How would you change Popcorn Hour's A-100 HD media streamer?
By Darren Murph 
posted July 11th 2008 10:00PM
posted July 11th 2008 10:00PM
posted July 11th 2008 10:00PM
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If it was a Media Center Extender, but still kept all its support for alternative codecs such as x264 in the mkv container then it'd be perfect for me.
All of these comments have made me glad I've waited. I know a few weeks back rumors were flying of some new models but honestly the feature set didn't impress me as much of the griping about the Popcorn Hour is directed at the implementation of current features and lack of firmware support for things like DTS audio (without a separate decoder).
Hmmm. If you are waiting for something to access your digital video media, then you are making a mistake. I agree that the box is not perfect, but everyone I have shown it to goes out and gets on the waiting list. Topics like this one are great, but they do dwell on what is wrong with a product, which can make readers think a product is worse than it is.
For me the ability to rip my entire dvd collection to ISOs (or just the vobs!), put them on my 5Tbyte NAS, and then view them on my TV is awesome. I do get the occasional freeze when watching a movie. FF and FR are kind of weak. And the system is a bit sluggish on navigation. But for all it's warts, this is a great device!
1) Slow UI. It's like web based or something -- pages feel like html.
2) Macromedia Flash support -- this is part of the "make the web browser not total shit" request.
3) Some decent IPTV content portals
4) A useable music/mp3 player. This thing "can" play mp3s, but the UI basically makes this useless.
That said, it's great for playing all my .mkv and .avi files.
I love my PCH. The UI needs some work and the SMB support needs major work. Actually, most of the netcode needs work. I have mine hooked up wirelessly and it streams DIVX no problem, even some DivX @ 720p. However, it does not do well with DVD isos over wireless or any high bitrate 720p stuff.
I agree that this market is far from mature. The demand is there, but the available products are not there yet.
I own TViX M-5100SH. It is way much better than PCH, more stable (hardly crash), more features (cover art, ff/rewind, etc.) and good remote.
But still, there are some basic functionality that has bugs:
- Auto brightness / contrast. Why on earth they implemented this feature? It will automatically adjust the brightness and contrast which most of the time ruin your TV setting (luckily you can reset it btw, every time you play a video).
- Does not play ISO (ripped DVD with menu) quite well. 7 out of 10 will play btw.
- Cannot zoom to full screen when playing ISO
- Photo (JPEG) viewer is broken, really. It is slow and unstable.
- Cannot fast forward more than 8x because the audio timing will screw up.
Other than that, TViX is fantastic. All formats are supported. Including the latest beta that support HD audio pass-through (DTS MA, Dolby TrueHD). Yes, thats right, HD audio support.
But as you can see, some of basic functionality are still buggy.
I cannot understand that. Why is it so difficult to fix this?
And one thing that bothers me, why those big names (Sony, Samsung, Philips, Panasonic, Pioneer, etc.) do not have this kind of product??? Well, yeah they have multimedia streamer, but it cannot play most modern video file format (container), like *.MKV, *.TS .. or ISO, subtitle supports (SRT, SUB, etc.).
Hulu support would make the perfect addition to this system, also keyboard adaptability for more effective youtube searches
Add in HD audio pass-through...
Make it look better, It look's to much like what it is, an External enclosure Turned into a media device, A tuner would be nice but I'd still buy one anyway, if it was not soooo ugly.
SDK? SDK? SDK?
If topfield with a propiertary OS can enable customers to add plugins to their STB's, surely popcorn with their Linux based system should be able to do that to fully enable the potential of the community they have...
Have you read the forums? There may not be an official hand-holding SDK out but there are plenty of people writing apps for the PCH.
Is it just me that has to aim the remote *right* at the box for it to register? I have to turn into an armchair sniper to do anything with it!
Also... I have a directory with like 1000 video files in it.... they're errr.... 'short films'. It takes like 10 seconds to change page! It would take my half an hour to get to the ones in the middle.
Apart from that it's awesome.
id have one
I don't think the PCH is that great at all. I have an iStar mini myself (exact same firmware), and the UI pales in comparison to XBMC. I mean, come on..HTML interface? This is a media device!
My main gripe is that it takes forever to skip within a video. Go 10 seconds forward, wait 5 seconds for it to resume playing. This is instantaneous on XBMC.
I really like my PCH. It does exactly what I need it to do (i.e. act as a video jukebox).
However, the following features would be nice:
- Way better music player. This thing doesn't even sort music by ID tag. It's stuck in the 90s.
- Resume playback. I'd love to be able to stop playback and have the thing remember where I left off.
- Built-in WiFi. I don't care about gigabit ethernet as the PCH doesn't even max out 100Mbit when transferring yet.
- BBC iPlayer/4OD support would be ridiculously good but I'm not expecting it.
- SATA support. I'm stuck at 750GB. :(
I got it to watch movies. and haven't explored the audio features yet. I love it....i can only think of a couple of things already mentioned here.
Remote. It's really bad.
Myihome for OS X needs an update.
SATA...I don't actually have any spare EIDE drives laying around and had to buy an adapter.
Reconfigure the front panel LED's. They are all jumbled together and you can't tell what's going on from across the room.
1) Now playing/folder art for MP3s. Actually, isn't this more a limitation of the streaming servers than the PCH itself?
2) Integration with Netflix, Amazon Unbox, etc. How long before we get past the one box/one service Stone Age and get an open standard so we can subscribe to any service from any box.
All I want is RM / RMVB support and playback resume
When you have NAS as media source, the icons from the main screen should be able to direct to a specific folder, rather than just filtering for that specific content and then opening the root of your NAS.
First: I do not currently own a PCH but it is definitively high on my list over "things to get".
What I would like is a remote with a screen (preferably color). This will make it possible to use the PCH as a audio streamer without having to turn on the TV.
I would update the Popcorn Kernal
bwahahahahhaha.
I have a Linksys WGA600N wireless adapter hooked to both of mine making them wireless devices so I can ftp content to the hard drives.
What is with all the remote control and DTS complaints? If you don't have a programmable remote (including reboot command so you never pull the plug) and a DTS decoder in your receiver you need them more than a PCH.
one word: hulu
I love my Popcorn Hour. It replaced an old XBox with XBox Media Center. It's so damn quiet.
The biggest thing I'd change is making the menu navigation speedier. I really miss how on my old XBox, the menu would render a new page of listings as quick as I could press the button. But the popcorn hour using some HTML/web based browsing technology, so it's slow. Nonetheless, while a bit inconvenient, it streams most anything.
Also, with the newer firmare, it seems that my harddrive stays turned off unless it's needed. For example, while watching a movie from a remote NAS, the harddrive doesn't spin up, which is great, because I love the silence. Did I mention it's silent?
Some other things I'd like to see: I'm only now starting to use it to act as a media streamer, so I'd like to see more support in those applications.
The two things that would make me purchase one of these NMT if they obtained the following:
1. DVD Drive (for playing back older DVDs)
2. Last.fm support (Pandora would be cool too)
Until then, I'm sticking to my Mac Mini using Boxee
Optical audio, all I use
gigabit, never hurts
hdmi 1.3 I guess. I don't think this adds to much except HD audio which apparently one guy has a receiver that can do that. Personally I doubt it is much better than 5.1.
As I don't own one yet I assume it needs the refined software people above mentioned.
Make all the lights go away.
I would NOT add wifi but put a USB on the back so people can add that.
SATA would be good too but I would stream so I wan the base unit to be as cheap as possible.
I'd agree that it needs optical audio. I'm really missing that myself. However, it does already have USB on the front, so you can plug in your wireless card there. The support for USB wireless cards however is pretty dismal so, adding more support would be nice.
A Blu-Ray drive.
I agree with much but I think people are being rather critical considering what it has to cope with.
As with many of you I replaced My XBox with this thing and I have to say I am 99% happy with it
One of the things you have to remember is that the media cantre is not a particularly mature technology and I have not seen anything that will play every conceivable format flawlessly. The most compatible I have seen is the XBMC. In addition the PCH firmware is still what one might call beta. They are regularly updating the firmware with improvements and fixes. There is a list of enhancements as well as a raft of possible feature improvements coming.
The first poster said iTiunes support. Already there. This is an example of a number of misconceptions. One person asked for the ability to play all audio files in a directory. Already there - all be it not randomly, only sequentially. Resume is being worked on.
Considering the number of different formats I have tried there is very little it cannot play. There are some notible exceptions but I am sure they will be addressed in time.
All in all there is more that the PCH will play that my XBMC would not than visa versa. For instance it appears to handle DVD iso files far better then the XBMC ever did, even if the XBMC interface is much better.
As for the oft quoted complaint that you cannot turn it off ... well helooooo how many of your appliances do not turn off. It uses less current in standby than any other appliance in my house on standby.
Now for the real subject of this entry - what would I like to see improved.
1. Better audio handling. OOB playlists ability to show selected pictures, album covers and info, better audio information, randomisation within directories and playlists. iTunes integration gives us some of these features and is a very nice compromise but adding pretty screens and audio information would be nice.
2. Ability to display video snapshot and DVD covers with lists, as well as online reviews from imdb etc.
1) More processing grunt - 1080p is not always flawless, especially with high bitstream encodes/fast motion scenes.
2) Onboard SATA drive connector, not legacy IDE.
3) A name change! Pop corn hour is a bit shite.
4) On board decoding of DTS. Hell, get ask people who want this option to pay for and download a premium firmware if they're worried about this hurting unit sales initially.
5) The ability to remember more than 8 or so network locations.
1. Decent remote
2. SATA
3. HDMI 1.3
4. Faster UI with skins
6. A case that keeps HDD silent
I love my Popcorn Hour! It's a bit rough around the edges, but it plays a lot of files that my PS3 can't! Also, it connects to any samba or windows share, so it "just works" with my NAS.
I would:
- improve the fast-forward and re-wind.
- include a built-in fan (I stuck my own in, never crashed since).
- offer a version with Wi-Fi.
- polish it's rough edges, package it better, and sell it in mainstream stores.
All I'd add is internal SATA support and GIgabit ethernet. I like that it has to be hard-wired in to the network because my house is huge and the WiFi is poorly executed (my own fault, i prefer wired).
Other than all that, love the PH, put me on the list for the A-200 or A-101
optical drive would be awesome
I have been looking for such a media player like popcorn but would also like to be able to play and/or rip stuff from any cd or dvd or vcd I put in there
GB ethernet is like a requirement at my home because of the Qnap NAS sever that is already serving up my inhouse streaming anyway
grtz
I'd purchase one if it had HDMI 1.3 so it could pass 7.1 channelHD Audio.
Add a tuner !
Hi, I own a PCH A-100 since a month and I love it. It plays everything I throw at it via SMB. MKV support is the way to go for any media player out there and for 180$ it is the real deal. Yeah, you could add DTS support, dolby HD, DVD drive.. But the licenses for these features would skyrocket the price of the unit considering that Syabas does not have the same sale volume than Sony or other big companies.
I chose PCH instead of TVIX because of price. To play MKV containing x264 and AC3 sound hosted on a network is the feature that most people are looking for when they go for this networked media player. I used to have a D-Link DSM-320RD and the DVD drive (and CSS license) alone added 100$ to the unit and it was crappy. AND I had to transcode 80% of all my media with very expensive softwares.
So if you want a HTPC, build one, otherwise I prefer to keep the price of this baby as low as possible even if it means transcoding DTS to AC3 with the audioconverter application (which by the way takes 10 minutes of your life to transcode a 2h movie).
To answer the question: I want the rewind feature on MKV asap please.
improve the UI to support quickly browsing large libraries.
add OGM and Vorbis support.
FEATURE REQUEST: A web interface to control the device remotely from any networked PC, handheld, phone, iPhone, etc...
Ive had a popcorn hour...and it worked fine...I also only purchased one as my XBMC boxes didnt play HD content....then I sold the Popcorn as I wasnt really uising it as I had no HD content and no hard cabled ethernet (as I couldnt get Homeplugs to work with it)
Then the ISTAR came out.....so I purchased one unit, hardwired my house with Cat6 cable...and got myself a load of HD content...and the box is a joy to behold...so much so that I now have two in my house....and its a great piece of kit....yes the menus are a little slow....and it would be great if it had the XBMX front end (although if you really want this its now on the PC and cant be run well on an HTPC) but other than that, it plays everything I throw at it 720, 1080....blah blah blah....yes DTS is an issue but most of the DTS stuff I have I watch on TV with AMP connected.....and I could always have encoded those items in DD if I was that worried about it....
SATA drives are supported in the ISTAR..and the box has power on/off button......far better than the PH in my opinion..
I bought the PCH to watch dvd-rips. It works ok, but the zoom feature sucks. On some movies (Titanic, G.I. Jane, etc) I can't get the image to scale properly. I just have a little box in the middle of the screen. The zoom feature only scales vertically and cuts off the left/right edges. You have to aim the remote directly at the PCH for it to work. The PCH is REALLY slow, but other than that it does what I bought it for (mostly).
I'd be happy if the video scaling (zoom) worked better or differently. Perhaps the problem is just my TV. (Sharp Aquos LC32DA5U).