I copied a couple of 720p videos to my Galaxy Tab 10.1. The native video player says it can't play them. I tried a couple of other video players that generally do a good job and were able to play them using software decoding, but one had a really poor frame rate, the other ran in super slow motion.
Seems like the hardware isn't up to software decoding HD video and hardware decoding is finicky about formats?
These movies were both mpeg4 video, aac audio in a mp4 container.
When I copied them over it offered to convert them for me, but if I let it do so it seems to be very slow and would take over 9 hours. I'm sure I could do better using handbrake or something similar to recode as necessary.
But can someone summarize the requirements to get hardware accelerated decoding (or sufficiently fast software decoding) of 720p/1080p video?
Thanks.
Did you try Diceplayer and BS Player? Both are available from the Market for free (ad supported) and played all my 720p videos (most were .mkv).
I'd suggest giving them a try (you also have to download the tegra2 plugins for both players).
As for 1080p its a far cry - depending on the specific encoding options it might work fine or be really crappy. Best bet would be to re-encode the 1080p videos you want to watch on your tab, but 720p is usually manageable (and more then enough for our tab, since it's basically the resolution of our screen)
nightmarebadger said:
Did you try Diceplayer and BS Player? Both are available from the Market for free (ad supported) and played all my 720p videos (most were .mkv).
I'd suggest giving them a try (you also have to download the tegra2 plugins for both players).
As for 1080p its a far cry - depending on the specific encoding options it might work fine or be really crappy. Best bet would be to re-encode the 1080p videos you want to watch on your tab, but 720p is usually manageable (and more then enough for our tab, since it's basically the resolution of our screen)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I like how they say the tab can handle 1080p video's, But forgot to mention "it would lag like ****" Youtube apparently get's played in 720p HD whereas getting a 1080p video to play is far from possible, perhaps ICS would make it possible, for now the stock decoders are horrible, HORRIBLE. Use the stock Movie Player/Video and it's like watching Lego or Minecraft graphics. Dice Player Ad is the best out there, and the only video player I use.
Just don't forget to download the Tegra2 plugin with it (Free ofcourse).
Thanks guys. I'll give Dice Player a try and see if it does a better job. I don't usually use 1080p so as long as it can decode 720p smoothly I'd be happy.
From what I've read, it seems that Tegra 2 can't decode Mpeg4 High Profile, which probably explains why the videos I tried don't work well. I'll also try recoding them with standard profile and see if those work. But apparently, most HD video (including commercially downloaded video) is high profile encoded so the fact that the Tegra 2 can't decode those is rather pathetic. I don't want to have to code/recode everything specifically for the tablet so that's rather disappointing...
OK, gave those a try:
BS Player: Slow Motion...
Dice Player: BRILLIANT! Works perfectly!
Thanks for the tip!
tmagritte said:
OK, gave those a try:
BS Player: Slow Motion...
Dice Player: BRILLIANT! Works perfectly!
Thanks for the tip!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hence the name, BS player' It's BS cause they wanna market their stuff and make people pay, Their software acceleration is horrible. Dice player uses HW Accelerator which is why the video's are intensely smooth.
Misledz said:
Hence the name, BS player' It's BS cause they wanna market their stuff and make people pay, Their software acceleration is horrible. Dice player uses HW Accelerator which is why the video's are intensely smooth.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
BS player also uses HW acceleration. In my experience it worked fine with most video - it has some problems in the first few seconds which Dice doesn't (since it doesn't start the video until it's loaded) but after it "warms up" it seems to work just fine for most of the stuff.
BS Player has some nice extra features like LAN mode, automatic subtitle downloading etc. But yeah, Dice player is usually better for playing movies "locally" (I'm using CIFSmanager to mount my media folder over wi-fi).
Every now and then you come across videos that Dice has problems with however, and then BS usually works (once I had a video that played at like double speed in Dice player, while the audio was normal speed. Changing the 1.0x 1.5x etc. speed settings on the right had no effect. BS player helped then ), so I keep both on my device.
nightmarebadger said:
BS player also uses HW acceleration. In my experience it worked fine with most video - it has some problems in the first few seconds which Dice doesn't (since it doesn't start the video until it's loaded) but after it "warms up" it seems to work just fine for most of the stuff.
BS Player has some nice extra features like LAN mode, automatic subtitle downloading etc. But yeah, Dice player is usually better for playing movies "locally" (I'm using CIFSmanager to mount my media folder over wi-fi).
Every now and then you come across videos that Dice has problems with however, and then BS usually works (once I had a video that played at like double speed in Dice player, while the audio was normal speed. Changing the 1.0x 1.5x etc. speed settings on the right had no effect. BS player helped then ), so I keep both on my device.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would love to know how to get CIFSManager to work, Would be epic to sync music folders via Wifi without having to copy/update it often
Misledz said:
I would love to know how to get CIFSManager to work, Would be epic to sync music folders via Wifi without having to copy/update it often
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A simple search: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1468498&highlight=cifs .
Basically, you have to push the cifs.ko module and then insmod it. Some ROMs (like the 3G ICS KANG) have the module included in the appropriate folder, so you can easily just modprobe it (open terminal: write "su" and then "modprobe cifs").
Then you just install CIFSmanager and set it to the appropriate IP/folder (for instance something like 192.168.1.42/Media - this would go to the comp at 192.168.1.42 and try to load up the shared folder with the name "Media").
You'll probably want to set up your router so it always gives the same IP to your media computer, as you don't want to check it's IP and change the settings every time
PS: Using cifsmanager is not without it's downsides though. I've noticed that if I turn off the wi-fi without first unmounting through the manager, the tab freezes (for about half a minute or so) when you try to show the folder containing the networked files. Mind you, I say show, not open - even just trying to see how many files are inside can lock it.
I worked around that by creating a CIFS folder on the root of the "sdcard", then extra folders inside CIFS for each mount. So I have /sdcard/CIFS/XBMC and /sdcard/CIFS/Music. Now I can safely look at my /sdcard folder without my tab freezing up (if I forget to unmount) - but if I try to open the CIFS folder it'll freeze up for a bit, then it'll give me the option to kill my file manager.
So basically, don't put the folder into which you'll mount directly on the root of your sdcard, or it'll become unusable if you forget to unmount
Related
Wondering what app you use to watch movies from sdcard. Built-in app doesn't work. Neither does es file explorer video app.
Sent from my mod'd nookcolor
ethanwinkley said:
Wondering what app you use to watch movies from sdcard. Built-in app doesn't work. Neither does es file explorer video app.
Sent from my mod'd nookcolor
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The built in video app works fine for me, but I prefer RockPlayer.
The built in player also works fine for me. But it really only supports MP4 video files, if I understand correctly. I use Handbrake and the iPod Touch preset to encode for my Nook.
That said, I actually use Act 1 Video Player because it has the nicest 'library' view that groups by folder.
I use yxplayer, no need to encode... plays avi files like a charm.
The built-in player outperforms RockPlayer, which has some audio sync issues.
I use the iPod Touch preset in Handbrake, but I bump the resolution up to 720 x ???, turn off Anamorphic, and set a constant video bitrate of 800kbps and an audio bitrate of 80kbps.
Works well for me. Speed Racer looks gorgeous on this screen.
from my very very few experiments, i concluded that once videos are converted to mp4 (h.264 / AAC) any player is the same (uses the hardware decoding).
with videos in different formats its likely that there will be problems
i agree with nooter on using handbrake's iphone preset modifying the bitrate setting it around 800kbps (for animated movies it can be lower 600kbps should be ok). About altering the size of the movie, only for reducing it (remember the max lines in landscape is 600)
rock player works if u have the latest universal player but you need to install add block because even if you pay for it you cannot activate it
I've found that all the players avail still play back xvid/divx avi's really choppy, going to have to give handbrake a try to take advantage of the hardware decoder...
I was just able to install vplayer from the market (a few days ago it wouldn't install)... some audio sync issues but there are some cache parameters to tweak... anybody had any luck?
Kokanee483 said:
I've found that all the players avail still play back xvid/divx avi's really choppy, going to have to give handbrake a try to take advantage of the hardware decoder...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same experience with playing divx/xvid files, choppy sound and 21-24fps video playback. Take that same video and run it through handbrake to convert to .mp4 and it runs great.
Where is the built in video player located? I cannot seem to find it anywhere..
I agreed with vplayer beta from the market place. It's free. It'll play most video formats. I've tested 480p and 720p mkv and both play with high speed setting. 720p mkv video is slow but 480p play fine. It's great with cifsmanager and mounted shared videos.
Nooter said:
The built-in player outperforms RockPlayer, which has some audio sync issues.
I use the iPod Touch preset in Handbrake, but I bump the resolution up to 720 x ???, turn off Anamorphic, and set a constant video bitrate of 800kbps and an audio bitrate of 80kbps.
Works well for me. Speed Racer looks gorgeous on this screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So, what filetype does that create? What is the Extension? MP4 or M4V? Also, are there any other settings, other than the ones listed above that you use?
I am asking these questions because I am having issues with movies encoded this way playing in the default player. It doesn't recognize the video, so it will not play.
Also, VPlayer plays them, but there is a definite audio lag once you forward to about mid-movie.
Also, as an aside, I am converting ISO files (Direct DVD rips) using HandBrake. That is how I am generating these files. I do change the extension to mp4 from handbrakes default (m4v i think).
Thanks for any help.
J
sano614 said:
Where is the built in video player located? I cannot seem to find it anywhere..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is no shortcut in the App drawer (or Gallery) for the stock video player....I just click the video file (in whatever file manager you use or the Nook Library My Files tab).
Personally I use Act 1 Video player as it will present a list of videos on the SD card and Nook. Although for some reason it list videos on the Nook twice.
Sent from my Nooxus One using Tapatalk
The Act 1 app seems to be the only one that can properly sort videos. I tried the trial version, and it seems to work great, but as intuitive as the in-video touch areas may seem, I just can't get my brain dialed in to use them in practice. I think the built-in NC player works just fine, it's the video file/folder sorting that's nearly impossible to navigate once you have 20 or 30 vids on there along with a few thousand photos.
The media sorting options on Android are surprising lacking, or I just can't seem to find methods to deal with 32 gigabytes of media on this device.
I just did a bunch of conversions from some 720p MKV's. I converted them using Xilisoft video converter.
The settings I used were:
720x420
800k bitrate
44.1khz 128kbps audio
H.264 codec MP4 extension
Plays flawlessly with Rockplayer. No desync on fastforward.
The Built in player IS the best
After many attempts and reboots, I have determined that the Built-in Media player is the best player for videos encoded as specified earlier in this thread...
I tried Rock, and VPlayer beta, but both had very bad audio sync issues.
The Built-in player played all my encoded videos flawlessly. The wife LOVED watching Salt on the Nook during our road-trip. The only downside is the audio on the nook--hardly any volume. Easily solved by a good set of earphones. We are very pleased with the nook.
J
Check out mVideoPlayer. I haven't tried it on the Nook, but its perfect on my Galaxy S phone.
As for encoding, go with handbrake. Choose the Apple TV preset. Set resolution to custom and width to 800 (handbrake should automatically choose the correct height based on asperity ratio of source material). Set the video quality to constant at 60% (70% is the max you want for HDTV). Under audio, select the appropriate track and select aac with Prologic II or stereo as the encoding. Use the MP4 extension as to avoid issues with different t players.
You can get way more detailed on settings beyond that. It just depends on the material and the playback device. Those settings should get you outstanding video on the Nook. May have to scale back a little if the video is choppy.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using XDA App
After much trial and error, I have to agree with previous poster who said the best player is the built-in player with mp4 files created with the settings mentioned. The other players all had issues with controls and added nothing if the file was formatted as described.
I also had a lot of trouble getting any player to play any file at first. I think installing some of the other players added some necessary codecs. Then after a reboot, everything started to work. Hope that helps someone else avoid some frustration.
Despite a few trials like this, I love this tablet! Thank you xda devs!
Sent from my rooted Nook Color using XDA App
I'm running the free version of Rock Player. It's not exactly the cheapest app out there on the Android market, but if it works well, not a big deal.
Whenever I choose an mp4 video that I've encoded at 848x360, for example, Rock Player seems to default the widescreen video to this resolution, assuming the Nook Color scaled resolution is 1024x600, which means that a high quality widescreen rip at the smaller resolution will default launch with black bars around all 4 edges.
I noticed that the video display resizing has 3 modes,
(1) the default mode as mentioned above
(2) zoomed mode which fills the whole screen, stretching as required
(3) scaled mode which allows the widescreen video to stretch to the left and right edges properly, while maintaining a proper aspect ratio.
So the simple question is, how do I configure Rock Player to default launch video files in the mode (3) mentioned above?
I've had a look around and this issue has been brought up a few times, but then just brushed over without a concrete answer.
I have a few MKVs that I want to play on my phone, but that don't have sound.
I've tried with the stock player and with Mplayer.
I've spent the last few hours googling how to convert MKVs to AVIs and whatnot and tried a few times all unsuccessful.
I don't really want to covert them anyway, they all work fine, just not on the phone.
The video plays smoothly, and subtitles show up if it has them, just no sound.
How can I fix this?
OGG Vorbis audio track? Try Moboplayer. I just found out it'll read and play it, subs included.
That's what I'm using, Moboplayer and the stock player.
No sound from either.
I just noticed Moboplayer has a bunc of codecs in the market, do I need to install one of them? Which one?
well i have sound with stock player and mkv.... what sound is it ? DTS, DD ?
i use Vplayer, works fine for me. shows picture sound and subs
SuperTheMando said:
I've had a look around and this issue has been brought up a few times, but then just brushed over without a concrete answer.
I have a few MKVs that I want to play on my phone, but that don't have sound.
I've tried with the stock player and with Mplayer.
I've spent the last few hours googling how to convert MKVs to AVIs and whatnot and tried a few times all unsuccessful.
I don't really want to covert them anyway, they all work fine, just not on the phone.
The video plays smoothly, and subtitles show up if it has them, just no sound.
How can I fix this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most mkv's contain an ac3 soundtrack.
The SII doesn't like that.
I convert mkv's to mp4 now with avidemux.
With these settings:
- video: copy
- audio: AAC
Works like a charm!
Edit: it's a 'cheap' conversion, it goes very fast because only the audio track is converted.
SuperTheMando said:
I just noticed Moboplayer has a bunc of codecs in the market, do I need to install one of them? Which one?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The Mobo Player app should have an option to point you to the correct codec.
If you don't install the codec then it will only play the same formats as the stock video player.
I use mVideoPlayer, works fine for all of mine.
But I think DicePlayer has the best support for audio codecs, though it's only free for a trial period and doesn't support embedded subs (AFAIK).
I have these installed permanently as one of them usually does the job, I usually try stock first followed by mobo, then rock with Act1 and QQ as backups.
Dice is probably the best but isnt free.
Dice
mobo
rockplayer
act1
qq player
I have tried pretty much all other players, honestly dont waste your time or money on any of the others.
EDIT - sorry I forgot, since moving to this Phone I hace scrapped qq for everything and rock for HD stuff as it doesnt seem to decode as well as stock or mobo, always try stock first.
On my GS2 I do not see any option Mobo Player to point me to the correct codec, any clue?
MyrddinLXXIIX said:
Most mkv's contain an ac3 soundtrack.
The SII doesn't like that.
I convert mkv's to mp4 now with avidemux.
With these settings:
- video: copy
- audio: AAC
Works like a charm!
Edit: it's a 'cheap' conversion, it goes very fast because only the audio track is converted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I like this idea best, it means I can play through the stock player, so I don't need to have unnecessary apps. I do like the stock player.
Is there any quality loss when doing this?
Will embedded subtitles carry over?
Edit: I just tried this, and the file it pushed out had a really low framerate. I could see jaggeddyness in frames.
Mobo is good. it's free.
Mobo's ffmpeg codec support almost all codecs.
but ffmpeg sw codec use CPU more than HW codec.
when playing 720p H.264+DTS mkv. mobo ( or rock ... ) sw codec use almost 100% CPU power.
Stock Player and DicePlayer use only 20-40% of CPU power. ( Audio codec use cpu.. )
SW codec players use lossy color convert and resize routine.
dithering or color loss will occur. ( you can see when playing dark scene )
HW Codec's Pros.
1. Performance ( Can Play 1080p )
2. Battery
3. image quality
Cons.
1. Codec compatibility ( but SGS2's HW codec is AWESOME. )
2. not supported codecs ( RMVB, VP6/7.. )
** dice player 1.1.2 add mkv embedded subs.
SuperTheMando said:
I like this idea best, it means I can play through the stock player, so I don't need to have unnecessary apps. I do like the stock player.
Is there any quality loss when doing this?
Will embedded subtitles carry over?
Edit: I just tried this, and the file it pushed out had a really low framerate. I could see jaggeddyness in frames.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Generally I get good results, but haven't tried it with movies yet.
Only 720p series with 25fps, no subtitles.
Back at my desktop tonight I will try a movie with subs.
The file I tried was a movie, 720p, no subs.
I don't know what it's framerate was, but it's pretty damn high. It looks seamless.
When I tried loading it with the app, I got this error. Maybe it is actually important and not to be overlooked?
I answered no.
SuperTheMando said:
The file I tried was a movie, 720p, no subs.
I don't know what it's framerate was, but it's pretty damn high. It looks seamless.
When I tried loading it with the app, I got this error. Maybe it is actually important and not to be overlooked?
I answered no.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I answered no every time without much problems. Forwarding in the stock player seems a little slow sometimes but that might be normal.
25 is pretty standard for series I believe.
Converting gives the advantage of hardware acceleration and I do not want to loose that.
MyrddinLXXIIX said:
I answered no every time without much problems. Forwarding in the stock player seems a little slow sometimes but that might be normal.
25 is pretty standard for series I believe.
Converting gives the advantage of hardware acceleration and I do not want to loose that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Diceplayer give you hw acceleration without converting.
As promised...
Promised a follow-up with an mkv with subtitles.
I must admit I didn't get it to work yet.
Unclear to me if it is even possible, I found some info that the stock player will accept separate subtitles like .srt but I have not confirmed that yet.
Ran across another problem that put me off track.
Tried a conversion to mp4 with a movie but didn't think about the size restrictions.
Could not connect in Storage mode for some reason, so I tried to use SD-cards / usb-otg. No succes with 4 Gig+ files yet ~ using windows which has exFAT and NTFS, neither is working.
Possibly there is a filesystem that will do the job on Win7 and Android 2.3.3?
My research tells me that exFAT is not really available for Android, too tired atm to look for alternatives from the Win side.
Like USB-OTG very much, would like a way to get 4G+ files to my SII that way!
As I said, got sidetracked seriously ~ apologies if I got too far offtopic.
Hi, I just tried to play a ripped copy of a 720p bluray video, and realized that this laggs pretty bad when trying to do this. I am currious if there would be a way to play 720p on these, I know archos can. I have tried several apps, all of them lagging, even tried overclocking. Google don't turn up much.
Maybe it's because your using a blueray video?
Use matroska format.
________________________________
~ Sent from iOS/Android device
iJimaniac said:
Hi, I just tried to play a ripped copy of a 720p bluray video, and realized that this laggs pretty bad when trying to do this. I am currious if there would be a way to play 720p on these, I know archos can. I have tried several apps, all of them lagging, even tried overclocking. Google don't turn up much.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have lags too! I've tried every player.
It seems hardware acceleration doesn't work on mkv files.
tapioco2000 said:
I have lags too! I've tried every player.
It seems hardware acceleration doesn't work on mkv files.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I actually am using an mp4 file but I think we have the same general problem.
If you are rooted, you can try editing /system/build.prop. Open it with text editor in root explorer and add "video.accelerate.hw=1" without quotes to it (make sure you back up the original file first!). That line is supposed to let the GPU render videos. Reboot your device, and see if video playback is any better. Also, there are many other build.prop tweaks that you can use found here:
http://www.freeyourandroid.com/guide/build-prop-modifications
and here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1227269
I use MX Player, easy to see whether GPU acceleration is working in that program. It has a lot of other nice features too, recommended in general.
The Wifi-5 plays the 720p trailer files I've tried without lag. Sometimes a few home-made files may seem to lag, but this is more likely to be due to incompatibility/ non-standard compression codecs than a lack of power. It doesn't seem to have problems with high-profile files or high bitrates in general. This is under Froyo, by the way.
onurdndar said:
I use MX Player, easy to see whether GPU acceleration is working in that program. It has a lot of other nice features too, recommended in general.
The Wifi-5 plays the 720p trailer files I've tried without lag. Sometimes a few home-made files may seem to lag, but this is more likely to be due to incompatibility/ non-standard compression codecs than a lack of power. It doesn't seem to have problems with high-profile files or high bitrates in general. This is under Froyo, by the way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Let's try the famous mkv test file "Killa sampla" posted on XBMC forum.
MX fails! It says "hardware acceleration not supported"! And other players too!
tapioco2000 said:
Let's try the famous mkv test file "Killa sampla" posted on XBMC forum.
MX fails! It says "hardware acceleration not supported"! And other players too!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which version of Killa Sample? Hopefully not the 1080p, that's obviously not supported. Even if it's a 720p version, it's way overkill.
klin1344 said:
If you are rooted, you can try editing /system/build.prop. Open it with text editor in root explorer and add "video.accelerate.hw=1" without quotes to it (make sure you back up the original file first!). That line is supposed to let the GPU render videos. Reboot your device, and see if video playback is any better. Also, there are many other build.prop tweaks that you can use found here:
http://www.freeyourandroid.com/guide/build-prop-modifications
and here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1227269
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the tip, I tried it, then used Mx video player with hw rendering, but it still lags. My next mission is converting to 480p, witch is the actual resolution of this screen.
Two possibilities are either:
1) Resolution is too high or
2) Device can handle the resolution but not the H.264 profile used for the video
Samsung Galaxy Player 5 won't play m4v files
I have several files loaded onto my Droid 3 that play fine. But, when I load them onto my Samsung Galaxy Player 5, I get the error message: "Cannot play video, sorry, this video cannot be played". What format do I need to use for the Samsung Galaxy Player 5 to get the videos to play? I have tried MP4, WMV, M4V, etc...
iJimaniac said:
Hi, I just tried to play a ripped copy of a 720p bluray video, and realized that this laggs pretty bad when trying to do this. I am currious if there would be a way to play 720p on these, I know archos can. I have tried several apps, all of them lagging, even tried overclocking. Google don't turn up much.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
my 4.0 plays 720p and 1080p without lags, the formats I use are wmv avi and mp4. Maybe its audio coding my player can't play AC3
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA
no AC3 audio is perfectly fine, its definitely the container. google Handbrake and DL it, its the greatest encoder I've ever used. Sure there is a slight learning curve but once you know how to use it your 720p videos will play flawlessly on your preferred video app (imo mx player is the best one out there)
{EDIT}
It appears there is an audio issue with RockPlayer and Hardware Decoding on our device. After contacting the developers, they will be releasing a version with SW audio support while using hardware for video to fix this. Expected within one month. Post will be updated once released.
DicePlayer has been recommended as an alternative as it has HW decode and native SAMBA support, however it does not appear to handle hardware decoding for as many formats as RockPlayer (watch for SW in the upper left).
{/EDIT}
Hi all,
While going through the Accessory Guide post (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1377669) I realized there was an odd recommendation on video playback using Emit Free. With our devices there is no need for transcoding like you would have to do on an iPad, but it's still not "easy" to get full 1080P playback over the network.
With root, you can install cifs drivers that are pretty efficient, but without it, many times video stutters. I tested a large combination of File Managers that mounted CIFS/SAMBA shares and Video Players to see which performed best.
From File Manager HD and Astro to MXPlayer and XYPlayer nearly all of them had stuttering issues with 1080P video, and lag when seeking in 720P video. Below is where I ended up, which entailed perfect 1080P playback, with zero lag when seeking (tested on high bitrate MKV and AVI w/ AC3 and DTS audio samples).
1. Install ES File Explorer: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.estrongs.android.pop
ES File Explorer is a file manager that supports CIFS/SAMBA mounts (these are the shared folders on your Windows, Mac, or Linux PC). Once open, swipe right to access the network shares. I recommend turning on "Detail" mode in the settings, so you can see file sizes and permissions, too. The advantage of ES File Explorer over other managers I tried is that the CIFS implementation has been optimized very well, and was the best at streaming the file data to the video player from a speed and bandwidth perspective.
2. Install RockPlayer Lite: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.redirectin.rockplayer.android.unified.lite
RockPlayer is a great player that includes hardware acceleration, much like MXPlayer. The difference here is that like ES File Explorer, RockPlayer seems better optimized for network file handling. With other players in combination with ES File Explorer, there were still lag issues during seek. RockPlayer has none of these issues.
Be sure to enable HW acceleration in Rockplayer
Also ensure app mode is set to "stretched" instead of "zoomed"
Any questions, or other options, feel free to post below.
If this guide was helpful, please click Thanks below instead of replying to keep the thread clean.
Thanks!
Ben
i tried your suggestion.
yeah it gets rid of the lag but:
- there is no sound for most of my hd mkv videos
- subtitles dont show for mkv files
nice to see that the tfp actually does have the power to play these smoothly though!
I have been using ES File explorer and it does help with the streaming. However, I have not gotten a streaming video to play thru the whole movie/show. Seems every 10 or 30mins (differs), it will quit playing. I've tried the same setup on my Galaxy Nexus and don't have issues. I guess I can try Rock Player. I guess no one else has this issue? I've seen it mentioned once or twice while reading the boards but no answers. I thought maybe it was on my end and somehow the wifi was dropping, but if it is...its not displaying it.
I use dice player. It has native ability to open network shares and plays HD MKV files over wifi without lag or stutter.
r0ck0 said:
I use dice player. It has native ability to open network shares and plays HD MKV files over wifi without lag or stutter.
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can it transcode dts audio or any multichannel audio? any program i have tried plays fine but there is no audio
tried it , unfortunally no sound on most of my mkv's.
Dice player does a better job, way more codecs supported and equal network performance, rockplayer seems to build up a bigger buffer, at the beginning it may look like its more stable but after a while both are laging .. (high profile 1080)
what's up with all the lagging ? wifi performance not good enough or is the SOC not capable of streaming and decoding all at once? no problems from sdcard ..
knives of ice said:
can it transcode dts audio or any multichannel audio? any program i have tried plays fine but there is no audio
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Dice player works great with mkv movies with DTS and AC3 audio on my TF201. Dice player is the best way to stream movie using a NAS Imo.
tested with dlink dns-323 and stock tf201.
Tempie007 said:
tried it , unfortunally no sound on most of my mkv's.
Dice player does a better job, way more codecs supported and equal network performance, rockplayer seems to build up a bigger buffer, at the beginning it may look like its more stable but after a while both are laging .. (high profile 1080)
what's up with all the lagging ? wifi performance not good enough or is the SOC not capable of streaming and decoding all at once? no problems from sdcard ..
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Click to collapse
Wifi performance is the issue for me. If i'm sitting next to the router 1080p plays fine. If I go to other rooms(even adjacent rooms) then it will stutter periodically. It really impairs one of the primary uses that I wanted the Transformer Prime for. As of now I use Plex to transcode to a smaller bitrate
Tempie007 said:
tried it , unfortunally no sound on most of my mkv's.
Dice player does a better job, way more codecs supported and equal network performance, rockplayer seems to build up a bigger buffer, at the beginning it may look like its more stable but after a while both are laging .. (high profile 1080)
what's up with all the lagging ? wifi performance not good enough or is the SOC not capable of streaming and decoding all at once? no problems from sdcard ..
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Click to collapse
Interesting, I've had the exact opposite impressions with Rockplayer having more HW decoding support. In any event, I'm stupid for not testing audio.
I've updated the first post based on discussions with the developers of Rockplayer, and will do a re-work of this guide focusing on both solutions once it is released and we can test.
Thanks,
Ben
I haven't tried Rockplayer. However, I get excellent results with Diceplayer. I stream all 720p and most 1080p .mkv using estrongs file explorer. Some 1080p will get lag. Just depends on the bit rate your 1080p video is encoded at, and your WIFI connection speed.
I actually just run an entire home PC with Win 7 Ultimate on it for my movie collection. I just RJ45 it right to my Wireless router. That way I can stream all of my movies to any device in my home. I have quite a few WDTV lives hooked up to all my tv's in my house. So it works out great.
Plus once in awhile If a 1080p video isn't playing well on my prime. I convert it using airvideo. I have airvideo server running on the Win 7 server. (those that have an ipad 2 that is) Have this option. You simply load airvideo on your ipad 2. Select the .mkv you want to convert to .m4v and add it to quere. Airvideo has all the conversion and bitrate methods built in the program. So I don't have to mess with jumping on Win 7 machine. Loading a conversion program and blah blah. I have yet to find an Android program that compares to Airvideo. If someone has suggestion let me know. (Yes, I have tried PLEX). Just can't beat the Live Conversion and simple conversion in Airvideo.
lollee76 said:
I have been using ES File explorer and it does help with the streaming. However, I have not gotten a streaming video to play thru the whole movie/show. Seems every 10 or 30mins (differs), it will quit playing. I've tried the same setup on my Galaxy Nexus and don't have issues. I guess I can try Rock Player. I guess no one else has this issue? I've seen it mentioned once or twice while reading the boards but no answers. I thought maybe it was on my end and somehow the wifi was dropping, but if it is...its not displaying it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah i get the same thing happening to me randomly.
Using mx player and es file explorer, maybe 15 or 20 mins into watching, the player will just quit by itself. Doesnt happen always though, maybe twice for every 5 vids i play.
Erusman said:
I haven't tried Rockplayer. However, I get excellent results with Diceplayer. I stream all 720p and most 1080p .mkv using estrongs file explorer. Some 1080p will get lag. Just depends on the bit rate your 1080p video is encoded at, and your WIFI connection speed.
I actually just run an entire home PC with Win 7 Ultimate on it for my movie collection. I just RJ45 it right to my Wireless router. That way I can stream all of my movies to any device in my home. I have quite a few WDTV lives hooked up to all my tv's in my house. So it works out great.
Plus once in awhile If a 1080p video isn't playing well on my prime. I convert it using airvideo. I have airvideo server running on the Win 7 server. (those that have an ipad 2 that is) Have this option. You simply load airvideo on your ipad 2. Select the .mkv you want to convert to .m4v and add it to quere. Airvideo has all the conversion and bitrate methods built in the program. So I don't have to mess with jumping on Win 7 machine. Loading a conversion program and blah blah. I have yet to find an Android program that compares to Airvideo. If someone has suggestion let me know. (Yes, I have tried PLEX). Just can't beat the Live Conversion and simple conversion in Airvideo.
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I'm amazed you think going through all that is better than PLEX. With PLEX you just load the app and select the movie... Done. For bonus it also works when you're away from home and want to watch a movie even tethered through 3G
dalingrin said:
I'm amazed you think going through all that is better than PLEX. With PLEX you just load the app and select the movie... Done. For bonus it also works when you're away from home and want to watch a movie even tethered through 3G
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Well, I will try Plex again. I haven't tried it in awhile. Alot of movies I don't have any problem with. Its only the high bit rate 1080p mkv's. I know Plex does Live conversion as well. Perhaps they have improved it since I last used it. One feature i did think was cool with plex was how it catagorized your movie collection for you.
Erusman said:
Well, I will try Plex again. I haven't tried it in awhile. Alot of movies I don't have any problem with. Its only the high bit rate 1080p mkv's. I know Plex does Live conversion as well. Perhaps they have improved it since I last used it. One feature i did think was cool with plex was how it catagorized your movie collection for you.
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Click to collapse
Another nice thing about Plex is that you can choose not to do live transcoding and just stream the original video(silly wifi bandwidth allowing). But, that does bring me to my one complaint about Plex. You cannot directly stream the original video if it is mkv, it will always transcode.
In my experience:
If you want to avoid transcoding, then rooting + CIFS support really is the best, most efficient way, imho...plus, you're killing multiple birds with one stone, as file types not recognized by ES or other file explorers that support SAMBA, but which are supported by various apps on your tablet, will still work with whatever app you're using to interact with them.
Otherwise, this guide is good for playback without transcoding for some files. I'm able to stream some of my bluray and HD DVD rips (full bitrate mkv's with no down-sampling, de-rezzing, additional compression or detail removal) without transcoding, but high-bitrate titles such as The Empire Strikes Back hitch frequently. Don't know if that's a limitation of my wireless setup, tho).
On the transcoding side:
Emit free works fine. It's a little easier, imho, to set up remote file sharing that even Plex is, if you have to set up port forwarding manually on your router, as the instructions are pretty explicit about which ports it's using and how to get it set up. And, it's free.
Plex works fine, and cross-compatibility between Ipad and Android on the Plex server side, along with the cataloging, support for file types such as .wtv, and the channels concept, is pretty damn cool imho. You have to look around if your setup falls outside the norm as far as port forwarding manually is concerned, but if you don't experience issues, getting set up with a myPlex account for remote streaming is pretty straightforward. Transcoding looks pretty stellar if you can support anything above 4 mbps on your wireless, and it doesn't take a lot of CPU horsepower to do live streaming, either. I have an older AMD processor in my HTPC, and I stream 1080i .wtv files all day long to both my Prime and my wife's Ipad with no or extremely little stutter, and all my bluray rips play without issue. .WTV files can be played back while they're being recorded, and while watching something else on the HTPC, too...oh, and combine this with a Windows Media Center control app, and you can basically watch live tv on the Prime...just browse the guide, set a show to record, and you can watch it almost immediately in Plex, while it's recording.
Last, but not least, Splashtop THD or whatever the newer version is, actually works pretty damn well on my office rig, which is nvidia-equipped. .wtv files work as well, but you have to set your machine to open them by default in WMP instead of Windows Media Center.
I have lots of movies in .mkv format with .srt subtitles.
Can you recommend a free Windows program that can convert these into one package that my S3 can play?
setspeed said:
I have lots of movies in .mkv format with .srt subtitles.
Can you recommend a free Windows program that can convert these into one package that my S3 can play?
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Click to collapse
instead of converting you can try using mx video player from market, it has support for all types of subtitles
That's a good idea, and I will probably go with that - however at the moment I'm wanting to show off the features of my new phone to work colleagues, and popup play (although it's a gimmick) seems to impress! So I want to use the standard built in video player for that reason
Any suggestions? Is it even possible to combins .mkv & .srt into one file? I'm pretty ignorant when it comes to audiovisual stuff :-D
setspeed said:
That's a good idea, and I will probably go with that - however at the moment I'm wanting to show off the features of my new phone to work colleagues, and popup play (although it's a gimmick) seems to impress! So I want to use the standard built in video player for that reason
Any suggestions? Is it even possible to combins .mkv & .srt into one file? I'm pretty ignorant when it comes to audiovisual stuff :-D
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Click to collapse
hmm, here you go
http://www.videohelp.com/tools/MKVtoolnix
guide
bala_gamer said:
hmm, here you go
http://www.videohelp.com/tools/MKVtoolnix
guide
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Click to collapse
I tried using that and it seemed to be doing the job ok - (using the associated program MKVExtractGUI) it allows you to select the elements of video/sound/subs you want.
However the H264 file it spat out at the end won't play properly in VLC on my computer - it's jerky, jumping up and down from about 8 frames per second to 25fps and back again, lots of artifacts, and no sound or subtitles (despite me selecting those elements to be included).
If it barely plays in VLC on my laptop I doubt it's going to play on my phone...
Any more ideas?
Have you tried using the stock video player? It plays MKVs and subtitles out the box.
I tried that, that would be ideal - but it didn't play the mkv files i gave it. I'll try a couple of others and report back...
Ok well I've just found the first chink in this phone's armour:
It's very fussy about the .mkv files it will play.
It outright refuses some. Others it will play the video but no audio. Some it will play perfectly, unless you try and activate subtitles under the settings menu, in which case it craps out, freezes, and gives me a "this video cannot be played message." Even if I do manage to get it to play subtitles along with the video and audio, it's well out of sync - like minutes out of sync....
setspeed said:
Ok well I've just found the first chink in this phone's armour:
It's very fussy about the .mkv files it will play.
It outright refuses some. Others it will play the video but no audio. Some it will play perfectly, unless you try and activate subtitles under the settings menu, in which case it craps out, freezes, and gives me a "this video cannot be played message." Even if I do manage to get it to play subtitles along with the video and audio, it's well out of sync - like minutes out of sync....
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Click to collapse
Well if you do have to end up re-encoding your videos, try out Format Factory. It's free and has a ton of options.
I would suggest using MP4 and 'burning in' the subtitles. If you can't understand the the language you might as well have them a part of the video.
Thanks, I'll give that a try