter a time to go to.. or do you just do that once, like enter 30 and it skips 30 seconds after that?


Does the FF/REW performance depend on the media server being used? Do some provide better options / performance than others? For my uses, this seems like the biggest limitation of this device.. the lack of ability to easily skip through commercials or resume at a bookmark really hurts the usability.

No the firmware is not available yet. I spoke with Tech Support and they informed me that the firmware is still going to QC and may take another few weeks.

-Aaron

Kind of makes you wonder how broken 1.02 was if it takes them a year to release a new version. My guess is the firmware is still going through marketing, not QC. They're trying to decide if they want to force us to upgrade or not.

Has anyone heard anything new on the update? Just curious...

Any more news about the supposed firmware update?

Any more news about the supposed firmware update?

So far nothing. But I would proceed with a great caution with upcoming update. You better check feedback from the early adopters, i.e. "guinea pigs" first.

I just Emailed D-Link for an update. After this firmware runaround, I doubt I will ever buy a D-Link product again. The device has had too many bugs for too long and I expect better support than this.

I just Emailed D-Link for an update. After this firmware runaround, I doubt I will ever buy a D-Link product again. The device has had too many bugs for too long and I expect better support than this.

Unfortunately I have to agree. I took a chance on the 520, even though I have had poor results with D-Link networking equipment in the past. Sadly, even though the potential was there, D-Link has once again failed to make the product live up to that potential.

I replaced my 520 with a Mac mini about a month ago and couldn't be happier. I can finally stream recorded HD programs, without first reducing the quality, and I no longer have a 4GB file limit for VOBs (or any files for that matter). I also get the added features of being able to Skype and browse.