Sharing PC data in TV / Blu-ray doesn't work

[JN]

Hi. I have TV Samsung LE32C650 and Blu-ray player LG BD390 (bought at the same time). I cannot make sharing of PC data work. This TV does it by application Samsung PC Share manager, Blu-Ray player by Nero MediaHome 4. Both appliances cannot see any shared data (server). PC, TV and Blu-ray are connected to router (via UTP cables) and internet connection is functional (I can watch YouTube videos from both TV and BluRay). I switched everything off in PC - Firewall, Antivirus,.. Now I'm stuck.
Have anybody there any experience with sharing PC data in appliances such as TV or DVD/DB players ? Thanks in advance.

[guns1inger]

You should be able to stream to both using Windows Media Player 11. You don't need to use the Samsung program to do this (or Nero, for that matter, but each to their own). If you are happy with Nero Mediahome then just use that.

For static devices like TVs and consoles I prefer to use static IP addresses. It makes troubleshooting easier. Usually the router will provide IP addresses to whatever connects using DHCP. You should be able to reserve a pool of IP addresses in the router that DHCP won't allocate. Reserve 20 or so, then set your PC to use one, the TV to use one and the BD player to use one. Once you have done this, open a console window on the PC (Start->Run->CMD) and try to ping the IP address of the TV and the BD player. Make sure you get responses form each. If you don't, then the devices cannot see each other on the network, and you have to change your router settings. If they do respond, at least you know the network is OK.

Concentrate on getting one appliance working first. It doesn't matter which one at this stage.

[JN]

Here's the description of settings I already made:

The router type is D-Link DIR-100

WAN settings:
Connection: Static IP
IP Address: <IP address provider gave me>
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: <provider's Gate/DNS IP adress>
DNS: <provider's Gate/DNS IP adress>

LAN settings
IP Address: 192.168.0.1
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
DHCP Server: Enabled

PC setting
IP Address: 192.168.0.101
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.0.1
DNS: 192.168.0.1 (<provider's Gate/DNS IP adress> working too)

TV setting
IP Address: 192.168.0.102
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.0.1
DNS: 192.168.0.1 (<provider's Gate/DNS IP adress> working too)

Blu-ray setting
IP Address: 192.168.0.103
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.0.1
DNS: 192.168.0.1 (<provider's Gate/DNS IP adress> working too)

Ping is responding for all devices!

[JN]

First little success - after rebooting the router, suddenly in Nero MediaHome 4 the TV device appeared. I wasn't denied enetring the Media from TV menu, but after few seconds the connection is lost. The device remained in MediaHome but is now offline. Another reboot didn't help. Maybe something must be set in router.

[guns1inger]

In the router settings look for UPnP and make sure it is enabled

[JN]

It is enabled from the beginning.

[JN]

Router has nothing to do with the problem. I Connected PC with TV via switch. Still no connection, ping OK. Maybe something wrong with LAN controller - I have Marvell Yukon 88E8053 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (onboard). But I don't have any idea what can be wrong.

[berane]

Hi!


Seems I'm experiencing kind of the same problem as JN.


Last fall I purchased a Samsung 40” LED-TV (Samsung UE40C6005) along with a LAN adapter. I downloaded and installed Samsung PC Share Manager on my laptop and succeeded in viewing photos via my WLAN.


Yesterday I purchased a Samsung Blu-ray Player (BD-C5900). I put the LAN Adapter on the Player and were able to connect to my internal WLAN. I checked that I was able to stream photos from my laptop (it found the player without any problem). Well, then I installed the PC Share Manager on my desktop but the blu-ray player was not detected. How come? I’ve tested to deactivate my firewall and MSE (Microsoft Security Essentials) to no avail. The player could clearly be seen on my routers “homepage” (D-Link DIR 635). Any suggestions/hints to solve the problem are very much appreciated. Attached are a couple of files: from D-Link as well as from both PC.


N.B. I’ve noted there are other “Media Players” on the market – even free ones! – but I want to test this out first.

[JN]

Hi,

I made some progress:

First - I upgraded Windows XP to Windows 7. You must run Multimedidia Center in windows. You can try Nero Media Home 4, it works too. Both my devices (BluRay player, TV) detected DLNA server (PC name). So far so good.

But with this all good news end:

I collect music videos and have them in two-level directory (letter and singer name). I spent twice the time (if I'm lucky) browsing to particular file than playing it . The browsing is simply slow (on both devices) . And if I browse deep into direcory, it in 99% cases ends with some error such as 'network doesn't respond' or 'timeout', even with restarting whole device! How do I have to browse through 40 pages of items, if passing between pages (10 items on page) takes from 5 to 10 seconds ? It crashes after 20 pages maximum anyway.

If I'm lucky and browse to desired file, the playing is ok. It proves that speed of LAN has nothing to do with slow browsing. And by the way - forget mkv, flv and many other file formats you'd expect to be playable (as from flash disc). Device could play them, but DLNA won't let it. Another step back.

To be brief, this DLNA technology is unusable for me. I stopped trying to use it. If I want to play something from PC, I simply use sofware BSPlayer and connnect video card to TV via HDMI cable. Even notebook with TVOut is better solution.

Why not to simply browse shared folder and play desired file? If the devices can do it from USB flash disc, why not over the network? Why the DLNA then?

I'd like to hear your opinions on this too.

JN

[aedipuss]

it's not "dlna" at fault, it's the device you are using to play the videos off the server. the lg bd570s we use here play just about anything (mkv, mp4, mp2, divx, avi) off our 4tb dlna server, a zyxel 221 free standing network attached storage device. not to mention the ipad, laptops, and computers that all have no problems.

[JN]

If you are able to play .mkv files over network in your device, it is not because of DLNA but in spite of DLNA.

See http://www.dlna.org/industry/why_dlna/key_components/media_format/

And I recommend this article

http://gxben.wordpress.com/2008/08/24/why-do-i-hate-dlna-protocol-so-much/

, especially this part:

"Using plain UPnP A/V, a server can share any kind of file (being binary, audio file, video file, text file like subtitle, or even a Word or PowerPoint presentation, whatever …). All it does after all, is sharing a file through HTTP with its associated MIME type, just like any HTTP server (Apache …) would do. It was then up to the client/player to determine whether or not it can handle the stream. This was quite too simple for DLNA folks. They have decided that only a numerous number of files are worth being shared. As a result, they’ve decided to restrict the protocol so that only some specific file extensions, but also containers and audio/video codecs combination can be used."

JN

[berane]

JN, thanks for your input and for your thoughts.



Finally I got SAMSUNG PC Share Manager to work on my PC. It was my firewall (ESET Smart Security) which caused the problem. After the settings of the firewall was changed by the support, it worked.



Now, I’m fully aware that there are limitations re formats, containers etc that can be streamed using this software. I’ve read reviews of other DLNA-software, e,g, serviio and Mezzmo, maybe they are in some respect “better” than this software from Samsung. But still, as you point out, the limitations lies in the DLNA-specs.I’ll keep my eyes open and look for alternatives that may come along.