Some questions from a trial user

[MezzmoNewbie]

Hello Everyone,

Thought I had posted these questions the other day but for some reason my post never showed up in the forum so I'm trying again.

Background...I stopped burning discs a few years ago and now all my home movies are on my hard drive. I have five DirecTV boxes with Mediashare and three Sony bluray players (one on each TV in the house) with DLNA. I have found that I like using Mediashare to watch shorter home videos because of the convenience of it (just hit a couple buttons on the DTV remote and don't have to wait for bluray to boot up) but I prefer using my DLNA units for watching actual movies over my home network because of the ability to FF and REW, which Mediashare doesn't seem to be able to do. Started looking for a new server program when the newer version of TVersity wouldn't work with Mediashare and the older version became flaky and unreliable. I'm in the midst of my 15-day trial and have come across a few scenarios/questions and appreciate anyone's feedback:

Pre-transcoding: Why does it seem to be making EIGHT copies of all my files (a separate one for each DirecTV box and each bluray player)? Isn't the program smart enough to know that my DTV boxes are all identical to each other and my bluray players are all identical? Why can't it make one copy for DTV and one for Sony bluray? A separate file for EVERY client? COME ON!

I'm pretty sure my bluray players can play mp4, h.264 and wmv files without transcoding (aren't all bluray players REQUIRED to be able to play those formats?). Why is it pre-transcoding those files, when I have set it up to NOT transcode files that are in a format that is native to my player?

For all of my DTV boxes, Mezzmo is defaulting to 720x480, which is an SD screen size. When I tried to change it to 1280x720, it indicates it has accepted the change, prompts me to restart the server and then I go back to check and it's defaulted back to 720x480. WTH???

For my bluray players I also specified 1280x720 but it seems to be stretching it out and badly distorting the image. Why is it not playing in regular 16x9 format (which is what my home videos were filmed in)?

Someone else posted this recently and I'm having the same problem: I'll be playing a file and it will just stop after 2-3 minutes. Then it will automatically go to the next file and do the same thing.

I was really excited when I read the reviews on Mezzmo and thought it was going to meet my needs. I'm really questioning that now. If someone can help answer these questions I'd appreciate it, otherwise I'd say there's very little chance I'll buy it when my trial is over.

[JohnM]

Welcome! I can not address the DTV boxes since I don't have one yet. As to the Sony Blurays if it is a BDPS370-570 or BDPX37-57 then they do not accept mp4/h.264 via dlna. They will through the usb port.
For the supported containers and codecs for the Sony Blue Rays refer to: http://www.kb.sony.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?cmd=displayKC&externalId=C1017936&fes=true

They are very limited. But once you get it down they work well. I have all of my movies that I extracted as a single VOB file. The Sony will play them however the BDP uses the internal timing info in the file for FF/REW. This will not work well with VOBs extracted from a DVD. The DVD players ignore it so most of the manufacturers don't keep it throughout the entire movie (most only for the first few seconds). To get past this I extract the movie as a single VOB file, then I run the program VideoRedoPlus against it and do a quickstream fix. This does a fast (3-4 min) rewrite of the file into mpeg2 format and save as a mpg. The timing is now consistent and I can FF/REW.

Note that when you first save the movie to save the audio as AC3/6. Since Sony does not allow dts via dlna. Once you are finished and have a mPeg2 video and AC3 audio it will not transcode. Since no transcoding is needed I have one file that plays on all of my players.
John

[Paul]

Pre-transcoding: Why does it seem to be making EIGHT copies of all my files (a separate one for each DirecTV box and each bluray player)? Isn't the program smart enough to know that my DTV boxes are all identical to each other and my bluray players are all identical? Why can't it make one copy for DTV and one for Sony bluray? A separate file for EVERY client? COME ON!

We regard each device as a separate streaming destination, each possibly with different settings. For example, you may have a Sony BDP connected via Ethernet cables to a HDTV and another Sony BDP connected via wireless connected to a SD TV. So both Sony BDP's possibly have different streaming requirements (video size and bandwidth). Your point is valid though - we could better optimize the "like" configurations so that it minimizes the transcoded files that are created. We'll look into this.


I'm pretty sure my bluray players can play mp4, h.264 and wmv files without transcoding (aren't all bluray players REQUIRED to be able to play those formats?). Why is it pre-transcoding those files, when I have set it up to NOT transcode files that are in a format that is native to my player? As JohnM points out, what you can play via your USB drive is not the same as what you can play via DLNA. Go to the Media Devices dialog in Mezzmo and edit your device(s). There are several different Sony BDP device profiles for you to try.


For all of my DTV boxes, Mezzmo is defaulting to 720x480, which is an SD screen size. When I tried to change it to 1280x720, it indicates it has accepted the change, prompts me to restart the server and then I go back to check and it's defaulted back to 720x480. WTH???

Directv HR20/21 boxes have a max resolution of 720x480 via DLNA. You can try the other two Directv device profiles using the Media Devices dialog. They both support 1080p.


For my bluray players I also specified 1280x720 but it seems to be stretching it out and badly distorting the image. Why is it not playing in regular 16x9 format (which is what my home videos were filmed in)?

What device profile have you selected for your Sony BDPs? You mention you have changed the max video resolution to 1280x720. If you have a HDTV, then typically it will be 1280x1080p. Also, you only need to set the max video resolution on the Performance tab if you are experiencing streaming issues such as stuttering. We typically recommend to turn off the max video resolution setting and let Mezzmo stream the original files' resolutions to your devices.


Someone else posted this recently and I'm having the same problem: I'll be playing a file and it will just stop after 2-3 minutes. Then it will automatically go to the next file and do the same thing.

That could be a transcoding+streaming issue, where a file that you have selected to be played on your device needs to be transcoded for it to be played on your device. Your devices wants to play the file but your computer is currently transcoding it on-the-fly. If your computer is not fast enough to transcode it on-the-fly and cannot supply enough data for it to be played in realtime, then your device may give up playing that file and proceed to the next file. To confirm this, go the Transcoding pane in Mezzmo and you will see what files are being transcoded by Mezzmo when you play them on your device. Mezzmo will alert you in this Transcoding pane when your transcoding is too slow for realtime playback. The fix for this is to pre-transcode your files before streaming them. To pre-transcode a file, right-click on the file in Mezzmo and click 'Pre-transcode File'.