ASUS O!Play - TV HD Media Player (Black)

Exxon Mc says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

I just installed this media player yesterday and I am VERY impressed. Video and audio quality is excellent(hd and sd/ better than my hd4350 on my htpc). Build quality is good. Menu navigation and gui are serviceable but NOT great. I have both esata HDD and 2 Win7 pc’s network connected via 100mbps. I updated my firmware to 1.17n but I still could not access files on my networked pc’s running win7 (prompted for login and password). I decided to install tversity (free)media server software on my 2 win7 pc’s to fix this problem. After I installed tversity and added my shared media folders, I went back to the oplay menu and was able to find my network shares under folders/upnp/(pcname)tversity. They still did not work via “network” setting, so make sure you go upnp route. I give a 5 star rating because for the money this player rocks(I have a wired connection and I don’t need access for web content on this box). It should only get better with future firmware upgrades.

Aligator says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

I was looking for something affordable, and that played .AVI and .MKV formats to name a few of them, and it does, It is incredibly easy to use, at first I wanted one with a built in hard drive, but this unit works with external sources like thumb drives , external HDD’s, which might be a blessing in disguise in the long run, you can use a usb, or esata external hard drive, and you can network the asus unit to your computer to transfer files right from there, it is NOT wireless, but for all it does, its well worth the money, the remote is awesome, very straight forward and functional.

on avi files, the quality is going to depend on how much compression is put into a dvd rip, so most movies at around 700mb are acceptable, anything less may seem pixilized, but blue ray is AWESOME! even at 720p.

To sum it up, ASUS has a winner in the O’ Play, absolutely no issues with any tv’s using this, you can use HDMI Cable or RCA cable, and sound is awesome, its a good buy all around.

Jinx says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

For how much media players cost now you could easily set yourself back $130-$300+. Why do that when the Asus O!play offers this much compatibility and functionality for the price?

I admit, this is my first day using the product, so this will be the use of both a first time customer for a media player and the first day use of it.

After getting the product you get all that is shown and told in their reviews. The power cord/power brick, the av cable, the unit itself, and an instructional cd and quick start guide. No hdmi cable, so you will need to get your own. You can get one for $5 ((which is the price+shipping)) on amazon for a 6 ft hdmi M to hdmi M so it isn’t a big deal price wise.

Installation of the unit is quite easy for a tv, just plug in the respective things, and you are good to go. When you first power on the unit you will be greated with a setup. Asking you for screen quality, time, and other things.(This should only take a few minutes top) After that you are put to the main menu.

As I ordered this on the 13th or so, it came with firmware 1.17 already installed. The latest on Asus is 1.18, which I updated to with minimal effort. For those of you who just download 1.18 it did now come with the installation guide with it, but it is quite easy to do: Insert a blank usb thumbdrive with the image file inserted(from the Asus download site) then go to setup and then “reinstall”. When you select to reinstall it will say it will go up to the version on your stick. After you okay this it will then proceed to do the update, at first the unit will look like it is off and that it isn’t doing anything, but after a minute the update screen will show up and then it will go to the latest version. The only minor(and I mean minor) issue with the reinstall is that you have to redo the settings you did when you first installed the unit, but this is trivial and not that big of a deal.

As for playing files, the only file types I have thrown at it so far are AVIs, soon I will use the others, but it plays the files just fine. There isn’t really that much of a lag time. The only point that it has it is a minor amount when it goes to show you the preview of the file, and it is a fairly short wait so not that important.

For a final note from a new buyer and user of this product, I do recommend it for those looking for a cheap and quality media player for their home. While the unit is bigger on the picture in comparison to the WDTV, it is in no way “bulky” It is quite smaller than some of our other devices including our mini dvd player which we thought was small. So if you are in the market, go cheap and go quality and get the Asus O!play.

S. Dawkins says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

Ok here goes. Straight out of the box this item work’s great. Things get complicated when using the network functionality of this item and trying to access a file off a N.A.S networked harddrive, worst if that said Hardrive is shared to a PC running windows 7 ;mine you if done properly It will appear In Window’s 7 Workgroup, meaning if the PC is turned off and the harddrive is still ON,you lose Ethernet connectivity to the Hardrive.and then there was a software update for that which enables UPAP, UNAP or something, that messed up some boxes and so on and so on and then there’s the new version to this that has wireless capabilities and SD card reader that is out now, if you can afford the wireless , buy the one with wireless , at least you have the latest version , lol.Final verdict , if on a budget , Buy it , or at least the one with wireless, if not, skip it.

massfnords says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

First off, I am very happy with this unit. I would have given it 5 stars but it required a little command line configuration on my part to work within my environment. I suspect that things will be very smooth if you have a windows machine and are sharing content from it but if you have a NAS it might be a little rough.

I have a Western Digital NAS and a couple of Macs on my network. All of my media is on the NAS and the OPlay is connected to the network via a standard ethernet cable. The OPlay didn’t see my NAS in its network browser but it did appear under the UPNP setting. Most of the files played without a problem but I did have some mysterious stops on some files under UPNP so I checked the forums and there are some detailed directions which are easy to follow if you’re comfortable with Linux. The solution was to mount the NAS on the OPlay and then all of the content appears as if it is connected via a USB storage device. I went back and played the files that consistently failed via UPNP and they played fine.

Overall, it’s affordable, tiny, and the UI is good enough.

Urs M. Gubser says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

This is the first media player that gets it right.

- Formats:

This player really plays anything you throw at it. Every MP4, AVI or MKV file that I’ve tried – from lowers all the way to 1080p – streamed flawlessly over the network. I didn’t get this from Mvix nor did I get this from my PS3 nor did I have this on my Apple TV. I suspect that this might be something that the hardware is responsible for and not so much the software (translation: I expect this to appear in other devices). But for some companies such as Apple and Sony – who simply can’t offer to play all formats because their content partners would probably not allow it – this is a huge issue and Asus clearly has the leg up here.

- Networking

Other devices have networking, so this is not unique – BUT networking worked out of the box. This was really an Apple like experience. I connected the Ethernet cable to my router, turned the box on and was able to start surfing my read-only CIFS shares (from my NAS).

- Price

Wow – if only the movie industry started to realize what a potential market this could be for them. If we all had devices like these (and for this price we could) then we could finally put the DVD’s to rest (and save everyone a lot of costs/troubles; of course we would also destroy industries in the process – but that’s what technology advances do)

- User interface

While not as polished as a PS3 or an Apple TV – it is surprisingly Apple like. It’s very simple, it doesn’t give you a million options – instead it focuses on what’s relevant, namely watching movies.

Joseph Robertson says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

A few things. I am giving this thing a 4 out of 5. It seems to play everything I throw at it. A previous reviewer on October 21 mentions that “The slightly annoying thing is that as you scroll through a list of movie files it tries to instantly play a preview.” You can easily disable this by going to the setup panel of the O!play.

[...]: [...] Make sure you download the appropriate firmware for your region. NTSC or PAL. I recommend opening this in Internet Explorer because when I used firefox; the download would never start correctly.

With this firmware I have successfully connected to and streamed MANY different formats via PS3 media server. (a UPNP server) I’m not sure why you would want to do this when connecting to a simple file share seems to be the stated goal of this player, but I digress, it’s a feature that some seem to want.

Now, I have had nothing but trouble connecting to file server shares. This includes both a Windows 7 box and an Ubuntu Linux box with Samba. I have tried everything and the shares won’t even show up in the list under Network. All machines are in the same broadcast domain, and I am able to connect to both servers with ANY other client. So with that being said i’ve been relegated to manually mounting the shares so they show up as LOCAL DISK(s). Yes you read that correctly. So now when I go to play files I go to the Storage Device option appropriate category and my server(s) shares are listed as locally connected disks.

Here’s how you do that:

telnet 10.1.1.243 (ip address of your asusO!play)

username: root

password: (< --nothing)

you need to edit the run_tail file

vi /usr/local/etc/dvdplayer/script/run_tail

vi isn’t an easy text editor google “vi cheat sheet”

(*in the below listed example 10.1.1.31 and HDmovies are variables that can be ANYTHING, they are your choice and must be set based on your own home network*)

add something like the following:

mkdir -p /tmp/ramfs/volumes/HDmovies

mount -t cifs -o username=yourusername,password=yourpassword //10.1.1.31/HDmovies /tmp/ramfs/volumes/HDmovies

now reboot your player and browse to Storage Device under the appropriate category and you’ll see your network share(s) mounted.

standstill27 says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

I first got a first generation WDTV and the slow interface bugged me. I decided to give the Asus O!play a try and wow. I put my movies in Vob format because quality is a big concern for me. But this player handles it all. I recently found out you could put the whole DVD into a folder and it would act like a regular DVD in a DVD player. You can go through the menus and choose what chapters you want to skip too. The only problem is the remote isn’t a DVD remote so functions like the menu button isn’t available. So navigating through the DVD and playing a chapter gets you stuck there and there is no way to go back to the Main Menu. If you hit the back button it takes you all the way out to the folder screen.

The other new feature I found was you could connect a USB hub to it and will be able to play anything connected to that USB hub. I got 3-External drives connected and with the price of External HDD dropping this feature comes in really handy. I read that the WDTV hub feature was taken away with a newer firmware update, but they may have put it back. I have not experienced any reboot issues, but I am on the newest firmware. Sometimes the interface lags, but not as bad as the WDTV interface. My advice is to try it and see if you like it, Amazon will take it back if you don’t.

E. Mrowiec says... on 14-07-2010
	Rating Collegue of mine pointed this unit out to me and although I have only owned it for a short time I love it. It is very nice looking and I really like the menu layout. I will update the review once I have owned it a bit longer but I would recommend this if you are looking for a player.

S. Karamourdian says... on 14-07-2010
	Rating very simple and easy to set up, and works great as advertised. You do not need a big and ugly computer in your living room to watch movies or pictures.

Helvin J. Fuenmayor Villalobos says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

After have read some reviews for another similar items, I decided to buy this one because the price-value relation. It play almost every format, containers, codecs for video and audio files, and in addition have some more useful features like hdmi A/V output, spdif digital audio out, ethernet 10/100Mbps port, etc… So, if you have a pretty good LCD Screen and a nice audio system, you will get exactly what you are looking for playing all your digital stuff.

I use it with my 250GB portable hard drive and works just perfect for HD 720p movies and TV Shows. It still have some minor issues like rewind function in HD 720p/1080p files, however, in Asus website you can download the latest firmware in order to keep improving this device.

C. MacLean says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

So I’ve had my O-Play since Christmas and I have to say I’m overall very happy with it. The new firmware load (1.17N) fixes a lot of issues with the player, they really need to get that version pre-loaded. I have all my content on a Windows XP Media Server, linked to this O-Play (and my other network devices) via Powerline ethernet. I have yet to find a video format this thing will not play. The menu is extremely clunky and needs lots of polish. The device needs a way to store ‘favorites’ so you can create one-click links to your videos, home movies, torrents, pics, mp3 etc. As it is right now you need MULTIPLE clicks to find the server, folder, subfolder etc. There is a way to improve this but it involves telnetting into the device and changing some config files. Only recommended for the hacker. Asus seem to be doing a superb job working on constant improvements to the device. They are definitely on the ball and are putting out way more updates for this than you typically see on a consumer device. This is a huge plus as new video formats etc. will require constant updates.

I would say if you are tech savvy, have a wired network, don’t care about web streaming and simply want to play content off an external server this is the hands-down winner. That’s all I wanted so am extremely happy with the purchase. There is nothing else on the market that can touch it at this time for the price and functionality.

4 stars for clunky menus and an issue with 1080p that I’m working with Asus on (did I say they were extremely receptive)

buru buru piggu says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

It’s not much to look at coming out of the box, but boy, does the O!Play pack a wallop! It’s an outstanding first effort from Taiwan-based Asus, a company known more for Eee Netbook and notebook computers than home entertainment devices. With Asus being a newcomer to the media player field and my having tested so many bad players, I was a bit hesitant to order the O!Play, but now I’m a believer. With its exhaustive list of supported video codecs and network connectivity, it is nearly the perfect player, capable of playing everything from VCD to DVD to Blu-ray/HD DVD rips. Most notably, it supports RMVB, an important feature to fans of Asian shows and one that most of the major-brand players lack, including the otherwise superb WD TV HD Media Player and WD TV Live Network-ready HD Media Player. ASUS seems to be very actively developing firmwares and I’m impressed by their diligence.

SETUP:

Setup is easy and literally takes 30 seconds. On the side is 1 USB port and 1 eSATA port to connect local hard drives should you need them. HDMI and optical cable (S/PDIF) are not included, so you’ll need your own. I really appreciate Asus using a 2-prong power cord instead of a wall-wart that blocks neighboring outlets. True to Asus’s PC pedigree, the AC adapter looks like a PC laptop’s AC adapter. It’s very small (about the size of a Hostess Twinkie) and has a pleasant (and VERY BRIGHT) blue LED. Upon boot-up, the device asks you to configure it with TV settings, network settings, time and date, etc. After plugging in the LAN cable, it found my NAS units (D-Link DNS321 Gigabit Network Storage Enclosure and D-Link DNS323) right away. The O!Play did have a problem interpreting non-Roman characters on my NAS, so folder names and files got garbled. Some files did not show up on the O!Play until I removed the offending non-Western characters (Chinese and Japanese).

With the new firmware, UPnP has been added, along with some slightly improved icons. With UPnP, the O!Play sees Chinese and Japanese filenames properly, but none of my MKV’s showed up, a problem I had on all networked players I’ve tested. Only a fraction of my total library was listed. If you want to see your entire list, don’t use UPnP.

INTERFACE AND USABILITY:

From a total off and unplugged state, the O!Play takes 10 seconds to boot to the home screen, compared to as many as 40 seconds for the Iomega ScreenPlay Plus HD Multimedia Player 1 TB. The home screen is bright and attractive, but the folder navigation scheme leaves a bit to be desired. It’s spartan, white text on black, and not nearly as attractive as the WDTV or WDTV Live, but it gets the job done. The remote control is big and solid, though the buttons seem to be bizarrely grouped and scattered about, forcing me to look down each time to make sure I’m pushing the right button. The bottom group of buttons is arranged in a circle around the music button for example, mixing different functionality into one area: volume controls (+/-) with subtitle (Aa), audio track (head icon), repeat mode (circular arrows), picture zoom (magnifying glass), file display mode (Mode), and device setup options (Setup). “Mode” is a file listing filter, toggling between Movies, Music, and Pictures. With it, you never need to go back to the home screen. Unfortunately, there’s no “Show All” mode which lists every file together at the same time. To PageUp or PageDown long directories, use the |< and >| buttons.

During video or image playback, the picture can be zoomed up to 8x. During video playback, the fast-forward/rewind can go up to 32x. The inclusion of volume control buttons is very thoughtful and useful. You can turn video preview on or off. Pausing over a file for a second will play it in a smaller window on the right (with audio). There is a slight delay of a second or two when reading the file’s metadata off a drive or the network, during which time you can’t push the play button. This can be a potential problem for people and gets annoying. For music, pausing over the file displays the ID3 info (song name, artist, album name, year, etc).

One cool feature is the ability to adjust the device options while playing back a movie. The menu overlays on top of the movie and you can adjust your settings (Brightness, Contrast, Aspect Ratio, etc) and resume. There’s also a Noise Reduction option, but I suggest turning this OFF. It caused strange and distracting frame shimmering in some movies. Lastly, O!Play also remembers where you left off on each movie and can resume the next time you play the file.

FORMAT SUPPORT:

This is where the O!Play really shines. It played all of the 100+ random files I threw at it, except for a few stray (and poor quality) .WMV files I got from the internet. MKV, AVI, MPG, DIVX, RM, TS all played flawlessly, both standard def and hi-def 720p/1080i/p content. It even plays Flash Video (FLV), a feature rarely encountered. DTS and Dolby multi-channel audio is downsampled to stereo, so there’s no need for an audio receiver if you just want to output through the TV for convenience.

The Asus also plays .IFO/VOB files with DVD chapters, menus, and all disc features as if it were the original DVD. That’s great news for users looking to make a centralized DVD collection on a server or a big hard drive. The only problem is there doesn’t seem to be a button to get back to the menu. You have to stop the movie and start it again.

For photos, the ASUS has a problem displaying progressive JPEGs. Images will fit to screen and can zoom up to 8x, but there’s no 1x view to see it at the original size.

EXTERNAL SUBTITLES:

I tested external .SRTs and internally embedded subtitles in .MKV’s in a number of languages, including Chinese, Japanese, Russian, English, French, and others. All worked when saved as UTF-8. For multilingual families and fans of foreign film, this is great news. You can also set the interface to one of 10 major world languages. Subtitle files can be downloaded from sites like DivxStation.

With firmware 1.11, external and internal subs are both recognized if both types co-exist for a movie. Previously, only embedded subs were seen when a movie had both types. Now, pushing the subtitle button pops up a submenu where you can select the subtitle, change its encoding, font size, position, color, and importantly, syncing (many downloaded subtitles are off by a few seconds). This is very useful! No more re-saving. Just cycle through the available encodings or adjust the timing until the sub looks right (but you should still re-save to avoid doing this every time). Where multiple external subs existed, the O!Play did not recognize their names, showing only a number (like “Subtitle: 2 (SRT)”, even when named according to the movie’s filename (e.g. “Batman.mkv” -> “Batman – English.srt”). Pushing the info button a second time shows extended info like codec, resolution, and bitrate. It is better to mux the subtitle into the file using something like mkvmerge GUI and metatag the language name onto it. Subtitle line-spacing is a bit of an issue (too much). You can change the font size and color, but not the gap. Lastly, I wish for a thick black outline around the text like the WDTV Live. Sometimes the subtitle blends into the movie, no matter what color you set it to.

10/100 NETWORK INTERFACE:

This is a weak point for the device. With no gigabit Ethernet, it is less future-proof against monster 8GB+ .MKV files and other bandwidth intensive HD content. Also lack of wireless connectivity means I do not have freedom to locate this device wherever I want.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

The O!Play is truly a multimedia beast. It plays nearly everything under the sun and as a WDTV and WDTV live owner, I can safely say that Western Digital has some serious competition here. At $99, it is a very capable device at a fantastic value, and its homely interface is forgivable. It is, however, rather boxy and brick-like, taking up as much space as a 3.5″ external hard drive or an average Bible. It’s 2x the size of the WDTV. Lastly, WDTV Live has Flickr, YouTube, and Pandora streaming. O!Play has no internet playback capabilities as of the current firmware release, though that can quickly change. ASUS has already added substantial improvements like the subtitle fixes and UPnP.

If wireless connectivity could be added with a firmware update, then this player will be all things to all people. (WDTV Live supports third party WiFi dongles). This is THE player to get if you want MKV, RMVB, and DVD .IFO support and don’t care about wireless. Great value coupled with a great firmware support attitude makes this a highly recommended buy, and I hope ASUS surprises us with more software features down the road.

UPDATE #1 – Dec 10/09: Firmware 1.17 is now available, which adds BD .iso support and lets you jump forward by 5/10/15/30 mins.

UPDATE #2: Feb 15/10: Firmware 1.21 has just been released. It adds MAJOR internet content connectivity as well as the option to wirelessly connect your R1! This is something users have been clamoring for since this product’s release and a giant leap forward. With a compatible USB dongle, this thing does everything the Air does, except the media reader capabilities (which you can add that with an external USB reader). I am upgrading my rating to 5 stars as a result of the obvious effort ASUS put out to make this player what users want. It’s still rough around the edges and the interface still needs polish, but this update adds major value to the player– a truly excellent buy at $99. I can now watch TV streams from all over the world, including my favorite, NHK (Japan). WDTV Live, the gauntlet has officially been thrown down.

N. Tonry says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

I was recently introduced to Media Players in general by a friend. Since then I bought a 1080p 24″ monitor and have been in search of a media player capable of playing 1080p movies.

I first started with the WD TV Media player. It was completely incapable of handling the task of 1080p movies. It could not properly decode the MKV file, which led to a very pix-elated picture. It did however perform flawlessly with a 720p MKV file, all the way through. And they looked great.

I then heard about this product, the Asus O!Play, with multiple positive reviews and decided to give it a shot. It does indeed play 1080p files, but not all the way through. I made it about 15-20 minutes in before the movie became out of sync. In fact, the audio began going faster than the video, but the video did not seem to be slowed down. It was quite peculiar.

I would have to hit the back button, because pausing it did not alleviate the problem, and then return to the video. Nearing the end of the film, the video itself began lagging very badly and the audio came out of sync after not even a minute. I left it alone for 5 minutes so the poor box could get a break.

Then I tried watching another 1080p MKV, and it froze up after the first 3 seconds and refused to play.

A third 1080p file yielded the same results as the WD Media player, with lots of pix-elation and the like.

This player does play 720p files flawlessly as well, however the quality of the image seems to be worse with the Asus when compared to the WD when playing the same file.

I do not like the remote that comes with the Asus, the button placement is very usual to me. Moving between the pause and arrow buttons is very awkward, and it was impossible for me to use under low lighting, because I had no idea what I was pressing.

I do like the menu interface, it is very well organized. Even the setup is easy to use. Some people hate it, but I find it very easy to use.

I will be trying out a variety of different media players and I shall post a review on each one, and hopefully I will find one capable of playing 1080p files all the way through with no breaks.

Yanlai Wu says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

Just bought it from newegg, updated firmware to latest version. firmware udpate works well and quite easy. easy to setup.

However, the biggest disappointment to me is that HDMI port doesn’t have video output. try on different TV, reboot, reset, wait, change to another HDMI port on TV, etc. tried everything I can think of, NO video from HDMI. the only video is from video cable.

first time I bought an end user product from ASUS. big disappointment. the product is a joke.

T. Pearce says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

I bought this device and made the mistake of updating the firmware which ended up causing numerous issues with LAN support. This rendered the device practically useless for me. It has been well over a month and no word from ASUS until recently when they posted to the forums that they would have a fix in another 3 weeks. Awesome. That will make it over two months since I was able to use this piece of junk. Unless you are a glutton for punishment, I would avoid buying this device.

Tod says... on 14-07-2010

Rating

I chose the Asus player over the Western Digital player due to the fact that it can play image files. In other words a DVD movie can be saved as an ISO file and stored on a hard drive, so you can keep the DVD properties and have it as a single file. You can also do a movie only image, and play the movie with the chapters intact. It streams movie files over my network without a stutter. Upscaling looks almost as good as my Blu-Ray player, and I tend to only use my Blu-Ray player to stream Pandora or Netflix now.

Kumo says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

Works very well out of the box and plays all the files that I’ve thrown at it. I decided to integrate it into my home network with an Actiontec MegaPlug A/V 200 Mbps Powerline Network Adapter Kit (White) which works exceedingly well and allows me to not have to deal with wireless issues.

For the most part this works well enough, but some high bit-rate 1080p H.264 gave this unit some problem. I suspected the network at first, and after some troubleshooting, determined that the little box uses Linux CIFS filesystem support which was maxing out at around 12 Mbps over my network. Using a Linux laptop, I determined that using FTP I was able to hit 60 Mbps, using NFS was around 50 Mbps, SMB via ‘smbclient’ was around 40 Mbps, and CIFS via the same Linux ‘cifsfs’ was just as slow as the O!Play. (Disclaimer: your setup and mileage may vary, this was my observation on my particular home network)

Armed with this knowledge, I investigated the ASUS forums and discovered that the box was easily logged into via telnet and was a little Linux box. I changed the startup script to use my NFS mounts and was able to get much better network performance. Definitely not for the average consumer, which is why it doesn’t get 5 stars.

There is definitely some H.264 scenes that have really spiky bit-rate that will not fair well on this box, in particular, the infamous ‘bird scene’ from “Planet Earth,” even on a local USB disk, will skip a little (I believe it hits ~100 Mbps bit-rate at some point which is ridiculous for the sample I was using). Outside of this one, admittedly extreme example, the device played everything else flawlessly.

The UI is definitely not the prettiest thing in the world, very spartan and functional, but not aesthetically pleasing at all–another reason why I can’t give this 5 stars.

Christian Szita says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

I bought this item with the hope I could access all of my data from my TV, and it lives up to the challenge.

The minute I received this item I did a firmware upgrade to the lastest 1.17N version (as of this review). This fixed some issues: Not being able to connect to windows 7 machines was the most important for me. Problem solved!

This is the prefect replacement for those of us who want an inexpensive alternative to a popcorn hour (and don’t need all the bells and whistles of that device). HDMI works like a charm, and you also can get audio signal from the goodie but oldie RCA output (in case you want to connect it to an external source like a receiver)

Another thing that I liked is the fact that you can connect a USB HUB to the USB port of the Asus O!Play. Not only it will recognize it but it will also “see” all the external drives connected to it ! So you can easily have 4 hard disks or usb sticks connected to one single port !!

Awesomeness doesn’t stop there: The O!Play will read all video formats available, from simple FLV’s passing through the standard AVI’s and the most recent MKV’s.

Maybe the only thing I would add is the ability to connect through wifi (that’s why I’ve thought first for the WD Live TV), but then you must realize that high-bitrate videos like large bandwitdh and you ain’t gonna get that through a basic 802.11g connection (at least at average rates). So better stick with Ethernet. (Or buy the new O!Play Air device)

eFan says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

I don’t review products often even I buy a lot of gadgets. However, this player deserves one positive review.

Have used a couple of Media Players in past years-from early day IPTV 3500, WD HD TV, Archos TV… This is simply the best. Play everying I throw in, streaming 720P video over my 802.11g w/o any problem! Much better and smoother than my PC playing.

Hope Asus will add the option to save favorites or shortcuts for folders, subfolders to facilitate content navigation in the future firmware update.

Tony L. says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

I ordered the ASUS O!Play through Amazon over the holidays. The standard free shipping through USPS was lost. USPS said it was left at my door but I never got it. A call to Amazon and they shipped a replacement to me immediately at no cost. And they upgraded the shipping to UPS two days priority mailing. Thumbs up to Amazon’s customer service.

I mainly wanted a HDTV player that plays DVD files from my portable HD. I have the WD HDTV player. But it only plays one (vob) file at a time. It does not provide the DVD full menu. ASUS O!Play solved the problem. First, the set up was plug and play since I do not have a network. Firmware version 1.17 was already loaded. It plays DVD files like a DVD player. I have full menu selection such as chapter selection, trailers, behind the scene interviews ….etc. The only thing missing is it does not have a button that takes you directly back to the DVD main menu. Another minor annoyance each time when the unit is turn on, it has to go through indexing the drive. It takes about 30 – 45 seconds each time for my 1 TB HD that has under 300 GB of files in it. When that HD is at its full capacity, I image it will take over a minute to index the HD every time the unit is turn on.

But I am still very happy with the ASUS O!Play. It does what I need for now.

B. Jackson says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

With daily use for over 5 months, this box has played every file I’ve thrown at it – mkv, iso, mp3, avi (with multiple codecs) – and played them all without a hitch. I’ve got it wired into my home network to play files off my computer, and have never had a problem with network speed. Good physical design, if not exactly gorgeous, and a well thought out interface. My wife and daughter, who aren’t as geeky as I am, haven’t had any problems using it. Thumbs up from me!

Hertz says... on 15-07-2010

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This is excellent player. I’ve being testing my for 3 days now. So far it is stable, plays every file I feed it and stays cool and quite. I stream my HD video and music files from Ubuntu 64-bin NAS. Other reviewers have complained about fast forward, rewind problems. While not smooth but jumping over scenes those functions are still very usable and allow me getting back to the once interrupted movie easily.

O!play regrets says... on 15-07-2010

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ASUS stinks it up again with another poor product that not only malfuctions repeatedly but is also likely to wreck your home theater speakers and not play the files you want played.

I have both the O!play R1 (which I received as a XMAS present) and the R3 wireless (which I purchased when I returned the R1) and they both malfunction repeatedly on a variety of files and file types.

O!play not only doesn’t play the files its supposed to (even with the newest firmware) but it also destroyed my home theater speakers. While playing a file O!play froze and sent a maxed out volume screech of constant static through my home theater system destroying my speakers! The only way to get the O!play to stop was to unplug it. The problem lies in the fact that Oplay sets their default speaker volume at the max…so when freezing occurs it will change its volume to this. So if you have turned the volume down to make it match the rest of your home theater components you’re likely going to have a problem when the oplay freezes…WHICH it will!

ASUS Technical support and customer support have been horible. First they refuse to even replace the O!play unit even though they think it is defective even though its under warrenty. Second they refuse to replace the speakers it destroyed (I’m currently filing a lawsuit over this). ASUS has the worst customer service I’ve ever seen…their manager even laughed at my misfortune. DO NOT BUY THIS PRODUCT…YOU MAY END UP LIKE I DID WITH A MALFUNCTIONING UNIIT THAT DESTOYS A $1000 WORTH OF SPEAKERS like my Oplay did. So now I have to go to court, I have filed with the better business bureau (please look up their record for yourself…last I saw there were 214 open complaints about ASUS as a company) and my state attorney’s office. O thank you ASUS!

I’ll never buy another ASUS product again. DO NOT TRUST THIS COMPANY WITH YOUR MONEY!

And for those who think this is a fake post…go ahead and look up my other review of the wireless R3 version…its been verified as a purchase. I can’t get this R1 purchase verified because it was given to me as a gift.

Dima says... on 15-07-2010

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I purchased this model mainly because it supports both, old composite connection (for my CRT TV) and new HDMI connectors (I tested it too in case I buy Plasma/LCD). The second reason is new chipset and a lot of supported media formats (including AVCHD produced by my camcorder). In general, I’m pleased with this item:

1. It plays all formats flawlessly. So far, I tried AVI(XviD/DivX), MKV(Matroska), MTS(AVCHD), IFO(DVD) and some audio MP3 files.

2. It is black, silent and cool with two ambient blue indicators switching to one red when it’s off. In other words – it’s practically invisible (which is a must for hone theatre equipment).

3. It has simple intuitive browsing interface and easy-to-use remote control full of useful features with nothing excessive (such as volume control, zoom, subtitle swap and home button bringing fast to main menu).

4. I couldn’t test much of a quality because I don’t own Plasma TV but from what I saw on friend’s set – HDMI and RCA works very good.

Here’s several points of improvement I’d like to mention (most of them can be fixed via future FW upgrade, currently 1.07N):

1. The model I purchased (in US) doesn’t support PAL (Europe) – the option exists in Setup but grade-out. This is a minor problem for me because although I have PAL TV, it also supports NTSC.

2. When seen on CRT TV, the menus doesn’t look very nice (letters are small and fuzzy, the picture slightly extends beyond left border).

3. The remote receiver should be pointed directly to the box, otherwise commands are often missed, and not too responsive.

4. The box is relatively large (almost twice bigger than WDTV) and not especially stylish.

5. I still haven’t decide whether I can tolerate odd Category “filtering”. What I mean is when you go to “Video” or “Music”, you don’t get your video or music library but rather “filter” the whole content by file types (video or audio). The only consolation here is dedicated button that allows you to switch filtering modes “on-the-fly” without returning back to home menu.

6. Media preview shows very little info about file. No meta-data

Overall, it seems to be well built, thought, fully functional and sometimes pleasantly surprising although not perfect media player which will suite very well most of consumers while may send the most demanding of them for farther search.

Now, after updating the firmware (to 1.11P), several improvements appeared:

1. Firmware upgrade allowed me to switch from NTSC to PAL system. Although it’s not the most convenient method, it’s also relatively rare procedure.

2. I must admit that Firmware upgrade was relatively easy: download, unzip and copy the image on USB drive, put it in player and start the upgrade via Setup menu. After less than a minute, the player reboots as new, so you only need to reconfigure personal settings (time, language etc.).

3. With new subtitle management, you can change the size, position, color and enconding! Size and position can be modified directly via arrow butons which is very convinient.

4. New browsing options allow you to retrieve recently viewed items and also to browse media sorted by property (date, author, album etc.) which is fantastic. However, since video files lacks meta data, I still wait for some kind of managing utility for them.

In order to get new Firmware or Manual, go to “[...]” and choose Product=Multimedia, Series=Media Player, Model=O!Play. Unfortunately, latest Firmware (1.13) lacks any Release Notes (until they published, I’m not upgrading to it), The installation instructions are confusing with names of downloaded files and User Manual (en) lacks any description of how to manage Network Shortcuts and and relates only to version 1.07. Apparently, in documentation area, ASUS still has a lot to improve.

Alonso Montoya Guzman says... on 15-07-2010

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I’ve just received my OPlay few days ago. Installation was pretty easy. Just a few selections to confirm language, tv system, and a few display options.

My video collection is stored on a PC at my home network, the Oplay find it easily and quickly, about 99% of the videos played great, no problem with subtitles.

Firmware upgrade is easy.

Music and photo playback are not the most relevant characteristics of this player, but quality and functionality is ok, as I intend to use it for playing videos must of the time, I fell very happy with this product.

Jay Brandt says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

I bought one of these for my brother for Christmas and plan on buying one for myself as well. The O!Play does one thing and it does it very, very well – it plays media, any media, flawlessly. Some pros and cons:

Pros:

- Plays everything we threw at it first time perfectly. We tried various resolutions and bit rates of every format I could make or find – MPEG2, MPEG4 (many flavors of this), Windows WMVs, Apple MOV, DivX, XVid, raw .VOBs, etc.

- Video quality is very good – a 1080p movie played on this vs. my Windows Media Center machine was better. Truthfully, I don’t know how much of that was the display (his is a Samsung, mine is a Vizio) and how much was the player, but I’m convinced at least *some* was the player.

- Audio quality is very good – we were hooking via optical to a 5.1 system and it sounded great. A scene we tried in a Roman coliseum made us feel like we were there with crowd sounds behind us and the fight in front.

- Versatile media sources – worked flawlessly accessing a Windows XP machine over the network, a memory stick, 2 different external hard drives, even an SD card in a reader.

- Very easy to installation – we attached the HDMI cable to the TV, the optical cable to the AMP, the CAT 5 to the switch and powered it on and it worked the first time.

- Simple to use interface – it ain’t pretty (see Cons), but it does the job and it’s easy to figure out what to do and what buttons to press. If you’ve ever used a computer GUI (Windows, OSX, etc.) to go through files, this’ll make sense.

Cons:

- The user interface isn’t extra pretty. It’s functional, but it’s not pretty – not even close to what you’ll find in systems like Windows Media Center, My Movies for Media Center, Boxee, or even web sites like Hulu. Once you get past the first rather attractive screen where you pick movies, music, pictures, etc., you’re in what looks a whole lot like Windows Explorer. It works, but there’s no WOW factor here.

- Yet another box(s) for your A/V rack. You’ll likely need to find room not just for this box, but the hard drive you’ll probably hook to it in your rack. This isn’t a big box, but it’s not small either – about the size of a couple of thick hard bound books laying on each other.

- The remote. It’s usable, but it’s not exactly high-end. If you have a nice programmable, you’ll end up using it. If you don’t, you’ll probably be buying one.

Overall, this box is a great value – it does what it says it does and does it very well. The one failure of many of these types of boxes is the worry about video format and as far as I can tell, this box pretty much eliminates that fear. At least, I can’t find anything it won’t play. It’s not always pretty, but I’ll give up a little flash for something that works, especially at this price point.

Addition – I note that at least one review here claims that this device will only work with FAT32 formatted drives. This is incorrect. My brother uses this with an NTFS drive and we commonly play files that range in size from 5GB to 12GB.

Can fan says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

I love Asus products and this does not dissapoint. I owned an Apple TV device and cannot compare the 2. reason is that ATV is very limited and I had to throw

in 3rd party apps/hacks to get it to work which was not always stable. This O!Play plays everything I have including ISO. I do like the simplicity of the screen on the O!Play but however this also becomes a bit of an issue. O!play does not pull down any graphics or movie details and everything is displayed in a SAMBA file directory format. Not very friendly to folks not into computers. Also do not like the fact you need to keep on going into a shortcut and choosing the location of your videos/files.

I know its just been released and I believe the open sauce format will allow many updates. Look forward to these.

Howard Shen says... on 15-07-2010

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I recently just got this box in the mail, and got it setup and start to watch movie in less than 10 min. It can read every file that I throw at and it plays them all perfectly. While some may feel that lack of wireless is a problem, I don’t think you can have a media player stream 1080p content reliably over wireless as you need a 25Mbps of constant stream. Maybe a N network will work, but even then, it is not something I want to mess with while watching a move with friends.

The box is small, makes no noise, plays every file from my nas storage, boots instantly, and it just works. It fits my need perfectly.

shopaholic says... on 15-07-2010

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I got this from Fry’s because I couldn’t wait for the [then rumored] release of the new WD Live. I watch a large amount of foreign content so subtitle playback is really important to me. The large subtitles annoyed the heck out of me because a long line that doesn’t fit horizontally would break into 4 lines and take over the entire screen. I was horrified that there was no setting option for subtitles (text size, text color etc.). That’s finally solved with the new firmware and now I’m able to reduce the font to reasonable viewing size. It also doesn’t support two independent subtitle lines at the same timing (for example, the dialogues and background lyrics), which is a drawback but not totally unacceptable.

It plays most of my videos except for the few XVID files I have. They’re not altogether unrecognizable; the vids appear, sputter, and then the player gives up. There’s also no manual control. If you lose the remote control, or it dies, you’ll be left with a nonfunctional box. Overall though, I’m pretty happy with the player. HDMI + 1080p looks sharp and great. I have no real need for network access so I can’t comment on that.

*edit* to sum up my earlier edits, basically this thing all of a sudden decided to dislike my 500 gb portable wd passport and would continuously disconnect the drive. i wiped the drive clean and reformatted it. works perfectly again.

Robert Puckett says... on 15-07-2010

Rating

Received this yesterday. Setup was easier than I expected – I read the quick start, but setup was even easier: plug it in and it goes. After setup and watching a few videos, I updated the firmware from the ASUS website. The update was easy and new features appeared on screen. I am very happy with the unit so far.

I do wish it had some sort of parental controls functionality. And, when pressing a button on the remote control, the UI seems to take longer than I expect to respond. Source code for the firmware is available from ASUS if anyone is interested.

Curt Spadewell says... on 16-07-2010

Rating

I saw this product being reviewed on Engadget and wondered why they weren’t giving it the best reviews possible if it truly did all that it claims to. Well, I guess the people at Engadget just don’t know perfection when they see it. This little black box is amazing on its quality, speed, and ease. I am pretty sure my wife will be able to operate this thing with zero help, which is saying a ton.

The ONLY thing I wish it did for us, would be that it would allow us to keep the menus and chapters on my ripped DVD collection. If it did that, then we would be in heaven. I can’t complain with what it does do, just praise it. Congrats Asus on a job well done.

Nelson says... on 16-07-2010

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The ASUS O!Play supports the PGS (full Blu-ray mode) subtitle which is missing completely from the top-rated WDTV Live.

Currently, I have both the ASUS O!Play and the WDTV Live. The WDTV Live supports the Dolby TrueHD pass through which is missing from the O!Play.

The WDTV Live is miserable with the Windows network shares. The shares are appearing and disappearing at random, frequently in the middle of the streaming. The O!Play has been very stable in this area.

When streaming high bit rate m2ts or Blu-ray ISO files, both players can stutter since the 100Mps ethernet is not fast enough. Sometimes, even the USB2 interface on those players is not fast enough. The eSATA port included with the O!Play has so far worked perfectly without any stutters.

Neither player is perfect. But in the end, I will return the WDTV Live and keep the O!Play for the PGS subtitle support, more robust network performance and the eSATA port interface.

Kenn Dahl says... on 16-07-2010

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I use the O!play with wired Ethernet, playing TIVO files that have been decrypted on a PC via kttmg. I also have the WD Live product. Unlike the WDLive, O!Play will play the decrypted TIVO files with no other processing. WDLive requires that I further convert the file to mp4 or a mpeg2 recode to pick up audio.

This is my second unit. The first unit would not turn on via the remote (all other functions would work via the remote). Amazon’s return process and policies on a defective product are extraordinary compared to any other retailers. I’m not as impressed with Asus quality.

I personally like the user interface on the O!play better than the WDLive. Its larger fonts and pictures are easier to see/read at a distance and the format of the networking files “explorer”, etc. just seems more responsive and logical to me.

The O!play remote has a volume control which is not available on the WDLive. This is quite useful as my files can vary significantly in volume.

The WDLive has a number of extra features, but also costs more. For my relatively simple needs the O!play was the better choice (but I’m also keeping the WDLive for a second location in our home.)

Michael Bernstein says... on 16-07-2010

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The oplay is a nice little media player. Watch out for the remote, it has a little led on top, but does NOT light up when you push buttons. At first I thought it was busted, but it just turns out that the LED is for show, it does not light up. The remote needs to be aimed directly at the oplay for it to respond, it does not have a wide reception angle. Other than that, the oplay has played everything i have asked it to play and with the firmware update does BlueRay iso’s, albiet mounting them is slow, but they do play in stunning HD.

B. Ellis says... on 16-07-2010

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I purchased this unit in part due to the excellent reviews on Amazon. I should have checked the ASUS Forum first.

Windows 7 users have all kinds of trouble with shared drives and files. I finally got it working with Windows 7 by doing a Registry Edit provided on the ASUS forum. Not quite plug and go, right?

The documentation states it plays most all file formats, however it will not play many of my WMV high quality files (these play fine on a PC and windows media center so it is not the file)

ASUS Support on this device is non existent… check the forum and there are cries for help everywhere.

User Interface has a long was to go as well.. functional but not great.

Perhaps with future firmware updates it will improve over time, but for now be advised.

Chris Eng says... on 16-07-2010
	Rating Worked well for the few days it worked then it died. Also, Windows 7 support is not available out of the box. No official compatibility available. I was about to buy two more when this died. So, maybe CinemaNow or WD are up for my money.

HD Reviewer says... on 16-07-2010

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After seeing an article on Engadget mentioning that this unit was finally up for sale – I followed the link and was suprised to already see a negative review. Then I read the review…. I’m a bit amazed that amazon would allow complete conjecture (by someone who doesn’t even own the unit) to post a review based on nothing more than a guess. So, I decided to post a review of my own based on nothing more than speculation – so that the unit has a fair chance of being purchased. Here’s mine”

“It appears to do everything I could ever ask of a media player. I’m not positive, but I belive it may actually make cookies while streaming 1080p video to your HDTV. Does anyone else smell chocolate chips?”

K. Costello says... on 16-07-2010

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I’ve been a big fan of NMT’s for some time now but it has not been until the last 6 months or so other vendors other than Popcorn Hour have really started to make NMT’s affordable.

I purchased this item with extremely high hopes and I’m sorry to say I was very much let down.

The size and design of the unit is fine, but the actual performance leave much to be desired.

I run 2 Popcorn Hours in my house. Both run over a standard G network, and although I have problems streaming 1080P, I have no issues at 720P.

This ASUS box straight out of the box was extremely slow to respond to commands from the remote control. The unit’s response did speed up somewhat after a firmware upgrade, but in general the response speed was still too slow.

I tried to play back 3 different files, which play perfect over my popcorn hours. Each of the files, stuttered and skipped when playing back through the ASUS unit.

ASUS will need to keep working on this product before I will consider it again in the future.

I’m going to give the Brite-View 5005HD a try. I’d love another Popcorn Hour, but the units are $200+ each and that is just too much to pay for every TV in my house.

PIB says... on 16-07-2010

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I have been waiting for a media player like this for a long time and this one does not disappoint at all. I was thinking of building my own HTPC; but I am glad I held off and waited. This little box does everything you could hope for and it costs less than one hundred dollars. Here is what is awesome about it:

- I had it out of the box and set up in 5 minutes. I networked it to my Windows XP computer (plugged it into my router). There was not one single issue in getting it set up. It works perfectly and it is easy to get going right out of the box. Just pick the right video and audio setting during the setup and off you go (I used HDMI raw).

- It plays every single file format you could want. I was using my Xbox 360 but I got tired of only being able to play .avi files at low resolutions. Now I can play high def .mkv blueray and .iso files and everything else imaginable.

- The video and sound quality if superb. I have played 13 GB Bluray files without so much as a stutter. I have tried to play the bluray files on my computer (on board graphics only) and it grinds to a halt. But the little O!Play doesn’t even break a sweat playing them on my TV. And the digital DTS audio sounds great on my surround sound system.

- No fan noise whatsoever. This thing is silent and it does not get hot at all. Not heat build up.

- Menu is simple and easy to navigate. Not flashy but it works. No complaints here.

- It was easy to program into my logitech remote control. I have set it up already so feel free to go ahead and download it now. Or use the remote that comes with it. It fits in your and nicely and is easy to use.

- I like the option of being able to travel with it and have video content on my flash drive or bring a hard drive (eSATA or USB). Then I could watch my videos anywhere I go. Obviously networking is the way to go at home though, but I really like the versatility. And who knows, maybe someday I will prefer to be able to watch video on my TV without having to boot up my computer.

- Even my wife can figure this thing out and watch content.

- Price is fantastic. It is much cheaper than other players with networking capability. And the Western Digital player cannot be networked so why would you want it — yet their player costs about the same as the O!Play.

- HDMI output on the O!Play works great.

- I am going to dump my cable subscription now and just pick up the free over the air signal for local channels. I can get whatever I else want to watch on the internet and view it through my O!Play.

If you have been looking for a media player, you have just found it. Don’t wait! This thing does everything it promises at an amazing price. And I have had other Asus products and I have come to really like their quality. The only reason to hold off on this (for now) is if you are running Windows 7 as they have not come out with the firmware yet. They will soon enough though.

Seriously, why haven’t you ordered this yet? By they way, I don’t work for Asus or have any financial interest in the company. I just love this product.

Weibin Li says... on 17-07-2010
	Rating It’s a great deal!! It plays so many formats movies and songs on my HDMI TV. Thanks!!

M. Cobos says... on 17-07-2010

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I looked up and researched many of the Media Players currently on the market before decided to buy the Asus. I have been using the player for about 2 months now, and it has been great. I have had no problems with it, and hopefully that will continue to be the case. Installation ans setup is a breeze, and the menu is straighforward. The only reason I did not give the product 5 stars is because you cannot search through your movies for a specific title, so that is a little annoying at times, but still, no reason not to buy this product.

H. Fisher says... on 17-07-2010

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I am not computer/electronically inept since that is what I do all day. Becuase of that I should have been able to get this device working. I could not. The first time I plugged it in the menu took about 30 seconds to appear on the screen and when it did it had many red lines running through it horizontally. I could not do anything about it without powering the machine off. During this first attempt all of the remote button clicks took an eternity to result in some action.

Second attempt I managed to get the menu looking correctly on the screen by having some serious patience with the menu browsing. I then plugged in my 8gb usb stick with mp3s and movies on it. The lights kept blinking but no music ever appeared in the menu and after about 10 minutes the menu was frozen hopelessly, time to power off again.

After 4-5 more iterations of similar futility I quickly boxed it up and sent it back. I will now go try something else.

These devices are great ideas and I know many people use their iPods to do similar things. Perhaps I need to wait a year until they are more mature?

Amazon Deals BlogPlenty of Amazon Daily Deals for Everyone

ASUS O!Play – TV HD Media Player (Black)

Posted by Amazon Deals | Posted in ASUS Computer International Direct, Amazon Best Sellers, Amazon Deals, Electronics Deals | Posted on 07-07-2010-05-2008

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ASUS O!Play - TV HD Media Player (Black)

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