HDX 1000 Review #7 - Known Issues, Workaround, Conclusions

Introduction

This is the 7th part of our HDX 1000 review. This part will first go over two known issues and the work-around. We will then deliver our final conclusion of this HDX 1000 review series.



You might be curious about why an important part of the review – content format compatibility test is missing. As stated in the first post of this blog: I’m still new in this HD digital entertainment industry. I have not collected my set of the content samples (in different codec / format). I’ll need to do this before I can start the compatibility test. Please send me the file through email if the file size is small. Otherwise, please send me a link to download the files. Your help will actually expertise my process to collect content samples so that I can come back to complete the review sooner.

Known Issue #1 – My Slave USB port on HDX 1000 does not Work

There is a USB slave port on the back of the HDX 1000. The design concept of having this port is to make your HDX 1000 work as an external portable HDD (if there is an internal HDD installed in the HDX 1000). Accompanied with the attempt to reduce the weight (see description here), users now can move the HDX 1000 around, connect it to the PC through the USB cable and transfer files between the two. If you are a person like me who is biased and thinks the file transferring via network is slower and unsecured, you can perform the transfer in this way.

This design looks wonderful on paper. However, when I first connect my HDX 1000 to my PC through the USB slave port, I can see the HDX 1000 trying to remove the internal HDD from the ‘Media Sources” menu (See the picture taken during the removing process at the end of this paragraph). But, my Vista notebook just cannot recognize the HDX 1000. After consulting with HD Digitech, they explained that when I first installed my internal HDD into HDX 1000, I formatted the HDD in EXT2 format. This is actually the default format the NMT application setup wizard will do, so more than likely you will have your HDD formatted in the same way. Furthermore, EXT2 is a Linux file system. This is why my Windows Vista notebook cannot recognize the HDD.



The application HD Digitech suggested for me to install on my notebook is Ext2Fsd. If you experience the same issue, you can go give Ext2Fsd a try, too. It did help me solve my problem. My notebook can now treat the internal HDD inside HDX 1000 as a removable HDD. The only caution to the Vista user is that Vista has a very restricted user account management system. You need to use your administrator account to sign in before you can use Ext2Fsd (or your Ext2Fsd will not find any HDD attached to your PC at all).

Known Issue #2 – My HDX 1000 Freezes

Depending on the content format you are trying to playback, you may experience a “freezing” up of your machine. You will need to reset the box to get back the control. I think it is an issue on Syabas NMT player software. All media streamers (Popcorn A-110, iStarHD Mini HDMI 1.3 NMT Player…) using the same solution should have the similar symptom. I’ll give you some examples below.

• I tried to use the HDX 1000 to access the Bluray ROM on my computer. I was hoping this setup could be a cheap Bluray playback solution. The result was not good. It would freeze my HDX 1000.

• I tried to rename a .dat VCD format file to .mpg and used my HDX 1000 to playback the renamed file. This action froze my HDX 1000.

• I tried to use the HDX 1000 to playback a comic clip I downloaded from the Internet. It froze my HDX 1000.
  

As you can see in the list, the HDX 1000 tends not to be happy when you try to get it to perform some weird actions of which it is not designed to do. In addition, it is better to download the contents with high user completion number or contents from well known sources, to help you filter out bad formatted contents. There are a lot of contents which are coded improperly on Internet. If you feed your HDX 1000 one of these contents, you might need to hit that reset button very soon.



Conclusion

I found the HDX 1000 is stable enough to perform the main task – playback contents stored in your PC on TV – what it was designed to achieve. The various storage options and services has broaden the experience and makes the operation easy. The HD playback capability is also a plus. Although I have stated several suggestions all along the review, I still found the benefit of having the HDX 1000 out-weighs the disadvantages. As long as you can operate the HDX 1000 in the way it is designed to, you can limit the chance of having issues. Besides, comparing to many other solutions from big name networking equipment companies, the price of owning a HDX 1000 is reasonable. If you are an early adopter like me and have the need to playback downloaded contents on TV, you should consider to give HDX 1000 a try.

Go to the HDX 1000 Product Page at AmperorDirect.com

HDX 1000 Review #6 - Comparison

Introduction

This is the 6th part of our HDX 1000 review. We are going to compare HDX 1000 with its previous generation: HDX 900 and one of its competitors, iStarHD HDMI 1.3 Mini NMT player.

HDX 1000 vs. HDX 900

Function-wise, the HDX 1000 works almost identical as the HDX 900. The major change on the HDX 1000 is the adoption of the HDMI 1.3 standard. (According to Wikipedia: the single-link bandwidth to 340MHz (10.2 Gbit/s) is the HDMI 1.3 version). It will supposedly enhance the performance of the HDX 1000. However, I have not learned a quantitative way to test the results yet. I can only say, judging from my eyes, the content playback is a little smoother on the HDX 1000. But, again, the “smoother performance” can be no more than a illusion generated by my brain after learning the difference between HDMI 1.1 and HDMI 1.3 on Wikipedia.



The most significant change to the HDX 1000 is on its design and the output interface. A picture with HDX 1000 and HDX 900 placed side-by-side is present above. The right one is an HDX 1000.

• You can see the size of the case has shrunk. The trim down of the metal used on the case has lowerered the weight of the machine itself from 3 lbs. to 2.2 lbs. This will help users to save on the shipping costs.

• The sharp corner of the HDX 900 case has been redesigned to an oval shape. Compared to the HDX 900’s industrial equipment appearance, the HDX 1000 now looks more like a consumer electronics product of which you would have little objection to placing on your home entertainment rack.
  

• The VGA display output on the HDX 900 has been removed and replaced by a coaxial and component output. Now you don’t need to have a HDTV to use the HDX 1000. It can work with an analog TV, too. I guess HD Digitech has listened to customers’ suggestions.

• The SATA port (data only) presented on the HDX 900’s back panel has been removed on the HDX 1000. The SATA connector without the power portion can be a headache to users because they need to go find a power source to power the HDD they want to install on the HDX 900. The SATA port has been moved inside the case on the HDX 1000. It is a complete connector with data and power ports provided. It is also safer to have the HDD placed inside the case, thus reducing the chance of having the HDD electronics components exposed to users.

• The power hard-switch on the HDX 1000 has been moved to the back panel. (I like it on the front panel better, for easy-access purposes.)

• With the HDX 900, there is a chance of having the VGA connector head / SATA connector head / HDMI connector head interfere with each other. In other words, you might need to unplug one of the connectors in order to have another connector plugged in. This is not an issue any more in HDX 1000.

• A card reader is installed on the front panel of the HDX 1000. Please see the below picture.

Overall, HD Digitech includes several design changes to the HDX 1000, which have been requested by real media streamer users. It indicates that they have a good attitude of listening to customers and trying to provide what they need. I certainly appreciate this attitude.

HDX 1000 vs. iStarHD HDMI 1.3 Mini NMT player

HDX 1000 and iStarHD HDMI 1.3 mini NMT player are based on the same media receiver solution: Sigma 3865 chipset + Syabas NMT player. Hence, they perform very similar functions. The differences are in the design, cooling and output ports selection.

• In the picture below you can see the box size comparison between the HDX 1000 and the iStarHD 1.3. The latter is almost half in size.

• The most significant difference between the two units is the case material. The HDX 1000 is made of aluminum and the iStarHD 1.3 is made of plastic. Thus, the iStarHD 1.3 is a lighter product.

• On the other hand, the aluminum case material enables the HDX 1000 have a better heat transfer characteristic. That is why the iStarHD 1.3 needs to install a Fan inside the box, but the HDX 1000 does not. This allows the HDX 1000 to perform with less acoustic noise. In theory, the cooler operating temperature will help components to achieve a longer life. However, this needs to be verified with the HDX 1000.

• There is a card reader on the HDX 1000, but not on the iStarHD 1.3.

• The SATA HDD connector is located outside of the iStarHD 1.3 case. Therefore, the “internal HDD” needs to be installed outside of the iStarHD 1.3 box. With the HDX 1000, the “internal HDD” needs to be installed inside its box.

• HDX 1000 provides more options regarding output interface.

It is a classic trade-off situation. The iStarHD 1.3 offers a cheaper solution while the HDX 1000 provides more value (card reader, aluminum case, more output options…). You can make your own decision to see if the price difference for the HDX 1000 is really worth the money.

More…

At the time this review was written, I had not yet received my Popcornhour A-110. After I receive my machine, I’ll add a HDX 1000 vs. Popcornhour A-110 section to make this review more complete.

Read the 7th part of the HDX 1000 Review - Known Issues, Workaround and Conclusions

Go to the HDX 1000 Product Page at AmperorDirect.com

HDX 1000 Review #5 - Services

Introduction

In this 5th part of our HDX 1000 review, we are going to go through the services it provides. The services can be categorized into two parts. The first part, “Web Services” are pre-installed in the HDX 1000. In other words, users can enjoy the benefit of using the out-of-box HDX 1000 to browse some pre-selected video / picture / news sharing websites. The second part of the services will be available when an internal SATA HDD is installed. It includes functions of file transferring and BitTorrent downloading.

Web Services

The “Web Services” are described in the introduction section. The browse-able websites are listed below in four categories. The link to each websites is also provided for preview purpose.



1. Video (21)

• Youtube
• Veoh
• Videocast
• DL.TV
• Cranky Geeks
• Blip.tv
• Podfinder UK
• Vuze
• Break
• Revision3
• The Larry King Podcast
• Anderson Cooper 360 Daily
• The CNN Daily
• In Case You Miss It
• Meet the Press
• NBC Today Show
• CNET TV
• CBS Face the Nation
• NBC Nightly News
• Mevio
• Mediafly
  

2. Audio (8)

• Live365 Radio
• iPodcast
• Radiobox
• ABC News
• BBC Podcast
• CNN News
• Indiefeed
• Jamendo
  

3. Photo (4)

• Flickr
• Picasa
• Pikeo
• 23
  

4. RSS (7)

• Bloglines
• Yahoo! Weather
• Yahoo! Traffic Alerts
• Traffic
• Cinecast
• Yahoo! News
• MSNBC News
  

As of today, Oct 22, 2008, the total number of the browse-able websites via HDX 1000 web services is 40. Syabas is in the process of adding more channels to the list.

HDX 1000 Works as a NAS (Network Attached Storage)

You can setup your HDX-1000 (with the internal SATA HDD installed) as a NAS device and move contents in or out of the HDX 1000 from your PC. The way to do so is shown below:

1. Access the HDX 1000 by IP address.

• Go to your HDX 1000.
• From Root menu page, click on “Setup” at the left-hand-side navigation bar.
• Click on “Network” on the left-hand-side navigation bar.
• You can see the current ip address on the screen.
• Go to your PC. Click on Start\Run in a XP machine and type “ \\(Your HDX 1000 IP address)“. (If you have a Vista machine, please go to Start and type “ \\(Your HDX 1000 IP address)“ at the Start Search Box.)
• Enter the User name and Password, you can login to your HDX 1000 from your PC. (Default user name is “nmt”. Password is “1234”.)
  

2. Map the HDX 1000 as your network drive.

• Right click on the “share” folder. You can see one option as “Map Network Drive”. Left click on that.
• Select the drive label you want to assign to the “share” folder, and click “Finish”.
• The mapped drive should appear in “My Computer” for easy accessing.
  

Access HDX 1000 via FTP Service

When installing the NMT application package on your HDX 1000 Internal SATA HDD (See the procedure here), by default you are adding a ftp server onto it. Later on, you can access HDX 1000’s internal HDD via FTP Service.

You first need to have a ftp client application installed on your PC. I recommend to use FileZilla (download from here). It will make the ftp tasks much easier.

Type the following server / login information into FileZilla site manager, hit connect, you should be able to access to your HDX 1000 now.

• Host: “HDX 1000 IP address”
• Port: 21
• Username: ftpuser
• Password: 1234
  

myiHomeLite Server

When installing the NMT application package on your HDX 1000 Internal SATA HDD (See the procedure here), by default you are adding the myiHomeLite server onto it. You can do two things with this service:

• You can playback content stored in HDX 1000 on your PC. However, I cannot make this function work on my system. Since I usually need to stream the content in the opposite direction, from my PC to my HDX 1000, I don’t care if this function works or not.

• You can upload a torrent file onto HDX 1000 and let the HDX 1000’s built-in BitTorrent application download the file for you. The downloaded file will be stored in the HDX 1000 Internal HDD.
  

The way to access the myiHomeLite server is to open up your browser and type “http://(Your HDX 1000 IP address):8088 in the URL box. You should be able to see the myiHomeLite welcome page display. The rest of the operation is intuitional.

Conclusions

The services listed above have added convenience when using the HDX 1000. I’ve found the NAS service extra helpful in transferring files in to and out of HDX 1000. The BitTorrent downloading service is also a plus. With this service, I can use my HDX-1000 (with internal HDD installed) to perform the download task and leave my PC to rest at night.

As to the web services, I have mixed feelings. The service can definitely do the job and it offers a good variety of channels to see. However, I just don’t like to use the limited buttons on the remote control unit to navigate. Imagine you are using your cell phone key pad to browse the Internet and do any necessary search key-in. This is exactly how it feels. In addition, there is also one thing you need to know when using the HDX 1000 to perform web browsing: on a PC, you will receive a buffering message warning when the PC is retrieving data from Internet; on the HDX 1000, you will just experience a pause during data retrieving. Please go watch the following video clip. You can better understand the scenario. This is not a bad thing, but is something that may take getting used to. Usually, this pause only happens when you first try to load the media.

Read the Part 6 of the HDX 1000 Review - Comparison List

Go to the HDX 1000 Product Page at AmperorDirect.com