# Does anyone know of a Blu-ray player with MKV streaming from PC?



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

People I have a Sony BDP-S5100 which is a great player but it is unable to stream movies from my PC in MKV format and that annoys me because I have a bunch of movies in that format. Copy them to a USB drive or a external hard drive is an alternative but it will take forever to copy my movies to such alternatives. I decided to solve the problem once and for all by getting a new Blu-ray player with the capability of streaming that container from PC. Plus features I can't miss beside that one are 3D capabilities and nice online streaming apps, better than Sony if possible. Does anyone knows of such player?


----------



## Mike Edwards (Mar 10, 2011)

BigLouis1971 said:


> People I have a Sony BDP-S5100 which is a great player but it is unable to stream movies from my PC in MKV format and that annoys me because I have a bunch of movies in that format. Copy them to a USB drive or a external hard drive is an alternative but it will take forever to copy my movies to such alternatives. I decided to solve the problem once and for all by getting a new Blu-ray player with the capability of streaming that container from PC. Plus features I can't miss beside that one are 3D capabilities and nice online streaming apps, better than Sony if possible. Does anyone knows of such player?


many stream via DLNA, I know my Sony S590 does it decently enough. However I honestly suggest getting spending a few hundred bucks and getting a very small HTPC... I've been dealing with this issue for years and it's saved me a billion hours of frustration from poor streaming in the player, to sluggish usb 2.0 transfer rates etc....


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

I'm sorry but what is a HTPC? You mentioned a few important points, the slow transfers and sluggish streaming. I was thinking about an alternative before I decided to ask for the player. Get a removable hard drive bay for the PC and a USB hard drive external enclosure (which I already have) for the Blu-ray. I can remove the hard drive from the bay and put it in the external enclosure after I copy my movies to the hard drive. My player plays MKV files that way. The problem is the streaming from the PC. But then I thought that a fast player that streams MKV directly from the PC can save the trouble of swaping the hard drive every time I wanna watch a MKV movie. So what do you think about my idea? Do you have a better alternative?


----------



## Mike Edwards (Mar 10, 2011)

BigLouis1971 said:


> I'm sorry but what is a HTPC? You mentioned a few important points, the slow transfers and sluggish streaming. I was thinking about an alternative before I decided to ask for the player. Get a removable hard drive bay for the PC and a USB hard drive external enclosure (which I already have) for the Blu-ray. I can remove the hard drive from the bay and put it in the external enclosure after I copy my movies to the hard drive. My player plays MKV files that way. The problem is the streaming from the PC. But then I thought that a fast player that streams MKV directly from the PC can save the trouble of swaping the hard drive every time I wanna watch a MKV movie. So what do you think about my idea? Do you have a better alternative?


HTPC = Home Theater PC... basically a cheaper computer with a decent video card with HDMI out and you're good. no need for a monitor and it doesn't need to be uber powerful to get what you want. that way you can have everything on a hard drive, no latency and it's a lot easier


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

Is there a special operating system for that or Windows can be used? I'm interested in this subject. I was thinking about upgrading my present build and when I decide to upgrade I can use the present one as HTPC. I will need only a HTPC case.


----------



## Mike Edwards (Mar 10, 2011)

BigLouis1971 said:


> Is there a special operating system for that or Windows can be used? I'm interested in this subject. I was thinking about upgrading my present build and when I decide to upgrade I can use the present one as HTPC. I will need only a HTPC case.


Not really. Any os will do as long as you install the codecs for playback


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

Is the audio from a Geforce video card any different than the audio from a standalone Blu-ray player? Cause I already have a GTX660 installed in my PC. I think that I'm going to make the HTPC case my next upgrade. I also would like to know about the remote control. Where can I get it?


----------



## Lulimet (Apr 4, 2014)

You can certainly go with a small PC like the Intel NUC or a Gigabyte Brix but they can get costly after you install RAM, a hard drive, and especially if you want to run Windows (new windows licence is about $100). You'll probably end up spending around $400 for an i3 NUC or Brix.

If you want to keep the cost low, I suggest you get something like a Roku 3 ($80-100) and install Plex Media Server on your existing PC. You use the Plex app on the Roku to stream the files from your PC.
Roku also has Netflix, Amazon Instant Video, Vudu, Hulu and tons of other apps.


----------



## Andre (Feb 15, 2010)

Get and MKV to AVI conversion program:

Example: http://www.arcsoft.com/topics/mkv/convert-mkv-to-avi.html


----------



## Mike Edwards (Mar 10, 2011)

BigLouis1971 said:


> Is the audio from a Geforce video card any different than the audio from a standalone Blu-ray player? Cause I already have a GTX660 installed in my PC. I think that I'm going to make the HTPC case my next upgrade. I also would like to know about the remote control. Where can I get it?


you'd want a decent soundcard with HDMI out or analoge out to get full lossless that's for sure


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

Mike Edwards said:


> you'd want a decent soundcard with HDMI out or analoge out to get full lossless that's for sure


Like which one?


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

Andre said:


> Get and MKV to AVI conversion program:
> 
> Example: http://www.arcsoft.com/topics/mkv/convert-mkv-to-avi.html


The videos will take ages to convert and that's exactly the opposite of what I want.


----------



## Lulimet (Apr 4, 2014)

Mike Edwards said:


> you'd want a decent soundcard with HDMI out or analoge out to get full lossless that's for sure


Not really true. His card already has HDMI and can pass through lossless HD audio. Even my lowly GT610 can do that.


----------



## Mike Edwards (Mar 10, 2011)

Lulimet said:


> Not really true. His card already has HDMI and can pass through lossless HD audio. Even my lowly GT610 can do that.


You're right. I forgot about pass through. I usually did processing on the PC end so I never used it.


----------



## redsandvb (Dec 2, 2009)

BigLouis1971 said:


> People I have a Sony BDP-S5100 which is a great player but it is unable to stream movies from my PC in MKV format and that annoys me because I have a bunch of movies in that format. Copy them to a USB drive or a external hard drive is an alternative but it will take forever to copy my movies to such alternatives. I decided to solve the problem once and for all by getting a new Blu-ray player with the capability of streaming that container from PC. Plus features I can't miss beside that one are 3D capabilities and nice online streaming apps, better than Sony if possible. Does anyone knows of such player?





Mike Edwards said:


> many stream via DLNA, I know my Sony S590 does it decently enough. However I honestly suggest getting spending a few hundred bucks and getting a very small HTPC... I've been dealing with this issue for years and it's saved me a billion hours of frustration from poor streaming in the player, to sluggish usb 2.0 transfer rates etc....


BigLouis, is the Sony connected to the same network/router your computer is? If it is, or can be, the above mentioned DLNA method can work pretty well. You'd just have to install a DLNA server on your computer, configure it to share your folder(s) with your mkv's in it, and you could be streaming to your Sony just like that. I used to use an old version of TVersity, I now use Universal Media Server. Serviio's another free one, among others.


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

redsandvb said:


> BigLouis, is the Sony connected to the same network/router your computer is? If it is, or can be, the above mentioned DLNA method can work pretty well. You'd just have to install a DLNA server on your computer, configure it to share your folder(s) with your mkv's in it, and you could be streaming to your Sony just like that. I used to use an old version of TVersity, I now use Universal Media Server. Serviio's another free one, among others.


Yes it is in the same network. I'm able to share the media using Windows Media Player but is the Blu-ray player that is not capable to stream MKV files. MP3 and MP4 among others are streamed with no problem.


----------



## djlittlewonder (Jul 19, 2008)

Look at Mede8er. Specifically the med600x3d. It can map multiple network drives, PC, nas, etc. and show them in a favorites "library" view. It's affordable and ready to use out the box. Will stream mkv's (>30gb) no problem, play audio files, and show photos. I upgraded from a wdtv hub, no regrets. They just updated the firmware to allow web trailers to play. Good luck.

Ps: I used to have an HTPC that I built, but find media streamers easier - it just works!


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

redsandvb said:


> BigLouis, is the Sony connected to the same network/router your computer is? If it is, or can be, the above mentioned DLNA method can work pretty well. You'd just have to install a DLNA server on your computer, configure it to share your folder(s) with your mkv's in it, and you could be streaming to your Sony just like that. I used to use an old version of TVersity, I now use Universal Media Server. Serviio's another free one, among others.


Correction, Universal Media Server almost works. I was able to stream some videos but with some restrictions. I'm not able to fast forward or rewind the files and I'm not able to change audio files or subtitles neither in videos with multiple audio files or subtitles. That's why I say almost works. Once that restrictions are solved I will consider I solved my problem. Does anybody knows if that is a setup problem? I also noticed choppy streaming so that's another problem that needs to be solved.

I noticed that Avisynth was also installed when I installed UMS so it looks that the container is changed on the fly when you stream. That and a folder named #--TRANSCODE--# where you can see some more versions of the file you're trying to play add to my thoughts that the container is changed on the fly. The files in the #--TRANSCODE--# folder seem to be added by UMS. Not all files added by UMS are playable.

So the Blu-ray player is not actually playing MKV files but another container instead. This look like the way to go instead of spending more money in HTPC or media player. I'll try another DLNA server to see if it don't have the restrictions that UMS have.

Thanks everybody for your kindness.


----------



## redsandvb (Dec 2, 2009)

Seems odd that your Sony S5100 doesn't play mkv when Mike mentioned his S590 does, unless he wasn't referring to mkv files in his reply. The S5100 is the newer model, I think...

The FF/REW thing may be a problem with the mkv itself, I've heard that mkv's made with a certain version (and newer, I think) of mkvmerge can have that problem. Do those FF/REW if you play them off USB? Sorry to say I don't have many files with subtitles, I don't know how to help much there. For audio, have you looked at the Transcoding settings-->Audio settings? I set mine to passthrough everything because I don't want any transcoding going on. I want my player to receive the audio/video 'as-is', untouched.
Also for transcoding, the TRANSCODE folder, as far as I understand, just shows files that need to be (or that you want to be) transcoded by UMS prior to reaching the Sony. So if a codec inside the mkv isn't supported by the player it'll be converted, if they're natively supported by the player they'll be sent through untouched. The latter should show up in the folder before going into the TRANSCODE folder.

As for choppy playback, in my experience it was congestion on the 2.4 GHz spectrum. I changed to 5 GHz and have no more problems.


----------



## RTS100x5 (Sep 12, 2009)

Try installing JRIVER on your HTPC and setup the SERVER option in settings.... Then see if your SONY will play the files you want through DNLA ...


----------



## BigLouis1971 (Jul 28, 2014)

RTS100x5 said:


> Try installing JRIVER on your HTPC and setup the SERVER option in settings.... Then see if your SONY will play the files you want through DNLA ...


I tried J River and is way better than UMS. It streams better and allow me to change subtitles and audio files. Also let me fast forward and rewind my files. I consider the problem solved now. I also consider my computer to be HTPC now. I decided to use a tower case because I found no HTPC case that suits my needs. They all have some kind of problem like not enough expansion slots and the like. Thanks everybody for your help.


----------

