Best Multimedia-Player for MKV playback? Please help!

[samtoy]

Hi everybody,

which (Hardware)-Multimedia-Player is the best when it comes to *perfect* MKV playback on a LCD/LED TV with flawless PGS subtitle support?

I currently own a Popcorn Hour A-210 which plays all my MKVs without any problems but it has a serious PGS subtitle problem. It displays them but the timings are off and it has problems with PGS subtitles in special fonts (like in Avatar or Kill Bill 2). This is superannoying! The guys from Popcorn Hour (Syabas) just won't fix that bug in a firmware update. Now I'm tired of waiting for a update so I'm planning to buy a different multimedia player. But which one??

Who owns a Popbox or an Asus or Ryan model for instance? How do these (or other) models handle MKVs with PGS subtitles?

I'm starting a small list here with the (little) info I got. So maybe an owner of a different model can add his info too. Thanks in advance, guys!

Player: Popcorn Hour A-200/210
MKV playback: perfect, no problems at all
PGS subtitle in MKV support: yes, but with some timing and display problems

Player: WD TV Live! (2011 version)
MKV playback: good (as far as I know)
PGS subtitle in MKV support: partially, subtitles have to be zlib compressed (only god knows why, this is very annoying for older MKVs!)

Cheers, S.

[crowfax]

I have the WD TV Live Streaming (this one) and the Xtreamer Sidewinder 3 (info here). Both of them handle MKV's from MakeMKV flawlessly (with the exception of PGS subtitles which still need zlib compression on the WD TV).

The Xtreamer is fun to play with, the new firmware which is in testing is like a mini-XBMC interface and is pretty cool. If you consider yourself pretty techie and like to fiddle, I'd go with this, you can install a 2.5" hard drive into it and run android apps off of it too.

The WD TV is solid, and despite the issues the WD developers have with their firmware on occasion, it's reliable. If you want something that "just works", I'd go with this.

Any player with the new Realtek 1186 is going to be fine with PGS subtitles, I'd look at them, you can browse by chipset on the iboum website: http://www.iboum.com/net-media-players.php.

Happy shopping!

[samtoy]

Thanks for all the info, crowfax.

OK, since the WD Live player has that strange PGS zlib limitation it is out of the question for me. I want a player that works 100% reliable (subtitle-wise) this time.

About the Xtreamer Sidewinder 3: Interesting player, but does it display PGS subtitles in MKV correctly? I'm asking because PGS subs are not in the specs on the Sidewinder 3 page you linked to.

EDIT:

I've heard the new Dune TV 101/301 is a very good player with PGS support in the specs. Can maybe anybody confirm this?

[PeacePipe]

Netgear NTV550 does it flawlessly.

[Chetwood]

OK, since the WD Live player has that strange PGS zlib limitation it is out of the question for me.

Actually, it's the standard's default setting for MKVs. And since you have to mux the MKV once, it's absolutely no extra work to compress the subs with zlib in the process, so I see no limitation there. The actual limitation people failed to mention is that AFAIK no available standalone recognizes the forced subtitle flag in MKVs.