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Home » Laptops & Computing » Peripheral » Popcorn Hour A110 » Video

Popcorn Hour A110 video review

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The Popcorn Hour A110 may not be the most attractive media player on the market and there are cheaper alternatives that support as many file formats and codecs but lack the internal storage and network connectivity. However, if you want the ultimate all-in-one multimedia player, and you're not fussed about PVR capabilities, then there is no better solution on the market. Read full review

Overall

9/10

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Edward Chester

By Edward Chester
Reviewed 16 June 2009
Updated 26 May 2011

Price as reviewed

£194.00

  • Review
    • 1: Popcorn Hour A110
    • 2: Popcorn Hour A110
    • 3: Popcorn Hour A110
    • 4: Format Support
  • Video Review
  • User Reviews
  • Comments
  • 9 Photos
  • Reviewed by Edward Chester
  • 16 June 2009
Read the full Popcorn Hour A110 review
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Awards

  • Recommended by TR

Popcorn Hour A110 details

Value
8/10
Features
9/10
Design
6/10
Overall
9/10

Price as reviewed

£194.00

Manufacturer

Popcorn Hour

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Moogle Stiltzkin

5:51 AM on 16 June, 2009

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I have owned the Popcorn A100 for roughly a year. This is my setup:





Desktop PC >> Dlink Dir-655 Router >> Aztech Ethernet Homeplug >> another Aztech Ethernet Homeplug located in the living room >> Popcorn Hour >> A/V Receiver >> HDTV








So why do i use the popcorn when i already have a pc ? Well i want to watch the videos avi and mkv videos i download online on my 42'' HDTV hooked to my 5.1 Hifi speaker system in the living room. This is a better experience then watching on a 24'' LCD monitor and using crappy pc speakers or headphones. Not only that, but the popcorn doubles up at a network storage device. The value for popcorn should be a 9/10 i would say.











Looks to me that the A110 is basically a polished up A100 with most of the little problems fixed.





Some pointers i noted:





1. Still no fan inside :{ But you can easily mod it to add one !





2. RMVB support isn't that big a deal. My preference is mostly avi and MKV anyway. But if you really need RMVB support, i believe the new Asus Media device that is similar to the Popcorn does have support. But imho most people including myself won't be that iffed about the lack on the popcorn :p Worse case scenario you could re-encode i suppose which you try your best to avoid.





3. Still no Gigabyte ethernet port :{





4. Edward mentioned about navigating the files. Imho it's not that bad. And for files that won't display when navigating through the screen. So yes if you select video, you still need to browse to the correct folder to find the video files rather then popcorn filter it out for you. Not too big a deal. They probably did it this way because if they filtered all the media to one spot, you cannot find stuff sorted in folders on the drive. All this filter thing does, is if you select video, it won't show any other non video files which is perfectly fine with me.





To show non video files, you either select to show music files, or you go to your Desktop PC and browse there. You can easily use this as a network storage device for your PC as well :}





5. Not many people realise that you don't need a very long ethernet cable laying across your living room space. There are ethernet homeplug devices that can network your popcorn to your Desktop PC through the house electrical wiring and utilize the full speed your popcorn supports. The one i am using is a pair of Aztech Homeplugs. I can stream 1080p mkv videos just fine without any stuttering.





I believe it was Netgear who recently released a homeplug device that has many ethernet ports sort of like a router. This could be a step up from the single ethernet port homeplugs incase you needed additional ethernet ports.





Imho wireless is over rated as the homeplug ethernet port solution is far superior :}





In summary, the Popcorn offers more then the competition and firmware has very good support. So why invest in buying another device when Popcorn is already known for having good support and you can easily update the firmware.






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Eotris

12:12 PM on 16 June, 2009

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Digitek's HDX1000 is a solid alternative to the Popcorn - pretty much the same features, and you can sometimes get it cheaper. (IBOOD.com offered it a couple of times for about £160 inclusive). NMT comparison chart at - http://www.networkedmediatank.com/wiki/index.php/Products#Product_Comparison

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Keithe6e

1:08 PM on 16 June, 2009

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@Moogle: Imho wireless is over rated as the homeplug ethernet port solution is far superior :}





Homeplugs are certainly a good idea, but not much use for using your laptop without wires / IPhone etc. Also Wireless has come a long way, streaming HD from my loft to XBox360 works 100%.

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Chris

1:24 PM on 16 June, 2009

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Hmm. I know it's a bit of a stretch, but the price is dangerously close to that of a PS3, which includes a hard disk and wireless networking in the box as well as being a decent Blu-Ray player.





Oh, and it plays the odd game too ;)

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cjb110

1:50 PM on 16 June, 2009

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The biggest plus for A110 is the ability to play HD sound (DTS-MA and TrueHD) from files (ie bluray and hd-dvd rips) AFAIK there are 2 devices that can do this. The only format it wont play is Dolby Digital+, but its easy to convert that to a full bit rate (1.5mbps) DTS stream and you won't have lost much.





It's interface is a bit clunky but it's somewhat customizable, if your prepared to the put the effort in.

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DolphinPromotions

2:36 PM on 16 June, 2009

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I have had the Popcorn Hour A110 for a few months now. I have found several issues with it. The main one being I find it freezes when downloading torrents. At first I thought it was an incompatible HD or a broken one but I tried an alternative and had the same issues. It maybe just a fault with the unit itself.





As Moogle said the lack of gigabit Ethernet is a bit of a nightmare but if I remember correctly the hardware support for Network Media Tank is limited and I think all the NMTs use the same CPU and it is just not powerful enough to handle gigabit Ethernet. In fact it doesn’t max out 100Mb Ethernet.





However as mentioned when it comes down to playing your content you can’t fault it. It plays everything you throw at it and once set up an idiot can happily use it.





While I was happy to fork out the £200 for a device that can play anything I do think it has somewhat of a limited lifespan due to things like Intel Atom + Nvidia Ion and Tegra. We have already seen the Acer Revo Nettop that can handle 1080p thanks to the Ion GPU and is competitively priced compared to the NMTs. Granted the CPU is a bit puny but it is only a matter of time before other products start coming out that tick all the right boxes for a HTPC/Media Player

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sthair

5:01 PM on 16 June, 2009

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I have had a A-100 for a year or more and I love it :-) You can create a fancy HTML UI using free tools like YAMJ if you want. Lots of info on the NMT wiki on that stuff. My setup is very similar to Moogle's - using powerline to ship files from a server upstairs to the local hard drive. That said I have happily watched an SD TV file located on the server over the network. Haven't tried it with HD nor have i tried the streaming option from the myIHome server. I have streamed MP3's from upstairs and listened to internet radio (go Triple J!) with no probs at all.





It does the job, it's quiet, it's unobtrusive. What more do you want :-)

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davef

5:11 PM on 16 June, 2009

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Although I see the appeal of a 'one box to rule them all' HTPC, the advantage the Popcorn Hour has is that it'll play 99% of the stuff you throw at it. You don't need to mess about with codecs or settings etc. as the picture quality is excellent.





However, the new Popcorn Hour is on the way (specs just announced) and this'll have the ability to add a Blu Ray drive to it and play retail DVDs. Might be worth holding out for:





http://www.networkedmediatank.com/showthread.php?tid=23731

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Kanu

12:12 AM on 17 June, 2009

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Reviewing this product now is rather outdated and kind of pointless. Its a "geek" product, so to speak, aimed at early adopters. 99% of people who would buy one have already done so and a generation of NMT are on the way to launch right now, which they will all focus on next.





Joe Q Public - this product is too left field for most. And they too have many other products old and upcoming that they will buy before this eg the WD media extender. if they would buy an NMT, there are many others that are prettier and this product wont be interesting to them.





So who is this review aimed at then? A couple who geeks who have been in a coma for the past year and for some bizarre reason down want to buy Popcorn Hour's newer and better successor product? :-)





Seriosuly this review is just so outdated it not even funny. Where were you when the product was launched?

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Ed

12:40 AM on 17 June, 2009

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@Kanu: Who made you the overlord of what is and isn't relavent?





We've reviewed the Popcorn A110 because a number of readers asked us to and because a number of more recent products that we have reviewed are direct rivals of it. We're not here to be first, we're here to help the buying public make an informed decision.





Beside which, you're wrong. We never reviewed the A100 because it wasn't available over here - or at least not officially launched - and the A110 that we're looking at here is only a few months old. Just because it's being superceded, doesn't make it any less relevant a product.

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