[TrungGap]

In another thread, I was praising the PS3 over 360 for divx playback. However, I have discovered a stash of videos xvid videos that would play back on the 360 but not on the PS3. I guess it's a hit and miss on both PS3 and 360. So in the end, I'm not really happy with neither 360 or PS3 for xvid videos, but in general I'm happy-ier with PS3 than 360 for divx/xvid videos.

I have setup a Windows Media Center with my DirectTV. Using my 360 as a media extender, it's working pretty well, but still not very happy with it. Mainly because it's the same PC that I play game with. So, I need to setup a dedicated PC for Media Center. Not very happy.

In general I'm not very happy with neither 360/PS3 as my media player...as my PC does a lot more. Though I can't complain too much with the PS3. If, I had to chose one...I would chose PS3, mainly because of overall cost. $400 for the PS3 vs ~$1500 for the PC. I won't consider the 360 a good alternative to PC or PS3 as a media player. (this is coming from a xbox fan, yes you heard me...).

As a media player, the 360 started out pretty strong. However, with lastest fw, the PS3 has clearly beaten the 360 in this area. I don't think MS has dedicated enough resources to make the 360 a strong media player, though I think MS is thinking the 360 as gaming console more than a media convergence device.

This is where Sony could have an upper hand. If they stake their claim as better media player device in the mind share than MS, in the end they would win the whole digital distribution, because DD is where everyone is heading toward...not physical media.

In summary, as a gaming console, I prefer the 360, as it is geared to playing games. It's a gaming console at heart. As a media player, I feel the PS3 is better. This is where I think Sony isn't doing too well at getting the message across and creating a viable business model. I feel that while they're trying to make a stealth convergence device, they have abandon the core user...gamers.

So in the end, I think many of PS3 fans here are correct. PS3 isn't just a gaming console....Slowly Sony will win the mind share that PS3 is a media player device. So, if market move toward that direction, Sony could win big. However, that is yet to be seen. MS is only playing following the leader, even though it would seem that MS has been doing very well in the gaming, it has yet crack the convergence device.

[goonergaz]

long shot - but could you actually see the files?

I find on PS3 I can't see some files until I select 'show all files' (or something like that) and then it can play them.

just a thought

[-tkf-]

a vs thread!

[TrungGap]

Originally Posted by eb

long shot - but could you actually see the files?

I find on PS3 I can't see some files until I select 'show all files' (or something like that) and then it can play them.

just a thought

Yeah, it's not that...it's when I tried playing back the files, either the video or audio is corrupted.

Originally Posted by -tkf-

a vs thread!

LOL. Yeah, it's a vs thread. But you must admit that PS3 is generally better as a media player than the 360. As anyone here can tell you, I'm usually a xbox fan more than PS3. While no one solution satisfy everyone, the PS3 is the closest.

Okay, here's my xbox fan persona coming out...the best media player is the xbox media player (XBMP) on the original box is the best (for none HD materials). Though you have to do a little modding.

[Cheezdoodles]

Originally Posted by TrungGap

LOL. Yeah, it's a vs thread. But you must admit that PS3 is generally better as a media player than the 360. As anyone here can tell you, I'm usually a xbox fan more than PS3. While no one solution satisfy everyone, the PS3 is the closest.

Um, you missed the point: Versus threads are again forum rules me thinks.

[Arwin]

You may try to present the topic differently. Something like "The Status of Consoles as Media Players at the end of 2008: What Can They Do and What Can't They". Then instead of making subjective arguments about which console is teh bestest, we simply make an inventory of what they can do and what they can't do, etc. For multi-console owners (like me) that kind of thing is interesting.

[Rangers]

Originally Posted by TrungGap

In another thread, I was praising the PS3 over 360 for divx playback. However, I have discovered a stash of videos xvid videos that would play back on the 360 but not on the PS3. I guess it's a hit and miss on both PS3 and 360. So in the end, I'm not really happy with neither 360 or PS3 for xvid videos, but in general I'm happy-ier with PS3 than 360 for divx/xvid videos.

I have setup a Windows Media Center with my DirectTV. Using my 360 as a media extender, it's working pretty well, but still not very happy with it. Mainly because it's the same PC that I play game with. So, I need to setup a dedicated PC for Media Center. Not very happy.

In general I'm not very happy with neither 360/PS3 as my media player...as my PC does a lot more. Though I can't complain too much with the PS3. If, I had to chose one...I would chose PS3, mainly because of overall cost. $400 for the PS3 vs ~$1500 for the PC. I won't consider the 360 a good alternative to PC or PS3 as a media player. (this is coming from a xbox fan, yes you heard me...).

As a media player, the 360 started out pretty strong. However, with lastest fw, the PS3 has clearly beaten the 360 in this area. I don't think MS has dedicated enough resources to make the 360 a strong media player, though I think MS is thinking the 360 as gaming console more than a media convergence device.

This is where Sony could have an upper hand. If they stake their claim as better media player device in the mind share than MS, in the end they would win the whole digital distribution, because DD is where everyone is heading toward...not physical media.

In summary, as a gaming console, I prefer the 360, as it is geared to playing games. It's a gaming console at heart. As a media player, I feel the PS3 is better. This is where I think Sony isn't doing too well at getting the message across and creating a viable business model. I feel that while they're trying to make a stealth convergence device, they have abandon the core user...gamers.

So in the end, I think many of PS3 fans here are correct. PS3 isn't just a gaming console....Slowly Sony will win the mind share that PS3 is a media player device. So, if market move toward that direction, Sony could win big. However, that is yet to be seen. MS is only playing following the leader, even though it would seem that MS has been doing very well in the gaming, it has yet crack the convergence device.

Cant speak to PS3 but 360 has been simply amazing as a media player to me. It has literally rekindled my love (like?) for movies for me since the Xvid/Divx update. Honestly, I have probably used it more as a movie playing box than gaming since that update.

Some people dont mind watching movies at their PC, but I never could stand it. So getting them over to my 360 connected to TV made a huge difference for me. Add in the excellent media remote of course.

Also, I found it great help to ditch the finicky streaming, and transfer the movies from my PC via a physical USB key instead.

I'd say an advantage of 360 there is you can format with the HFS system, allowing for file sizes over the FAT32 4GB limit. As I understand it this isn't possible on PS3. It mainly allows you to put HD movies (8GB+) on your external HDD or aformentioned USB key. And yeah, thats a pretty big deal, HD movies versus not.

The funny thing is though the HFS support in 360 is supposedly a by product of 360's Ipod support, not any grand plan by MS (for example 360 doesn't support NTFS). Thats what I'd like to see, more emphasis/marketing on these as easy to use media boxes in their own right, rather than as an afterthought like that.

[tongue_of_colicab]

Can I be honest? I dont own a ps3 so I cant comment on that one but the x360 is a total piece of shit. My brother has recently bought one and now Im home for christmas so I want to watch some movies/anime. But that is just impossible. So many formats are not support or just not work properly. For example my brothers dbz collection does not work. It has jap/eng audio and eng subs but you just cant select them so he's stuck with jap audio and no subs. .mkv cant be played neither can dvd rips. Its horrible. Whats the point including media options if like half of common files out there cant be played? I have the feeling MS actually ported the windows XP MCE mediaplayer because that for a large part has exactly the same problems of not playing alot of files.

No, if you want to play media on your tv frequently fork out 400 euro's and buy a htpc system. Install MediaPortal and see how in less than 5 minutes you will be able to literally play every file out there.

[Rangers]

Originally Posted by tongue_of_colicab

Can I be honest? I dont own a ps3 so I cant comment on that one but the x360 is a total piece of shit. My brother has recently bought one and now Im home for christmas so I want to watch some movies/anime. But that is just impossible. So many formats are not support or just not work properly. For example my brothers dbz collection does not work. It has jap/eng audio and eng subs but you just cant select them so he's stuck with jap audio and no subs. .mkv cant be played neither can dvd rips. Its horrible. Whats the point including media options if like half of common files out there cant be played? I have the feeling MS actually ported the windows XP MCE mediaplayer because that for a large part has exactly the same problems of not playing alot of files.

No, if you want to play media on your tv frequently fork out 400 euro's and buy a htpc system. Install MediaPortal and see how in less than 5 minutes you will be able to literally play every file out there.

Hmm, it works for me on all the major files one would normally download movies on, aka Xvid, Divx, most AVI's..sure there is an exception now and then, but thats to be expected, heck my PC still has to download a codec to play a file now and then. Then again I dont know what an .mkv is..

If you want to play all those strange niche formats, yeah a HTPC should be your bag, especially how dirt cheap PC's are these days..

[tongue_of_colicab]

Originally Posted by Rangers

Hmm, it works for me on all the major files one would normally download movies on, aka Xvid, Divx, most AVI's..sure there is an exception now and then, but thats to be expected, heck my PC still has to download a codec to play a file now and then. Then again I dont know what an .mkv is..

If you want to play all those strange niche formats, yeah a HTPC should be your bag, especially how dirt cheap PC's are these days..

.mkv isnt really niche. Lots of anime use it. Also I dont think the dvd format is very niche Im not a big fan of disks so I generally rip everything to my hd. Just about every windows based player can play that so I feel its kinda dumb the x360 cant.

That is just my main problem with both the x360 and ps3. They are sold as more than gaming machines (especially the ps3) and are also aimed at playing your media. Still they fail at playing half the files I have here at my parents home and none of those are uncommon formats.

Sure, you can use extra software like TVersity, spend hours trying to get it playing everything (as it will need to convert on the fly) and that way you'll be able to play most stuff but ofcourse its hardly a efficient or clean way.

So no I think they fail. Your best of with a HTPC or one of those mediaboxes, I heard they pretty much play everything too these days.

Originally Posted by TrungGap

I haven't touch MediaPortal for a while now, is it much better than before? It's not quite the same XBMP.

Not sure what version I have, its one from atleast 6 months ago. But it works fine for me. Never crashes and it plays all my files. Dont know about XBMP but MP works fine for me.

[Fafalada]

Originally Posted by tongue_of_colicab

.mkv isnt really niche. Lots of anime use it.

Well, I suppose you have a point - piracy is pretty mainstream these days too after all. That said, I've yet to encounter a MKV file that I couldn't remux to play on PS3 (no transcoding involved).
I personally never understood the whole 'container' fanboy mentality anyway, when MKV first appeared most video distributed on internet was in AVI containers (and a tiny bit in OGG), MKV playback was buggy as hell on every platform known to man, yet people put up with the shit and kept encoding things in MKV against all better judgement.
Spending 20seconds remuxing a HD video to a different container so a console can play it is a walk in the park compared to the issues that accompanied rise of MKV and certain other open-source video related stuff.

That said, I pretty much expect that when(if) MKV becomes part of DIVX spec(it's been rumoured, I wouldn't know for sure), some other open-source container format will appear to take its place over few more years of frustration to everyone using it.

But not to go off topic here, personally I've found PS3 to be refreshingly stable as a media platform, something that I've never experienced with any PC based solutions I've used over the (many) years to date. If I wasn't using a LinkSys router at the moment(which is terribly unstable with well, just about everything, including PS3 Media server connection), I'd hardly have any complaints.

[TrungGap]

I really don't want this to be a vs thread, but more of an experience/differences between 360 and PS3. Mainly, because I have never thought of my PS3 as media player device until recently, when my PC was out of commission.

I realize that a lot of stuff I said is really subjective, as I don't have a empirical data that say 360 or PS3 will play back more different kind of videos. However, of my collection, I noticed that those I encoded with older codec would play back more often on the PS3 than 360. With the newer codec they are about the same. Maybe it's the way I've encoded them. I would have to investigate...

Yes, the 360 has a better experience when using it as a media extender, but that would require a PC. And one thing I like about the 360 is larger UI/text, which makes it easier. However, the PS3 display thumbnails and info about the file, which is a nice touch...along with continuous playback of media (file1, file2, file3) and easy context sensitive menus make the PS3 a much better out of the box experience than the 360.

Rangers, you find streaming was finicky with 360? I guess I have a different experience 360 as a media extender. I have a tight control on what is installed on my PC, so much of PC experience is relatively stable.

I haven't touch MediaPortal for a while now, is it much better than before? It's not quite the same XBMP.

BTW, there's one thing I hate about the PS3. No IR remote...I hate having to switch to PS3 blue-tooth remote. My universal remote works fine with 360. I know I can get an IR adapter for the PS3, but com'on I shouldn't be doing this.

[tuna]

Most (illegally) file-shared Hollywood HD movies are in an mkv container with x264 video compression. Usually they also have subtitles and different audio options. In order to play these on a PS3 you have to re-mux them into a vob or m2ts cointainer (this could be the same thing, I am not really sure) but I think subtitles can be a problem.

You can find file shared m2ts movies, and a lot of anime is in mp4 cointainers, but sometimes it does not work on the ps3 and sometimes stuff like fast-forwarding does not work.

[Shifty Geezer]

An intelligent discussion of the pros and cons of the consoles in specific areas is perfectly acceptable, but any degeneration into fanboy talk will get it closed. In this case, there are clear features that can be discussed as the consoles function as media players.

[joker454]

Originally Posted by NavNucST3

Be nice if people have actually used both as well

I've used both extensively for video. I take all my blurays and I create lesser 1280x720 VC-1 versions more suitable for distribution around the house, portables, etc. They are usually 2 to 4gb in size. I've also got HD home video files. Originally everything was on a DNS-323 raid, now we've upgraded it to a 3 terabyte DNS-343 raid. I used to use twonky media server, but I've switched to tversity which seemed a touch quicker.

Originally I had a PS3 in the bedroom used to play movies off the raid. The biggest problem I had with the PS3 for video was it's inability to deal with large files when it came to fast forwarding or rewinding. I had posted a thread about this long time ago looking for solutions, and never never found any. The problem is simple, start playing a movie on the PS3 over the raid and everything works fine. Try fast forwarding to a scene I like and it's basically impossible. It stutters along at a very slow speed, basically unable to fast forward properly. Then when you hit play, it would freeze for a very long time. Basically, unusable. I even tried that preview feature they offered on a recent firmware where you hit a button and it puts up thumbnails spread at 5 minute intervals and it was also unuseable. It would stall and take many minutes to create the thumbnails. For whatever reason, I simple could never get the PS3 to properly support large HD video files over a network via dlna.

I just recently sold that PS3 and replaced it with a 360 arcade. Turns out, the 360 handles large video files far far better. First, it doesn't seem to have as many hangups fast forwarding. It's still not realtime quick, but it is useable. More importantly though, the 360 has a simple feature that makes fast forwarding simple. You just hit the bumpers on the controller and it skips ahead in the video in about 5 minute chunks. This works instantly, no hestiation, no delay. So now I can fire up a movie and if I want to watch a scene near the end of the movie, I just hit the right bumper a few times and I'm instantly there. Ultimately, this makes the 360 infinitely more useable to me as a dlna playback device for large HD video files, hence why I sold the PS3 and replaced it with a 360 arcade.

For file support, the 360 plays all my wmv's, the PS3 was unable to play them all. My home movies that I created from my Sony Hd video camera in wmv format were all unplayable on the PS3 for whatever reason, the 360 handles them just fine. Divx was hit or miss on both, but I have very few of those files anyways.

Ultimately, there seems to be something wrong with either the PS3's network support, or dlna support, but no matter what I tried I could never get acceptable performance from it. I expected it to perform better than the 360 given that we have a gigabit wired network all over the house, but it just never performed right. This seems like it should be a fixable issue, but until they do I recommend a 360 arcade as a cheap and fast network media player. They are cheap enough that you can put a few around the house, and you can use the money you saved compared to buying PS3's and buy a multi terabyte raid box to centralize all your videos.

[patsu]

joker454 and NavNucST3, here are my preliminary findings so far:

Fast forwarding and rewinding large video over the network will "suspend" the player. You will most likely also see DLNA protocol error messages intermittently. If you wait long enough, it will come back (at least it did for me, but I really don't want to try these more than 2-3 times ). I tried it with TwonkyMedia 5.0 Server.

I suspect (but am not sure) this is due to deficiency in the DLNA server (Because it should look into the container and jump to the right "indices" as the video leaps forwards/backwards). If it doesn't do this fast enough, DLNA may time out. Microsoft may have added additional logic to uPnP to deal with this in its implementation.

In any case, my solution is to request the DLNA server to copy the video locally to play. Photos and music continue to be streamed from the DLNA server remotely. I then removed any HD or one-off videos from my PS3 HDD at my own leisure (since the server has a copy). Once the file is local, fast forward and rewind are extremely fast. In this way, I don't need a PC or RAID array (It's a cheap $200 box).

The main reason I do this though are:

(A) At home, I use a wireless LAN (77% signal strength). I tried viewing HD video over WiFi but the experience is not consistent. A lot of people will fall into this category in the near term.

(B) PS3 upscaling and other image enhancements. The videos on the PS3 HDD will be upscaled automatically (The player can employ better algorithms to treat the image if the file is local). My family loves this part since a lot of my home videos were taken on crappy cameras (or webcam my little boy took himself). They look great even in 1080p on my XBR today.

For me, the bad part is the folder organization. When I copy files from the server, it should automatically set the empty "Album Information" field to the server's folder name so that I can group them into the same folders as the server.


It seems that moving forward DLNA will introduce content synchronization capability (Many people probably don't have gigabit wired network at home):

* http://www.dlna.org/news/pr/view?ite...2b14bad7408b57

Built on a foundation of technical work completed by the 240 member companies of DLNA, these Guideline additions offer:

* Photo, Video and Audio Synchronization providing automated synchronization of content across multiple devices.

* Menu Sharing allowing menu control of other networked devices.

* Wi-Fi Protected Setup making it easy for users to configure and add devices to a home Wi-Fi network protected with WPA2 security.

Inclusion of 802.11n and MoCA® connectivity standards in the Guidelines reinforce DLNA's commitment to work with other industry standard groups.

...and a more flexible playback infrastructure:

* http://www.dlna.org/news/pr/view?ite...046d2bdea31c7b

DLNA has added two new functions to its certification program. The expanded program includes “Play to” and “Print to” capabilities that allow connected devices to push photos, videos and audio from one device on a home network to another DLNA Certified device.

“Play to” and “Print to” functions let users send content to a rendering device such as a digital photo frame, TV or printer. This extends the traditional concept of players and servers to add a third device, digital media controller. Digital media controllers are useful for sending photos, video and audio to display devices which have inaccessible or no integrated controls. An example is a mobile handheld device or PC pushing content from a networked attached storage (NAS) server to a networked digital photo frame in another room using “Play to” functionality. “Print to” products let users send photos from a remote server to a printer.

When I have time, I will look into open source DLNA server to understand the HD fast forwarding problem. But for now, I am tied up by work and other personal projects




Where noise is concerned, my new 80 Gb PS3 is quiet. It's supposed to be quieter than the 60Gb anyway. I am sure the newer PS3 (with 65nm RSX) will be even more quiet. Don't think it's an issue for PS3 at all.


EDIT: I remember someone complained about slow thumbnail display on a PS3. At that time, I commented that the DLNA server should probably generate the thumbnail (instead of the PS3, because the latter can't write the generated thumbnails back to the DLNA server). It looks like MediaTomb is doing that now: http://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.p...orum_id=440750 . I have not tried it personally though.

[joker454]

Originally Posted by patsu

In any case, my solution is to request the DLNA server to copy the video locally to play. Photos and music continue to be streamed from the DLNA server remotely. I then removed any HD or one-off videos from my PS3 HDD at my own leisure (since the server has a copy). Once the file is local, fast forward and rewind are extremely fast. In this way, I don't need a PC or RAID array (It's a cheap $200 box).

Locally it all works very fast, but that's not a good solution for us. Copying multiple 4gb files locally before playing them would become very tedious really fast especially when I want to quickly see some cool scenes in 4 different movies, and far more so when you have family guests over sitting on the couch around the tv and they quickly want to hop 40 minutes into an old baptism video. I don't really want to micro mange the whole thing either. All the files are there, safely on the raid 5 box, it should be able to play them from it.

Originally Posted by patsu

When I have time, I will look into open source DLNA server to understand the HD fast forwarding problem.

Cool, would be interesting to see whats up. I was really expecting the PS3 to be better at playing hd video, it was very surprising to see a plain 360 arcade run rings around it. PS3 had similar speed issues when viewing photos, it takes long to create thumbnails of the photos, wheres my 360 arcade instantly pops them up making it far easier to navigate our thousands of photos. This clearly seems to be a software issue somewhere in the PS3 since with standard hdd and gigabit, you'd expect it to be better.

[patsu]

Originally Posted by joker454

Locally it all works very fast, but that's not a good solution for us. Copying multiple 4gb files locally before playing them would become very tedious really fast especially when I want to quickly see some cool scenes in 4 different movies, and far more so when you have family guests over sitting on the couch around the tv and they quickly want to hop 40 minutes into an old baptism video. I don't really want to micro mange the whole thing either. All the files are there, safely on the raid 5 box, it should be able to play them from it.

When I get into situations like this, I'd just do it over sneaker net. Once they are on the local HDD, there'd be no playback issues. Remember, I am on a WiFi at Home, not gigabit network. Playing HD movies over it was flakey in the first place.

If it's over a gigabit network, copying those 4Gb files should be a breeze. If the movies are rips of Blu-ray movies, just use the Blu-ray movies ! You get to show them the extras and the original 1080p quality.

Originally Posted by manux

You might want to try out PS3 Media Server new(er) open source media server to share data for ps3. As far as I have tried it seems to be superior to tversity in all things that matter. Wider and easier support for transcoding/file formats/subtitles/etc. The selling feature for me was the .iso support+subtitles. This makes it possible to archive easily the dvd's I have bought as digital copies to server. Without subtitles I would be lost on the non english content I have bought. I also like that it doesn't create a database of content but rather "maps your harddrive directly" to ps3. This makes navigation snappy and no need to those "recreate database and wait for half an hour after update".

That's great ! Would love to try the PS3 Media Server out. Perhaps someone can tell him our issues with FF and REW over gigabit network.

[manux]

Originally Posted by joker454

The biggest problem I had with the PS3 for video was it's inability to deal with large files when it came to fast forwarding or rewinding. I had posted a thread about this long time ago looking for solutions, and never never found any.

You might want to try out PS3 Media Server new(er) open source media server to share data for ps3. As far as I have tried it seems to be superior to tversity in all things that matter. Wider and easier support for transcoding/file formats/subtitles/etc. The selling feature for me was the .iso support+subtitles. This makes it possible to archive easily the dvd's I have bought as digital copies to server. Without subtitles I would be lost on the non english content I have bought. I also like that it doesn't create a database of content but rather "maps your harddrive directly" to ps3. This makes navigation snappy and no need to those "recreate database and wait for half an hour after update".

# Ready to launch and play. No codec packs to install. No folder configuration and pre-parsing or this kind of annoying thing. All your folders are directly browsed by the PS3, there's an automatic refresh also.
# Real-time video transcoding via MEncoder, tsMuxer or Avisynth
# DVD ISOs images / VIDEO_TS Folder transcoder
# OGG/FLAC/MPC/APE audio transcoding
# Thumbnail generation for Videos
# You can choose with a virtual folder system your audio/subtitle language on the PS3!
# All formats PS3 natively supports: MP3/WMA, JPG/PNG/GIF/TIFF, and all kind of videos (AVI, MP4, TS, M2TS, MPEG) the ps3 is willing to play
# ZIP/RAR files as browsable folders for pictures/audio files
# Preliminary support for pictures based feeds, such as Flickr and Picasaweb
# Preliminary Internet TV / Web Radio support with VLC, MEncoder or MPlaye

As for the original question, I find blu-ray playback and dvd scaling performance in ps3 really good. Waiting for cable version of playtv to use as secondary cheap recording box. For general mediaserver functionality ps3 needs a pc to help(i.e. that ps3mediaserver to share .mkv, .iso, .flag, etc). PS3 is also nicely silent which is pretty big deal for me if I want to put a device on the livingroom.

[psorcerer]

Originally Posted by manux

You might want to try out PS3 Media Server new(er) open source media server to share data for ps3. As far as I have tried it seems to be superior to tversity in all things that matter. Wider and easier support for transcoding/file formats/subtitles/etc. The selling feature for me was the .iso support+subtitles. This makes it possible to archive easily the dvd's I have bought as digital copies to server. Without subtitles I would be lost on the non english content I have bought. I also like that it doesn't create a database of content but rather "maps your harddrive directly" to ps3. This makes navigation snappy and no need to those "recreate database and wait for half an hour after update".

Tried it, needs a lot of debugging.
But most of the problems are on the mencoder side, the subtitles crash it too frequently.
But thanks, maybe I can try and fix some of these.

[Babel-17]

The 4Gb limit also applies to mp4's. You can demux them with YAMB however and then load the streams into tsMuxeR. That will give you other options.

[-tkf-]

Originally Posted by manux

You might want to try out PS3 Media Server new(er) open source media server to share data for ps3.

The PS3 mediaserver seems like a very very promising project. Aimed 100% at the PS3 it uses nothing but Open Source tools to power it´s PS3 ability.

This includes on the fly MKV serving and DTS to AC3 encoding!

Seems very promising, it even worked on a friends ripped Blu-Ray where it aparently does a on the fly encode of the movie. Only had one disc to test with since he only bought ANYDVD for that exact disc, yes it can be expensive to by Region Locked exclusive movies

[Nesh]

Anyone tried megabox? I think they made it functionable now and it can really turn the PS3 into a media hub.

Havent tried it yet

[Citrous]

Originally Posted by -tkf-

The PS3 mediaserver seems like a very very promising project. Aimed 100% at the PS3 it uses nothing but Open Source tools to power it´s PS3 ability.

PS3 Media Server is simply amazing. From it's simplified file structure, to the fact that it just seems to work on ewverything I throw at it... I'm simply amazed. I did have to run an ethernet wire as my WiFi couldn't quite keep up with some more detailed 1080p/AC3 streams. I used to try to remux .mkv's into VOB files, but I swear it just works better to let my PC transcode them on the fly now. Rewinding/FF seems to work fien for me, you just have to give it a minute to enter the mode you want, and don't overburden it with commands. There's maybe a .5 to 1.5 second delay you have to account for. Again, that's only for transcoded material. If they add internal .mkv support in the next update my head might explode from overhappiness lol.

*edit: I used to use TVersity, I had it like pretty dialed in, most things would work, but I would run into showstopping problems on occasion.

[Shifty Geezer]

If they haven't, they can't fairly say 'x is better than y'. They can at least contribute what they use, and help draw up a list of features. As a casual observer, I haven't followed this side of the boxes at all, and don't understand the zillions of codecs and containers and all the muxing and nonsense required. A reference doc would be a useful creation, updated as firmwares are released.