Best way to play MKV contained movie files on a HDTV?

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Caporegime
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Warwickshire
Hello all

We've got a LG 42PQ6000 plasma and I'd like to know if anyone knows the best (in terms of image quality) and most reliable way to play MKV contained movie files on it.

The problem is that the home PC is upstairs and the TV in question is downstairs.

Running a DVI cable from the video card to the TV is unfeasible due to the length restrictions of DVI cables. Am I going to have to buy some external hardware that will play MKV files, either via USB or DVD-R DL?

If so, does anyone know of any hardware that can do this?

Thanks.

PS the TV has no ethernet port so even if it were possible for TVs to talk to a PC on a network, it can't be done in my case.
 
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Budget?

You could get a Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player for £80 then an external hard drive.

That will play MKV's and it connects to your TV via HDMI but you do need an external HDD or USB stick to store the files on.

Or are you looking for an all in 1 device?
 
Sorry I don't know the budget as I have no idea how much the hardware will cost for me to do this. This is literally my first ever forage into the world of remote HD media so I'm totally clueless in this regard.

Whether or not I'm looking for an all-in-one device depends on whether or not they are any good and how much they cost. If I could create an E2140-based media centre PC downstairs for £200 or buy an all-in-one for £250, then I'd rather do the former and buy a blu-way player as then at least I could browse the internet etc.

The WD solution you mention sounds interesting (and quite cheap). Is there anything a full media centre PC could do that a WDHD media player could not (with respect to playing media files)?
 
Not really, as long as you get the latest updates for it it'll be very similar. The only problem with those things is that for double the price, you could build a whole media PC, install media centre on it and stream videos across the network onto it. You then end up with a media centre controller, and it's like having it built in (If you hide it well enough).
 
Locke said:
You could also take a look at the Popcorn Hour range of products :)
Click to expand...

Will do, thanks.

Redgie said:
Not really, as long as you get the latest updates for it it'll be very similar. The only problem with those things is that for double the price, you could build a whole media PC, install media centre on it and stream videos across the network onto it. You then end up with a media centre controller, and it's like having it built in (If you hide it well enough).
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When you say 'stream videos across the network onto it', how does this work? Do you mean PC--> router--> TV somehow? Surely it would have to be GPU HDMI --> TV HDMI, in which case I'd also have to run X-Fi --> sound processor?
 
If you have a media centre PC under the TV, you can tell it to index files in //StorageArea/Videos. Then connect the media centre tot he TV via HDMI (Make sure the mobo on the Media centre has a HDMI out), this will then display the media centres current display, which you can control with the media centre controller. So you scroll down, select Film A, then the media centre PC goes down the ethernet to the router, then to the place where the film is stored and plays it on the TV :)

However, this only works if the storage location of the film is always turned on, it is in my case, thus the suggestion :) (Or you can just turn the storage location on wheny ou need it, bit of a pin though)
 
Would personally say get a WD TV Media Player (Gen2 at least), get a large external (1TB+) and another depending on budget but around 250GB. Have the 1TB plugged into the WDTV (Which in turn is plugged into the TV, has its own channel and user interface with a remote etc) which has your collection on it, then use the smaller drive to transport media between your PC and WDTV, the player has the ability to copy files etc from one storage device to another.

Have been using it this way for a month now, ideally I would have liked the Live version but thats due to me being close to the router with both TV and PC. However, due to the PC and TV being on seperate floors and the wireless signal *unlikely* to be good enough to stream 1080p its not worth getting the Live version. Homeplugs are a possibility of course but will be upping the cost.
 
If you're gunna be getting a WDTV and a 1TB HDD you're really getting close to media PC costs.

@ Richeh, is cabling to the upstairs not a possibility?
 
The Sumvision Cyclone MKV Enclosure (also known as the Cylcone MKV Mk2) is getting very good reviews on the AVForum,

Can be used with either an internal HDD USB HDD or as a streaming player via either ethernet or WIFI (with an added wifi device)

sold for about the £80 mark
 
Redgie said:
If you're gunna be getting a WDTV and a 1TB HDD you're really getting close to media PC costs.

@ Richeh, is cabling to the upstairs not a possibility?
Click to expand...

No, just not very convenient to have cable running up the stairs.
 
Meatball said:
A Samsung BD-P4600 plays Blu-Rays as well as streaming MKVs :). It's the expensive option though.
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Yeah a blu-ray player that supports MKV is an option so it's good to have a model number to look at that will definitely do it, thanks.

teddy4 said:
The Sumvision Cyclone MKV Enclosure (also known as the Cylcone MKV Mk2) is getting very good reviews on the AVForum,

Can be used with either an internal HDD USB HDD or as a streaming player via either ethernet or WIFI (with an added wifi device)

sold for about the £80 mark
Click to expand...

That's another one to the list then, cheers.

To be honest my current E2140 + 8800GT + X-Fi Xtreme Music would be a reasonable platform for a HTPC but for the fact that it has no HDMI outputs (Gigabyte P35C-DS3R).

Are there any disadvantages to connecting GPU (DVI) --> TV (HDMI) and X-Fi optical --> sound processor compared to running pure HDMI for everything from a media player? If not then I may just upgrade my main PC and transfer everything I currently have into a small HTPC case with some silent fans and a blu-ray optical drive.

Yes this will be the most expensive option but I would have a new PC and a HTPC, both of which would be upgradeable and last for years.
 
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Update for anyone that's interested...

I'm getting the WDTV Live! as reviewed here:


The unit will sit right next to my router, so I'm going to set up a media server on my W7 PC, which will allow me to stream MKV files straight from my PC as well as being able to connect directly to the internet for YouTube vids and firmware updates etc.

Until I get an optical-capable amp, I'm just going to connect to the TV via HDMI and get the TV to output analogue audio to my old stereo amp.
 
I've got the older WDTV and it rocks. Great piece of kit; removes the need for a dedicated media PC. Only problem I have with it is that .mkvs encoded with DTS sound need to be played through a DTS decoder for you to actually get any sound (as TVs don't usually have the decoder) but other than that, great product. If you don't have a DTS decoder you can transcode to AC3 on your PC.
 
reflux said:
I've got the older WDTV and it rocks. Great piece of kit; removes the need for a dedicated media PC. Only problem I have with it is that .mkvs encoded with DTS sound need to be played through a DTS decoder for you to actually get any sound (as TVs don't usually have the decoder) but other than that, great product. If you don't have a DTS decoder you can transcode to AC3 on your PC.
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Ahhh....thanks for that, now I see what xander_uk2 meant here. I doubt my TV does (LG 42PQ6000) but as long as there's a solution until I get an optical amp, that's not a problem.
 
easyrider said:
MKV2VOB software and a PS3

Bluray playback too.
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Didn't know you could do that with a PS3! However the WDTV Live is £90. I could then get a cheapie £70 Blu-ray player and still save £50, whilst having a media player that could network, connect to the internet, and play anything I could throw at it without having to install extra software.

Pug said:
could possibly use homeplug to stream to the downstairs instead of a wire up the stairs:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HomePlug_Powerline_Alliance

though for me it proved flakey enough to warrant building a PC under my telly
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I've already run network cable under the carpet to the PC upstairs, but thanks anyway.
 
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