Are there any media servers that decode h.246/AVC ?

No not yet unless you have a HTPC

Rumor from engadget had that the Buffalo PC-P4LWAG could do H.264.

For a bit this afternoon the Buffalo site had a new set of specs for the device that included H.264 support, however it seems the site reverted back to the old content.

And on ces dot engadget dot com they just posted something about the Dlink Medialounge DS750 with h.264 and VC1 support, and a 802.11draft n wireless interface.

And at long last, here are your answers:

Text: None /currently/. Two announced for US sale.

Early Q2: D-Link DSM-750, http://www.dlink.com/press/pr/?prid=312
"Late June": http://www.buffalotech.com/products/...-media-player/

Unknown Capability (Announced, no Specs)
I-O Data (Again, assumption is not): http://www.iodata.com/usa/products/p...AVLP2%2FDVDLAV
ZyXel (At $175, my guess is no, but worth mentioning): http://home.businesswire.com/portal/...71&newsLang=en


And Just for fun, HD streaming over Sigma designed wireless (Pure HD wireless, not 802.x ethernet): http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/09...d-uwb-hd-stre/

And an actual HDMI wireless product announcement: http://www.engadgethd.com/2007/01/08...uwb-offerings/


Ok, so this turned into a CES "Cool Stuff" post...anyway, with these release dates, the Apple announcement today may sell me on their media streamer...it's a given it will do H.264, the question will be non-DRM support. With how easy it is to convert things to H.264, and how that is the future...I don't mind taking older codecs up to that as it will last...I'm hesitant to base my solution on a codec that is being phased out however.

PS3 able to decode AVC/H.264 format and .m2ts from Sony AVCHD Camcorder.

no word on streaming yet. Sort of makes them a "Could be" your correct, but they are not really Media Servers (nor will they ever be), or Content Streamers. When they upgrade and let people know the details that may change...IMHO.

One more:

Netgear Digital Entertainer HD EVA8000
http://www.netgear.com/Home/Products...s/EVA8000.aspx

It has been confirmed that it can do h.264:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=782700

The same user says it will ship in a "couple of weeks"

Shouldn't the thread title be h.264 and not h.246?

Media Server not necessary to be streaming server. In fact, PS3 can stream music, photo and video to PSP wirelessly.

I would consider PS3 is a media server since it could store music, photo, video onto it's internal hard disk or USB external hard disk.

That's cool if you care about content on a PSP, but the poster was asking about streaming content to his LCD TV. Which the PS3 can't do today...just like before the windows media extender was put out for the xbox 360 I'd not have considered it a digital media server...it played DVDs and stuff, but was isolated to it's own world.

The PS3/PSP is a small world, and isolated right now. They will change that, but we can't know how yet...so factoring it in as more then a future possibility is not something I'd do myself.

This beast has its own product page already. Not much info tho:

D-Link DSM-750

Certainly Apple TV will support H.264 but QuickTime 7 currently does not handle High Profile for H.264. According to Wikipedia, it is a Main profile encoder, and supports "Baseline, Extended, and most of Main Profile". See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC and http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=102609. I doubt Apple would support anything beyond this, though they may do so if they plan to have newer versions of QuickTime use High Profile.

The reason I care about this is that all my existing DVD rips are done at HP

I've started a similar thread with H.264 (rather than the H.246 in this thread) here . I'm assuming there's still nothing short of a HTPC that fits the bill?

See the LimHD thread....

Kevin