Exhaustive Micca EP600 G2 review - Page 3

Can anyone describe how it displays TV shows? I'm used to using Boxee on my Mac and I'm hoping it is somewhat similar.

I'm coming from a Patriot Box Office history, but those are extinct now and looking for a replacement to get for my daughters, great job with the review btw!

The PBO did some upprocessing, does the Micca also do this, meaning it will upscale your file to 1080?

Also I've read some reviews that mention that when you use an external hard drive, and then connect it back to your computer, the computer pops a flag up saying somethings' wrong with the drive and needs repaired, have you experienced this? I believe the people that ran into that were using windows 7.

Thanks in advance!
G2

Good to know and thanks for the tip, I ordered one and it should arrive on Tuesday next, my daughter's are excited, if it works as well as the PBO, I'll get another one for the other daughter too and then maybe get one for me as it looks to be slimmer than the PBO is and would be handy for travel.
G2

Unit arrived safely today, nice looking unit, surprised they didn't include the AAA batteries needed, luckily I had a few on hand.

Connected up and it arrived with the latest firmware installed as well, v1.0.3.9

And the drives do cause a warning to pop up to scan and repair, although it was ejected/powered off when removed from the player, didn't seem to harm anything, more of a nuisance.

I'll try putting that bootlog.txt file on there to see if that takes care of that.

The player appears to work great, but my use is just for connecting hard drives to it and playing video, no connections other than that.

it's a bit wider than my PBO but of course way thinner, which will be handier for travel. Although I may add some small self adhesive pads on the bottom to give some air clearance for cooling, never hurts to have things running cooler.

Thanks again for the review, made my decision that much easier.

G2

I decided to order one and give it a try. I hope I am not too disappointed with its use via network streaming as I have heard the jukebox/media library functionality does not appear to work. Strange decision to omit that feature when on a LAN, but we'll see how much of an impact that really makes for me. I figure I can always return it if it drives me crazy.

Received the EP600 G2 today and I must say we are not off to a good start. As soon as I opened the box I could hear a screw rattling around on the inside of the unit. Lovely. So I opened it up and sure enough a screw had come loose from the board. I put it back in and noticed that two of the four screws were rusting. Nice. Needless to say, I am not impressed thus far. I will get it hooked up when I get home and see how it performs, but this is NOT the way I wanted to start the experience.

I got it up and running, but it has been a disappointment again. Stuttering picture and random audio dropouts are unacceptable. It was already a reach when considering that it did not allow a media library via network, but inconsistent a/v playback is a killer. Already re-boxed and ready to ship out. Would not recommend.

That sucks. May be you got a refurbished unit!

Tiddles88, I am anything, but new to this. These are all direct BD rips using MakeMKV containing video, single HD audio, and forced sub stream (when needed). XBMC and my NeoTV550 play all of these rips fine across my network. I have neither the time nor patience to "make" the EP600 work properly. I have about 400 BD movies on my server and I am always looking for a more economical way to play them around my house. I gave the EP600 a shot and it failed for me. No worries.

Well put!

Update about the hard drive issue, I was wrong when I said I ejected it, as I didn't see an eject option when viewing the menus on the screen, THEN I noticed an Eject button on the remote, duh...so when I used that method, my one hard drive I put on was ejected and didn't have any issues when I put it back onto the computer, but for some reason the initial hard drive still comes up with that problem. Just wanted to clarify that if you DO use the EJECT BUTTON on your remote, it appears that you shouldn't have an issue with that...

G2

I had one instance of a stuttering of signal, no video, but a stacco of sound when it was turned on, two hard drives connected. it's only done that once so far...
G2

Great to hear that the product is working out well for you guys.

Just bought this unit & it fits my needs nicely. The only problem I have besides the one's that are being addressed is that: I can't use the remote no further away than about 8' & it has to be pointed directly at the box. Is anyone else experiencing this issue? I'm using the Logitech Harmony One Remote.

Logitech Harmony one is a pretty powerful remote. Is the remote range better with the remote that came with the player?

No it's not. Unfortunately the receiver on the unit just isn't powerful enough. I returned it & decided to go with another unit.

Cadett,

This indicates that the unit you received probably had a defect. The range of the unit should be 20-ft minimum according to the hardware spec's, and in actual use is much further than that in a normal home environment.

Sorry to hear that you ran into this issue...

Just reading the User Manual on the 600 and on the topic of Media Library the manual states on page 23 of 54

"Prior to using the media library, the player must perform a media scan. The player must have an attached SATA hard disk drive and/or USB drives with media files."

Can I perform a media scan over the LAN of my Media Server or NAS to build the Media Library? This media streamer looks like its about to be added to my toys.

Got this player over the weekend. Just want to share a couple of findings.

Using the firmware 1.0.3.9 that came with the box, tested a few blu-ray rips (mixture of mkv (2D) and full disc ISOs (3D)). Got a few stutters here and there. Not consistent enough to point the finger at the player. Decided to update to the latest 1.0.4.17. The stuttering gets a lot worse, un-watchable. Decided to downgrade to 1.0.3.9. While it still stutters from time to time but at least it is watchable. When the stuttering happened, just pause it for a few seconds before playing again and it will continues fine. I have watched a 3D is in its entirety without a single stutter at one point and then the other times the same iso stutter a couple of times. Maybe to do with the network.

So definitely in my case, I am skipping 1.0.4.17.

All the testing are done over SAMBA shares.

try a direct cable from your router to micca, if is the case format a a external hard drive with micca , and copy de iso files that shutter to the phisical hard drive, if they stop shutter is your network related .

also samba is not avaiable in 10.3.0.9, just nfs, and nfs doenst work in 10.4.1.7 just samba.

regards

No need. I am pretty sure it is the network issue. But until someone figures how to solve the network issue, the point is moot. I didn't buy the player for local media storage.

I have a Netgear NeoTV 550 and it also used to have stuttering issue. It was solved by turning on the Flow-Control of the NIC on the NAS where all my media is stored. The flow-control is still on but didn't help in this case. Maybe on the EP600 G2 side the flow-control isn't set?

Question to Jack@Micca:
1. Is there any plan to implement a jukebox style interface for the player for local and network medias?
2. Mede8er 1000 has a nice jukebox and uses the same chip. Is it possible to flash their firmware on the EP600 G2?

Thanks

My EP600 G2 arrived last night from Amazon with software version 1.0.3.9 . My application for buying EP600 G2 is heavily focused on HD Audio file streaming via ethernet from a Media Server. Setup was intuitive and options gave me exactly the options I wanted for RAW audio output via HDMI to my Classe SSP-800 Processor for decoding. Learned the media library can only be built with attached SATA drives or USB, not over the network. With no ability to build the Media Library, I was forced to use the file manager to locate my files. No problems configuring wired ethernet, but ran into difficulty getting this unit to work seamlessly with Windows 7 folder sharing security. Micca provides folder sharing tutorial at http://content.miccastore.com/node/230 . I'm pretty good with Windows 7 issues, but could not get around request for network ID and network password to access folders with my Music Library. My Windows 7 security advanced settings does not require ID or password, but the Micca would not stop asking and thus I was unable to access folder. The Micca tutorial mentioned that all Public folders could be accessed without security. I was able to access the Public folder and get my first sample music files to play. So I copied my HD Audio folder with my FLAC files in 192/24 and 96/24 into the Public folder and the testing could begin.

Verified this unit passed the 192kHz 24 bit and 96kHz 24 bit FLAC files (2 channel stereo) properly to the Classe for decoding and the following audio sample rate and sample size was displayed via the Classe info screen.

Digital PCM Source: 96k - Mari Kodama 96/24 -Beethoven Piano Sonatas Nos 21 in C Major (HDTracks)

PCM 96/24 Source: 96k - Helene Grimaud 96/24 - Resonances -Mozart Piano Sonata No 8 in A (HD Tracks)

Digital PCM Source: 192k -The Bill Evans Trio 192/24 - Waltz for Debbie- My Foolish Heart (HD Tracks)

Will listen tonight and let you know if I experience any streaming dropouts, etc.

Hi,

This is done through HDMI connection, correct?

Correct, audio through the HDMI connection. Ethernet from the Media Server upstairs to the EP600G2. RAW output through the HDMI connection to my Classe processor for decoding. Actually with 2 channel stereo there is no processing, just a pass through. Hoping to get some time tonight to listen as sports interrupted.

One thing I noticed so far is that my WMA lossless files are not readable by the EP600G2. Thats odd as WMA is shown as a compatible format for this unit.