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  1. one of my friends just told me that the dreamcast not only plays vcds but also plays divx files....can this be true???
    does anybody out there know about this?
    I'd appreciate an anszer from you guys before i make up my mind about buying one!!
    thanks
    tony 8)
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    Well, you can get software to play divx on a dreamcast, but only certain divx formats (I think only 3.11) and only limited resolutions. There should be a link and/or information on the divx player at http://www.dcemulation.com/.
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  3. I play VCD's and Divx through the dreamcast, your are limited on what will play, either 352x240 or 352x288 no higher and codec divx must be 3.11, Angel Divx or Krystal Divx I have not got a 4.12 or 5.02 to work on it yet, though I understand the next upgrade will have that problem fixed.
    also no sync problems with audio either, gotta remember the dreamcast is using windows CE+ for an operating system and windows media player for audio and video playback, look for up coming Divx players for the Xbox and PS2 real soon also.
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    the dreamcast can play vcds, 3.1 divx, mp3 cds, playstation games, game boy games, game boy color games, supernintendo games, sega genesis games (no sound), atari games. sega mastersystem games, colecovision games, real arcade games (MS.pacman etc). its really cool. you can put 1000 supernintendo games on one disk, and 2000 gameboy games on one disk, you can run linux os on it, netbsd, surf the web, network and use broadbandcable connections with it and you can play sega online games free until the end of the year. you can read email, and you can instant message on it (aol. icq, yahoo, msn, etc_
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  5. thanks very much to everyone who answered my question!!
    It sounds like this is the machine to buy!!
    I think i'll wait until it is compatible with divx 4 and 5 before i get one, though.
    What about xvcd or svcd???
    And what about the quality of the video reproduction?
    Just like a decent pc??

    tony
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  6. dreamcast? didnt they stop making those 2 years ago?
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  7. Ok hold on, I'm somewhat of an expert on this subject. In fact the only reason I'm in this forum is because I've ben using the dreamcast for so long to play media I'm looking for an alternative. It will play mpeg-1 video with the right player, but the frame rate isn't very good, and you have to format the disc properly, you cannot just take a bin/cue burn it of and go. Yes it plays divx, and its not just divx3 either, dcdivx plays divx3,4,5,xvid, and also serves as a mp3 player. The resolution and audio quality are both limited a lot though. if you wish to keep hq audio the cumulative bitrate support for xvid, which best on it with its cbr mode, is about 350. Its great for putting a bunch of stuff on one disc at at time. The only thing it does better than the standalone plays with mpeg is resolution handling. Any res, no matter how screwy will scale to fullscreen, something I wish the dvd players did.
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    using the dreamcast vcd player software, 29 dollars on the net, you can play vcds with no problems , and even comes with a remote control, i saw it at 25 dollars at funcoland game store
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    Originally Posted by Rabid_elephant
    dreamcast? didnt they stop making those 2 years ago?
    I don't remember when it was, but yes, they discontinued them. Most of the big consumer places (like Best Buy) have stopped carrying the games, too. Sega did a completely miserable marketing job and they couldn't compete with Sony and Nintendo consoles, so they gave up on hardware and decided to concentrate on selling games.

    Of course, there were some pretty cool games made for the Dreamcast plus all the emulators, and you can now get them pretty cheap, so some people who would never have bought one before have over the past few months just to play one or two games. In some cases the console plus a game or two might be less than the price of a single game for the PS2 (or any of the other current consoles). If only I could find a broadband adapter for cheap and hook my DC in to my home network....
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  10. Its funny that $29 thing gets mentioned. 1 word: crap. Unless its better than one I sw in the past, the freeware player is actually better. The one like you described I saw wasn't even worthy of being markets. Constant sckipping and pixellation on VCDs. As for the death of the DC --- the biggest reason it died is because the copy protection sega used was horrible. The went to the trouble to make the system have proprietary media, yet allow it to read CD-Rs as well. Thus, when formatted properly anybody could download a game off the net and play it. The plus side to this is it is now a great machine for homebrew stuff like emulators and yes media players. I use mine frequently with DCDivx. I have to re-encode everything I play to what people would consider low quality settings, but they still look good on tv. Can fit 6 or 7 42 minute tv shows on one cd.
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  11. dreamcast will only play divx files with 8 character file names too, so think before u burn (using dcdivx that is)
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  12. secretagent, how in the world can you play those games from gameboy super nintendo and stuff on the dreamcast. I have never had such a thing. Searched the net and could not find anything to support that info.
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    go to www.dcemulation.com they have lots of emulators that let you play games. I use dcgnuboy for gameboy and gameboy color games and the emulator comes with 270 public domain games on it (I love the space invaders, lets you know how old I am). i use dreamsnes for supernintendogames and burned 200 games on one disk and still had 500 mb left over on my cdr, used nero multisession so i add more games to the same disk whenever i like, I love supermarioworld on this, just like the real game, it fact it is the real game. I use dreampac to play the original arcade games pacman and mspacman. I use dreammp3 to play mp3 cdrs over 150 songs on one disk, great for parties, hooked up to my amp it rocks. i use ( can't say you know why(wink) to play vcds, watched spiderman last night, perfect picture and sound. I forgot the name of the sega genesis emulator but its on the page, this has no sound but sonic is cool, i aslo use a turbograffix emulator and a segamaster system emulator, and by the way i play hundreds of games on my dreamcast but i dont have a single dreamcast game.
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  14. Well I use my DC to play all kinds of stuff esp. fansub anime (7-8 eps a CD!!!) and for those looking 4 more info..... check out

    http://www.dcemulation.com/

    When encoding most files, I used 400 as the bitrate on Divx 5 files and I usually have no problems!!!

    Yeah Sega really dropped the ball on the DreamCast.... I didnt know much about when they DID support it... and then boom it was gone and I picked one up off Ebay for $60 with controllers and such and now I have a VERY nice collection of games.... and IMHO it beats the pants of the PS2 even some of the newer games......

    and is it me or is the X-box the DC2? or is the DC the X-box practice.... hehehehe just a thought...

    LR
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  15. from dcdivx.com:

    Supported Audio/Video Formats
    - Audio: OGG, MP3 and Layer I + II Audio w/ MAD MP3 decoder
    - Video: OGM, VP3, DivX 3.xx, DivX 4.xx, DivX 5.xx + Pro, OpenDivX, XviD, AVI

    you are limited in terms of bitrate (about 700 kbps combined audio/video, i stay around 96 mp3 w/ 575 divx 5.02) and resolution must be less than or equal to 496x496 (but i would recommend keeping it at about vcd resolutions as it takes a huge playback hit as the reolution increases, i try to keep it at 352 or 320 by whatever)... also, with the supported formats, you can't use ogg w/avi: ogg support is currently limited to audio only, and 5.x pro divx is supported but the "advanced" features are not....
    i myself have tested it with divx 3,4,5 (pro and standard), and xvid video and they all worked great... ive only used mp3 audio, but it works perfect (both as stand alone .mp3's and with video)... as for ogg, layer 1+2, ogm, vp3 and open divx i have no clue, but judging by the quality of the others, im sure itll work just as well...
    also, there is no 8.3 limitation, but the site claims a 10.3 limit (which isnt true, i have much larger filenames, i wouldnt go to big though as you just wouldnt be able to see it in the menu)...
    the world is not enough
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  16. d'oh, hopefully not many of you have wasted cds since my last post...
    i tried to burn a new dcdivx disc today and it wouldnt boot... seeing as im quite good at the various selfbooting methods, i knew i did everything in that respect right, so i put in an old dcdivx disc and swapped with the new one... thats when i realized what my problem was, that 10.3 limit! it seems that the discs i had from before with >10.3 filenames were disc i was swapping in, not discs with the program on the same disc as the vids...
    so if you intend to put your everything on the same disc, you will need to keep it within the 10.3 limit... sorry if anyone lost any discs, but hopefully that wasnt the case 8^]
    the world is not enough
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  17. my 2 cents.....i use my dreamcast for House of the Dead...that sums it up....i did the vcd and found it to be crap quality...why waste my time with makeing it possible on the pc when i can play it from my pc to my tv with much better quality....gameboy games? doesn't float my boat...but..i did try some snes games..speed is lacking and if i remember i used many of them and the best emu i found was dreamsnes but it was slowww motion...playstation games...hmmm...i don't remember seeing anything about dc being able to emulate a ps...what is that emu called???if there is it must be super slow...but hay if it works to speed then i'd like to know how and where...a dc playing a non original dc game...i've tried that and found it not to work or not even possible...don't get me wrong. for 30 bucks its not a bad system to have if you want something else to do and some different games to play but i wouldnt waste time makeing vcds to play on it or mp3's...heck...buy a vid card with a tv output on it and play the vcd file from your pc...much better quality....and run the sound output from your pc to an amp or home theater....i've spent time at dreamemu and zophars domain for emu's for dc but nothing that has jumped out at me...
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  18. Well, as far as the mpeg1 playback, I'll agree that it's not worth it. Terrible framerates, awful image. As for not being able to play back non-original dc game (I assume you mean copies), you gotta be kidding. The DC is the easiest system out there to get bootlegged games. My thinking is that is what played a huge part in killing the system. No need for boot discs, mod chips, or swapping. A properly burned pirated game will boot right up. As for divx, never tried it but I'm going to.

    As far as playing divx from your computer to your tv, that's all well and good if your computer is close to your tv, but if you run long cables the interference and signal loss are greatly noticed, at least with my system. It would be great if the dc played good looking divx files, and they stayed looking good. Something I have doubts about after the mpeg1 experiments I did, but I'm definitely going to give it a whirl.

    One more reason to still have my dreamcast hooked up to the ole big screen...
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    ok i see you guys just dont get it. A dreamcast will play standard vcds. you dont have to do anything different to your vcds. that means you can play the same vcd that you play in your dvd player in the dreamcast. the point is that not mpeg1 playback, it is vcd playback. you probably didnot use the right program. the name of the program to use is dreamcast vcdplayer. you can find it on any p2p program. the quality and sound is excellent. at least on my tvsets.
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  20. what was the quality like on the files encoded according to the DCDivx specifications? if you create the divx from a dvd, what would the quality be like? near dvd or vhs quality or what?
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