|
The system is super slow when navigating thru the menus. This item is really cool if you use an external media source (ie; flash drive, external HD, etc.). Dont buy this if you plan on using it for network use. I like it because when you use USB it is fast and reliable. if you plan on watching any videos on the network you will be very disappointed. I have over a thousand movies on a HD in my office and to even scroll through the movies would take hours.
It does support MP4, though not through its WMP11 server but through an additional, and rather confusing, HP SmartConnect server. Also, I cannot listen to any of my lossless WAV albumes. I asked HP several times before I bought the product whether it supports MP4, MOV and WAV formats. The HP server simply flattens all the files into one large folder and then you are on your own; my 500GB of MP4's has been flattened to a folder of 11,467 music files, with no structure on it; this is the equivalent of unuasable for me. What is the most annoying thing is that HP lied so explicitly before I bought the product and now they do not answer anymore when I contacted them through their customer service. They assured me that it supports them. Got the unit and it did not support MOV and WAV.
(some features with universal remote do not work). Found a nice workaround for my DVD collection (Combine.vob's and rename to.mpg), so now all home video and movies are accessible. Since I read so many good things about this HP Media Smart Connect, I thought I'd give it a try. So glad someone actually knows what they are doing with these extenders. this thing works exactly as you'd expect right out of the box. Can I tell you something.
Wireless N was awful. Some response lag with the buttons, nice 1st attempt with the universal remote too. Don't even mess with a Linksys Media Center Extender. Setup took all of about 3 minutes. Nice Job HP. I had one and was terribly disappointed.
After hooking up my first one, it wasn't 48 hrs before I needed to add to my collection with a second.
I think this is a great little thing, sits unobtrusively under the TV. It does support uPnP which is good because if you buy a HDD case (mine is a QNAP TS-109) that has a NIC in it you don't have to install anything on any computer which means you can cut down on how many electrical devices are running at home, good for the green conscious, HDD only uses 14W a year. Has a beautiful and easy interface. Once up and running was great.
Which is not an issue for new TVs, but for old TVs spells doom.All in all I would buy it again. I am running on a Linksys WAG160N through the wireless NIC. All songs and movies ran seamlessly. Is a simple GUI that even my missus can use. Keep in mind that there are only 2 out puts, and that is component video and HDMI. Does everything it sets out to do.
And have had no buffer issues. Plus it looks great, which again, pleases the missus. Only down side was that I had to buy a new plasma as the old CRT could not handle the the component video out put. The only other niggly thing is that the interface is a little slow at times and delayed and it leaves the user unsure if the product responded to the commands of the remote.
I have a wirelesss-bridged network, and it looks like some firewall on the way blocked certain request, as I kept getting 'contents can not play' error from a Vista box. The unit integrates with some online services.
Unfortunately, these are just peripheral features and can't compensate for it's critical flaws.By the way, I would like to be able to stream play DVD from a PC to the TV, and stream Netflix online movie (and other similar nature movie such as those from my local library site) to the TV. The connection is easy and clear.
This is my fourth media center, after a generic brand, a Logitech and a D-Link one. The unit often needs to be 'reset' while it wouldn't respond to the 'power' button on the remote once it stuck in a wrong mode, for example, busy going through a photo album that won't display.The appearance is neat.
I would like to have it support my Linux laptop. First of all, it doesn't work (out of box).
Secondly, the interface is extremely slow, and sometimes confusing.
|
