My quest to get DLNA working on the Hopper...
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Are you able to fast forward and rewind the videos? If so are you using MKV, MP4, AVI???
Thanks for the tip.
I was struggling with Serviio as well. It would see the server, but it would never load any media files. I tried all of the different profiles without luck.
I just downloaded the Mezzmo trial, it's 30$ to buy, and it worked like a rockstar. Without any config, the Hopper was able to see my Mezzmo service, and all my movie files (encoded by Handbrake using AppleTV/AppleTV2 format), it's streaming Goonies right now. My audio decoder is showing Dobly Digital, so it's passing the audio in the right format as well (no crappy 2 channel stuff here).
So in summary.
Get the HIC, you need that for your Hopper and All Joey's to be able to grab IP addresses.
Get Mezzmo, it seems to be the best product so far.
That's all for now gang! Enjoy!
Wow, I just started messing with music, Mezzmo is badass guys. It has smart playlists built in. I was able to build a smart 1970's playlist which plays like a champ on any of my Hopper/Joeys. Bye bye Roku, welcome to ebay!
I just loaded Mezzmo as well but have no controls on the Hopper (like Fast Forward / Rewind) except for Pause and Stop. Is this a limitation of the Hopper or Mezzmo.
This thread has been so helpful - thanks, all (first time poster here). I have a 1H/1J system and would like to get DLNA working on the Joey. I have it directly connected to an ethernet cable and it's detecting both TVersity (which I want to use) and my Windows Home Server 2011. I can browse folders and whatnot as well without any problems. But when I try to actually play a program, nothing happens. Hitting select does nothing, hitting play does nothing. I have TVersity set to always transcode and it works just fine with my Xbox 360, but the Joey simply will not play any of the programs I have (I believe they are Divx/Xvid format AVIs). Any ideas?
Has anyone tried using Mezzmo on a Mac? I can't seem to find any recommendations for a Mac anywhere?
Will a HIC help? It seems like since I can already see the files but not play them, connectivity is not the issue. Did someone else have this problem that I am having? I didn't see any sign of it in the thread.
rhambus said:
I'm seeing the same thing with tversity and avi/xvid files, but h264 files play fine. Tonight is my first time trying it so haven Thad much time to play with settings etc. I have "always transcode" turned on. I don't think this is an issue an HIC will solve. For me this is just for fun anyway, since I have HTPCs in each room already.
I have been able to get DLNA working with Mezzmo as well.
It works WITHOUT a HIC. For those of you saying you MUST have a HIC, this is not true. I have my Hopper plugged directly into my router, and the Joey is plugged into a router in the bedroom which is being used as client bridge which then connects to the main network via wireless.
I am able to stream 720p to the Joey without a hitch, and the Hopper handles 1080p fine.
I saw some comments about being able to fast forward or rewind. For most DLNA servers, fast forwarding does not work while something is being transcoded. Only if you are playing the video back in a native format that the playback device supports, will fast forward or rewind work.
Someone else mentioned that Mezzmo transcodes slow. I've noticed this too. I can transcode video using Serviio or Plex on the same computer and stream 1080p without frame drops, but when I do it in Mezzmo, the framerate drops below 30fps. I scoured through Mezzmo's user forum and cant find any solution other than to upgrade the CPU. Mezzmo recommends at least a quad core chip to transcode 1080p which seems unnecessary to me.
For me though, I just set the quality to a lower value for my Joey (its connected to an Insignia 32" 720p bedroom TV that the girlfriend and I watch in bed) so the highest possible quality isnt that necessary to me. I dont use the DLNA capabilities of the Hopper in the living room because i have a purpose built HTPC running XBMC there for streaming movies.
In any case, my DLNA journey has come to a close. It works good enough in the bedroom through the Joey and I did not need any additional HICs to make it work.
It works WITHOUT a HIC. For those of you saying you MUST have a HIC, this is not true. I have my Hopper plugged directly into my router, and the Joey is plugged into a router in the bedroom which is being used as client bridge which then connects to the main network via wireless.
I am able to stream 720p to the Joey without a hitch, and the Hopper handles 1080p fine.
I saw some comments about being able to fast forward or rewind. For most DLNA servers, fast forwarding does not work while something is being transcoded. Only if you are playing the video back in a native format that the playback device supports, will fast forward or rewind work.
Someone else mentioned that Mezzmo transcodes slow. I've noticed this too. I can transcode video using Serviio or Plex on the same computer and stream 1080p without frame drops, but when I do it in Mezzmo, the framerate drops below 30fps. I scoured through Mezzmo's user forum and cant find any solution other than to upgrade the CPU. Mezzmo recommends at least a quad core chip to transcode 1080p which seems unnecessary to me.
For me though, I just set the quality to a lower value for my Joey (its connected to an Insignia 32" 720p bedroom TV that the girlfriend and I watch in bed) so the highest possible quality isnt that necessary to me. I dont use the DLNA capabilities of the Hopper in the living room because i have a purpose built HTPC running XBMC there for streaming movies.
In any case, my DLNA journey has come to a close. It works good enough in the bedroom through the Joey and I did not need any additional HICs to make it work.
I also finally must have run across some files that were not Xvid, and I am able to play them, no FF or RW of course. I guess maybe it can only play h.264? This happens to me even when I have Tversity set to always transcode. I notice in TVersity there is an option to select what device you want to stream to. I have it set to autodetect but clearly that's not right. What have other people set theirs to? I think that maybe if I pick the right thing, it will automatically transcode into h.264 for me.
I'm repeating this post here...
Dish Network rolled out an update a couple of days ago and Home Media is working.
Those of you using other software may wish to look at PS3 Media Server. I've tested about every DLNA compliant server out there and have found it to be the best. It's freeware and you don't have to have a PS3 to use it. PS3 Media Server is fast, does not put a huge load on your processor and does not build a huge database every time you open it or add files to the directories you are sharing. Best of all there are both Windows and Linux versions of the program.
From what I can tell, it looks like the Hopper can't read a lot of file formats. It doesn't seem to like .avi unless the video has been encoded in mp4 format. My guess is that Dish Network hasn't negotiated a license with DIVX, Microsoft, or Apple yet and has never heard of XVID.
Anyway, you may need to convert your video files in .mp4 format. If you do, there are two freeware applications you can use. The first is HandBrake and the second one is called Freemake Video Converter, both are freeware. They can be found on FileHippo.com and MajorGeeks.com.
Freemake Video Converter supports a lot of file formats, will natively do batch conversions of files but, only runs under Windows... unless you can figure out how to get .NET 4.0 installed in Linux that is.
HandBrake has a Linux version and will also do batch conversion of files but, will take a lot of mouse clicks to do so. There is a Windows version and someone has created a utility called "HandBrake Encoder v1.0" to fix that problem under Windows; however, I haven't used it yet. Again, if you can get .NET 4.0 to install you can try and use the Windows version under Linux for easier batch processing of files.
I recommend Windows users stick with Freemake Video Converter and Linux users the Linux version of HandBrake. Hope this helps.
Dish Network rolled out an update a couple of days ago and Home Media is working.
Those of you using other software may wish to look at PS3 Media Server. I've tested about every DLNA compliant server out there and have found it to be the best. It's freeware and you don't have to have a PS3 to use it. PS3 Media Server is fast, does not put a huge load on your processor and does not build a huge database every time you open it or add files to the directories you are sharing. Best of all there are both Windows and Linux versions of the program.
From what I can tell, it looks like the Hopper can't read a lot of file formats. It doesn't seem to like .avi unless the video has been encoded in mp4 format. My guess is that Dish Network hasn't negotiated a license with DIVX, Microsoft, or Apple yet and has never heard of XVID.
Anyway, you may need to convert your video files in .mp4 format. If you do, there are two freeware applications you can use. The first is HandBrake and the second one is called Freemake Video Converter, both are freeware. They can be found on FileHippo.com and MajorGeeks.com.
Freemake Video Converter supports a lot of file formats, will natively do batch conversions of files but, only runs under Windows... unless you can figure out how to get .NET 4.0 installed in Linux that is.
HandBrake has a Linux version and will also do batch conversion of files but, will take a lot of mouse clicks to do so. There is a Windows version and someone has created a utility called "HandBrake Encoder v1.0" to fix that problem under Windows; however, I haven't used it yet. Again, if you can get .NET 4.0 to install you can try and use the Windows version under Linux for easier batch processing of files.
I recommend Windows users stick with Freemake Video Converter and Linux users the Linux version of HandBrake. Hope this helps.
Luv2K155 said:
Thanks to your post I finally found a server that works with my Mac and hopper. I've only ran into one problem so far. I can see my iTunes library on my hopper but for some reason I can only play certain music. It seems the only music from iTunes that will play is in MPEG-1 layer 3 format. Unfortunately most of my iTunes music is in AAC audio files and they will not play. I can see them but instead of a thumbnail pic on the songs I show a big question mark. Any idea what I can do about that? I asked this question in another thread that I started a while back. But I thought you may know since you know so much about this PS3 server.
