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They are constantly adding more features, and I absolutely love this device. This product will only get better as time goes on, and the fact that it can now transcode WMV files, and other formats, makes it the market leader, your Apple TV can not play WMV or Divx files can it.
For those with large music libraries, I did find the music interface to be difficult to work with, the navigation structure is just not completely polished yet. Future improvements allowing it to connect to a UPNP NAS Device without having to have your PC on would be nice.
This device is awesome for playing back your video library on your computer. There are some audio sync (lip sync) issues with a lot of the videos, but there is an adjustment function, which I kind of found hard to use.
I ended up getting an Airport and using my iphone as a remote to play music on my TV, so I'm not using the DivX device to play back my audio files. It checks for updates to both the server software and firmware automatically so you are always getting the latest version of the product.
Video playback is smooth.
While Connected will appeal primarily to early adopters, it feels good to own a device that continues to remain on the cutting edge, even though it was released a while ago. With Connected, not only has DivX done a good job of keeping the software up to date, but the community has developed a number of plugins for the device. By using the plugins, you can get access to popular services like Flickr, Hulu, Dailymotion and internet radio. I've been using DivX Connected for over a year now and can tell you that the product is even better then when it launched. One of the problems with more traditional DivX devices is that because they don't connect to the net, once they ship them, the technology has a tendency to become obsolete.
Last.FM, flickr)·Nice visuals, able to change theme easily·Wi-Fi connectivity·HDMI & digital optical outputsWeaknesses·Limited codec and format support (no AAC, GIF, etc)·No playlisting ability·Software only available for Windows XP/Vista, no Mac·Limited online service support at launch·Choppy video performance on systems with less than 1GB of memory ·No internal storage·Slow to load thumbnails for photos·Slow media file scanning·No shuffle within overall music folder·Music navigation lists songs in alphabetical order, not track order·Non-RF remote (IR) DivX has a head start with its simple start up and intuitive UI, and I wouldn't be surprised if this product gets a major facelift in the near future.Strengths·Fast server software setup·Fast device setup·Third-party plug-in support (e.g. The D-Link DSM 330 loaded with DivX Connected software is a media manager that connects your digital files (music, video, photos & online content) with your television. DivX Connected bridges the gap between desktop and home entertainment center, however, the lack of comprehensive codec support, limited online content and heavy price tag for the DSM-330 are areas where these products could be improved.
In the basement is our main TV. I chalk that up to it being a beta unit and I assume these D-Link units do not have that issue. We use it a lot and it works very, very well at what it was designed to do: play on your TV/stereo the media that are located on your PC.
Of course, the files that are small (e.g., QVGA video files) will not look terribly good blown up to 1080p, but reasonable files (most of our stuff is ripped to VGA or 720x480) looks excellent. For the price, this unit offers a LOT of functionality and works very well. My only quibble is that our unit sometimes will hang upon startup forcing me to yank and reinsert the power cable.
I've been using the DivX Connected box for over a year now as I got it while it was in beta test. This unit interacts with the DivX Connected software running on the media PC upstairs and converts, on the fly, all our media to a format that looks quite good on our TV. We've tried over half a dozen different video/media streamers and this is the only one we've kept.
We have gobs of movies and children's shows and music on our PC upstairs. Having a PC in the basement would not be good, as they tend to be loud and hot.
That being said, I was forced to setup a wired connection because the wireless was a little to slow. Overall I love it. All in all device does what it says, making it easy to setup and get to all your media. Also I thought it would give a little more help organizing content, but it is left up to the user and how your organize you files on your computer. I can play all my downloaded media content, home videos, and browse family photos on my tv. It would be nice if it handled a gigabit network connection, because browsing media can stutter sometimes.
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