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DVD Player as 802.11b Peripheral
sysadmn writes "Instead of building a PVR from a computer, why not let your DVD player access the computer you already have? That's the thinking behind Sonicblue's new Go-Video D2730. The just-announced DVD player will use an 802.11b (Wi-Fi) wireless network connection to access content on PCs, such as photos, music and videos. The player is aggressively priced at about $250 US and is due out in first quarter 2003. Full details are on CNET."
For the same price you could put together a cheap computer which could decode media in formats this player isn't likely to support (i.e. DivX) This seems like it's a bit too high tech for Joe Sixpack, but not priced competatively for today's stylish geek on the go.
Got a WAP right above my desk. Free pr0n for everyone!
Every product that I've ever bought from SonicBlue has been malformed and returned to sender.
The technology sounds cool, but I'll probably wait until it's available from another vendor.
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
I notice on home home 802.11b network that the 11mbps connection between my den PC and upstairs office PC is nowhere near fast enough to stream high quality compressed digital video (e.g. DivX). How is this player going to be able to pull it off?
m@
But how does this relate to PVR? Allowing my DVD player to access PC content doesn't allow me to PVR, as far as I can tell. The article mentioned plans to network to Replay TV, but that's not what you're saying here.
Did I miss something?
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
Or you could just buy a DVD player for $50 at WalMart. Is the geek-factor really worth the additional $200?
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Too bad I never got around to actually do anything.
Check out Rubik by Mosaik. Oh so lush.How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
The posting is misleading. The item comes with an ethernet port, but support for 802.11b will require an additional piece of hardware. I'm not clear from the information available if it will just use a PCMCIA slot or something else.
if it could access my favorite websites like Slashdot and theBubbler.
Now that would make it worth while investing in.
Instead, why not just spend $50 bucks and do this on your Playstation 2?
Q Cast Player
This thing rocks, by the way.
All you have to do is make a Pringles-can antenna and drive around for a while...
Niceeeee... Watching XVID's is never been easier with this genius of an invention
"CD: It seems that I might have fallen for a hoax. Doh!"
Right there, after the text. I think that may be a correction.
This is wonderful. Now, in addition to DDOS attacks and hacking by the RIAA, we can have wardriving by the MPAA!
...
Also, wouldn't it be theoretically possible to take over someone else's DVD player if they don't set up decent security? Definitely interesting idea, but it's sure to have its issues.
Buy the President
It just says you can "access media" from your PC. No word on what it supports. MPG-1, certainly. WMV, maybe. DivX3, almost certainly not. OGM/XviD, again, probably not.
Also, thankfully the default is ethernet, 802.11 is an option (that I'm not interested in - too slow)
I'm still going to build a PC for my entertainment center - then I can play what I want including FUTURE formats.
Could it? That's pretty damn cheap for a Wi-Fi enabled burner. Because if it's not a burner, than what the hell does this have to do with a PVR...
Hades, PoD: Official Advocate
I could have sworn it was illegal (or at least against some shrinkwrap EULA mumbo-jumbo) to play a DVD over any sort of wireless link. It came up during Microsoft's massively ill-conceived tablet PC thing, I believe.
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
I think they're dead wrong; look at the device this article mentions.
"The Go-Video D2730 player's software will let consumers view content on their television that's stored on their PC using a remote control for navigation. The customer will be able to stream music files and other content on the DVD player. "
Hmm, what protocol does it use for filesharing? Netbios on a WiFi network? Will it play my ogg files? My DivX? My png photos? You can put together a shuttle SV-24 with a dvd player and a 6 channel sound card for about the same price they're quoting; that's what I use at home and I'm quite happy with it (except for the fact my TV won't do more than 640x480). If I were a gambling man, I'd sell sonicblue's stock short and profit from their stupidity.
Most video cards with TV-out are cheaper than this. GF4 for example - via S-video, with optional conversion to RCA-style connector, and a booster to bypass Macrovision issues if connected to a VCR (or in my case, an old BETA machine). Combined with a PC DVD-ROM and you can play everything just fine.
Granted, wireless is pretty cool, but this seems to be not-entirely-useful in a comparative aspect... unless your computer is beyond TV proximity.
Nice thing about computers though - people may biatch about the cost, the the addons sometimes replace home electronics more cheaply. PC DVD-ROM's were a helluva lot cheaper than console ones for a loooong time, and you can play around with them more.
Its nice, I guess, but the PC connectivity features don't seem to leverage off the DVD player at all. The only connection I see is that a DVD player is something that you are going to want in your home theater anyway, so at least you don't need another box in your system.
But honey, I swear that the DVD player just started pumping out pron on its own!
This certainly isn't the first integration of PC and TV in a consumer product. I own a SliMP3 and the Qcast Tuner software for PS2.
I wonder how long it will be before these types of devices which play media files from your PC onto your TV/stereo system are considered "mainstream".?
I think that the more of these enabling (sorry to use that cheesy buzword) media technologies there are, the better. I doubt however that the MPAA and RIAA share that view. They're bound to step in with heavy handed tactics sooner or later. Just look at how they responded to DeCSS - software which allows consumers to watch DVD's on platforms that they do not control. Seems like this is right up their litigation alley.
Just my two cents.
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
Sonicblue's DVD player will be able to connect to networks via an Ethernet connection. Consumers will be able to purchase 802.11b PC cards to connect the player to a PC using wireless networking
SONICblue reserves the right to automatically add, modify, or disable any features in the operating software when your ReplayTV 5000 connects to our server.
Translated:
We will sell you this box with a list of features you want but once the *AA gets congress to pass favorable laws, wins a court battle, or becomes a major shareholder in our business we will promptly castrate your box without sending you one penny in refund.
interlaced
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
You forgot to mention that you need to buy the 'official' ps2 ethernet adapter also. It wouldn't be a big deal but originally Qcast said that you could use a usb adaptor. I allready have a usb nic for ps2's madden 2003 and it works great. I refuse to replace it just because Qcast is too cheap to buy the development kit!
I've found that trying to stream anything worthwild over a .11b link is just too iffy. I often stream video files from my server to whereever I am sitting with the laptop. With the netgear card reporting a full speed connect at ~60% signal strength and 100% quality it is kind-of jerky at times. I know I'm pushing the limits of what that little wireless connect can do.
Now I can deal with it for now because I'm not expecting it to perform perfectly. However, what is going to happen when Joe Consumer picks one of these up, hooks in the wireless part and tries to stream his DVD rip collection and it gets .3FPS?
Answer: You get one very unhappy Joe Consumer.
I believe that people will expect this thing to do more then it can, and I doubt that sonic will be up front and tell people about this limitation.
Makes me think of a car dealer trying to sell a car for use on interstate highways but the car can only go 45MPH. Sure it works, but it isn't quite what you expected now is it?
Sonicblue has a history of trying to add cool features to unrefined products. The title is misleading since 802.11b requires an additional purchase. Last month I decided to get a PVR. Sonicblue's replay tv 5000 had some real cool features, but the interface sucked. Interface is extremly important in consumer applications such as a cell phone or PVR. I ended up getting a tivo after i learned that you can use usb ethernet adaptors with the series 2. Anyway, my point is sonicblue has a history of sticking some cool features in a completely unrefined product.
So all I need is a laptop with an 802.11b card and a couple of people in my neigborhood with HBO and an penchant for "The Sopranos"!!!!
Hopefully this has ZeroConf or it could be added. Imagine having an 802.11 DVD player, seamlessly networked with your Panasonic Plasma TV.
It really seams like we are going to see a revolution in networked aplicances, finally, and it dosen't look like bluetooth is going to be the springboard.
So far, if I recall, Panasonic and at least 2 other companies have jumped onto the ZeroConf bandwagon. This includes some stero equipment along with TVs from Panasonic which support slide shows sent from the TV.
Are you excited?
Modular Redundancy--Because 4 out of 5 Nodes agree
If it was a dvd writer that would be different, but remember the "R" in PVR stands for Recorder, not player. I think this would be a great idea for a DVD-R, and I'd snatch it up! Unfotunately it's not, it's not even that useful as is. 11 Mb/s is awfully slow to be streaming video, but the ethernet could be an option. However, if you were going to go that route (ie running wires), it'd still be cheaper and more effective just to buy a Tuner card and send whatever to your TV via Composite or Svideo.
I think this product relies more on it's "cool" factor than it's usability. DVD Player competition is tight, and they seem to be really reaching for new features. Next I'm sure we'll start seeing dvd in Custom translucent color cases, or come with Madonna's signature for an extra $50..
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. It's just that yours is stupid.
From tests I've done in the past with DVD quality streaming, wireless networks such as 802.11b can not support the throughput required. I've had DVD's max out at 13 MB/s. 802.11b can only send 11 Mb/s not including overhead which is greater than 802.3 in the first place...
This little doo-dad doesn't actually sound like it's a PVR - streaming content off your computer is great, but it never says anything about getting TV onto your hard drive.
If you already have a PlayStation2 (that doubles as a DVD player), why spend $250 on more hardware when you can use this: QCast Tuner? It'll record TV onto your computer's hard drive and pull media off of it, too. All you need is the Sony Network Adapter... wireless network option is up to you.
No, I don't work for BroadQ, but I do own it and it's a great product. Who needs to spend more cash on extra hardware?
In addition with using wi-fi, which the vast majority of average people still don't have on their PC's, this thing isn't practical. Most people have DVD's on... surprise DVD's! This means, you want to put in a movie? Go to the computer, boot it up, put the DVD in, and walk back to the living room. The only people who'd like this would be uber-geeks with money to blow on huge hard drives to store movies, broadband to download those movies (since most people don't rip DVD's onto hard drives, and the few who do are pretty stupid), and wi-fi in the computer. I predict this product will sell... to about 100 people. In fact, if it even actually hits the shelves, I nominate this product for The Biggest Flop of the Year.
Yeah, people are going to be pissed when they discover the tunes they so easily ripped from their CD's via WMP won't work through the SonicBlue DVD player because it doesn't have a license for them..
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
I love my ReplayTV. There are two priority levels: Non-guaranteed and Guaranteed. If you guarantee a recording, it will reserve hard drive space for the show and it will record it. It won't let you set two guaranteed shows for the same timeslot. The only time you run into problems is when the network shifts the schedule slightly so that two shows overlap when they normally wouldn't.
As to finding new shows, you can do a search fairly easily, and you can browse the guide. It's trivial to tell it to record something, and also trivial to change the settings on something already scheduled.
What Replay lacks is a to-do list. So if you have a bunch of non-guaranteed things (like my wife's "Shakespeare" theme or my "Stargate" theme), it will pick the one to record using a fairly cryptic algorithm (which one starts first; which one is on a lower channel; which theme was create first).
Now I can get my DVD player hacked by wise guys.
It's Christmas everyday with BitTorrent.
Actually every "media" device in your house should have this capability. There should be such a thing as "storage" (i.e. hard drive) and everything from your video game console to your stereo to your video playback device and your computer should access it.
;)
Put the "consoles" in their proper perspective; computers will be great for surfing the net and ordering content. Your video playback console is great for playing back your videos, and your stereo console is great for playing back music.
The point I'm making here is everything should be contected together, but accessed in with the console that makes sense. IMO, playing tunes and watching downloaded videos on a computer stinks. Playing video games on the TV rocks, but video game consoles with their own storage devices sucks.
If 802.11b wireless is the link that ties all these together, great, but it should be seamless and painless to the user to set it up.
Oh yeah, it needs to be secure too.
You know you're a geek if you've ever replied to a tagline.
If you want to access stuff on your PC, and you have a Playstation with ethernet adaptor, go to
BroadQ
It's software for your Playstation and your PC that lets you play movies and music on your entertainment system. All that stuff is stored on your PC.
If you've got a Playstation, no need to go buy a separate box to do it.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
Read the FBI warning at the beginning of any commercial DVD.
Strictly prohibits the rebroadcast of the contents.
Then again maybe someone should add a pay-per-view video streaming service to their WiFi ISP service offerings. . . .
BroadQ now supports Ogg audio as well as MP3.
Also plays most video: mpeg, avi, mov, divX . . . and has a picture viewer supporting jpg and png formats.
Dude, you can actually buy a player or burner that will fit Inside your case! I got a tiny box with a mini-itx board with a DVD player from iDot Computers. Its half the size of the DVD player it replaces. I suppose I could use a wireless card with it, but why bother? It makes much more sense to put audio components (along with audio software) in PCs. Unfortunately Joe Average hasn't figured this out yet, but hopefully that will change soon.
It seems that it supports standard ethernet out of the box, with 802.11 supported by swapping the ethernet PCMCIA card with an equivilent wireless PCMCIA card.
It plays MPEG1 and MPEG2 video and MP3 and WMA audio over the network. (presumably via SMB fileshare) Not too bad for the price point ($249 MSRP). No mention of anything MPEG-4 based ala DivX/Xvid, so it's highly doubtful.
For my money, I think I'll get a modded Xbox for roughly the same price and run Linux and mplayer or XBMP, which is based on the mplayer code anyway. I don't need 802.11 for this application. If I did, an ethernet to 802.11 wireless bridge (such as the Linksys WET11) would serve quite nicely.
For the not-hackers out there, however, this isn't at all a bad deal, and a bunch of MPEG-2 (ala SVCD, or ripped DVD's) on today's large hard drives, combined with multiple cheap "media terminals" like this one, plugged into your TV's / Home Theatre, is a decent solution. Consider that network mp3 stereo components are going for about this price already, and you get the ability to archive and play your DVDs across your network, too, for the same price.
Not too shabby.
NetShadow
This SonicBleu box will not play DivX -- at least, according to the news.com article. It will only play MPEG1 and 2 (for video) and WMA and MP3 (for audio).
/. or elsewhere is totally beyond me...
That means that to play back MPEG2, you're really going to be talking about 320x240 or 480x480 (SVCD) res. only... 640x480 will be too big to fit in WiFi.
Of course, from the news.com article it's clear that WiFi is an OPTION, not default-- default is 10/100 Ethernet.
All of this is interesting, but if you have a PlayStation 2, you would be much better off buying QCast from BroadQ -- www.broadq.com -- which allows your PS2 to pull OGG, MP3, JPG, MPG1/2/4, DivX 3, 4, and 5 and more off your PC...
That, and it will be able to do progressive output, HD resolution (with component cabling), and is future-proof (software upgradable)...
Oh, and it's $49.95 -- if you have a PS2 and a Network Adapter, and the PS2 already plays DVD's!!!!
Not to mention the obvious... you can play games on your PS2!!!
I have this software, and it rocks. Why it's not covered on
What I really need is a DVD player that can stream data to my wireless computers. It would be nice to be able to continue watching a movie on my PDA when I need to take a bathroom break (slightly lower quality video would be ok)
NTSC has 525 scanlines (vertical), 25 of which are during the vertical blanking interleave, and the horizontal resolution isn't really defined. PAL has 625 scanlines. Both standards interlace scanlines. Since NTSC is an analog standard, the horizontal resolution doesn't need to be defined, and televisions and broadcasters can vary the signal as fast as they want to to add more horizontal resolution, as long as the equipment supports it. VCR's have an effective horizontal resolution somewhere below 320 pixels, though it doesn't look pixelated because it kind of smears the values (it's analog, and stored as a wave, not discrete pixels).
DVD's are 352x240, 352x480, 704x480, or 720x480 in NTSC, x576 in PAL. I've never encountered an NTSC DVD that wasn't 720x480, and I'm not sure if players even support the other resolutions (someone please correct me if I got those resolutions wrong). 4:3 aspect ratio movies are typically displayed unscaled, with 720 pixels horizontal resolution in the analog signal (if it's a good decoder and NTSC signal generator), while 16:9 movies fields are typically shrunk vertically and reinterlaced. On an HDTV or projector with a DVD player that has built-in scaling or using a line quadroupler/deinterlacer, the resolution is scaled from 720x480 to whatever the HDTV or projector uses. Some projectors can sync at resolutions up to 3500x3500, though they cost tens of thousands of dollars.
A solution to the problem with music today
$200 for ps2 $50 for broadq's qcast tuner which plays DivX, mpg, ogg, mp3, jpg, etc.. and works great link doh! for got the $40 for the network adapter... so the broadq solution is a little bit more expensive, but playing games as well makes up for it..
My Linux Command of the Day site : LCOD
Susan Kevorkian, an analyst with research firm IDC
I hear she can get you a KILLER deal on one of these!
Creationists are a lot like zombies. Slow, but powerful and numerous. And they all want to eat our brains.
Check out the www.xboxmediaplayer.de . It does everything that Qcast does, and more - you can play homebrew games, emulators, etc. as well. It also supports more codecs (it uses the mplayer engine), and is updated regularly with new features and bugfixes.
The total cost of a modchip for xbox is less than that of the ethernet adapter and Qcast for PS2.
BBK
If you want a cheap set-top box for playing video, you can't go wrong with Xbox. I'd rather have a 100 meg link than 802.11b anyway. Streaming SVCDs gets choppy @ 11mbit.
http://www.remix.net/
Your DVD player is in a fixed location in your house.
Your home PC is in a fixed location in your house.
I can't imagine why, other than the geekiness factor, wireless data transmission would be needed to have the DVD player and the PC communicate.
I'd run 100BaseT between the two devices and get better data throughput for less money.
I agree, it's a nice idea, but hardly "agressively priced". I would much rather see them just stick a cheap 10/100 ethernet port on the back of the unit and not charge me for the wireless technology. Such a product (more agressively priced) would appeal to more users - those who want to direct connect to their network could; those who want to go wireless could use an external device.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
...we use mule to carry PC to living room.
for $250 I can buy a DVD player from a company that, admittedly, is not a huge consumer electronics corporation. And at $250, that DVD player is significantly more expensive than similarly specced (excluding the networking) players from companies like Sony, Toshiba, or Panasonic. It's only saving grace: the ability to play back video over a network.
OR
For $199 (after the two $50 rebates), I can get the 40 hour replay TV (granted, subscription required) which IS a PVR. Many of the name brand DVD players nowadays will support SVCD if you're dying to watch your MPEG-4/DiVX movies on your television. My other question: with as many different flavors of DiVX, and as many different takes on encoding the audio there-in (MP3, WMA, OGG, standard AC3), I don't really trust a hardware-based player to be able to handle any old DiVX file without some tinkering. Once I get to the point where I'm decompressing the audio and other similar exploits, I'm not as interested.
However, I stream video from my desktop (with TV tuner card) to a laptop (with TV-out) under the TV over 802.11b. I do this by mounting an NFS volume over a VPN I establish from the laptop to the desktop. My datarate is set so 1 hr of video will just fit on a 700 MB CD (in case I see a show I want to keep). I'm also running an ad-hoc (rather than access point) network, if that makes any difference. The laptop and desktop are fairly close together, but there are a few walls.
Under these conditions, I can just eek out enough bandwidth. There's more room for error if I stream over HTTP, but then I can't seek within the stream, so I stick with NFS.
Very occasionally for no apparent reason I'm unable to use the player - interference from something, I assume.
You did it to get the job? I thought that was the salary you negotiated for yourself.
This seems like a complicated and awkward solution compared to the 'media center pc' initiatives based on Windows or Linux machine.
I guess the selling point is that it's cheaper. This is certainly true compared to the expensive Windows-based media PCs, but I'm interested to see how much the Linux-based machines (I think Sony is working on this) will cost.
Well, It's Sounds Good But It HAS to have some kind of password protection or encrriptiopn on the wireless network or it WILL become subject to "attack" and "misuse"... But The Idea Of It Is Wonderful, Just Be Paranoid And Protect The 802.11 Ok?
Dear world,
I don't particularly care about this specific product. I am excited about ethernet adapters being added to home audio/video components. What's particularly cool about a DVD player with a built-in NIC is that, if hackable like other DVD players, it could become a cheap networked MP3 player.
Later,
-Slashdot Junky
.
Landfill Mining Co.
Managing the (Un)natural Resources of Tomorrow
Let's see how many freaks we can add to ekrout! Click here and add him as a foe!
I already have this identical setup at my house, and it works like a dream.
Here are the components:
XBox - $199
Matrix modchip - $50
802.11b access point running in wireless client mode - $99
Now I can stream JPEG photos, MP3s, MPEG, AVI, and Divx movies to my television from a RelaX media server running Linux.
Xbox Media Player 2.0 is GPL, gives you a great user interface and is very user friendly. If you haven't checked it out, please do so.
"When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." - Richard M. Nixon
For $20 get a cheap video card with component out. Add a $70 wireless video and mouse transmitter/remote from x10 and you have everything your PC can dish out.
That's because the decoder for DivX is software based rather than dedicated hardware. Give the player a dedicated chip and it'd be easy... kinda the same way they all handle the MPEG-2 on DVDs.
Let's see...
Porn, porn, porn, XXX porn, XXXXX porn...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Very occasionally for no apparent reason I'm unable to use the player
Very occaisionally? Is that like the shirt size "extra medium?"
If you're a teenager, a college student or a pimple-faced geek living in an efficiency you may have a PC in your living room and, thus, TV out will be just fine for you. But, real people don't have PCs next to their TV. Get married or move in with a woman. No way will they want a PC in the living room unless it's a dedicated media PC.
DVD Players have Computers as peripherals. (rimshot)
Perhaps because I'm smart enough to look at a PC and realize that it would make a lousy PVR. I know what a real PVR is like (I own two TiVos), and a power-hungry PC operating off a generic program guide isn't it. A good PVR is so much more than a hard-disk VCR, but it's hard to explain to someone who hasn't lived with a good PVR such as TiVo.
So we're looking here at a DVD player that can fetch pictures and music off of a PC. Fine. What makes this any kind of step towards a PC-based PVR? All I have to do is run the video output from the graphics card to the A/V input of my receiver, and then futz with the kludgy remote control solutions, to play video from the PC to the TV. You don't need a DVD player for that. Oh, you want wireless? There are plenty of wireless audio/video transmitter devices around.
Yes, there have been a lot of attempts to turn a PC into a PVR. All of them have failed miserably so far - they're expensive, fragile, and don't come anywhere near the simplicity of use of a good purpose-built PVR with a service behind it. I'm sure that one of these efforts will come up with something that demos well, but I doubt it will appeal to a larger audience.
Yes, a PVR is full of recognizeable bits of a PC - there's a processor, a hard disk or two, video encoders and decoders, and some software. But this doesn't mean that a PC would make a good PVR, any more than a PC would make a good bedside alarm clock.
There's a lot more to a PVR than just these bits - multiple inputs and outputs, control of cable and satellite boxes, a quiet, low-power box that can sit next to your TV and doesn't cost a lot and can be dedicated to its purpose.
A PC-based video recorder has its uses. But a PVR it's not.
That has to be one of the most confusing, unhelpful web pages I've ever seen. It's too many small, unconnected blurbs of different color all splashed on the page at once, without any logic as to what box is related to what other box. I noticed the links at the top, but at that point I was to disgusted to keep browsing.