Hi all,
I am wondering how useful this device could be. Is it something similar to iTV?

Mvix Now in HD and Wireless!

The venerable Mvix player and enclosure took a quantum leap forward in ability and coolness. First, it's a drive enclosure...you have to supply your own hard drive..., but you can put any size 3.5" IDE hard drive. Any size. What size you got? Trust me, that'll fit. Second, it connects to your network either via Ethernet or 802.11b/g/pre-N MIMO. Third, it's a media player that connects to your HDTV via composite, component, s-video or DVI.

What you want more? Okay, how about it's massive file support? It can do Mpeg-1/2/4, VOB, WMV 9, DivX, and Xvid. It'll play your MP3's, WMA's, AAC's, Ogg files, or straight-up WAV and AC3. It can do it all from its internal hard drive, an external USB drive, or even stream off of your other computers over the network.

More? Wow, you're greedy! Okay, it will also display your photos for you, showing you a happy little slideshow while you listen to your music files.

Last, but not least, it will do all this while upsampling to 1920 x 1080i.
You can read specs here http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/drives/8e50/?cpg=cj

Alex

I suspect the main question is what protocol they use on the client PC, and whether there's a Mac OS X client (standard, provided, third-party, whatever) to talk to it. I see no specific mention of Mac support, so I'd guess they're using Microsoft's protocol. I recently saw a Mac SERVER for this protocol, but I'm unsure about CLIENT support for the Mac.

Doug

Alex, the only thing I'd suggest is for you to post this in the correct AVS forum: Digital Media Servers & Content Streamers. That's where the "alphabet soup" of these sorts of devices tend to get discussed, and what's promised often seems too good to be true once one actually tries to integrate and use the thing.

Most of us here use a core duo mini in this media player/media extender role. And we're still months away from being able to meaningfully discuss the value of the iTV device, whatever it will be called.

Ultimately, I doubt protocol will matter, methinks wireless g and lack of gigabit will render this dead in the water, most users won't want to move high def files over to its hard drive first, and then play, whenever they wanted to watch something.

Mvix Now in HD and Wireless!



It would be great, but probably not both simultaneously. (Ok, maybe you could copy the HD file to the drive in non-real time, then watch in real time.)
But wireless aside, just how good a job will it do with real high def streams?

The Blu-Ray 1920 x 1080p drives and content are out, and it would be interesting to see if this unit can handle one of those files.

But for most of us, the question is: will it play full-resolution 1920 x 1080i .ts files with AC-3 without any audio or video dropouts?

For instance, some recent media players only do HD in 1280 x 720p.
Others that try to do full-resolution 1920 x 1080i do suffer from skipping or suggest you use a different format [which probably will involve down-rezzing.]


Bottom line: "Early adopters" -- please stress test!!

Can it only play media from it's own internal drive or could you connect a external and or stream. I have a 500gb WD Book external I could use.

Can it only play media from it's own internal drive or could you connect a external and or stream. I have a 500gb WD Book external I could use.

It mentions connecting to network shares. I would assume SMB shares, but that is not a problem for OSX. It also mentions playing from external USB2 drives. So if your WD external has USB2, you might be set.

Here's the link to the pdf manual:
http://www.mvixusa.com/download/manuals/MX760HD_Manual_Full.pdf

Looks interesting...claims to be able to play .ts, .vob, pass-thru of DTS, etc.

I'm not sure what MPEG-2 MPat HL is that is listed under HD support but would this device do a good job playing back full 1920x1080i mpeg2 ts files recorded from a local tv station?

User Submitted Mvix (MX-760HD) HD Wireless Media Center (500GB HDD Bundle) Reviews
the link:
http://www.hdtv-source.com/reviews/B000LYAAGY_1.html

would this device do a good job playing back full 1920x1080i mpeg2 ts files recorded from a local tv station?

There's a big thread on this device here:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=759390

Best to read through that, early on I remember a few posts from one Mac user who bought one, Squished Squirre, not sure if he kept the device...good luck.