I have a DSM-520, and all I can say is that I regret buying it. I find there are several formats it doesn't like, though it also seems to depend on the server software used. <br><br>I started off with Twonkymedia, which worked OK, but was touchy in its own right. When that was working well, I generally used handbrake to rip my dvd collection in .mp4 format. However, when my 30 day trial ran out on the Twonky software, I remembered I had an old PVR-250 and I started working on my MythTV setup, believing I had a decent frontend to work with. While I worked on myth, I used uShare, which worked fairly well. With this server software, I couldn't view any of my .mp4 files, only listen to them (it seems ushare assumed .mp4 was an audio only format). To solve this problem, I renamed all my .mp4 files .mov and the problem was solved. A month later, once I got myth up and running, I realized the only movies that worked any longer were some old .avi files I had downloaded years before. My .mov were suddenly unsupported. So, it seemed logical that if I renamed them .mp4 (again) it should work. No such luck. The only change was switching the server from uShare to Myth. <br>
<br>After I had my myth system running a while, I began working with transcoding to save some disk space. I started transcoding most stuff to 480 x 480, and this worked well on all of my "frontends" that were actually running mythfrontend. My DSM-520 on the other hand, would display the video, but no audio, and the picture was distorted (I assume the DSM-520 was treating it as 640 x 480). <br>
<br>Of course, the DSM-520 does not work with commercial skipping, and since it didn't play nicely with my movie collection, it was basically useless to me. Therefore, I replaced it with an eMac (running OS X) which has been quite satisfactory for me. The menu's were slow, and it would tend to hang at least once a week, requiring a restart (I only used this in my bedroom to watch something to fall asleep to for less than an hour per day, and I generally turned it off every day). <br>
<br>I also feel I should note that this is actually my second DSM-520. I bought it on eBay, and while the auction was underway, I was getting impatient, and as I thought I was going to lose the auction (I was winning it by $1 for several days) I decided to just buy a new one at Best Buy. Of course, after buying the unit at eBay, I won the auction and decided to keep both. But, after having them both for about a month, I decided it was just an inferior piece of hardware and I decided to return the new on if I could. Lucky for me, Best Buy took it back, and I was only stuck with the one I bought on eBay. I had the eBay item listed on craigslist for quite a while without a single inquiry. <br>
<br>If you're still interested, I'll sell you mine for $40 + shipping. <br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Feb 27, 2008 at 1:52 PM, <<a href="mailto:dvjunk@netscape.net">dvjunk@netscape.net</a>> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">I just saw that Circuit City has the D-Link DSM-510 HD media player for $80.<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/Search.do?c=1&context=outlet&searchType=user&keyword=dsm-510&searchSection=Outlet&go.x=0&go.y=0" target="_blank">http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/Search.do?c=1&context=outlet&searchType=user&keyword=dsm-510&searchSection=Outlet&go.x=0&go.y=0</a><br>
<br>
Free shipping or free in store pickup.<br>
<br>
It sounds like this *might* work as a MythTV frontend. I have seen limited postings on using this with Myth, but for $80 it seems like it's worth a try for a HD frontend. (Especially with the amount of work it seems to be getting a cheap Myth frontend working reliably.)<br>
<br>
Some links to using this with Myth:<br>
<a href="http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=754811" target="_blank">http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=754811</a><br>
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/review/product/B000A4AVQO?pageNumber=7" target="_blank">http://www.amazon.com/review/product/B000A4AVQO?pageNumber=7</a><br>
<a href="http://knoppmyth.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=85272&highlight=&sid=dcc22288a2f57f6e6a31ed1d688418b2" target="_blank">http://knoppmyth.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=85272&highlight=&sid=dcc22288a2f57f6e6a31ed1d688418b2</a><br>
<br>
DSM-520<br>
<a href="http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/UPnP#Compatible_UPnP_AV_MediaServer_ControlPoints_.28UPnP-clients.29" target="_blank">http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/UPnP#Compatible_UPnP_AV_MediaServer_ControlPoints_.28UPnP-clients.29</a><br>
<a href="http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/DLinkDSM520-UPnP" target="_blank">http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php/DLinkDSM520-UPnP</a><br>
<a href="http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=593973&page=44" target="_blank">http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=593973&page=44</a><br>
<br>
<br>
Any thoughts, suggestions, links, pointers would be greatly appreciated.<br>
I plan to pick one up at the local CC tonight and give it a try. If it doesn't work out I can always return it!<br>
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