Looking for a certain type of box. Suggestions?

Drumspace

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Kind of a noob to all the new boxes out there.
i need a box, to replace my WD livetv box that is going bad. Eventually the other ones i have will go bad as well.
I need a box that will play audio files and video files from my external hard drives attached to my windows computer.
Ethernet and wireless compatibility
Needs to be able to do network shares.
Would be nice if it could handle sacd, 24 bit flac files,
What sort of recommendations do you have?

I currently have 3 wd boxes. in my living room (ethernet), downstairs (ethernet), bedroom (wireless)
All are connected via network shares, and show my external drives (50 TB's) and folders exactly how they are on the drives. plays most audio and video files. I dont use any of the streaming features except YouTube occasionally. I don't subscribe to any pay services so its not really important to me.
What kind of recommendations do you have for me.
Cost really is not the issue as much as doing what i want it to do.
Thanks
 
How do you want to control it? From the PC or with a TV interface?
 
I would like to control it from my tv's so with a remote control. Externals connected to windows computer, Ethernet cable from router to two different tv's.
View files on tv which is then connected to stereo systems.
Right now I have 3 wd livetv boxes. Its setup for network share, so I just point the wd box to my computer and then access my files from my tv, exactly how they appear on the externals.
 
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I am interested in this too, I also want to replace a WDTV with something simple to stream from my NAS.
 
Since I didn't see any answers here I just dove in and tried some things, here is what I have done so far:

I bought two devices, a PS4 slim and a Roku Ultra. I opted for these devices because they have lots of horsepower to run apps so loading menus, scrolling through TV guides, etc is nice and fast. The PS4 is in the living room and the Roku is in the bedroom.

Both devices can stream from my NAS without any fuss (simply download the free software on the Roku or PS4 from Roku/Sony), no having to install Twonky or Plex on the NAS (although I did install both to see how it works, prefer the ease and speed of just running them without the extra software using just the media player software from Roku/Sony). The one problem I ran into is if you have any MKV files, they may play without sound which is a problem with the PS4/Roku not licensing a particular audio format (I think it was DTS5.1 but may be wrong). This audio issue happens whether streaming directly from the NAS share, through Twonky or through Plex.

Some MKVs play fine and all my MP4s play fine. I will continue to test and see what happens but both these devices play far superior to the WDTV. The PS4 is the fastest and most responsive, it also replaced my BD player so that is a bonus. Both these devices have Ethernet and wireless so you can use them anywhere however I have them both hooked up hardwired. The PS4 I had to buy an additional remote control as using the Dualshock controller for TV and movies was a little of a pain.

If you are doing wifi, any of the Rokus will do, but only the Ultra has Ethernet. The Ultra also has a much faster processor than any of the other Rokus so everything is much more responsive. I also like the fact that it has USB so I can play off an attached USB device.

Last note, I am not a console gamer, never have been. I bought the PS4 for its streaming and BD capabilities and it seems to do well. I am still testing it against my stand alone BD player and I am pretty sure at this point my stand alone is a better player, but I have not decided if it is enough to warrant a separate player or not. Not to say I will not play games, I will, but the gaming aspect was WAY down on the list of what I wanted the PS4 to do.

So far, I am happy with what I have.

Don't know this will help you but maybe it will get you going in the right direction.
 
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I recently had a similar challenge - I needed to replace 3 ageing WDTVs so I could play movies around the house that were stored on a NAS.

I took a punt and went for a cheapo yet powerful £50 Android 7.1 box from eBay. I was surprised how quick and stable it was with KODI 17 - pretty faultless I would say.

I haven't witnessed a single glitch with playback, let alone any crashing etc. over the last few months

I've been so impressed in fact, as well as replacing the 3 x WDTV's, I ended up ditching my rather expensive media PC as well, so I am now opting for 4k content whenever possible which looks awesome on my Panny plasma (despite only being 1080p)

I can't speak for their reliability with other apps such as amazon or netflix, but I will be setting up SkyGo shortly on some of them
 
I took a punt and went for a cheapo yet powerful £50 Android 7.1 box from eBay. I was surprised how quick and stable it was with KODI 17 - pretty faultless I would say.

any chance you can link to that android box ? do you know if it handles 3D mkv MVC files ?

thanks
 
Sure, here's an ebay link, its an "H96 Pro Plus" and comes in a few different guises;
H96 Pro Plus Android 7.1 3GB 32GB TV Box Amlogic S912 Octa Core Dual Wi-fi 4K | eBay

There have been a few bad reviews on Amazon complaining of freezing, but the 3 I have have all been ok so far.

They have the same chipset (CPU/GPU) as the minix u9h, but more recent android and more RAM;

Minix Neo U9-H Android TV Media Hub Review

No doubt the minix is better build quality and possibly a more stable firmware, but if you're only running KODI it might not matter

3D SBS/TAB works ok, not sure about frame packed though
 
-- As an eBay Associate, AVForums earns from qualifying purchases --
I have the older version of H96 Pro (non plus) 2gb ram 16gb storage.

running the latest version of Libreelec from usb.

The earlier Libre, versions did have freezing, but I haven't noticed any recently.

The remote on theses boxes are pretty basic, I have setup my Harmony 650 for the Librelec version using the Pivos remote config, which gives more buttons.

For just basic controls, the Alfawise H96 + is in the Harmony database, so should work under Android
 
I also use a Harmony, but have learnt commands from a basic Windows95 MCE IR remote (i leave the USB receiver plugged in). Works fine once everything is setup for KODI (play/pause, stop, up/down/left/right etc.)

An IR air-mouse with keyboard on the back is a MUST for getting it all set up however (£7.95 from ebay)
 
If you are streaming content from your PC I think that you need a media server installed on that PC, something like Plex or Emby (both free) once you set them up, basically any Android Box/Apple TV or Smart TV will be able to access your media files over the network
 
If you are streaming content from your PC I think that you need a media server installed on that PC, something like Plex or Emby
There's no need for either. Kodi and many other programs can access content without a server running.
 
There are advantages and disadvantages of using a "media server" such as plex.

Personally I have used Plex media server on a NAS and a "server PC" and like the way the library can be managed centrally without the media player being switched on (or indeed is busy playing something)

I had Plex serving to 4 media players, and only had to manage 1 library common to all the players. It is fantastic at retrieving the movie meta-data and it's really easy to group different movies together in sub-libraries (eg New Movies, Family, Kids etc.) I could manage the library from anywhere with a laptop and knew each of the media players would easily be able to navigate the library served by Plex, without ANY config on the player whatsoever. (just need the plex player on the media device and link it to your account)

Compared with KODI, the media library has to be managed within each individual player itself, and any customisation in KODI to make the library look "correct" has to be replicated on each player.... bummer. It's a pain because I have to sit in front of each media player whist messing about with KODI, and can't make changes if a player is being used (eg by the kids)

Plex is also able to "transcode" (convert the movie to a different format). This can be useful if for example you are not at home and want to watch a movie on a tablet. Plex can convert the file on the fly to a much lower bitrate so it can be sent over the net.

However this can be Plex's biggest downfall.....
When Plex "serves" a file to a media player, it checks to see what the player is capable of playing and checks the speed of the connection. If Plex thinks the media player cannot play the file (happens a LOT with audio streams and certain file types) it will want to convert the file in some way, or downgrade bitrate if it thinks the network speed isn't quick enough
This is usually completely unnecessary but Plex transcodes never the less - it's kind-of OK (transcoding doesn't always degrade quality) if Plex is running on an ultra powerful PC, but if it's on a NAS, it wont be powerful enough causing buffering.
It's a real PAIN as sometimes Plex will transcode the audio stream to 2.0 (and it takes me a little while in the movie to notice...) and recently it doesn't think my android box doesn't support some 2160p files so insists on transcoding them, which crashes my NAS.

The other issue (for some people) with Plex is that the "server" cannot be installed on an android box

I would say that Plex support is pretty good and many of the issues I have come up against have been sorted.

However Plex's weakness is KODIs strength. All KODI requires is access to a file on a network share (or usb). It will then work out the best way to play the file (with many, many options), and doesn't have a "server" in the way to complicate things.
But the problem for me is setting up and managing 4 or 5 libraries (one on each player) because the library is built into KODI, rather than being on a central PC or NAS

There is a way to get the best of both as there in a Plex Player add-on for KODI, so KODI can use a Plex library, but it's normally a few releases behind the dedicated andoid/PC Plex player
 
But the problem for me is setting up and managing 4 or 5 libraries (one on each player) because the library is built into KODI, rather than being on a central PC or NAS
It takes around 10 minutes to set up a shared kodi library on a PC/NAS. The wiki may make it look difficult, but it's literally copy/paste.
 
It's not just the shared library, it is more so the customisation needed on each KODI to achieve the "folder structure" I need.

KODI only has the option of a single "movies folder", unless customised.

Unless there's an easier way (please advise??), I have to create a custom smart-playlist to select movies using rules in certain locations on the NAS (eg New Movies, Kids, Family, etc.) and then make the play-list a "favourite".

Once I have setup favourites for each folder, I can then customise the Home Menu with additional items corresponding to each favourite, so at the Home Menu I can see "New Movies", "Kids", "Family" etc, rather than bundling everything under the default "Movies".

Even then, not all skins can have the Home Menu be customised (eg the Kryton default skin cannot), and navigating using this method (smart playlists) becomes really glitchy.

Bundling all of my movies in the "Movies" menu as normal gives a super slick fast responsive navigation, but I have too many movies and it can take an age to find something. Of course I could sort A-Z but then it's not easy to view the most recent movies.....
I could kind-of put up with changing the sort and searching, but the kids (and wife) struggle.

With Plex, multiple sources can be selected, and it is possible for each source to have it's own sub-library from the home menu. Much simpler.
 
Maybe use tags rather then smart playlists? Although as you've got lots of movies already it'd take ages to tag them now. If you want to try it it'd be quicker to set up Media Companion and tag from there. Media Companion - Documentation

With Plex, multiple sources can be selected, and it is possible for each source to have it's own sub-library from the home menu. Much simpler.
IIRC there was some talk years ago about having that as a feature, but the devs just said to use files view and update the library via a remote button to get the art, info etc in files view. (Which isn't really a solution but given how much I paid I suppose I can't complain. And I'm lazy and just use voice search for everything instead.)
 

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