Gateway Connected DVD player Review

About a month ago I started looking for a networked media device to join my home theater setup. I loved the Home Media Option in my Series 2 TiVo, espeically for playing music downstairs in my home theater system, but I switched to a DirecTiVo system recently that lacked HMO support.

I started my search by combing the landscape. My wishlist called for music, photo, and movie streaming on my wireless network and good audio and video connections to my home theater. After checking out what was available, I eventually settled on either the KiSS DVD with ethernet or the Gateway Connected DVD. When I found out the Gateway had recently added DivX streaming support, I decided to buy one (it was also about half the price of a KiSS DVD player).

First off, I started out by using a tip someone once told me. If you ever see a coupon code box in a checkout page, do a quick google search for "company name coupon code." Using this method, I found a "$20 off every purchase $199 or more" code, making my Gateway DVD player $179 at checkout.

Setup and Hardware

The unit showed up days later and consisted of a short, wide player in silver and chrome, with a remote and a laptop wireless card that slid into the appropriate slot on the back.

The Gateway DVD player, sitting below my DSR7000 DirecTiVo unit

I installed it with S-video and optical audio connections to my home theater receiver. It also offers progressive scan connections if you've got the equipment for it.

The Gateway controller

The controller is OK, offering a pretty simple point and select pad in the middle that was easy to use without having to look down. The network functions all reside along a column on the upper left side, which is fine but the main "connect" button is the only way to access network features and is buried in the next middle row. Since I use the connect button more than the DVD features, I wish it was bigger and located in a more prominent location. Another unfortunate design choice was making the forward/reverse seek buttons the same size as the forward/reverse chapter buttons, and putting them next to each other. This means if I want to jump back ten seconds I have to look down to find the correct rewind button. It would have been nice if they were special shapes and different in size so one could use the buttons by feel.

The Network setup screen

Since I run an open wireless network at home, setup was a snap. I started the unit up, checked the network setup and noticed it found my wireless access point upstairs and joined it. If I had a WEP password, this is the screen I would have entered it. Unfortunately, the Gateway doesn't support typing network names in directly, so if you're not broadcasting your access point ID, the gateway won't be able to find it (this is how I had my wireless network setup, security through obscurity).

Screenshot of the server application running on my PC

The server software installed easily on my Windows XP box and let me direct it where to find my music, video, and image files. At first I was surprised to see it ignored all my DivX movies, but I later found out my unit shipped with the latest firmware on the DVD player, but the server software was out of date. If you want to be safe, download the server software from this Gateway Support Page (which required quite a bit of digging on their site to find, as it's not listed under support files for the device). Once I had the new software my DivX movies were all added to the list. I set a schedule to do a nightly re-index, but I did find it a drag that it couldn't keep track of my music directory automatically. If I ripped a new CD, I'd have to tell the software to re-index my collection to see the new files.

Music

Once all my mp3s were indexed, I started listening to music whenever I was downstairs doing chores (making dinner, doing dishes) or relaxing without the TV on.

Surfing the musicians list on TV

Once you've got 3000 songs by hundreds of artists in a database, it's often a challenge to find and listen to music. The programs I typically use on my desktop, iTunes and Winamp, handle the problem in different ways but both do a good job of making and managing playlists and letting you listen to all music on random. Since the Gateway is limited in interface and controls over a PC, I found it to be a bit cumbersome to find certain artists or randomize large chunks of my collection. Near as I can tell it isn't possible to play all your songs randomly, so I usually would pick an artist and listen to all their music, or pick a genre and listen to all tracks within it. I found the next problem being if I wanted to hear "Pink Martini", I had to scroll through the 10-15 artists listed on each screen all the way down to number 370 of my 440 artist collection (that's where the P's started). The scrolling was quite slow and the only shortcut is to guess a number in the list that it should jump to.

Playing music from a playlist

Playlist files are supposed to be indexed but I didn't notice any in my library. The only playlists I could get to work were the ones I made with the Gateway server software, which was easy (it was very iTunes like, you name a new list then drag tracks to it), but lame that it ignored my existing lists. Once I had a few good playlists created for each mood I found myself using the playlist feature most of all.

Images

The number of images on my hard drive is about the same as my mp3 collection, with thousands of loosely organized (by directory name) images downloaded from digital cameras. I quickly found out the server software's scanner was a bit too good at finding images, and would grab any gif or jpg on the drives I pointed it to, including all the incidental little files within software applications.

Image playing in a slideshow

Once I weeded out all the photos except for my digital camera output, I still had the same problems negotiating thousands of items with a simple remote. It did have a nice feature where it automatically grouped photos found in a directory as unique, but playlists seemed the way to go when browsing a specific set of images. Slideshows were pretty basic though I didn't notice any controls for setting how long images show up, and although I didn't expect it, it would have been nice if I could listen to music and watch a slideshow.

Movies

The Gateway Connected DVD player supports MPEG 1 and 2 and offers some DivX support though it isn't certified (also, the divx support requires the latest version of the server software).

List of videos ready to play

I don't have that many movies stored on my PC, aside from a few DVD backups I made for plane flights. I set out to find content to test this player against and downloaded every movie and tv show I could find on underground networks. From playing around with a variety of sources, I found that almost anything played fine over the 802.11b network. About the only problem files were those with errors or truncated file headers (movies that could barely play on my PC).

MPEG video paused

I was amazed at the quality and that my network could handle it. I've got a 802.11g network in the house that I use for all computers (including my PC desktop). The access point is directly upstairs above the TV in the living room, and I was worried all those walls and the entertainment unit would affect network performance. The Gateway docs say it can handle up to 3Mb/sec video and I couldn't find a single file anywhere that was encoded at a higher bitrate.

The visual quality of downloaded movies did vary. While DivX did a great job making large movies small filesizes, the videos did usually show compression artifacts (blockiness like a jpeg) that reminded me of TiVo's lowest quality recordings. Higher bitrate MPEGs looked fantastic, with some approaching DVD quality. For research purposes (heh), I went in search of every hollywood blockbuster I could find, to see if the experience of watching movies at home was better than going to a theater. For the films that were ripped from screener DVDs, the quality was great and the experience close to DVD. For shaking camcorder recordings done inside a theater, the experience was mostly crap, with overexposed images and lousy sound.

I was kind of bummed to see that it didn't support quicktime video, since that's what my digital camera records and everything I make in iMovie outputs as quicktime. It would have been nice if it supported that.

DVD playback

It's easy to forget this thing plays DVDs too, and the DVDs in my collection all seemed to play fine. The controls seemed a bit sparse compared to my older DVD player this replaced, as I found I couldn't quickly swap audio tracks while a movie played (maybe I haven't found the exact keystroke for it yet). The fastforwarding for both DVDs and Video playback leave something to be desired, espeically if you've used a TiVo. There aren't easy ways to jump forward quickly aside from chapters in DVDs. My old player worked more like a TiVo, with three levels of fastforwarding and tick marks you could jump to.

Upsides

Overall, I really like this unit and it fills the void left by giving up the Home Media Option nicely, and adds video support to boot. I was really surprised to see the 802.11b card keep up with video playback through a couple walls and only found network problems on a couple occasions when I was also downloading large files in another room. If you've got a big mp3 collection on your computer and a good speaker system in your home theater, there are few better ways than this unit to hear your music at home. As for movies, this thing reminds me of how an ipod makes mp3s useful. I never saw the point of downloading movies if you had to watch them at your computer. With this setup, I could watch them how they were meant to be shown and I found a whole new appreciation for the underground world of TV and movie traders (while I waited a couple weeks to get my DirecTV setup, I got to catch missed episodes of the Simpsons and The Daily Show). Jack Valenti of the Motion Picture Association of America once called the VCR the "boston strangler" when he tried to kill the technology in the early 80s, and when his MPAA folks catch wind of devices like this, I have no doubt they will call them something like "Osama Bin Laden in a box" to their industry.

Downsides

The downsides aren't too numerous or too bad. Even though I already had an ok DVD player, this was a great replacement, and if you are in the market for a new progressive DVD player, this is a great option to have. The remote control could be improved and I found it somewhat limiting to scanning ahead in DVDs or jumping around among hundreds of listings in music. I thought 802.11b would be too slow for my needs, but it worked fine (and I hear you can drop a 802.11g card in and it'll work fine though I wish Gateway would explicitly support it). It seemed to work fine on all my mp3s, jpegs, mpegs, and divx files, though it isn't officially certified for DivX support (Joe from DivX pointed out the KiSS DVD player is certified).

It'd be nice if the unit could read more video formats though the ones it does support work great. Be sure you get the latest software and firmware when running the unit, so you get all the features you can out of it. One big downside is that there is zero mac support, as the software requires a PC running win2k, winxp, win98, or winme. Another missing feature was the ability to read media from networked or mapped drives on my PC. Since it didn't have mac support, I hoped it could see my mac's music and image folders that were mapped on my PC, but it could not, only seeing physical drives. It doesn't support streaming mp3 from radio stations as far as I can tell, and it doesn't support Apple's encrypted AAC files bought at the iTunes music store. The last lacking feature I can think of is the support for inputing access point names into the network settings. There's no reason why a quick firmware upgrade couldn't let people not broadcasting their SSID connect manually.

Conclusion

Overall, I'd rate this unit very highly as a capable network media device. With a simple setup and easy operation, it was painless to use all the files from my PC on my home entertainment center over the wireless network. I expect to keep using this unit for a long time and hope Gateway continues to refine the desktop server software and player firmware. After using this for week, I went out and bought a 250Gb hard drive to add to my PC, so that I could have all my files in one place for this unit to play, with plenty of room to grow.

Helpful links
Gateway Connected DVD order page
Search on Google for "Gateway coupon code"
Gateway software and firmware download page

Comments

[Adam Keys]

Any chance for Mac folks to use these boxes? As far as I can tell the 'server software' is Windows only and the unit would be useless without said software. Is this the case?

[Matt Haughey]

Yeah, as I mentioned in the "downsides" section, there is no mac support of any kind and you need a windows box with media files on it in order for the networks parts of this DVD player to work.

[Dan Isaacs]

Heh. I have thsoe same coasters, matt. Never thought about using them for that. :)

This sounds like just the device I've been looking for. Want a progressive scan DVD player to replace my aging Apex unit. But streaming my mp3s without sticking a PC in the living room is the thing I've been waiting for.

I really wish it would support Winamp playlists. With several thousand songs, I don't fancy scrolling as you had to to find things.

[Matt Haughey]

Heh, yeah the coasters are there to promote air circulation under my tivo, as I found out last year when I fried a motherboard on my first DirecTiVo device.

I need to do more digging, because the software claims to index .pls and .m3u files, though I didn't see any in my library (though I only have a few of them).

You can download and run the Gateway server software without a DVD unit. I'd suggest loading it up and seeing if it finds your playlists automatically.

[Josh]

Just as a basis for comparison, Matt, you really oughtta check out Xbox Media Player (now called "Xbox Media Center") for modified Xboxen. Sounds to me like it covers many of the same bases as this Gateway device... only with XBMP/XBMC it's an open-source collaboration with lots of hacker cred. Getting there is half the fun (with modding the Xbox and all) but once you're there, you'd be amazed at how polished it is. I have it set to access every sound, picture, and movie off my networked Mac. With immediate access to games, multimedia, online content, and even karaoke ... the Xbox has become the digital hub in my entertainment center.

[Peter]

Have you tried WMA Lossless with the Gateway? Several other of the WMA-compatible players (e.g. AudioTron) have limitations wrt the bitrate they handle for WMA, which is a PITA if you've been WMA9Lossless-encoding your discs.

[Zafar]

I bought this player based on this review. However I can't run the DivX files, the server software just wont import it.

Bummer.. Have to eat the 15% restocking fee of gateway.

[Matt Haughey]

Did you use the latest version of the server software Zafar? Once I updated my server, all my divx files were ready to stream.

[bobby]

Anyone using this with their HTPC? I have Snapstream working great on my PC, but don't want to put the PC in the living room.

[Matt Haughey]

If you recorded shows in mpeg or divx, The Gateway would work fine as a streaming device. About the only downside is that you'd need to delete programs from your computer, since you can't delete anything direct from the gateway interface.

[Zafar]

OK. Back again.

I was finally able to get the DivX to play. Here is the trick Gateway has done with this system.

Apparently the player itself is not capable of decoding mpeg4 but due to popular demand that added server side stream transformation in the software. Hence the server side software will tranform video stream on the fly as it is being sent to the player.

Clever, eh? Specially because this gives them the ability to support any/all formats on their player.

Downside? You need a high performance server (min required 1.2GHz CPU) and more cpu cycle.
Another downside is that the conversion quality does not appear to be very good specially AC3 audio quality was completely lost.

Since I installed the server on a PC with 850MHx CPU, the AVI option was disabled. Fortunately, the server software gets all its parameters from .cfg files in the installation dir. I was able to successfully remove the minimum cpu speed requirement by editing these files. If you are not happy with the imposed bit rate limits (the 3Mbps), just change it. Apparently there is no hardware restriction but the limit is imposed to avoid choppy videos.

I ended up returning the unit because I wanted to free up my hard drive and play divx from dvd-r. I also noticed that the colors on my streamed videos were significantly paler. If this does not appear to be a problem for you, I think that software conversion is a better proposition because you could just install any new codec on your computer and the streamer would work.

[JerryS]

Can you control the connected DVD (at least play much) from your PC, or do you have to use the remote and your TV? Thanks for the great review!

[Matt Haughey]

zafar, thanks for figuring that out. I was wondering how they enabled a new codec without changing the hardware or firmware, and transcoding must be it.

Jerry, you can't control the DVD play through your PC, the TV serves as the only interface.

[RichardR]

Great and timely review. This points me in a very helpful direction.

I have a related question: I'm in the market for a PC for the first time in years, and so I'm spending time trying to figure out how to configure it.

Will a FireWire port accept DirecTV input, and can a PC perform a TiVo-like function while also burning DVDs from the satellite input and/or stored video files?

Thanks.

[Julius]

I would just like to warn people that I have owned this device for two months or so and I really wish I wouldn't have bought it. Frankly, you're better off moding your xbox or just putting an old pc in a Shuttle case and putting it in your living room.

While there is nothing really that wrong with the Gateway, the interface is absolutley horrible. For one, it'll turn your living room into a huge ad for gateway. You can't change the "cow theme" and when you're playing MP3s, a screensaver pops up that shows "Gateway tm" floating around your screen. No thank you.

And I've had nothing but trouble getting it to show all of my mp3s. Some mp3s just don't show up. Others just don't show up correctly. Go figure.

All in all, I would recommend waiting to buy this type of technology. I was happy right at first, but quickly realized the limitations are too great at this point to be really worthwhile. Like I said, you'd be better off making your own from spare computer parts. It may cost a little more, but it'll be customizable, which is really important for a technology that is trying to do everything.

[Wayne]

Julius - I think you are being a bit harsh. Many people do not want to have a PC in their living room for many reasons - noise and appearance being two that come to mind immediately. You can buy this for $200 (or less) and have a progressive scan DVD player that can do other things. Buying a digital-capable sound card and a remote to use with your PC will likely cost over half of what this device costs.

I agree that the interface is not so good, but hopefully some upgrades will change this. I found that this was a much better deal than the Turtle Beach Audiotron as it can play videos and photos as well as DVDs. Unlike many competitors it has digital audio out - both optical and coax as well as 5.1 analog audio out. My wife and I also love it to view photos as well as music.

[David]

Great review! I bought one of these about six weeks ago and I'd like to add a couple of things. First there is Playlist support for Windows Media Player 9.0 and MusicMatch Jukebox. This came with the stock code!

Also - there is a flash memory upgrade available which I did. The process is very simple but more importantly it gives Gateway the ability to add additional features - one of the things that is suppose to be coming is skins! That would be great!

I have set mine up to do a scan of my Windows Media Player every 12 hours so it automatically updates the playlists. With the "auto playlist" feature on WiMP it made things even easier to scan things out by genre (my MP3 collection is also in excess of 3K).

A complaint no one brought up is one that I have. You can build a slide show with your pictures and you can set it up to music. Sweet! But one thing you can't do is have more than one song - that's a drag. Also it would be nice to be able to say - hey play my pictures along with this music - the bandwidth is there.

Finally - as I understand it there is .WMA support - but no Windows Video. Also although no one brought it up the lack of RealAudio and RealVideo support is a bit of a drag.

But I will close with this - if you're looking for a progressive scan DVD player and a way to get your pictures and MP3 files into your home theater - there isn't a better product out there bang for the buck.

[David]

A screen saver? I've never seen that on mine!

[will]

Has anyone actually successfully got the player to import files over 3mb by editing the cfg file? No matter what I set it to it still eliminates my 4 mb files with a reason of "high bitrate file". The workaround is tp scan a lower bitrate file that has been named the same as your Higher bitrate file, then swap them on the disc, But Id love to get the file working with the autoscan as I have Like 1000 of them to work with.

[Matt Farley]

Will,

To get the program to import higher bitrate files just edit the filter.cfg and change it from:

BITRATE\WIRELESS > 3000000

to

BITRATE\WIRELESS < 9000000

Or however high you want..

----

Help - What codecs/bitrates are you guys using? I record TV shows via my TV Tuner card, but I can't seem to find a good codec/bitrate combo to play on the gateway. Nomatter what I try I get large artifacts, freezes, noise, etc, on the gateway output :/

Thanks!
-Matt

[PeterL]

I really like the review and comments on this product. Many questions I had about this unit got answered.

But... a couple of questions remain.

- Can you play all kinds of media also from the DVD/CD bay? I have a lot of diverse movies, pictures, music etc on CD-R and DVD-R and I'd like to access them without downloading them to the PC first.
Technically this should be a piece of cake but I wonder if Gateway supports this?

- Do you guys know of anyone who has replaced the 802.11b card with a 802.11g card? What's the verdict?

Thanks,
Peter

[adampsyche]

Your Vonage review had me sign up for their service (and I'm thrilled with it), and the same can now be said for this device. Well, that, and the fact that they did add DivX support. I just bought one of these, and it'd be a sin to play a DVD on it without progressive scan, so I think I'll pick one up at some point this week. Too bad I can't still get an employee discount, though :)

[Matt Farley]

Okay has ANYONE gotten this thing to play quality mpeg's/xvid's without freezing or distortion?

[adampsyche]

I just bought this guy yesterday, and it's working ok so far, but I had to employ the CPU speed limit hack (thanks for the tip), but playing videos was horrible. I have a G network, and it's usually very fast (can get an 80% signal from the basement to the attic). I'd love to be able to get the logo and screensaver out, though. I'll keep fiddling with it. It does play DVDs well, but you do have to really point the remote at the unit to get it to respond, and it seems to freeze up every once in a while when navigating my music dir (though it does have @8000 mp3s, so who knows...)

[Matt Haughey]

My wireless base is fifteen vertical feet above the DVD player below and it does have the flooring and the tv cabinent as obstructions, but I've had no problem streaming video up to the 3Mbps limit clearly. My powerbook shows very high signal strength where the DVD is located.

Have you guys tried disabling other network traffic when testing out movie playback?

I've heard wireless g cards work in it, but I've never tried it myself (don't feel like doing a $79 experiment I don't need), but it's probably worth a shot.

[adampsyche]

I just tried to put my Linksys G card in, and when I booted, the DVD player told me that there was no card present. Apparently, the DVD player that I got was one that needed the firmware upgrade (stoopid me should have checked that first), and since I applied the upgrade, the video is flying. Bringing up that first mpeg and the quality that it was in made this purchase worth every dime. (But I still wish there was DVD-R/RW support...)

Now, on to those Invader Zim archives...

[I like big speakers]

Thanks for the review. I just ordered one from Gateway. That $20 coupon did not work online so I had to call to a sales person. I paid $192 for it which includes sales tax and free shipping. I hope that it will work. I already tried Oritron 802.11b dvd player and that thing barely played divx through wireless or wired connections. I hope that this dvd player will work out for me. I will post later.

[Patrick]

Anyone have a hack to get this software to index a networked (mapped) drive?

If it had this ability my setup would then be PERFECT!

[Matt Haughey]

Patrick, on an earlier thread, someone posted instructions on how to hack in support for networked drives.

[Patrick]

That works for removable drives but I have been unable to get it to work with a networked or mapped drive. It does not showup as a mappable device.

[Tony]

Just stumbled across this post, and after looking at the pics, I'm certain the Gateway unit is actually the GoVideo D2730 Networked DVD Player. I have the D2730, and the screenshots of the server software right down to the on-screen menu's look identical (except for the Gateway branding.) You can read my review (if interested) at epinions.

Any idea if this is, in fact, true?

[Patrick]

Got it working... I was not putting /mnt/xdrive on a NTFS drive...

Works now!!

[juc]

I am new to the connected DVD player. Let me say that I love it. I also have the Prismiq and the Gateway beats it hands down. Two questions. First, when the other threads were mentioning getting the media software to recognize 'removeable drives'--does that include CD-roms and writers (D:). Basically I want to be able to see the cd-rom drives so I can add or view contents directly from the bay rather than copying it to the HD? Second--I want to use my G-wireless card but it is not recognizing it. I checked to see if I needed to update my firmware but the download page only specifies certain versions that need updating--mine isn't one of them. Has anyone got this to work yet? Thanks

[juc]

Really basic question here--How do you go about editing .cfg files--I would like to employ the bitrate hack but when I click on the file it is not recognized.

[Jason]

I just bought and hooked up the GoVideo player which is essentially the same player. I've had no trouble with music and photos but I cannot get it to reconize the videos that I am recording with Snapstream. The default recording format is MPEG-2 so this should be a no-brainer but after I import media files they aren't there. Anyone else run into this problem?

TIA,

Jason

[JB]

I purchased the Gateway connected DVD player (Wireless) about a week ago, and have to echo some of the earlier comments about challenges with set-up. I am running a 1.3ghz Sony Vaio with windows ME and I couldn't get this installed successfully. I didn't have any trouble getting the unit to see my network (Linksys B) or computer, it just wouldn't connect. After 3 hours of troubleshooting myself, and a completely useless hour on the phone with Gateway tech "support", I gave up and installed the software on my work laptop (Thinkpad 600x, Win XP) and it installed in 5 minutes, worked 1st time.

Since I can't keep this software on my work computer, I decided to upgrade to XP on my desktop. So $125 more in RAM, $99 for XP home edition, and 12 hours trying to get XP installed and working at home, I now have this thing working. I had read the reviews and knew I might have a problem, but it's very difficult to follow logical troubleshooting with this. Buyer Beware.

[juc]

--will the hack for networked drives work for CD-Roms on the computer? I followed the instructions and created the folder /mnt/edrive in a NTFS drive and when I opend the program--it sees the folders, but not the disc that is in the drive. Is this even possible?

[Matt Haughey]

The CDROM is likely using the FAT file system, not NTFS so I doubt it would work.

[Juc]

Thanks for the reply---is there any way to change the CD-Rom file system to a NTFS? Or a way to get around it---The Prismiq Unit can take media from ANY drive---networked or removeable or whatever with no problem so there should be a way around it--
-Also, does anyone know if there are any Gateway supported Forums for this site like Prismiq has--it is an excellent tool for users to troubleshoot and for gateway employees to see what is actually going on in the real world. As I have posted previously, I own both and the Gateway is so much better (for me) even with the limited B support. One more thing--OnMedia's GoVideo which is essentially the same thing as this has released a second version that supports wireless G---anyone know if gateway plans on releasing a new version and leaving us users high and dry or are they planning on helping us out with only a software upgrade to allow G support?
I know, lots of questions in one post...
later
juc

[Jason]

OK, I sent back the GoVideo player and bought the Gateway player instead and I've got this one working on my home wireless network. I also hacked the filters.cfg file to allow the server software to recognize mpgs with bitrates over 3mbps (thanks Matt). I use Snapstream's Beyond TV 3 to record television and now I am able to stream those shows down to my home entertainment center - cool. Video quality isn't great, however, and higher bitrate files do get choppy. So my questions, has anyone actually gotten this player to work with a wireless G card? How do you enable Divx support because my software (ver. 2.1 B07-08) doesn't see them.

TIA,

Jason

[Chris]

couple of points:

First check out the twin of the DVD:
http://www.acekaraoke.com/hamipl9200.html

There is reference to an ADC-320 under the tech support page. This may be a new and improved DVD media hub.

The wireless DVD player is no longer on the gateway site. Don't know why.

The Player does not accept 32 bit cards. I learned this the hard way when I was given a new Linksys card by the salesman at Gateway. The player will not recognize the card. I believe all G and some new B cards are 32 bit.

My player did not work at first. Not until I upgraded the firmware. Seems odd that my player would ship not functioning. Plus the guys at the Gateway store had no clue. Wish I knew about this flaw before I took apart my network and put it back together trying to get this thing to work.

I purchased this player a few days ago. I plan on returning it, since there is a 15 day return policy.

I love being able to access my music...but I am not crazy about the funtions(or lack of)on the player. Unfortunately most of my MP3s are not tagged properly...so I have to scroll down to find music.

I really like the Creative Player. Although it is only for music, It my main focus.

Plus I believe this new market will grow very competitive and we will see superior products within the next few months.

That XBox idea sounds good...any good links for that.

Mike

[Ken]

Did you try playing the audio tracks downloaded from the Napster, those encrpted files refuse to play on mine. Do you have an answer for this...? ASAP ....plz

[Marlo]

I appreciated all the great information on this site. It helped me make my purchase decision.

I just purchased the Gateway Connected DVD. I have several avi files I have created from my DV camcorder. I am having a problem playing these files via the Gateway DVD through the network. These files are not recognized by the software. It appears to be a codec problem. However, I can't find any help about what to do with these existing avi files. I captured the video using my Nero Ultra 6 software and also Adobe Premiere. Both of these software programs created avi files that the software that came with the Gateway that it refuses to play or list as a choice when I attempt to import it into the Gateway software.

Can someone please point me to information about how I can modify these avi files or how to capture and use the avi files in the future. I have other small avi files from my HP Digital camera that play through the system but without sound.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Marlo

[JUC]

Marlo, are you using a wired or wireless setup? If wireless, make sure you have implemented the .cfg hack. They may be at too high of a bitrate for the software to recognize them. Also, make sure the AVI box is checked in the settings/options page in the software (if it is greyed out you need to use another hack). I have successfully used both snapstream and snowshifter with good results on the Gateway (although snapstream's Beyond TV doesn't work well with ATI cards). Hope this helps
JUC

[Marlo]

Thanks JUC for responding.

I'm using a wired version and have the correct settings for the wired and avi selected (avi is not grayed out). I'm using an Nvidia card with the latest drivers installed. I'm beginning to suspect that its a software problem with Gateway's D5 software.

I attempted to download several avi files from the net as a test. Most of them were not recognized by the software except for the "Unsupported Codec" message I received when I clicked the Details button (on the Media Import display) after attempting to import an avi file.

I went to a site - codeccorner.com/ae.html that contains many different avi file samples using a variety of codecs. I downloaded and attempted to import several of these sample avi without much success. A very few did work: div3 - Divx4open - Divx503 - Xvid4.

I have tried capturing short video segments from my JVC DV camcorder via Premiere 6.5, Nero Ultra 6 version, Showbiz by Arcsoft, and finally via the latest version of Windows Movie Maker. All these attempt failed to produce an avi I could import into the the player.

I also have Gateway support working on it. They are trying to be helpful. However, their latest suggestion is to contact JVC about the camera but since all the other avi samples also do not work it has to be something else.

I will investigate and try the cfg hack you mentioned as see if that helps.

I really appreciate your willingness to try and help. I'm a novice when it comes to codecs and video stuff. This is the only place on the net I've found where I think I can get some help.

I'm also guessing that there are some other guys out there with the same problem.

Thanks Very Much!
Marlo

[Marlo]

Mysterious Frustration Solved!

I guess being a beginner has its problems and I'm a little reluctant to advertise my lack of experience but sharing my struggle and lack of experience might help another person avoid the problems I have encountered and save them some time and frustration. I guess we all have to start from somewhere! Thankfully there are some helpful people out there like the ones that read this blog.

I was unaware that I needed to specify a specific type of codec / compression option when I was capturing video from my DV camcorder. The automatic or no compression selected does not work on my system with the Gateway software. (I could play all my previous captures with a variety of other players except for Gateway)

I discovered that if I changed the capture option from DV to custom (in the Nero version 6.0 capture software - Select Capturing Template) that I could select from a list, the different codecs installed on my system.

The only trick is to select the right codec that is compatible with the Gateway Digital 5 software. I noted that the small sample avi files listed, in my earlier post, also indicated which codecs would work. I also captured just a few seconds of video as a test to check quality when played back on my TV.

This has been a difficult challenge. I'm just glad I can make it work.

My final question. Does anyone have any suggestions as to which codecs provide the highest image quality? Obviously, the codec will also have to be compatible with the Digital 5 software on my system.

Thanks,
Marlo

[JUC]

Hey everyone, I posted a question in the 'hack' section of pvrblog for the gateway but have yet to get an answer so I will try here. I just started using showshifter to record TV. However, the only codecs that I can get to work with that program is the DivX3. When I switch to DivX pro (or 5.03) the media server software recognizes the files, but when they play they are all choppy and the sound is extremely poppy until it eventually cuts out. When I switch back to DivX3 I keep the same audio codecs and they work fine. The files do play on DivX player and Windows media player. I have a wireless connection using their new G card so I don't think the bitrate is an issue. Any thoughts?
Thanks
JUC

[JUC]

One more question. When you search by artist, does a list of the artists albums come up for you to select? My problem is that after I import music into the software, I can search by artist, then see the artists albums and go from there. However, if I restart the program or computer, the next time I search by artist, it just gives me ALL of the artists songs with no album identification. This happens all of the time and requires me to manually delete my software dataway and then rescan it everytime I start the computer--which really sucks. So, which way are you seeing it: artist---album---songs, or just artist---all songs.
Thanks
JUC

[Robert]

Hello everyone, I have to say that this site is very informative.

I purchased my connected DVD player a few months ago and I just bought the Wireless-G upgrade that Gateway has released. Unfortunately, as soon as I popped in the card and upgraded the firmware with the CD that came with the G card, things started going wrong. The player is now much slower and songs sound like they are skipping. Music sounds better if I disable WEP on my network but that is not a long term solution. I don't want to leave my network open like that. Nothing like this happened with the old firmware/card. Has anyone else encountered this problem? Gateway has offered to fix or replace the player but I would rather fix it myself if possible. Anyone have any advice?

Thanks!!!!!!!

[Jason]

I have a media center pc and I am interested in the gateway device in order to fully exploit the PVR functions as they do not require a subscription service like tivo does. No mention of anyone hooking this thing up to a media center pc- anyone? also are the same slowdown/quality issues present in a wired network apposed to the wireless model?

[MB]

Great Review. I have been waiting for this functionality and just hooked this unit up last night.

The server connection seems to work properly but any PC file I select plays for 15 seconds and then it jumps to the next item in the play list goes 15 second and then jumps again... Gateway though it was the wireless connection cutting out but I doubt this due to the regularity. I have been through the manual several times, but cant find any setting to change. Has anyone run across this or offer any suggestions. Thanks.

Michael

[JUC]

Michael

Do you mean ALL of your files only play for 15 secs --video and audio. If it is only your video files, what type of files are they? Maybe you can try to restart the player and software. If I am having any problems with videos not playing that usually helps.
JUC

[LoveGravy]

Thanks for the review! Too bad I found it too late, oh well, I missed out on the $20 coupon code... :(

Mine should be delivered tomorrow (why does Gateway offer "overnight shipping" when they don't even process the order for 4 days?!?) and I hope it works as well for me as it seems to have done for you!

[Confused]

I have a Belkin 802.11b card, and the player won't recognize it. I have the latest firmware installed. Gateway says the player only works with Gateway or Linksys cards (odd). Any advice, or do I suck it up and buy from Gateway???

[SupNow]

I just bought the AC-220 and really like it. Plays DVDs well and was pretty easy to set up. That being said, I'm having some serious problems streaming video. My computer is 2.0 GHz and the video files I've tried to stream are xvid and vcd. They all work - for about 10 - 12 minutes. Then, out of nowhere the video stops, the DVD player tries to reacquire the server and I get a "Lost network connection" message. Then it goes to "Failed to connect." The only way to get the same video file back up is to power cycle the DVD player and try again. I realize that the server software is converting the video on the fly so I tried to close all programs, etc. Anyone have any ideas that could help? Also - I'm running the latest firmware / server software off the gateway site. Thanks

[JUC]

SupNow, do your MP3's play the entire length? Maybe your have another application that is coming in after 10 minutes or so that may affect it--screen saver (although I don't think this would be a problem), firewall, ...). Also, if you are running a wireless connection the microwave or phones may be interfering (sp) with your connection. Have you tried reinstalling the software--that may help. Good luck
JUC

[SupNow]

JUC,

Thanks for the quick reply. I took your suggestions and turned off my cordless phone (it was 2.4 GHz band, and I'm using a type G wireless card) and I reinstalled the server software.

Again, a video file would stream wirelessly with no problem for about 10 minutes with no trouble, then hang and the DVD unit would lose network connection. I monitored system performance during this 10 minute period and the processor usage hovered around 25% for the entire time except for every 2 or 3 minutes, the processor usage would dip down to basically zero for a second or two, then jump back to 25%. The same exact problem happens with music or photos. Like I said, I like the DVD player but if the thing hangs after 10 minutes, it's useless as a wireless media server / center.

Also, I have no firewall software running and no screensaver that starts in that time. Anyway, thanks again for the help you've already given. Do you have any other thoughts? Have you noticed a processor usage dip while playing video files?

[Craig]

This is a great forum and I appreciate the free advice you're providing all of us. I have had the ADC-220 for about two weeks now, and I have had several problems.

First of all, Gateway's latest version (released on 3/25) of their D5 Media Server software does not seem to work. Every time it trys to scan my computer (running windows XP), I get a fatal error and the server shuts down. I have uninstalled the newest and installed their last version which seems to be running for now.

I am running a 802.11g network in my home and have upgraded the Gateway firmware. I have never been able to play a video file longer than ten minutes without it freezing, regardless of the bit rate. I have similar results with MP3s but while they are playing, there are annoying and loud popping noises randomly throughout the song, until they eventually freeze as well. I though that I might not be getting a solid signal from my router, so I moved the router to about 5 feet away from the player, resulting in the same performance. I have tried files of nearly every format and bit rate. I have tried files recorded with the SnapStream PVS with the lowest bitrate (about 1000000) and no success.

As for AVIs, they will play for about 7 or 8 minutes and the player will stop, and begin playing the next file in the folder. I saw someone mention this in this forum, and I wonder if they ever solved this.

Atleast I have a progressive scan DVD player? Well, yes I do but even while just playing DVDs, I have had the player freeze twice resulting in me having to turn off the power to the player and restart.

I am reading that this month, Gateway released a "New and improved" connected dvd player (Model ADC-320). Does anyone know if there is really any difference between this and the ADC-220? Like I said, I ordered this player two weeks ago and received the ADC-220, with a Wireless-G card.

I am not ready to give up, and I am thinking of running an ethernet cable into the living room to see if I get better results. Although, I have trouble believing that it will solve most of these problems. Also, the Wireless-G card that comes with the player (WGM-240) does not seem to work with a laptop, and Gateway does not provide these drivers. So it may be useless to everyone if you need to replace it with a 10/100 ethernet card.

Sorry to ramble, it has been a long two weeks. Thank you for any advice.

[JUC]

What channel are you guys using on your router? Try 11, 9, 2, and then 4 and see if any of those help. 6 is not so good and is what many routers come set with.
Good Luck!
JUC

[SEAN]

I am planning to purchase this particuluar dvd player by this weekend and i a question to ask you.

Does it support full versions of DivX 3.11 ~ DivX 5.something, and mpeg4?

Thanks.

[ibigpapa]

i to am having problems with the newest firmware and server. i can only stream for about 3 mins
then stops trys to reconnects and fails. also the server software you can sync databases but this doesn't work very well at all. i'm using the wireless g 2 bout it last week and i'm happy but unhappy with the fact it won't stream for very long at all. does anyone how to fix this

[ibigpapa]

i also found out that after 4 mins or so of an mp3 playing it does the same thing. i called gateway they are sending me a new wireless g card i'll let every know if that helps.

[SupNow]

JUC,

You rock. Switched to channel 11, was using the default channel 6, and now video and audio play flawlessly on my DVD player. That was a great tip!

Thanks

[JUC]

Anyone having trouble with the new software version continuously crashing on startup?
JUC

[Uvozone]

Does anyone know if this would play windows media video (wmv) files? I have a lot of video in that format and would like to watch them on my TV. DOes anyone know of any player that would play wmv files?

[Matt]

I picked one of these up in my last days at a Gateway Country store. Some stores may still have a few in stock. Clearance price is approximately $80.00+ $17.00 for a Linksys wired ethernet card , so you really can't go wrong. The first time I tried it out it was impressive.

[Brian Adams]

Plugin Support??

Does anyone know of a way to tell the server software to look in plugins besides Windows Media Player. Has anyone found a way to have it look in iTunes and download playlists from there?

Let me know.

[Craig]

Well, I also switched through channels and the player did player a little better, but I have given up on the wireless, and just ran an ethernet cable into the living room. Now the DVD player runs nearly perfect. I still have a few problems/questions that some of you may have run into.
I am having problems with some videos, particularly AVIs. I have a few AVIs that are about an hour long each, and they will run until certain points in the file, and will stop and begin playing the next video in the library. These points in the video remain constant each time I play the files.
Has anyone figured out how to get the player to recognize MP3s that have been purchased online (license protected). I have some that I purchased from the new Napster and the player does not recognize them.
Whenever you press the 'Next' button during video playback, it will skip ten minutes. Has anyone figured out a way to adjust this time, say to 30 seconds?

Thanks again

[JUC]

Craig, I think the new firmware addresses the issue of FF times. It now lets you FF in increments of 1X,2X,4X,10X...and you don't even have to hold the button down anymore. Not sure about your other issues yet.
JUC

[Craig]

JUC, you're right, the new firmware does allow you to fast forward in speed increments up to 100X but I'm actually talking about the 'Next' button or 'Next Chapter' button, not the 'Fast Forward'. During playback of a video clip, like a half-hour recorded tv show, the next button will jump you forward ten minutes. I noticed that you use ShowShifter. I'm using Snapstream, and you know it would be nice to have an adjustable skip for commercials.

[Divx]

Anyone know how to serve a ripped DVD (vobs) back to the Gateway connected player.

(Note: Most are ripped at much higher then 3mb/sec bandwidth)

[JUC]

Craig, sorry for the confusion--although I am glad you replied because I wasn't aware of the 'next' feature. However I plan on using it now! I would actually prefer to use snapstream but my ATI card really doesn't work that well with their software--the quality of the video is really poor compared to showshifter. But, I just got an email that said they added interlacing that may help my problem--if it does I will probably suck up the money I spent on showshifter and move to snapstreams nice interface and user config. settings. If I think of anything about your other AVI problems I will post later

JUC

[Craig]

JUC, according to what I have been reading in the Snapstream forums, the ATI cards are now working very well with their software. Snapstream has now released 'Beyond TV' which claims to provide "full support for ATI tuner cards". I am using the WinTV PVR-250 which works great, but I would download the BTV demo, and see how well it actually works with ATI. BTV has several MPEG-2 and Divx settings that work well with the Gateway Player. Like you said, their interface is fantastic, but it really doesn't matter if you're using the Gateway Player.

[H]

15 Second and Other Timeout Problems: I was having the same problems some of the other posters were having with my DVD player timing out on songs after 15 seconds on every song. I downloaded the new server software from Gateway support (http://support.gateway.com/support/drivers/search.asp?st=pn&param=2519945) and the new firmware for the DVD player. After resetting everything, it now timed out at 41 seconds every time! Better, but not really the result I wanted. Since it was so regular, I figured something was forcing it to time out. So I turned off all of the programs in my system tray in the lower right hand corner of the Windows XP screen. I am not sure which of the programs I exited (OpenOffice, Palm HotSync Manager, Kazaa, etc.) was the one that was triggering the timeouts, but one of them was because as soon as I turned them all off, it started playing every song all the way through. I then downloaded a program called "Startup Co!Pilot" - free trial version - to turn off all but the essential items in my startup folder to try to avoid this program in the future. I think there are several other startup folder control programs like this out there. Good luck! This was a very frustrating problem until I found out what it was, so I hope that this post helps some of you.

H.

[H]

15 Second and Other Timeout Problems: I was having the same problems some of the other posters were having with my DVD player timing out on songs after 15 seconds on every song. I downloaded the new server software from Gateway support (http://support.gateway.com/support/drivers/search.asp?st=pn&param=2519945) and the new firmware for the DVD player. After resetting everything, it now timed out at 41 seconds every time! Better, but not really the result I wanted. Since it was so regular, I figured something was forcing it to time out. So I turned off all of the programs in my system tray in the lower right hand corner of the Windows XP screen. I am not sure which of the programs I exited (OpenOffice, Palm HotSync Manager, Kazaa, etc.) was the one that was triggering the timeouts, but one of them was because as soon as I turned them all off, it started playing every song all the way through. I then downloaded a program called "Startup Co!Pilot" - free trial version - to turn off all but the essential items in my startup folder to try to avoid this program in the future. I think there are several other startup folder control programs like this out there. Good luck! This was a very frustrating problem until I found out what it was, so I hope that this post helps some of you.

H.

[JUC]

Just an update on the Snapstream software for those who are interested. I downloaded the new trial and it worked perfectly with my ATI card--they added something to do with the overlay that fixed the jerky video problem (I mentioned previously that it was interlacing but it is overlay). Anyway, just thought I would pass on the info. Thanks Craig.
JUC

[mb]

1st, Juc thanks so much for you support of this forum.

My 15 second time out issue was solved by turning off zone alarm.
Following the firewall settings in the help file seems to do the trick too.

[DB]

I love this unit. The progressive scan is right in line with this price point. However you get all these extra features for just a few bucks more when everything is tallied up. Heck, you get a Wireless G card for 10 Bucks!!!

There is only one complaint and for me it is a big one because I like variety and unpredictability when I listen to music. I have about 5000 songs on my hard drive and I cannot listen to my genres randomly. It seems to only give you alphabetical playback. Has anyone figured out how to do this yet or is there a hack I can use to gain this feature?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!!

Thanks.

[ctcoinman]

I had a problem with the software continuously crashing on startup. Evidently when I tried to remove and reinstall the software (gateway version) it had problems. So I downloaded and installed the go-video version and havent had startup problems since!

[rpi86]

Has anyone found a way to get internet radio to work with this? It recognizes the musicmatch plugin but doenst seem to support url's for internet radio...

Anyone?

[Jeff]

I've had the player for a few months now...loved it...no problems at all...but recently I bought a new TV, and when I tried to use it with component cables, I cant get a picture. I've done everything to narrow down that it is the player’s outputs, and not the TV or the cables. Has anyone else encountered this? Any advice on what to do? whats gateways policy for stuff like this? doubt I have the receipt still...bought it in January or about. Would the gateway store where I bought it take it back if it’s actually defective? Am I doing something wrong so the output isn’t working correctly? Any help would be great. Thanks. -jeff

[faradhim]

Jeff,

Did you know that you have to hit "video out" button repeatly to select the correct output? Apparently the output aren't on all the time, you have "switch" to component from whatever port you were using before. I had a hell of time setting my the player for S-video. Just a though.

[Jeff]

WOW...I had no idea...i'm at work now, but i'll try it when i get home...is the video out button on the remote or the box?? If this works I owe you big time. Thank you for such a quick response. -jeff

[craig]

Yes, it's on the remote. That's in the quick start instructions that come with the box. You know, instructions. As much as we hate them, that's the place to check. But only after having trouble. It's much more fun to try without first.

Is there a list somewhere of supported wired ethernet cards? I'm having no problem with mp3s but I am getting disconnects, usually after four or five minutes, watching avi files of TV shows. I think it may also be causing my server machine, also wireless, to disconnect. This hasn't happened before, even when download large files at full speed off a wired box (my Tivo).

The gateway is sitting about a foot and a half from the access point. I figure, if I can get a cheap enough ethernet card, it will be an easy enough thing to check.

I tried a D-Link I had around here but it wasn't recognized.

[Earl]

I have a bunch of ripped (backedup) DVD's on my computer; can these be streamed?

[Craig358]

Hey Craig, I also gave up on the wireless. I have a 50' ethernet cable running into the living room and a Linksys PCM100 card. Works great.

BTW, let me know if anyone has any luck in getting the player to recognize licensed MP3s (Purchased from the new Napster).

The Other Craig

[Earl B.]

Can Ripped Backed up DVDs, rsiding on the Hard drive be streamed?

[Matt Haughey]

Earl, it only streams mpeg or avi (divx), not vob or other sorts of dvd backup files.

[Chas]

Help! This is driving me crazy. I purchase the ADC-220 with the G-wireless card. I have been going through the install and I have been able to hook everything up, load the software on my desktop and everything seems to be working fine. However, I'm stuck on the P-to-P connection. I'm able to set up the network and it sees my Wireless Linksys router fine. However, there is no P-to-P connection on there to hook to my desktop. I do not have any firewalls set up and I'm able to access my desktop fine from my laptop. Any ideas on what I'm missing here?

[Chas]

Nevermind... I went home last night and turned it on to start the battle again and the system came up just fine. Very strange, but true. It found my computer right away and I started playing my MP3s. I love this device and my heartache is over!

[Kevin]

Go Video's version is onsale for $117 at http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/detail.asp?dpno=259971

[Joe]

My apologies if this question has been asked before, but after downloading the latest software/firmware upgrades, I've encountered an issue that really bugs me. I'd like to view and play the ablums songs in numerical order, not alphabetical order. I can't find a setting anywhere that allows me to make this change. Is there someting I'm missing - I could have sworn the previous software version permitted this.

Thanks, Joe

[E]

Yo...great forum...has anyone noticed after installing the upgraded D5 Media Server software that there is not longer a Rrecently Played Playlist? This was an addition of the previous upgraded software but it is now gone....or am I just crazy?

[Greg]

Be careful with this player - I had a problem with the audio clicking during DVD playback (although the MP3 streaming worked fine) and called them three days after I received it so that I could get a replacement. After two months of calling once a week and simmering in tech support purgatory, I gave up trying to get a replacement. Now I can't return it because more than 15 days have elapsed since I received it, even though it has never worked properly and my first call was three days after I got it.

My advice - if you have problem with a Gateway, return it immediately! Otherwise they've got you.

[Ron McAdams]

Does anyone know where to get a cheap replacement remote? Or would be willing to let me send them a learning remote to "learn" the codes off a original gateway remote. I was messing around with my GoVideo Connected DVD player (basicly the same as the GW unit) and flashed in the GW firmware. It boots normaly, but I can only assume the gateware remote codes are different than the GoVideo ones, thus I am locked out of the unit :(

Any help would be greatly appricated.

Ron McAdams

[GroundZero]

Greg, that would be no problem to program it for you. If you email me we can figure out the specifics. gjackson@summitenergy.com

On other news, I just bought this unit about 2 weeks ago. I am a network admin at an energy company. We buy ALOT of gateway computers using our corporate account rep. So needless to say I could not resist buying this thing knowing that I was able to return it at any time no questions asked. And I have to say I am surely impressed! I am streaming 400mb avi files with no problems whatsoever. At first I had some issues with getting it to play the video smoothly. After calling Gateway they suggested that I change my Beacon Interval on my router to 50. After I did that I could connect to the router that is in the basement with no problems. All audio, video, and pics are playing great. One thing that I think has been missed in the review is the fact that the Gateway 220 will play burned DVD-R and +R. It is great!!

I have a question about showshfter and recording my shows to be played to the Gateway. I am using the Hauppauge PVR-250? I think. Does anyone know what the best format to use is? I want to be able to play it directly from the HD to the Gateway at the best quality. I am sure that someone here has tackled this already.

Thanks for all of your help and input.

Gary

[JUC]

Hey Gary, I use showshifter and it is a great program that works well with Gateway. I usually record directly to DivX. The setting that works best for me without killing my CPU is the DivX Pro Home Movie setting. You will have to change the audio codecs though because I cannot get the gateway to use the one that is standard (IMA AD???). Download the LAME codec and use that--it gets really good audio compression and works flawlessly with the Gateway (there is instructions on Showshifter's knowledgebase about it).
Let me know if you have a different config. that works well too. BTY-showshifter if completely redoing their showguide and it should be out in a few weeks.
later
JUC

[GroundZero]

Thank you for the info. I looked in my Showshifter and I do not have a DivxPro option and I am not sure which lame codex to use. I am pretty new in the 'pvr' realm. Could you please elaborate on exactly what I need to do. Thanks again.

Gary

[JUC]

Gary, if you do not have a divx pro option you probably do not have that codec installed on your system. You can get a version from their website. There is a free one with ads or you can pay as well. Install and restart showshifter. You should now be able to see the divx pro option. In the knowledgebase section of showshifters site there is specific info on the LAME codec and installing it (its better there than what I can give you). Finally, once you get it all set up and recording you can schedule the gateway software to scan your video folders every hour to pick up any new shows you recorded with showshifter.
JUC

[GroundZero]

I am sorry to bother you but I am so new at this. I looked for the lame plug in and added it but when I tried to convert an .ssf to the newly created codec showshifter said that I was unable to convert it. I am using Showshifter 2.01.2075. Is there a reason I should get the newest version of Showshifter? Can you please send me the url’s for the codec’s or email them to me. Also is there a way to save the files from the tv in the new codec without having to convert it. Converting a 1 hour show takes over an hour and hogs up my 2.4Ghz with 512mb RAM machine. I am sorry to be such a bother. Another question, I was testing all of my files through the Connected DVD Player and I found one mpeg that I had downloaded from Limewire. It was 450mb for a one hour tv show. It looked AWESOME!! Is there a way to figure out what codec they used. I would like all of my content to be saved in that format. Once again that you for all of your help!!

Gary Jackson
Summit Energy Services Inc.
Network Administrator
gjackson@summitenergy.com