Philips DVP5960 and USB

[horo]

Many Divx/DVD players don't support long filenames so you're seeing automatically generated 8.3 versions of the filenames. Use short format filenames if you need to see the full name. Start your names with episode numbers and they will sort properly.

yeah i notice that alot of the DVD players dont support long filenames, and i had the dvp 642 i think it was about 11 characters it could handle up to and thats how i renamed the files on my HDD but its still renamed by the dvd player to some wierd filename and it throws it out of order which is hard when you got over 50 files to watch lol. I havent tried putting the ep # in front yet has anyone tried this yet??

[FFNogoodnik]

I have noticed that the Divx files that have the .divx extention (Ver 6.0 I believe) will allways have the ~ in the name. Even a file name line 0001.divx gets displayed as 0001~1 or something like that. I renamed it to an avi extention and it was fine.

[jagabo]

I have noticed that the Divx files that have the .divx extention (Ver 6.0 I believe) will allways have the ~ in the name. Even a file name line 0001.divx gets displayed as 0001~1 or something like that. I renamed it to an avi extention and it was fine.

Because four letter extensions aren't allowed in 8.3 filenames. Just like computers in the old DOS days.

[jmikeh]

I notice that the filenames are weird/different when its listed from the EHD (external hard drive)

for example
Bell - 01 <- filename on computer
BEUAL~ 0 1 <- not exactly same letters but something like that on the dvd player

is there anyway to fix this? Im trying to watch a series and i dont even know which ep is which i have to watch some of it just to tell if im on the right ep

I'm using a 1gb flash drive, loaded with episodes of an old show, and not only does it do a similar thing as stated above in that it alters the filename, but it also loads the episodes out of order (and yes they have sequential numbers in the filename). Any idea what this is about and if there is any solution? Thanks.

I have noticed the same thing with the files not alpabetized. It obviously doesn't. If you put 1 on the drive first, 2 on second, etc, it shows up fine. FWIW....

[FFNogoodnik]

I have noticed that the Divx files that have the .divx extention (Ver 6.0 I believe) will allways have the ~ in the name. Even a file name line 0001.divx gets displayed as 0001~1 or something like that. I renamed it to an avi extention and it was fine.

Because four letter extensions aren't allowed in 8.3 filenames. Just like computers in the old DOS days.

lol, I should have thought about that, being a child of those DOS days.

[horo]

i hope they come out with a firmware to fix this filename thing

[jagabo]

i hope they come out with a firmware to fix this filename thing

8.3 only filenames has been a limitation since the first Divx DVD players so I doubt it will be fixed any time soon. The only player I know of (not that I know all that many) that supports long filenames is the Liteon 2002. Since it's such an obvious problem, and the fix fairly simple, I suspect it's a patent issue.

[youngthile]

awesome, i finally got my external hdd to work, thanks for everybody's help on here

[Bodyslide]

Which external drive did you use and the HD size? Thanks

[Slapstick]

I have great luck with both Lexar 1 & 2 GB flash drives and an old 30 Gb maxtor & 80 GB WD drive in Adaptec ACS-100 enclosures. Both drives set as primary and formated as FAT 32, (thanks to nspavan who recommended Swissknife to format the drives, works like a charm). I've had no stuttering playing Divx off the HD's but had a little when I played a Mpeg off the flash drive.

[youngthile]

Which external drive did you use and the HD size? Thanks

i am using an old 60 gig maxtor with some generic enclosure i got off of ebay almost 2 years ago. i have occasional mild stuttering, but all and all i am really happy to have gotten this to work and with the set up.

i also used swissnife to format to fat32. one complaint however, i was originally trying to use a 20 gig drive i had lying around. when i tried to reformat, everything seemed to have went well. but one i unplugged the usb and plugged it back in, i got the blue screen of death. this happened no matter what i tried, even when i put it in a desktop pc. i am unable to reformat it and it looks like it pretty much bricked the drive. so luckily this didnt happen with a decent drive.

[weaseloso]

Which external drive did you use and the HD size? Thanks

i am using an old 60 gig maxtor with some generic enclosure i got off of ebay almost 2 years ago. i have occasional mild stuttering, but all and all i am really happy to have gotten this to work and with the set up.

i also used swissnife to format to fat32. one complaint however, i was originally trying to use a 20 gig drive i had lying around. when i tried to reformat, everything seemed to have went well. but one i unplugged the usb and plugged it back in, i got the blue screen of death. this happened no matter what i tried, even when i put it in a desktop pc. i am unable to reformat it and it looks like it pretty much bricked the drive. so luckily this didnt happen with a decent drive.

Sounds crazy but when this happened to me I swapped the USB from the front of the computer to the rear and it formatted without problem. Another idea is to connect the drive to an IDE port inside the case and try to format. If this fails try the jumper on cable select and lastly try a low level format using the drive manufacturers utility disk. I would use the DOS version if you can find it. Good luck!

[youngthile]

Sounds crazy but when this happened to me I swapped the USB from the front of the computer to the rear and it formatted without problem. Another idea is to connect the drive to an IDE port inside the case and try to format. If this fails try the jumper on cable select and lastly try a low level format using the drive manufacturers utility disk. I would use the DOS version if you can find it. Good luck!

hi thanks for the reply, i tried connecting it to the ide port and got the same result. i also tried all of the different jumper settings and couldnt get anything to work. formating through dos may have some hope. altho, i am not too broken up about that drive. i wasnt using it before, and decided to use it because i didnt want to reformat my other drive. if i get a chance i will try it out.

[MJA]

Never owned the 642. The DVD seems fine I'm only playing it on a 27 inch TV. The PAL DVD looked fine no stuttering or ill effects at all. I'm also not sure about the Up Conversion. If you have any test clips you need me to try send them to my bodyslide@gmail.com email and I'll test them with my usb drive I have.

When I had the DVP 642 I had a 27" TV and the PAL to NTSC looked very bad. There was a huge amount of anti-alasing garbage due to poor resizing from PAL to NTSC. The image was "smooth" in terms of frames per second though.

Now I have a 51" 16x9 WS TV so something that looks bad on a 27" will look even worse LOL

BTW the one thing I noticed with the DVP 642 is that (using the picture adjustments in the set up menu) the image was either way too dark or way too bright. Very annoying.

Also gradient colors (including shadows) had a "banding" effect instead of a "smooth" gradient look.

However the DVP-642 used a shit old ass chipset and my understanding is that the DVP 5960 uses a much newer and better chipset ... so really there should be no comparrison.

But I had to ask

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

dude Avoid Philips they make nothing but grabge players .I bet the DVP 5960 like the 642 comes with 3 months warranty only

check the Pioneer DV-490V-S DIVX player

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000EZKZLA/ref=pd_cp_e_title/104-6040047-4441543?%5Fe...lance&n=172282

it got a HDMI out perfect for your 51" TV you have

[handyguy]

"I bet the DVP 5960 like the 642 comes with 3 months warranty only "

If you buy it with some credit cards you get 2x free. Also, my card, Visa, offers longer guarantees for a few bucks.

[Bodyslide]

When I bought the 5960, I got the standard 12-month warrabty from Circuit City.

[intence]

can someone inform me where i can find the latest firmware upgrade for the dvp5960? ive searched philips' website and google but no luck.

[Bodyslide]

There is no new firmware as of yet for the 5960....

http://www.p4c.philips.com/cgi-bin/dcbint/cpindex.pl?slg=ENG&cat=DVD_PLAYERS_RECORDERS...uctInformation

[TBoneit]

Just because, well because I like toys, I was picking up some of the Sony MIJ that is on sale at Bestbuy until tonight July8, 2006.

I saw the 5960 and remembered from this thread that it works with external drives so I grabbed one. Did I mention I like toys?

Took a external 80Gb I'm not using right now, used computer management to remove the partition, SwissKnife to format as Fat32 and put some Divx/Xvids on the drive and tested,

Bummer! It worked and prompted to push the USB button, I was watchingsomething else, Then I got a unsupported USB message. Then it came back later with the Press USB button message.

Mostly it worked (Generic ME-320 USB2 Case)

To me it looks like one way around the 8.3 limit may be to put the video into folders by type such as Drama, Comedy, SStone (Sharon Stone) or KTurner (Kathleen Turner) etc. IOW Genre or by Star or Kids, Pops, Moms .

I have a spare 40Gb laptop drive, I may take home the external laptop drive case ($10) and see if it works with no extra power and no supported/unsupported problems.

Stray thoughts section:

No eject (open/close) button on remote?
Not very intuitive remote operation.
In contrast the Toshiba's I have that also play Divx/Xvid have much better remotes.
OTOH it seems to load Divx faster than the Tosh.
I Didn't find a way to move the zoom around the screen. IOW on the Toshiba if I zoom I can use the 4 arrow keys to move the screen up/down and left/right.

Cheers

[handyguy]

Take a look at the bottom of your remote, it has a light on it. Funky huh?

[KrisS]

I use an A-Data My Flash 1GB USB 2.0 PD2 Flash Memory Drive and it works great!

Works for me - when video bitrate is below 3.0 mbs. Does not play divx files having 4.0+ mbs.
Anybody from you, guys playing "high bitrate" divx files from USB port without stuttering?
ALL FILES PLAY WELL when put on OPTICAL DISK...

I capture video usind ADS Tech DVD Xpress DX2. Below are my capture settings:

640x.divx - stuttering
Video Resolution - 640 x 480
Video Bit Rate - 4,327,159
Video Frame Rate - 29.97
Audio Bit Rate - 192,000
Audio Sampling Freq - 44,100
720x.divx - stuttering
Video Resolution - 720 x 480
Video Bit Rate - 4,226,679
Video Frame Rate - 29.97
Audio Bit Rate - 192,000
Audio Sampling Freq - 44,100
640y.divx - OK
Video Resolution - 640 x 480
Video Bit Rate - 2,501,765
Video Frame Rate - 29.97
Audio Bit Rate - 192,000
Audio Sampling Freq - 44,100
720y.divx - OK
Video Resolution - 720 x 480
Video Bit Rate - 2,501,228
Video Frame Rate - 29.97
Audio Bit Rate - 192,000
Audio Sampling Freq - 44,100

Best Regards
Kris

[esojmc]

I just bought this dvd player and absolutly love how you can play DivX/XviD through the USB port.

I have a 2G thumb drive that I can copy my AVI file into and watch. No need to burn cd/dvd.

Only problem that I have seen is that the sound seems to go out of sync. a little when watching avi through the USB thumb drive. Pausing and restarting seems to sync. it up again but it goes out sync. after a while. The sync. isn't too bad but its just enouhg to be a little annoying. Sync. is just fine when the same file is played through the cd. Anyone else notice this? Any way to fix it? BTW, my thumb drive is formated with the FAT32 FS.

Thanks.

[MJA]

wait until they start failing like the 642 model . keep us up to date guys

[jchansen]

I've had no problem playing files from a USB flash drive. Fun capability.

Here is my question, and I'm hoping someone knows:

Is there ANY way to get this player to play something "HD"? Are there any HD DivX resolutions that will work? Or XVid, or anything like that?

I've tried a number of things, but I haven't had any luck yet.

[jmikeh]

I've had no problem playing files from a USB flash drive. Fun capability.

Here is my question, and I'm hoping someone knows:

Is there ANY way to get this player to play something "HD"? Are there any HD DivX resolutions that will work? Or XVid, or anything like that?

I've tried a number of things, but I haven't had any luck yet.

Any file over 720x480 will NOT play. I have tested them all and they all yield an 'unsupported resolution error'

[kthan]

I bought the player yesterday and everything works fine except one. It plays xvid file through my PNY 2GB flash drive, but, whenever it plays hi-speed action, like war or fight scenes, it shows stuttering, and then go back to normal (plays fine) when it plays regular scenes.

I found that many people experienced stuttering problem. But, some experienced it with smaller cache/speed drive, like mine (flash drive), others had it with large size 3.5" higher rpm/cache drive. I don't know how to resolve this. I am planning to buy a USB external drive (WD, 60gb, no power supply, formatted FAT32) not just for this player though. Would it work with no stuttering?

Have it play via USB is important to me because I can save my dvd-r discs as well as time to burn.

[jagabo]

I bought the player yesterday and everything works fine except one. It plays xvid file through my PNY 2GB flash drive, but, whenever it plays hi-speed action, like war or fight scenes, it shows stuttering, and then go back to normal (plays fine) when it plays regular scenes.

That is a bitrate issue. Many players stall on high bitrates. Any VBR encoding will have higher bitrates during action scenes. Reading off a hard drive (via USB) may or may not help.

Have it play via USB is important to me because I can save my dvd-r discs as well as time to burn.

It won't help with burn time, but you can always use and reuse RW DVDs or CDs.

[kthan]

That is a bitrate issue. Many players stall on high bitrates. Any VBR encoding will have higher bitrates during action scenes. Reading off a hard drive (via USB) may or may not help.

Then, even if I use other usb drive (faster rpm/cache), it will have the same problem, as long as I played the same or similar (VBR encoding) files? (does this problem have nothing to do with the type and spec of usb hard drive?) I had the same file and burned it to dvd-r. It played with no problem in this player.

Is there a way I can change VBR encoding to the other setting, if VBR encoding (bitrate) is the reason for the problem?

[jagabo]

That is a bitrate issue. Many players stall on high bitrates. Any VBR encoding will have higher bitrates during action scenes. Reading off a hard drive (via USB) may or may not help.

Then, even if I use other usb drive (faster rpm/cache), it will have the same problem, as long as I played the same or similar (VBR encoding) files? (does this problem have nothing to do with the type and spec of usb hard drive?) I had the same file and burned it to dvd-r. It played with no problem in this player.

I don't know if the player has a USB 1.1 or 2.0 port. Since the specs only say USB I would assume it's 1.1. Although USB 1.1 has a theoretical bitrate of 12 Mb/sec, its real world throughput is about half that. A poor implementation might give you even less. So that would explain why the player has problems with certain files on a USB drive as compared to a DVD (with 10 Mb/sec or real throughput).

Is there a way I can change VBR encoding to the other setting, if VBR encoding (bitrate) is the reason for the problem?

You could encode with a lower bitrate, or with the Min Quantizer value to a higher value.

[nesler]

The player uses USB 1.1, which as mentioned above, sorts a maximum transfer rate of 12 megabits per second (1.5 megabytes per second). Even at half that transfer rate, that's plenty for most xvid files.

To give you an idea of how even USB 1.1 is overkill, an xvid file with a running time of 45 minutes (the length of a typical episode of a TV drama) with an average bitrate of 6 mbits per second (.75 megabytes per second)--half the theoretical max of USB 1.1--would have a file size of 2025 megabytes...far larger than anything you're typically going to play.

It's not a matter of transfer speed, it's just that the high amount of action requires a lot of processing power, which is too much for the cheap little processor in the DVD player.