Author Topic: Ipad Media Player  (Read 9800 times)

  • Offline Shaun

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Ipad Media Player
on: March 29, 2011, 23:12:39 PM
I have been keeping my eye out to try to pick up cheapish one for a few weeks now, I found a 16gig, Wifi one on ebay that was listed wrongly under laptops, there was only one other bidder and I won it for £230.

Had it a few days now first impressions: it’s like new! It was listed as a 2010 Xmas present, not a mark on the screen or back. The guy hadn’t even wiped anything off it, including his email log in! :P I was kind and deleted his details, good job he didn't lie about the condition or took his time over postage! :lol:  easy to tell it hadn’t been used much at all.

So I jail broke it and installed a couple of themes and apps from Cydia, first of all I installed MXtube which allows you to either stream or download and keep vid from youtube, it is quite a simple little app written by a 14 year old, but works well  here are some screen shots of the UI and playback:


Search results.


Video options.


HD video playback.

I then installed Air video which is a paid for app but well worth the couple of quid asking price, it enables you to stream video files directly or using live convert on the fly, very easy to set up just need to install the app on the ipad and server software on your PC and share the folders or drives you want to share:


Server.

Here is some screen shots of the apps UI and HD video playback: 
 

Settings, Bitrate go's up to 5120 kbits but either my network or the Ipad could keep up so have it set to 2560.


Browsing files on the server.


Audio, sub and zoom options, Live convert is on the fly and Convert will copy a playable copy to the ipad.





Still to do: Sort out live TV using ipimp and the mediaportal TV engine on my server, I updated mediaportal a few weeks ago, the latest version of ipimp was made for an older version and can be temperamental with it, A new version is set to come out soon and will wait for that.
 
I must say I’m happy with how well it works as a media player, the thing is a bit heavy to hold for any length of time,  but if you’re sat with your feet up with it on your lap it’s not bad and a lot easier to fire up, pick up and put down than a netbook,  I do see it very much as a coffee table gadget, it’s great for browsing the web but trying to type on the screen gets old after a couple of lines tbh, if the asking price was say £250 I would be highly recommending it, it’s miles to expensive new, but for second hand money I think it is a top gadget and you don't need to sell your soul directly to Apple! :D
Last Edit: March 29, 2011, 23:18:06 PM by Shaun #187;

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #1 on: March 29, 2011, 23:26:38 PM
I joined the band wagon yesterday as well, got the 32gb for 280 second hand off someone who wanted the new one.

I'm also running air video on the HP Microserver in the other thread, I didn't think it would have the power to real time encode but it does it!

Also got vnc running so I can play with the server, and writing this now on it, using atomic web browser which seems to be better than safari, tabs for one!

Also got wol setup so I can do remote boot :-)

  • Offline Shaun

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Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #2 on: March 29, 2011, 23:37:33 PM
Nice :D Does atomic do flash?

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #3 on: March 29, 2011, 23:49:25 PM
No unfortunetly not, mines not jail broken either though

  • Offline Shaun

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Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #4 on: March 30, 2011, 00:02:13 AM
If your has the 4.3 ios installed I would wait a bit if you are thinking of jailbreaking, mine came with it installed and it’s very much tethered at the mo, in fact it’s a bit of a bugger to cold boot, so I intend to not shut it down till a untethered jailbreak comes out! :P but if you have an older version its a doddle!

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #5 on: March 30, 2011, 00:25:25 AM
Cheers tbh I probably won't bother seems to do everything I need it to do

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #6 on: April 18, 2011, 17:37:31 PM
http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Install_XBMC_on_iPhone/iPad

ive got it running on my iphone, impossibly small to use as i have fat fingers

  • Offline Shaun

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Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #7 on: April 20, 2011, 16:44:11 PM
http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Install_XBMC_on_iPhone/iPad

ive got it running on my iphone, impossibly small to use as i have fat fingers
Cheers installing it now to have a look at it  :)

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #8 on: April 20, 2011, 17:32:37 PM
On a slight side note, if you want free view over wifi and possibly 3G check out TVcatchup.com, I'm amazed at the speed that it works tbh.. iPhone and iPad and I imagine other devices as well..

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #9 on: April 20, 2011, 17:45:45 PM
On a slight side note, if you want free view over wifi and possibly 3G check out TVcatchup.com, I'm amazed at the speed that it works tbh.. iPhone and iPad and I imagine other devices as well..

yes, its just a webpage & happily works on a computer

  • Offline Shaun

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Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #10 on: April 21, 2011, 01:23:15 AM
Well I won’t be swapping XBMC for Air video just yet, while it looks lovely the UI is a nightmare to use even on the much larger screen of a Ipad, really needs a lot more work to get it up to scratch for use on a touch screen.

While it will run SD content fine it won’t play some HD files smoothly, I spent a bit of time over at the XBMC forum and fiddled about with some settings, which did improve matters but still far from perfect, guess this is one to keep an eye on and it will hopefully mature with time.

Cheers for the reminder about TVcatchup I tried it a few months ago and wasn’t that impressed as the picture quality wasn’t that good and it would cut out often, they seem to have improved it quite a bit.

Re: Ipad Media Player
Reply #11 on: May 03, 2011, 06:45:19 AM
Well I won’t be swapping XBMC for Air video just yet,iPad2 case while it looks lovely the UI is a nightmare to use even on the much larger screen of a Ipad, really needs a lot more work to get it up to scratch for use on a touch screen.

While it will run SD content fine ipad 2 leather casesit won’t play some HD files smoothly, I spent a bit of time over at the XBMC forum and fiddled about with some settings, which did improve matters but still far from perfect, guess this is one to keep an eye on and it will hopefully mature with time.

Cheers for the reminder about TVcatchupipad 2 leather I tried it a few months ago and wasn’t that impressed as the picture quality wasn’t that good and it would cut out often, they seem to have improved it quite a bit.

if you want free view over wifi and possibly 3G check out TVcatchup.com, I'm amazed at the speed that it works tbh.. iPhone and iPad and I imagine other devices as well..

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