DivX player support

[jakers]

Thanks for helping, I'm a newbie. I've just ordered a dvd player -- JVC XVN40BK. I've read the reviews on it and feel comfortable that I'm getting a good player. HOWEVER, I'm buying this player because it supports Divx movies. My question: If put the Divx movie on a CD-R as a data disc will it play? If not, what are your sugguestions? Thanks is advance for your help.

[thayne]

You sure it supports DivX? I did a search for it on google and looked at the specs on several sites and saw no mention of Divx

[jakers]

Weeelllll, when I went to the DVD Players section on this site, I clicked DIVX support and this is one player on the list??????? If not, can you tell me how to find divx support players?

BUT, what about my original question also?

Thanks again

[thayne]

If it does support Divx it should support them on CDR.

Here is the one I want!

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=90123771&loc=111&sp=1

[cplevel42]

I just bought one and it works GREAT!!! It is the Kiss DP-500. It plays DIVX, XVID, Mpeg, Jpeg, WMV and regular AVI. It plays DIVX 3.11, 4, and 5 just fine with the new Firmware updrade. The upgrade takes just a minute to perform and is real easy.

This unit has a 10/100 ethernet card built into it and the remote is really nice with many features.

It will work with DVD-R, +R, -RW, and CD-R, and CD-RW. Just burn the discs in data mode and play the raw files in the Kiss. This is the coolest purchase I have made in a long time and worth every penny.

[cplevel42]

Oh yeah! and my kiss plays mp3 and is region free as well.

[Roundabout]

As far as I know, the only REASONABLE priced DVD that will play DivX and Xvid is the LiteON PhoMaster LVD-2001 - $149.00 at pcclub.com (also available in their retail stores for slightly less, on sale). If you look at the DVD players page on this site, you'll find this one listed there, along with reviews of the product. I plan to buy one myself in the next few days and will add a comment also, based on my experience with the player. Seems most who bought it like it a lot, and they have constant firmware upgrades to improve it's functionality. Yes, it will play DivX on a normal CDR...

[jakers]

Thanks for all your help. That's a nice player thayne, but a little out of my price range.

cplevel42 -- can you explain about firmware? Not sure what that is.

If anyone can let me know for sure whether the jvc is divx supported, that would be great. I'll have to cancel my order if not.

Thaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnnkkkkkkkk Yyooooooouuuuuuu

[cplevel42]

Kiss is the only DIVX compatible DVD player that is certified by the DivX format. It is $299.00 and in this case, you get what you pay for. Yes, I could have bought that cheapie model, but in the end, it would not have been worth it. I know people who have both models and they say the kiss is WAY BETTER in both funtionality and workmanship. This kiss is made in Denmark. Where is the cheapie made? China? Nuff said.

Firmware my friend is the internal software that runs the hardware in CD players, DVD players, TVs, etc. You can modify this firmware to improve funtionality and to add features. Usually this is done by downloading an .iso file from the net, burning it as an image in Nero, and then playing it inside of your DVD player to upgrade the players software.

OK, now I'm going to confirm that your DVD player that you ordered will play divx. If not, I would suggest that you either get the model that thayne likes which is very nice, or the Kiss, but NOT the cheapie model.

I'll post back.

[cplevel42]

OK, just looked at the JVC. Don't buy that one!!!

The Liteon looks much better now that they have made some improvements to their firmware. This thing is still not anywhere in the calibur of quality of the Kiss, but if you are on a really tight budget, I would get the Liteon. I don't know if the Liteon can be made region free, but the Kiss has an easy region free hack.

[jakers]

Cool-- I've been trying to find out myself, but would like to know what you find out. If JVC doesn't support, maybe I"ll just have to wait until the price drops a little bit. Darn it, I had my hopes too high I guess. I'll wait to hear from you before I cancel my order.
Thanks,

[cplevel42]

Since you don't have the money, buy the Liteon as Roundabout suggested.

The JVC does not support DVIX or if it does it is quite limited.

[jakers]

cplevel......I was afraid that was your answer, so in the meantime I've been trying to find out how to go about finding/buying a liteon.??????? or even the cheapest kiss for comparison

Any suggestions......BTW, I've canceled my order. Thank you. If you would so kindly explain the region free stuff to me? I hate being new, but am trying to research myself.

Thanks again.

[cplevel42]

Region free refers to the "Region Code" of a DVD. The North american one is Region 1. Europe is Region 2, etc. But you also have to be concerned with format such as NTSC and PAL. You will need to buy a video converter to play PAL DVDs on an NTSC TV.

I think you are mainly concerend with DivX playback though, so let me do some quick checking for you.

I'll post back.

[cplevel42]

Good News buy here: http://pcclub.com/product_detail.cfm?itemno=A1546967

But if you want REAL quality and Region free to boot Buy Here: http://www.divx.com/hardware/detail.php?id=55

[Roundabout]

Hello again. I thought I'd answer your questions about this unit.

The LiteON region/macrov. hack (copied from another posting):
1. press: open/close
2. press: 2
3. press: 9
4. press: 6
5. press: 0

now you are in a special-menu of this dvd-player.
take the cursor to "0" for code-free! and you can take the cursor to "Macrovision: Yes/No"

when you are ready, press: Open/Close or Enter!

Apparentely someone likes this player, there are a lot of positive comments about it on this website. I'm sure the KISS player is a great unit too, but I, like some others, am on a limited budget
and 1 KI$$ unit = 2 LiteON units. As long as they continue to update the firmware (which it seems they are commited to doing) it should be fine. I am going to go to one of their retail stores locally and just pick it up, if they have any in stock. Some others said they are on B/O and don't have any available right now. Guess I'll find out. Can't beat the price, and as long as it works as well as others have said, I'll be happy with it.

[vandakeg]

If you have a Sony Playstation 2 you should check out www.broadq.com. I have used it for over a year now, and it is absolutely amazing.

For the price, it might even be worth buying a PS2 and the QCast software!

[jakers]

Roundabout, Cplevel, & others:

Thanks for your help.
Cp...I'll check out your sites.

Roundabout..was your post to make the liteon "region free"? Cause I like the idea of 2 liteons for the price of one Kiss on my budget!

I'll post again after viewing the sites, please check back.

[Roundabout]

Hi Jakers,
Yes, that hack is to make the unit Region Free so it can play discs from other countries, but also you can turn off the macrovision. Here is a website with a review of the LiteON:
http://www.kitsapcomputers.com/lvd2001.htm
It might help you out. This unit will also play PAL discs on NTSC (American) Television, and vice versa, if you are in Europe. It has 110/220 v. capability also, for possible overseas use. Basically, it will play almost anything out there, and for the price, it doesn't seem like it can be beat (for now).
I'm also interested it only because it can play DivX/Xvid discs without the long process of converting to MPEG2 for DVD. I am sure that is the reason in almost all cases why people are buying it, as the other functions are more are less standard on a lot of DVD players. BTW: some are being sold on EBay, as well as at the PC Club stores. Enter LiteOn as a search term to find some. I think they are asking more than you can buy it for at PC Club, but if they are on B/O at PC Club, this may be the only way to get one quickly.

[jakers]

Roundabout:

Thanks for the info. I did do an ebay search! I'm so hoping to get one. My fingers are crossed. I've still been researching and am concerned that this player may not play divx 3. Do you know anything about that?

I agree with you though. I've tried and tried and tried some more to figure out the dvd conversion process. Nothing out there is enough detail for me. I'm thinking that a couple extra bucks for the divx player is well worth my time since I have yet to even purchase a dvd burner.

[Roundabout]

Since I don't have one yet, I can't vouch for this, but I got this information from A. Roux's review of the unit (Hope he doesn't mind):
DivX movies:

In order to test properly the capabilities of this player, I started with a large AVI file (a high quality home made video). I then encoded the file using VirtualDub and Dr. DivX each time (took me a few nights to complete). I also used a few DivX that I had handy. Before we start remember this: the EM8500 does NOT support GMC and ¼ pixel (QPEL) encoding. The maximum supported resolution is 720x576 (352x288 for DivX 3.11 Alpha).

I encoded my DivX with the following characteristics:

No QPEL/GMC encoding. Resolution was 352 x 288 @ 25 fps. Average bitrate was 768kbps. The reason behind this is the fact that I wanted to see if the LVD-2001 would pass the DivX.Com requirements for their DivX Certification. I picked up the middle ground which was the DivX certified portable video.

- DivX 3.11 Alpha:

- Failed: Low motion with MP3 48000Khz encoded sound.

Other random tests with other DivX 3.11 movies (GSpot 2.2 stats).

PassivX 3 Fast-Motion 654 kb/s 25fps 0x0055(MP3) ID'd as MPEG-1 Layer 3 128 kb/s (64/ch, stereo) CBR 48000 Hz

Pass: DivX 3 Fast-Motion 640x304 (2.11:1) [=40:19] 563 kb/s 23.976fps 0x0055(MP3) ID'd as MPEG-1 Layer 3 160 kb/s (80/ch, stereo) CBR 44100 Hz

...so apparently it will play DivX 3 if it is formatted correctly. Don't forget that with each new version of firmware released, they are improving the functions of the unit and hopefully will continue to do so.

[Roundabout]

Jakers, also read the reviews on this website about other experiences with this unit: https://www.videohelp.com/dvdplayers.php?DVDnameid=2509&Search=Search&#comments
Yah, I'm lazy too, and if I can save the trouble of all this converting and burning (not to mention the time, cost of blank DVD-r's, DVD burner, Faster PC, etc,etc) and just play the AVI's directly, that's good enough for me, I just want to watch, not spend hours on the conversion process!
Did you try getting one from PC Club? It might be cheaper, and you'll have a warranty. You need to be sure, if you buy one through EBay, that the manufacturer will honor the warranty from that particular seller. You wouldn't want a nasty repair bill if it fails early...

[cplevel42]

Sorry, I didn't mean to sound snobish about the Kiss. I'm sure the liteon is great, but for $149.00, I'm sure that the quality is a tad lacking. There is a reason that DivX.com is selling and certifying the Kiss.

The Kiss is built really well. It Weighs a TON. It feels really solid and all of the controls are very fit and finish. I understand that the $299.00 is a bit high, but if it lasts twice as long as the Liteon, to me it's worth it.

From what I have read the Liteon is a close second to the kiss, espeacially in regards to features. In price, it beats the Kiss, but we know why. By all means, go buy the liteon; I'm sure it works fine and that is cool that it has Region free hack as does the kiss. Macrovision off and PAL to NTSC video conversion are other nice features.

I did NOT see any liteons at Ebay, but I already posted a link to www.PCclub.com I trust PC club, so save some money and buy there.

@ vandakeg - The playstation video player software sounds really cool. Can you give us more specifics on it? Will it play all colors of DivX?

[cplevel42]

From User Reviews:

Well known to support Divx 3.11 also check www.divx.com. 1st player that is Divx certified.

The greatest feature is the streaming over LAN support. You can stream:
* jpg images over the network from one server to many KiSS machines. Very easy to stream directly from your digital camera to the KiSS player if the camera supports Universal storage over USB.
* avi (MPG on the way) and there is no delay if you select a shared movie until it plays, i.e. no loading time. If the movie has acompaning subtitles as a separate file they are automatically streamed over the network.
* MP3 files, great sound if connected to a amplifier (I have a LINN CD player/Amp). 80 GB of MP3 as a jukebox!!!

I also just love the webradio feature. Don't compare this with how it works on the PC, this is much better implementation. On PC you have to search and struggle to find stations and when you have found a few it takes a long time before they start to play. On the KiSS you have a number of preselected stations to choose from (currently ~20 soon updated to 4000) and when a station is selected the music starts instantly, no delay!!!

I can testify to have tested on >20 Divx 3.11, >10 Divx5.05 and >40 XVID movies without one signle failure (except one XVID with QPel encoding (not supported).

Works great with movies encoded with Dr. Divx.

I simply love this player, my entire friend environment is extremely impressed with this player, I can gladly recommend it to anyone.

[Roundabout]

CP, I'm intrigued by the webradio aspects of the KISS unit, especially, my wife is from Europe and she would love to be able to listen to radio stations from overseas on our Stereo (even better if it could get some web TV stations, but that's hoping for too much right now). Problem is, I can't afford to spend that much on one of these right now, wish I could. I can afford the LiteON unit, and maybe in a year or so, when the prices come down I can buy a better unit. Meanwhile, I think the LiteON will serve my purposes for the near future, if it is just "good enough". Sure, I'd love to have a faster PC right now too, and a DVD burner, but ya gotta make do with what you can afford. That's the only reason why I recommended the LiteON to others, it may be within some others budgets too. Hell, I don't even own one yet, who knows, I might not even like it when I get it. I am trusting others reviews of this unit and hoping it will at least play what I need it to play. I would love to buy one of the ones you have when the price (hopefully) comes down. Keep reporting your experiences with it and others will learn too, which is what I plan to do when I get the LiteON - If it's a P.O.S. I'll tell everyone that too.

[cplevel42]

The kiss dp-500 just released the next firmware version.

It now does Fast Forward and plays Org Vorbis files much better.

It just keeps getting better.

[cplevel42]

A friend of mine is buying the Liteon. Who here knows where the firmware upgrades are? I don't think they are commited to upgrades. Please prove me wrong. I have done google searches and I have tried the liteon site. No luck!

[RabidDog]

I would also recommend a new unit from yamada dvx6100 which does everything the litoen does and wma audio @ price approx £86.
Does everything I want including 2/ 4/ 8/ 16 fast forward on divx/xvid movies. (which play full screen).

[yautja666]

Here's the Liteon firmware upgrade page:

http://www.liteonit.com/DC/english/csd.htm

I can speak on behalf of the Liteon, as it is a great machine. I haven't had great results playing Divx 3.11, but Divx 5.xx and Xvid work perfectly for me. I basically bought the Liteon so I could play Mpeg-4 and on-the-fly PAL-NTSC conversion, all on a budget, and it does exactly what I need. The Kiss machine sounds like it has a lot of great features...I would've definitely gone for that one if it was more in my budget.

[cplevel42]

Thanks guys!