What's the "smoothest" way to stream movie files to TV?

[gorcorps]

By smoothest I don't mean just the video itself, I'm also concerned about the UI. Right now I have a logitech Revue running the Plex app. The Plex app just uses my home PC to stream video to my TV. It works well except the interface is dog slow and all around terrible. I'm not sure if this is a limitation of the app, the Revue hardware, or what but it makes life more difficult than it should be.

So my question is, what is the best way to play my HD and SD movies on my TV as I slowly make my collection fully digital? I'm aware of XBMC, but I don't want to build another mini-PC just for that if I can help it. That wouldn't be as cheap. I'm hoping that may be something else out there that does what Plex is trying to do, but a little slicker. There are Roku, Boxee, etc type boxes out there but I don't know how they handle all of the HD formats and such... or if their UI is decent.

So, what's everybody using and what do they like about it?

 

[notposting]

I've been looking and haven't found the "perfect" box yet, which in my world would include Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon streaming, and good local network streaming (including deciphering DVD movie rips in folder format). You could see how well the PS3 handles what you have though.

 

[mmntech]

If you don't like Plex, you won't like XMBC. Plex is a derivative of it. I haven't used Roku or Boxee but I've heard positive things about them. Apple TV has a very smooth and intuitive interface and handles 1080p now. When it gets jailbroken, it will become quite a powerful tool.

In my case, I need something that can do proxies that allow me to watch US services like Hulu. Don't know if any set top boxes allow that. Most likely not. So HTPC is what I'm limited to.

 

[shortylickens]

Gigabit LAN, 4TB NAS.

 

[Brazuka]

Im thinking about getting the Panasonic BDT320 Bluray player but i cant find definitive reviews on its lan streaming capabilities, any toughs on that one?

 

[gorcorps]

If you don't like Plex, you won't like XMBC. Plex is a derivative of it. I haven't used Roku or Boxee but I've heard positive things about them. Apple TV has a very smooth and intuitive interface and handles 1080p now. When it gets jailbroken, it will become quite a powerful tool.

In my case, I need something that can do proxies that allow me to watch US services like Hulu. Don't know if any set top boxes allow that. Most likely not. So HTPC is what I'm limited to.

Well maybe it's just the Google TV version of plex I don't like. I was playing around with xbmc and liked how smooth everything was compared to Plex on my revue.

I also installed the boxee PC program and liked that as well. Looks like they have stand alone boxes too, so that might be my best bet.

edit: Yes, the desktop version of Plex is great. The version on the Revue is terrible. Might be looking into making a HTPC now.

 

[Dirigible]

I gave up on streaming boxes a while back. Htpc is more expensive but the only thing I know of that will work the way I want. Ive got three tv's and three htpc's, the slowest of which is running an i5-750.

 

[inabag]

iTunes + AppleTV works great for me.

Use Handbrake for your own video.

 

[gorcorps]

iTunes + AppleTV works great for me.

Use Handbrake for your own video.

No

Selling my iPhone and uninstalling iTunes was one of the happiest days of my life. Never again...

 

[dagamer34]

There is no easy solution otherwise we would have all instantly recommended it to you. We have to know the format of your files, where they are stored, and what UIs you are willing to put up with. Things change with time as well. At one point, I ripped all 130 of my Blu-ray movies only to realize that a) I never actually watched any of the ripped copies and b) my PS3 is a far better Blu-ray player than any PC software I've used (it does 3D easily and correctly).

"Perfect is the enemy of good" - Voltaire

 

[Rio Rebel]

I have been waiting literally years for something to play .iso files (including bluray), AND have a user friendly interface. I have given up on that. The Asus O!play will play anything, but the interface makes you work to find anything.

I now rip to iso, then use batchencoder with handbrake. Very simple, lots of control, set it and walk away and return to a folder full of mkv or mp4 files.

 

[gorcorps]

There is no easy solution otherwise we would have all instantly recommended it to you. We have to know the format of your files, where they are stored, and what UIs you are willing to put up with. Things change with time as well. At one point, I ripped all 130 of my Blu-ray movies only to realize that a) I never actually watched any of the ripped copies and b) my PS3 is a far better Blu-ray player than any PC software I've used (it does 3D easily and correctly).

"Perfect is the enemy of good" - Voltaire

I agree that things change. Right now my big thing is that I only watch digital content. I'm not a big fan of disc swapping and having my entire collection easily searchable on a drive is what I'm after here.

File format wise I have standard avis I rip my SD stuff to, or MKVs I rip my HD stuff to. It shouldn't vary too much from these. I also watch a lot of Netflix. As of now I have no desire to watch 3D movies or own a 3D display. I even got rid of my 3D PC monitor because it wasn't worth the drawbacks.

Drive wise, right now I just have a 2TB external drive plugged into the PC. I have a decent router which would allow me to use this drive as a NAS drive so that should work fine. Everything is close enough together so that whatever box/HTPC I get will be hardwired to the router. No need for wifi.

I've trialed a bunch of the HTPC sofware and I like most of them. Plex on the PC is fine, and nothing like the clunky POS it is on google TV. Boxee and XBMC are also quite nice, but they're all built around XBMC as I understand it. So I'm leaning towards building my own HTPC right now, but the D-link Boxees don't look bad either. Even though I don't bother now, I'm considering getting a TV tuner as well. I don't have fancy cable right now but being able to have a Tivo-like system on the cable I do have would be nice.

 

[Charlie98]

I agree that things change. Right now my big thing is that I only watch digital content. I'm not a big fan of disc swapping and having my entire collection easily searchable on a drive is what I'm after here.

You have the same reason I'm building a HTPC... I just want something I can source all my DVD's from and run Netflix. I'm slowly gathering parts as they come on sale, etc.

I have sort of the same question, only related to an HTPC... what is the best UI for that situation? I figured W7 (I'm familiar with it, at least) but got to thinking... how am I going to navigate when I'm parked in the recliner... a keyboard and mouse?

 

[Binky]

Win7 + Media Browser

With Win7 MCE, you can pin things like XBMC (if needed), Hulu, PowerDVD/TmT, and Netflix right to the main "strip" (the remote control menu). They are easily accessed with just the remote.

You may still have issues with certain file formats, requiring you to open windows explorer. These issues can usually be fixed but you have to know how. Out of the box with basic codec configuration it should play nearly everything. If you rip all of your own media, you can make it 100% keyboard free. A very minimal system like a g530 on an H61/H67 board will work great.

Other fun stuff to look up: sickbeard, couch potato, sabnzbd, media center master.

 

[poofyhairguy]

I vote for XBMC. With the new release it is a step above. Put it on some AppleTVs if you don't want to build comps.

 

[gorcorps]

Ok, I think I'm sold on building an HTPC then. I just bought a 128gig SSD so the 64gig it's replacing will be a perfect system drive. I've also migrated my external drive from my desktop PC to my router to make sure the NAS mode works.

I'll probably get one of the i3's and utilize the built in video. Probably stick it in this case:
http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Fr...g_bs_572238_86

 

[Charlie98]

Ok, I think I'm sold on building an HTPC then. I just bought a 128gig SSD so the 64gig it's replacing will be a perfect system drive. I've also migrated my external drive from my desktop PC to my router to make sure the NAS mode works.

I'll probably get one of the i3's and utilize the built in video. Probably stick it in this case:
http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Fr...g_bs_572238_86

I'll be upgrading my 60GB SSD in my main rig and using that for the OS drive in my HTPC.

I actually went out and got an Intel G620 last weekend as the CPU for my HTPC, I had posted a 'which processor for HTPC' question a few months ago and that was pretty much the consensus... enough muscle to encode but fairly low power consumption and heat. I considered an i3 (and even an AMD APU chip,) but I got the G620 at MicroCenter for $50... can't beat that. The base Intel graphics are supposed to be adequate for HTPC playback.

 

[Rio Rebel]

Ok, I think I'm sold on building an HTPC then. I just bought a 128gig SSD so the 64gig it's replacing will be a perfect system drive. I've also migrated my external drive from my desktop PC to my router to make sure the NAS mode works.

I'll probably get one of the i3's and utilize the built in video. Probably stick it in this case:
http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-Fr...g_bs_572238_86

I went with this case:
http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-LC13B-E-Aluminum-Steel-Center/dp/B001NPEB7E/ref=sr_1_20?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1338345388&sr=1-20

It's not necessarily worth the difference, it's just what I bought with the options I had at the time. I put one Blu-ray and one HD-DVD drive in it, and several big drives, and it's both an HTPC and a media server. I didn't bother with the ssd, because I leave it on all the time and rarely reboot.

 

[gorcorps]

I went with this case:
http://www.amazon.com/SilverStone-LC13B-E-Aluminum-Steel-Center/dp/B001NPEB7E/ref=sr_1_20?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1338345388&sr=1-20

It's not necessarily worth the difference, it's just what I bought with the options I had at the time. I put one Blu-ray and one HD-DVD drive in it, and several big drives, and it's both an HTPC and a media server. I didn't bother with the ssd, because I leave it on all the time and rarely reboot.

That looks good too. If I had plans on using more drives that'd probably be a good bet. Since I'm keeping fairly low key with just an internal SSD and then network storage only after that I can keep things a little simpler. Most likely will put a blu-ray drive in there for when people bring their own movies over I don't have.

Speaking of which, it looks like Newegg has a decent deal on a burner. Don't have much use for the burner part but it's even a good price for a decent reader.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...e-_-27-136-250

 

[slackerinabox]

Apple TV + plex works really well for me. Roku HD + plex gets you all of the features (hulu, netflix, etc.) you'd like, but plex is pretty flaky on my roku (the menus are slow, playback is fine for the most part).. Oddly, a samsung blu ray player with smart hub works very well for me as well - hulu, netflix, plex (similar to the roku version, not the superior apple tv version), all for under $100 with blu ray built in.