Transfer and viewing of an mp4 file on my Xbox

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post #1 of 4

11/7/12 at 8:38am

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Hi all,

I have an mp4 file on my laptop that I'd like to view on my Xbox. I'm unable to connect via Windows Media Player (due to administrative reasons, something I can't change), so the only real way I can think to get it to the Xbox is to transfer via portable HD or USB stick.

I tried this last night, but when I plug the USB portable HD into the USB port, my Xbox sees it as a storage device that it wants to format.

Is this the right to eventually move the mp4 over to my Xbox to watch?

Thanks,

-JR

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post #2 of 4

11/7/12 at 8:43am

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I don't think you can transfer it to the Xbox.

But if you say no to the formatting and go the the system video player, you can probably play it off the USB drive.

post #3 of 4

11/7/12 at 11:51am

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Thanks for the tip. I don't know what the system video player is? All I can find are apps and Windows Media Center. Xbox Video simply goes to it's movie app.

I've got to imagine there is some way to watch a video of an external HD...but maybe there isn't.

post #4 of 4

11/10/12 at 11:06pm

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You need to format the USB drive using FAT32. The current Xbox 360 software can see at most 32 GB of the drive. You may need to use the XBox to format the drive. Personally, I just used a 16GB USB stick, and for most purposes FAT32 is sufficient (for movies smaller than 4GB).

There's a neat trick for big movies: format the USB stick using a *Macintosh* (HFS+ format). No joke.

It turns out that this allows the Xbox 360 to read AVI files bigger than 4GB. I've played an 11 GB movie off a USB stick in my Xbox 360 this way.

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