Popcorn Hour A-100 review

Average user rating

9.5

spectacular

Average user rating from 2 users

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Popcorn Hour A-100 user reviews

July 11, 2008

Posted by: Tsonaqua

"Perfect for me"

What I like:

Video/audio playback via HDMI, mfg support, community support, third party apps.

What I don't like:

Currently not a very good audio playback device, sounds great, functionality as a audio player is lacking ... currently.

Review:

Signed up to correct some misinformation in the CNET review, primarily.

- FLAC has been supported since the January 31, 2008 firmware update.
- Don't use OGG so I can't comment as to whether its currently implemented but if its not it was confirmed as on the way by Syabas (firmware authors I believe) as far back as April 16, 2008.
- The latest firmware patch of June 18, 2008 added wireless via USB dongle in the form of 'Atheros USB 11n driver'.

As far as my 'review', video playback has been amazing, both from installed harddrive or http streaming. Even SMB network (slower speeds) was able to stream HD content from my PC with only the fast forward functionality lagging. That disappears with HTTP streaming.

Straight out of the box the popcorn hour will please most everyone. With a little technical know how and time you can turn it into a Dream. Setting up http streaming takes a little research and technical know how. Also implementing third party apps like 'moviejukebox', my personal favorite third party app, takes a little computer proficiency but once implemented makes the whole popcorn hour experience tops.

WARNING: In its current state the popcorn hour is a poor audio playback device period. By this I mean playback of mp3/FLAC/etc is unintuitive and down right irritating. No support for M3U files at this time which in my mind is inexcusable for a music device. Good thing you're buying this as a video device not a audio streamer. ;)

That being said, the NMT firmware is a work in progress and I suspect that sometime in the future audio playback functionality will be revisited and improved upon. For the time being though, the quality of the audio you do playback is as good as any device I've used.

www.networkmediatank.com is the community site. Check http://www.networkedmediatank.com/viewtopic.php?t=4287&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=452 for an idea of what the current third party apps will do for you.