Wireless g cards for the Gateway DVD connected player

Thanks to a comment on an earlier thread, I've learned that Gateway is now selling a 802.11g card specifically for the Connected DVD player. It's only $50 (even cheaper than most mainstream g cards) and they offer free shipping. I just ordered mine and will post a quick review after it shows up.

Hopefully it's the end to the occasional hang-up on video for me.

Comments

[John Bush]

Another option is to put a wired Ethernet card in the DVD player and connect it to a 802.11g bridge.

I have several devices in my entertainment center that need connectivity so, I bought a Linksys WET11 bridge (I know, it's only 802.11b... I'd like to eventually upgrade it to 802.11g). The bridge is connected to a 5 port switch. Then I plugged my Xbox, Connected DVD player, and Tivo all into the switch. Works great.

[adampsche]

Nice. I might have to do that. Video only occassinally hangs up for me, and did often in Battle Royale the other day, so this might not be a bad idea.

[brett]

How does the Gateway Connected handle divx video?

[Matt Haughey]

brett, the Gateway handles divx and xvid by transcoding it to mpeg on your computer before sending it off to your gateway device. It requires a bit of processing, at least a 1.3 Ghz PC acting as your server.

[AJRitz]

I can confirm that the primary issue with DiVX/XVID is processing power. I've been trying to stream them on my Athlon 1800+, and it just barely can't handle it. The playback is too jerky to watch - but gives me a good excuse to look into upgrading my primary desktop machine ;-)

[Matt Haughey]

Hmm, my athlon 1900XP home machine seems to have no prob with a bunch of xvid movies I've downloaded.

[AJRitz]

Perhaps I should have been more precise. If I shut down everything else except for the Media Server software on the Athlon 1800+ machine, then most Divx/xvid files WILL play. But if there's anything else running on the server machine, the processor can't handle even minimal multitasking. I tried playing an xvid file the other day while Azureus was working on downloading a large file, and the jerkiness and pixelization was impossible to see through (and Azureus was the only other thing running at the time, aside from usual startup system tray programs).

[Darkstar999]

Anybody try the new Gateway 802.11g card yet? I just received it in the mail and so far, wish that I could go back to my old B card. There is new firmware and new server software on the included CD. Dispite checking the transcode option, I have now lost the ability to play DIVX on my player. The server software says that the format is incorrect. The use to be able to play DIVX with the old software and firmware. I encoded the DIVX with Dr.Divx.

Any ideas or similar experiences?

[Javier]

Yup, I got the 802.11g upgrade as well, totaly unstable and stopped playing most of my avi files. I called tech support and was told that that there was a problem getting the G card to fully work with the DVD. The tech told me to send it back, I did. Back to to my super stable 802.11b card.