Happily the A also detects foreign titles offering to download subtitles in any specified language in association with opensubtitles. All of which means the A is just about perfect, right? Not quite…. In terms of raw specs and playback performance the Popcorn Hour A is near-faultless, but where its flaws lie is in the detail.
This content is indexed, tagged and as the screenshots show looks fantastic but networked content is little more than a list of files and metadata for them must be re-downloaded each time. Price also comes to haunt the A in the big picture. It has extensive connectivity, vast codec support, good build quality, the remote control is well featured and playback is excellent.
The A is so nearly a fabulous media player, but it just misses the mark. Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct. We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work.
Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. Founded in , Trusted Reviews exists to give our readers thorough, unbiased and independent advice on what to buy. Today, we have 9 million users a month around the world, and assess more than 1, products a year. It's pretty easy to do, just select the 'map network drive' option, give it a letter then just browse for your popcorn hour.
If you have a hard drive in the popcorn hour, then you can drag films straight on to the device by doing this. It is not necessary though, if you are using the popcorn hour as a streamer only, then you can skip this step. Whether you have mapped your popcorn hour to the pc or just connected the two devices and browsed to the film share through the popcorn hour, then you can just select the network share from the popcorn hour and see a list of films, which will play as soon as you select the film in question, or take it a bit further and install a jukebox, like YAMJ for example.
Installing YAMJ is quite straightforward as long as you follow the steps. The first thing to do is to get hold of it from here;. After you've made a folder, then unrar YAMJ into it. From here you will then need to run Guiconfig and use the program to set up the network share access for YAMJ. This is important, without this then it won't work. To do this, you need to select the movie directory to scan, then tell it where they are, then save the NMT path.
After this select the location to store the jukebox this should ideally be where your films are stored , then save. It will then ask you where you want to save the setup file and you want to save this into the YAMJ folder that you created earlier. I think it's a good idea to create a shortcut to this file and put it on the desktop, that way every time you make changes to your movie collection, you can rerun YAMJ to update it.
To make sure it downloads the correct information, you'll need to make sure your movies are named correctly. Use the 'name. So for example if you have the film 'Bolt', then name it Bolt. This way YAMJ knows which film to look for when it looks on the internet for information. It will connect to the internet and download all of the film info and build a jukebox. This can take a while the first time, but after you've done it, the next time you update your collection and run YAMJ, then it will download only what it needs, so it is faster.
To access this jukebox, after turning on the Popcorn Hour, you just browse to the network share where your films and jukebox are stored, select that and the jukebox will be displayed. If you have multiple shares, then make sure that after you have gone through the guiconfig process, then press the add button before saving. You can set up multiple shares this way, so can have lots of different hard drives all with films stored on them all linked up in one jukebox.
Setting this up correctly in Guiconfig is the part that really flummoxed me the first time, I didn't realise you could just keep adding shares. If you do this then you can have multiple hard drives, all filled with films and YAMJ will compile them all into one jukebox, if you press save too early, it won't work. The only thing you have to make sure is that before watching a film, you browse to the share to reconnect it. If your jukebox is stored in your films folder, then your popcorn hour will automatically do this, so you won't have to do anything.
If you keep your popcorn hour on standby rather than switching it off, then the share connection will stay open, if you turn it off you'll have to browse to the share to reopen it each time. It's a pain, but there is no other way round it. You'll soon know if your popcorn hour is not connected to the share, as you'll try to play a film from the jukebox and nothing will happen.
Not to worry, browse to the share manually and then you'll be good to go with the jukebox again. Best bet is to get a server that sleeps and use the popcorn hour on standby and then once your shares are set up the first time, they'll stay open. Once you have done the above, then you should have a drive or folder share with your films on, with the YAMJ index and jukebox files in there. When you open this folder through the browser in the Popcorn hour, then the jukebox will display.
It is much faster after the initial run as well, so you won't be waiting long. There are lots and lots of modifications that you can make to YAMJ to make it prettier, but if you do what I just said, then you will have it functioning and you can alter the properties files and add to it as you see fit. Installing new skins and messing around with boxes and covers and stuff is all part of the fun. Hi, Just got one of these A set up, via a mate who receommended it and set it up for me thank the gods for techno savy friends.
However having downloaded the youtube app, whilst I get video I cannot get audio… is there some specific setting I need to adjust? Secondly whilst the first movie we watched played OK via wireless to home Netgear network, pulling from my 1TB Elements external harddrive from my PC , all movie files are. Is this likely to be an issue with the popcorn device does it need rebooting between movies, if so how, just power off at the wall?
Would an internal hard drive fitted in Popcorn help this problem? The Youtube App might be buggy. Did you check to see if there was an update and are you running the latest fw?
As far as playback, it is a tough call. Anytime you stream wireless you are rolling the dice with steady playback, so that very well could be your issue. What type of files were you trying to play back? Otherwise, there are actually some bugs still out there such as HD Audio dropouts that may be affecting it is well. If the issue is solely due to streaming wireless then using an attached or internal drive would solve your issue.
If you have a USB drive that you can connect to the PCH to test out the files that are stuttering , you can try that first. Hi Damian, thank you very much for the review. Before reading the discussion forum I was convinced to order the A However after reading it, the number of bugs seemed too many for me. Or is the situation still the same bug-wise? The HD Audio bug and others is still out there.
Supposedly this has been fixed and the new FW is just going through QC, but I heard this a while ago so not sure where it stands now. I have a question though about the A in your review you tested the subtitling function mostly with MKVs. For example:. Will they display properly? Also, if I have multiple subtitles for the same movie e.
I am not a big subtitle user, but my understanding from reading around is that the A does in fact support external srt subtitles as you have listed above. It should then allow you to cycle through from the on screen display to choose which subtitle track you want to see. Compare between the two, which is better stability, better graphic arts and ease of use? All my files are iso and located throughout network driveswhich one is easier to configure for jukebox?
Is Thanks. They are all solid players. I saw in your Mede8er comment you asked about full bd menus. Between the two I find the Dune to be the most reliable there are still some bugs with the PCH that need to be worked out. However, I think you will be fine going with either. Yes it supports full bd menus. DLNP ceritified? I personally would not use it as a NAS as far as streaming movies to another device , but it is accessible. Hi Damien, 1.
Any built-in Favorite Manger feature? Not sure I follow what you are asking here 4. If you look at my screenshots in the review for the NMJ you can see you can sort by various options. Is it true that in order to use NMT, you have to format the internal hard drive? Not positive. Loaded rip bluray movies.
Wondering if you can shed some ideas why is this happen. I think because it has to be attached storage and not networked storage i. I have popcorn A I ripped regular dvd and playback on A I see that video is P. Is there any setting on A that you can make it to upconvert to the best resoulution available i. I have hdmi from a to my receiver. Please assist. There is no control over how the PCH outputs the video. Just about wrapped up with my testing. Just have to take some photos and get the writeup together, so hopefully no later then next weekend sorry for the delay, finding some free time has been a bit of a challenge of late.
Privacy Policy Advertise Contact. Links monetized by VigLink. All rights reserved. The tray slides out and allows you to install the internal drive before placing in the A In Full BD menu mode Full navigation the Blu-ray rip assuming it is a full disc rip will play just as if you were playing from a Blu-ray player, with full access to the menus, trailers, features, etc… Overall I have found the UI of the PCH A to be improved over the series.
However, if the BluRay is a seamless branch i. From here you will have 3 different views available, Category pictured above , Wall pictured directly below , and List the second picture below Selecting a movie will bring up a synopsis and additional information From within the jukebox you can further filter your video collection by categories such as Genre, Movie and TV Series.
Third Party Jukebox: The first item worth mentioning, and a big difference from the and series, is that the series no longer supports HTML jukeboxes such as the Aeon jukebox I wrote about a few years ago. Online Content Next up is the App market. Subscribe to the RSS feed! Thanks for your help and I enjoyed this review.
John, Hmmm…. Thanks Buddy. Love for everyone! Wht has the update stopped on a? The audio drops is the most troublesome issue for me. Thank you for your time! Thank you mate!
Two more questions. Thank you. It stutters along and drops audio! What gives? May be worth posting on the nmt forum. If you are looking for a robust online content experience Boxee Box definitely is the way to go. The remote on the Boxee Box is absolutely atrocious once again, just my opinion and proper integration with universal remotes can be problematic As far as local playback of videos, I prefer the PCH. Really no right answer.
Hi — great article. Just wondering what the cover art thumbnail quality is like on the A NMJv2? Is it high definition or low quality? Would you be able to comment on the quality of the cover art thumbnails for the A NMJv2? Cheers Damian. Any idea when you will get your hands on the Prodigy?
Thanks for any help. Regards Scott. Hello Damian, first of all thank you for the great review! For example: Movie1. Thanks, Roland. Hello Roland, I am not a big subtitle user, but my understanding from reading around is that the A does in fact support external srt subtitles as you have listed above. Hi Paul, 1.
Hi Paul: 1.
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