USB Host - USB Plus - what do they do ???

[nicknack]

Been looking to buy a home theatre sound system and have noticed that that several now have USB ports.

LG for instance seem to have USB Host on some models and USB Plus on others, but I can find no explanation as to what you can/cannot do with them.

The Samsung Samsung HT-Q20R has USB Host and according to the specs on the web site is "USB Host – with DivX, MPEG4, MP3, WMA, JPEG playback"

Does this mean I could plug in an External Hard drive loaded with mp3s, DivX files etc and they would play back through the Samsung.

If so, is this unique to the Samsung, or are there other models out there that can do this ??

 

[Gulch]

Hi

I've got a 120 GB external hard drive loaded with video files.
It would be fantastic if I could simply plug it into one of these systems.
I asked the guy in Currys and he simply hadn't a clue.

If it does work does anyone have any idea what the picture quality is like ?

I've got a 42" plasma which I'm looking to add a surround sound system to so if this works I would definitely go down this road.

 

[Gulch]

Hi

Since posting my response I was on the JVC website and they seem to suggest that if you plug in any USB 2.0 device into their player it will play whatever is stored on the USB device.
They are pretty specific about what types of files it will and will not play but most look like industry standards i.e. mp3, divx, jpeg etc so even if you had a file format that wasn't supported it wouldn't be difficult to convert it to a supported format using any of the widely available converters.
Hope this helps

Mike