Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion HiFi & HT Chat Which Media Players do you use for video?

I placed most of my DVD collection on my NAS and watch via a media player (for Blu-Rays I still watch via disc), which I did for convenience and to free up valuable shelf space (original discs are now in the attic). I started out with a TViX HD M-6500a, but then changed to a Dune HD Smart H1 (following a past recommendation on here). Main reasons for changing at the time was attempt to increase quality further and I was unhappy with slow start up time of TViX (approx 1 minute I believe). Annoyance with slow start up time meant I didn't use the TViX much.

However, I've been using the Dune player even less as I have not been able to program it with a distinct on and off command using a universal remote. Pleas note, that whilst the TViX player also doesn't have distinct on and off, I was able to use a sensor accessory with my remote to identify if the player was on and then a macro command to generate distinct on and off buttons. This should work with most devices, but has not with the Dune player.

Before the TViX, I actually had a Popcorn Hour A100, which was OK, but user interface not so good. As I loved my original Oppo BDP-83, I also tried upgrading to a Oppo 93 to try out the media player capabilities, but found it no good for playing from my NAS, mainly due to lack of support for ISO files (I knew this at time of purchase, but tried with MKV files as well, but was too problematic).

If only Meridian had a media player for video sources, life would be simpler, but without this I'm curious what others on here are using, knowing that quality and automation/ convenience are high on most peoples list of requirements.

Plex running on a Mac Mini.

Beautiful interface, excellent meta data support, works with the Apple remote.

And FREE.

Cheers
Greg

I use the media player built into my Sony TV. Not a brilliant UI but more than fit for purpose for the collection that I have.

Only issue that I have is that not all DVD transport features work on all discs. Not sure if that is a fault of the TV, the RIP or restrictions of the disc itself.

Apple TV 3 with Plex and the brilliant PlexConnect "hack".

Dune Duo. I had no problem finding discrete On/off hex codes at the Remote Central site for my Harmony 900

Another contented Plex user. Access via iPad, laptops etc is a huge bonus.

Does this allow ISO playback. I had considered Apple TV, but ruled out due to lack of support for ISO.

I'll have to look into this if I don't go down the Apple TV route. I'm using a Nevo S70 remote, but if there's a code for Harmony then Nevo should also be OK.

These are the Hex codes which work for my Duo

I have Apple TV 3's and two Dune's for video streaming. The ATV's in US have a 1080p video rental selection for TV shows and movies that is pretty good, for lossless video/audio viewing in the HT I use MKV's and Zappiti for my jukebox.

Z has a good iPad app for browsing movies/TV shows (they may have also released an Android app recently).

Lossless Bluray rips are very disk space intensive. I have learned a lot about ZFS and NAS technologies while struggling to scale to the space needed to store my fav films in BD 1080p.

IMHO you have to consider a Zappiti/Plex/iTunes library mgmt solution in addition to your hardware criteria.

Don't forget about backing up all you've ripped and storing offsite.

Not sure. Doing a little Googling "plex iso playback", I've seen yes and no answers and also someone who claims that the Roku XS will play ISOs in conjunction with Plex. More investigation needed...

Surprising if Plex doesn't since XBMC does a good job. For me, full BR menu support from ISO/folders is essential and only the older Dunes and the like currently offer this.