DVD Player as 802.11b Peripheral

sysadmn writes "Instead of building a PVR from a computer, why not let your DVD player access the computer you already have? That's the thinking behind Sonicblue's new Go-Video D2730. The just-announced DVD player will use an 802.11b (Wi-Fi) wireless network connection to access content on PCs, such as photos, music and videos. The player is aggressively priced at about $250 US and is due out in first quarter 2003. Full details are on CNET."

Wouldn't want to risk it

[ekrout]

Every product that I've ever bought from SonicBlue has been malformed and returned to sender.

The technology sounds cool, but I'll probably wait until it's available from another vendor.

Maybe I've overlooked something...

[CommieLib]

But how does this relate to PVR? Allowing my DVD player to access PC content doesn't allow me to PVR, as far as I can tell. The article mentioned plans to network to Replay TV, but that's not what you're saying here.

Did I miss something?

Ethernet, 802.11b add-on

[crow]

The posting is misleading. The item comes with an ethernet port, but support for 802.11b will require an additional piece of hardware. I'm not clear from the information available if it will just use a PCMCIA slot or something else.

Re:Fast enough?

[phurley]

802.11b is plenty fast to stream DivX. Now as some point you could have too many players (and other 802.11b devices) in a home (possibly a bigger problem in apartment buildings?) trying to share the same bandwidth.

Re:Fast enough?

[brunes69]

A DVD quality SVCD runs at arounf 3000 kbps (around 3 Mbps), and a simmilar quality DivX around 1500 kbps (1.5 Mbps). So I don't know what you are doing at your place, but a 11 Mbps conneciton should handle them just fine. In face, my 10 Mbps nic can play a SVCD over the LAN perfectly.

not integrated 802.11b

[asv108]

From the Article

Sonicblue's DVD player will be able to connect to networks via an Ethernet connection. Consumers will be able to purchase 802.11b PC cards to connect the player to a PC using wireless networking

Re:Cool idea, but...

[CaptMonkeyDLuffy]

Actually, any image with a resolution higher than 640x480 would be wasted on most TV's... I forgot the exact resolution that a standard TV signal is, but it is approximately 640x480(in addition to being only 30hz interlaced...) Now, the more recent HDTV's and such are a different story, one I'm not very familiar with... but your standard TV wouldn't need any improvement to the image provided to it.

Re:Fast enough?

[afidel]

11Mbps is the through the air "wire" speed that is the maximum speed that all data is being sent. The amount of usefull data on even the best .11b equipment is about 6.3Mbps or ~700KB/s which should be more then enough for DivX and even most MPEG2 streams but some could theoretically be 9.8Mbps but average 4.7 Mbps typical rate for movie on single layer with 3 multichannel audio tracks.

Re:Fast enough?

[genka]

11Mbps is a "marketing number". The protocol has a lot of overhead- data that is transmitted for servicing the connection. When it comes to speed 802.11B is moving your data (payload), it is about 3-4 MBps, shared between two directions.

Re:Illegal?

[afidel]

Not illegal, more against the liscense from the DVD Forum that companies have to sign to get a valid CSS decryption key. There are technologies that the DVD Forum does not think can be properly secured so they do not want content going across them. Besides this is for reading data off a pc through the DVD player to the TV, not for transfering the DVD data to the PC. This thing is basically a DVD player with a network jack that allows the same kind of multimedia features as some of the current players that can play SVCD's, mp3 cd's and have CF and MMC readers so they can display jpegs from your digital camera. Basically an all in one media center that uses the tv for a display. Since my pc is already in the living room and hooked up to the S-Video port on the tv this does nothing for me personally but some people don't have the pc in the living room and want to keep it that way so this would allow them to access all that stuff off the pc upstairs (with a 802.11b wireless bridge attached to the network port I would assume).

Re:Fast enough?

[Anonymous Coward]

This box will not play DivX -- at least, according to the news.com article. It will only play MPEG1 and 2 (for video) and WMA and MP3 (for audio).

That means that to play back MPEG2, you're really going to be talking about 320x240 or 480x480 (SVCD) res. only... 640x480 will be too big to fit in WiFi.

Of course, from the news.com article it's clear that WiFi is an OPTION, not default-- default is 10/100 Ethernet.

All of this is interesting, but if you have a PlayStation 2, you would be much better off buying QCast from BroadQ -- www.broadq.com -- which allows your PS2 to pull OGG, MP3, JPG, MPG1/2/4, DivX 3, 4, and 5 and more off your PC...

That, and it will be able to do progressive output, HD resolution (with component cabling), and is future-proof (software upgradable)...

Oh, and it's $49.95 -- if you have a PS2 and a Network Adapter, and the PS2 already plays DVD's!!!!

Not to mention the obvious... you can play games on your PS2!!!

I have this software, and it rocks. Why it's not covered on /. or elsewhere is totally beyond me...

Re:Consumer Electronics vs PC

[Anonymous Coward]

Hello. Earth to slashdot crowd. 99% of the public doesn't use "ogg" files. 99% of the public is never going to use "ogg" files. Don't expect product manufacturers to care all that much. NOT VALID CRITICISM.

Re:Fast enough?

[Bopper]

Check out the press release:

http://www.sonicblue.com/company/press.asp?ID=580 [sonicblue.com]

The D2730 works with either a PCMCIA Ethernet Adapter (included) or an optional PCMCIA 802.11b Wireless Network Card and can stream MPEG1 and MPEG2 video files that are compressed at bitrates up to 3 Mbps.

So, it will work on a good 802.11b wireless link, as long as the connection speed doesn't fall back to below 3 Mbps (the 802.11b standard says the fallback rates are 5.5, 2, and 1 Mbps). WEP, if its there, can lower the rate as well by 20-50%.

There is no mention of DivX or other formats in the press release, so you can assume anything other than MPEG1/2 is not supported. I would assume that even the MPEG file has to be VCD/SVCD/XVCD compliant.

Re:TV-out card?

[squeegee_boy]

$11.30USD, from a place I frequent:

http://www.rpelectronics.com/English/Content/Ite ms /212-650.asp