Playing Transcoded files stored on a remote NAS drive?

Hello,

I am having problems playing videos that have had their transcoded files placed on a NAS drive that does not have Mezzmo or the Operating System loaded on it. If I transcode to the same HD that Mezzmo is loaded on and that contains the OS, everything works fine. However, when I delete all the transcoded files and then recreate them on a NAS drive, I can't play them on my Samsung TV. I can access Mezzmo on the TV and even see the file. However, when I try to play the video, there is a slight blip on the screen and I am taken back to the listing of all the videos that I have on the NAS drive. In all cases, the source video files are stored on the same NAS drive as where I am placing the transcoded files, but the files are being placed on different partitions of that NAS drive.

Any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated. My PC where Mezzmo is loaded has very limited free drive space, being able to use a large NAS drive would be very helpful.

Thanks,

Doug

What's the network connection speed between your Mezzmo server, the NAS and the TV. I had similar issues with mine. The server and NAS were part of a wired gigabit network. NAS has all my media (raw and transcoded). I had a Samsung TV that was also on the wired network and a Samsung BDP that was connected wirelessly through a bridge. Files that would play through the TV wouldn't play through the BDP. I ran a long cable to the BDP and they were able to play.

Thanks for the comment.

Connections between the Mezzmo server, NAS and TV are all through Cat 5e cable. I believe that is the same as a gigabit connection. The Mezzmo server and NAS are directly connected to a AT&T Uverse router/hub. There is a switch between the router/hub and the TV.

The type of wire Cat5e does not set the network speed. It is a rating of how fast it could be used reliably. The actual speed is set by the devices that are on the network. So is I connect an ethernet device (10mbps) to a gigabit switch the switch will set that port to 10mbps. What we should talk about is what we mean. You have a nas with your video files on it. If a video file needs to be transcoded the transcoded file is placed on the nas. Does Mezzmo put the file there or do you copy it over? If you copy it then Mezzmo can lose track of it. Try this on one file only to see if it works. Open Mezzmo and right click on a file remove that file from your library. (DO NOT remove the file from your device). Now select add file to library and add the transcoded file back in. If you right click the file and view properties it will show you where it is located. If everything seems ok, than check if you can play the file.

Thank you for your continued inputs and tips. They are helpful.

2 Points and a question:

First: I assumed that my components were 1 Gbit capable given that they are from AT&T in the last 2 years. That was a bad assumption on my part. I have a 2wire 3800HGV-B residential gateway. It is rated to Ethernet 10/100. My understanding is that it means 100 Mbit/s. Therefore my system, as you point out, would not be rated to 1 Gbit/sec.

Second: In the last week, we switch from U-Verse cable to DirecTV. DirecTV allows a person to play media from a media server. Therefore I decided to run a test. I transcoded the files, and placed them on the NAS drive. I set Mezzmo to transcode for the Samsung TV and the DirecTV rendering system. I still was not able to view the video file on my Samsung TV. However, I was able to view the video using the DirecTV rendering system.

Question:
Is a 100 Mbit/sec network fast enough for being able to view media files from a media server like Mezzmo? I was obviously able to use it for our old UVERSE cable system. Furthermore, I am able to watch transcoded video through the DirecTV rendering system with the 100 Mbit/sec network. If the 100 Mbit/sec network is fast enough, then it would seem that the issue is with the Samsung TV. If the speed is marginal, then getting a faster network may fix the issue. Any thoughts?

Again, thank you for any help you can provide.

Yes 100Mbps is fast enough. A standard def tv signal needs about 2mbps and an HD signal about 6Mbps. So the network is fast enough to support multiple simultaneous devices. Note that it is shared with other network traffic also. You made the statement "I transcoded the files, and placed them on the NAS drive." I tend to pretranscode all of my files and place them on my NAS. After they are there I add them to my mezzmo library. So if I take a file, right click in Mezzmo and look at properties I will see:
\\NASname\Video\DVDs\All Movies\Moviename.mpg This shows that Mezzmo knows this in on the NASname server in a public sharename called video then it goes down the directory path to the actual filename. A couple of important points is that Mezzmo knows that the file is there. Next that it has access rights to connect to the network share \\NASname\video is a public share with read access to anyone. No login is require to get to it. From the bit you have stated I would make sure that Mezzmo knows where the files are, and that it has access rights to it. Next if you have changes your network make certain that the devices profiles identify the correct network type. (The safe way it to delete the device and let it discover automatically.)

All good points, JohnM.

snyderdj: A 100Mb/s home network will be fast enough for streaming typical HD video, etc. assuming there is no other major traffic on the network at the same time. As mentioned in my reply (http://forum.conceiva.com/showthread...8152#post18152) to your post in another thread, check your NAS permissions. If still no success, post back here and we'll help you get up and running.

Hi JohnM,

I apologize that this email will be a bit long, but I’m trying to be precise.

If I select my media file, in the properties window I have…
\\MyBookLive\Public\PC_VideoCard\aWinTVPause.mpg

Therefore it looks like Mezzmo knows the location of the source file.

When I state in my message that “I transcoded the files and placed them on the NAS drive”, I meant the following. I selected “Media Server/Transcoding Settings” and then I browsed to the directory on my NAS drive where I wanted to put the transcoded files. (in my case this is T:\TranscodingFiles) I then selected the *.mpg file listed above and did a right-click with the mouse. I then selected “Properties\Transcoding\Pre-transcode File…” and I selected my devices.

-Sharp Aquos (2011 models)
-DirecTV HR20-21 (LPCM)

I then selected the formats and selected OK. If I then look in the directory where I specified the location for the transcoded files, there is then a *.mzt file in “T:\TranscodingFiles\*”. Therefore, it seems that the file does get transcoded. The file is about 24 MB for a 30 second clip.

I have several questions.
1) Do I need to add the directories that contain the transcoded files to my library? My reading of your response seems to imply that I should. I thought I would try, but when I went to “Add To Library/Add Folder” to add the folders, it didn’t have the *.mzt extension in the files list. Therefore, I didn’t add the folder containing the transcoded files to my library. I thought Mezzmo would know where the transcoded files are, since I told it where to put the transcoded files.
2) If I select the *.mpg file listed above and do a right-click/Properties/Transcoding”, I don’t see any information listed in the window “This file has been transcoded for the following devices:”. Yesterday, I had pre-coded the file. Should I see something listed in this window?

Thanks for any help that you can provide.

snyderdj

OK we are getting much closer now. Rather than individually telling each file where to put the transcoded file, let's tell Mezzmo where to put all of them. Click on Media Server -> Transcoding Settings. That will bring up the transcoding Settings dialog box.

In the Entry for Transcoded files temporary folder Put the T:\TranscodingFiles Make sure that the Maximum folder size is big enough. Then Click OK.

That will have Mezzmo automatically place the files out there for you. More importantly it tells Mezzmo where the transcoded files are located. So it knows where to go to play back the files.

Hi snyderdj,

Some answers to your questions:

1) No, you don't need to add the transcoded (*.mzt) files into your Mezzmo library. Mezzmo knows about what files have been transcoded for what devices and will stream the appropriate one to your device when you choose to play them on your device.

2) On the Transcoding tab in the Properties dialog, you should see all the transcoded files that have been created for the selected file. If you select many files and display the Properties dialog, then the Transcoding tab will not show any transcoded files - it only shows transcoded files when you select one file and display the Properties dialog. If you don't see any transcoded files for a selected single file and you know that you have pre-transcoded files for it, then that is strange and we'd like to find out why. Please stop your Mezzmo server and exit Mezzmo. Using Windows Explorer, go to the c:\users\<username>\AppData\Local\Conceiva\Mezzmo folder and zip up the "MezzmoTranscode.db" file. Send this zip file to us at support [at] conceiva [dot] com & we'll check out what is going wrong.