media player

aeronic · 13 Jan 2008 at 13:43

I am wanting to buy a media player to hook up to my tv. (currently a CRT, but in the future will be a 1080p LCD).

I would like one with a hard-drive (either installed or enclosure), because I find WIFI streaming a little jerky - and impossible for high def xvids. Thus it needs to be able to be hooked to the pc by either usb, ethernet, or have a space for a usb stick, or be able to copy via wifi to the installed hdd.

It should be able to play mp4's of all the usual types (divx, xvid, mkv maybe?) and would be useful if it played mp3's. It should be capable of playing hi-def xvid etc (my current xvid/dvd player [yamada] does not).

I do not want to go down the road to a full HTPC, mainly because of cost, and size.

Does anyone have any suggestions / recommendations?

Butters · 13 Jan 2008 at 14:39

Xbox or Xbox 360?

Most other off the shelf systems I've seen or used are quite literally rubbish. The only one I like is netgear EVA700 which is stunning.

Guv · 13 Jan 2008 at 17:40

I use an original xbox and it'll play just about anything. Playing off the hard drive and streaming over the network are both fine.
They're so cheap and a bargain media player.

scratch · 14 Jan 2008 at 12:44

Guv said:
I use an original xbox and it'll play just about anything. Playing off the hard drive and streaming over the network are both fine.
They're so cheap and a bargain media player.

XBMC won't do HD though will it? Not used it myself but I thought I'd read that the original Xbox just doesn't have the grunt to decode it?

Sounds like a 360 would do everything you need. I setup my 360 last night to stream stuff off my server onto my LCD TV and the quality was great. DVD rip in Xvid format (ripped from my own DVD btw!) and no problems playing it whatsoever. You can also plug in USB memory sticks/hdds and play media from there. The only limitation with that is that the 360 only recognises USB stuff formatted in FAT32 so you're limited to 4GB file sizes.