#5
Post
by atc98092 » Thu Sep 04, 2014 11:50 pm
I use two types of players (3 counting the DLNA built into my TV), the Roku 2 XS and Sony BDP-S3100.
The Roku requires transcoding, because it can't handle a video bitstream much higher than 12Mbps, and most Blu-Ray rips run 25Mbps or higher. It will, however, play a DVD ripped into MKV without transcoding, and sends the DTS or DD audio as a bitstream.
The Sony (and most other Sony Blu-Ray players) plays MKV native, and will pass HD audio as bitstream. I have seen the video bitrate (the Sony has a rate display) over 50Mbps (Dark Knight Returns) without any playback issues.
I will point out one thing, neither of these players will display captions from a Blu-Ray rip. The Roku requires transcoding, which removes the captions from the stream, and the Sony, although it recognizes the captions in the stream and accepts me turning them on, just doesn't show them. MKV rips of DVDs will, however, show the captions.
I have the players hard wired into my Gigabit network, so there's no issue with Wi-Fi keeping up. If you are streaming HD video that hasn't had its bitrate modified (by HandBrake or some such product, or by your server transcoding), then I would stay away from a Wi-Fi connection. BTW, I use Serviio as my video DLNA server. Very adaptable to multiple types of video files, and supports almost any kind of player.
Serviio media server with 18 TB of space. Over 1500 movies and 2000 TV episodes. Samsung JU7100 TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Roku 4, Ultra and two Roku TVs (one 4K) on a gigabit network.