ISTAR MINI HD Review Based on the NMT firmware from Syabas, the ISTAR MINI HD should bring an affordable HD solution for home users without limitations compared to more expensive and bigger products on the market. With a wide range of video formats supported up to 1080p, its music and picture abilities the ISTAR MINI HD might be the smallest solution available today. Lets see if its any good too!

2008

Hi-Jack www.mpcclub.com

1/3/2008

MPC Reviews MPC Reviews are a great neutral source for any user or company,

offering an in-depth opinion on products from the consumers

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Electronic company developers and designers wish to promote

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reviews from independent sources which have no affiliation so that

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one of these unbiased resources with a well-established record of

open and honest evaluations.

Unlike most reviews which are limited to a few screenshots and

some basic text, MPC Reviews are detailed and explore device

features in-depth, with many detailed pictures. This allows any

reader to have a good idea about the product before purchasing it.

The high level of detail is especially appealing to well-informed,

technically-inclined consumers who demand maximum information

before making a purchase. Thats what makes an MPC review

different.

Reviewed by Hi-Jack, webmaster of www.mpcclub.com, this review

is intended to be your first and best introduction for the ISTAR

MINI HD as most consumers will experience it. Reviewed from a

consumers perspective instead of being based only on technical

details and specifications, which always look good but offer little

in-depth knowledge. Through our reviews we strive to provide

valuable feedback to the brands making electronic equipment, in

order to improve and tune the users experience with the latest

state of the art players.

Notice: MPC is a consumer oriented Media Portal analyzing

products and offering a first impression in their reviews so that you

have an idea of what you are about to purchase. In light of our

efforts to provide reviews quickly to leading-edge consumers,

these reviews are not always able to be fully complete or 100%

accurate and can become outdated over time.

Date: February 3rd 2008

Device: ISTAR MINI HD

Firmware: 50-15-080201-14-QPA-402-000

2006 - 2008 MPC Club

Contact MPC:

Press: press@mpcclub.com

Legal: legal@mpcclub.com

Owner: admin@mpcclub.com

Contents

MPC Reviews ............................................................................. 2

Introduction ................................................................... 3

The Box and whats in it! ................................................. 3

The player in detail ......................................................... 3

The Remote Control ........................................................ 4

The ISTAR Setup ............................................................ 5

Conclusion Setup ......................................................... 8

Booting NMT: The Interface ............................................ 8

Network Streaming ......................................................... 9

Network Performance ..................................................... 9

Samba ........................................................................ 9

FTP ............................................................................ 9

Conclusion Network performance ............................... 10

Copy Functions ............................................................. 10

General Sound Options ................................................. 10

Player set to RAW mode ............................................ 10

Player set to PCM Mode ............................................. 10

ISO DVD / Video_TS ..................................................... 10

Conclusion DVD ISO .................................................. 11

H.264 Playback ............................................................. 11

General test Video ........................................................ 12

Music playback ............................................................. 13

Picture playback ........................................................... 13

Conclusion Pictures ................................................... 14

NMT Apps and options .................................................. 14

Samba Server ........................................................... 14

Torrent Downloads .................................................... 14

Conclusion Torrent files ............................................. 15

myiHome Lite Server and online content ..................... 15

Conclusion ................................................................... 15

Pros (prelim) ............................................................. 16

Cons (prelim) ............................................................ 16

Introduction I always found it funny when people

come up to me and state Player

A and Player B use the same

firmware, so it doesnt matter

which one I choose, right?. If only the

world was that simple so we only had to look at the price and run

home with the most affordable and most likable one.

Despite using the same firmware in the NMT range, in which this

ISTAR MINI HD belongs, the hardware can be so different in many

aspects, offering lesser or more connection options, different ones,

the box contents can differ and the remote can be a total different

value, power consumption, convenience and so on

We are thus mainly talking about similar functionality but thats

where the comparison should stop. In this review, well run

through all things and show you what to expect from the ISTAR

MINI HD.

The Box and whats in it! Packed in a shoe style box, you find the ISTAR MINI HD player is

packed with all cables you can possibly need and probably not have

in spare lying around the house.

- A HDMI cable

- SATA Cable

- Power cable

- Remote

- Batteries

- Manual

Optional, you can order

a VGA to Component

adapter to use

component over VGA) and coaxial, optical and network cable

depend on the packager orders from resellers so this can be

different depending on where you buy. Check and verify!

To me the ISTAR is an incomplete package for the cost of the

device and offers an HD experience out of the box without network

cable. The value of the contents in the package certainly is ok but

hardly special. With a HDMI cable, power cable, remote and

batteries along with a poor composite cable, are usually the packed

contents so no extras here beside HDMI.

Now, lets see what other surprises we get from ISTAR MINI HD.

The player in detail The player is designed using full plastic materials although it looks

and feels like the black touches are rubber. The front of the ISTAR

MINI HD, further referred to as ISTAR, is clean an empty as

besides the power button (yes, it has one) and the little spot on the

left where the IR receiver sits, theres nothing.

Now, many will like this because there are no led indicators for

anything disturbing your view towards the TV, yet at least a power

indication would have been necessary as in this way, one can leave

the player on for days without noticing it as it is completely silent.

(More on that later on)

The rear of the unit harbors a VGA output (nice), a HDMI 1.1 or 1.3

connection, 10/100 Ethernet jack, Optical and Coaxial, composite,

power connector and finally 1 USB2 port. Here we already see a

difference in hardware where only 1 USB2 host is available and

where there is a VGA connector instead of component which then

offers component over an optional adapter.

You might think this is it, but theres something else On the left

side of the unit, there is a SATA DATA and Power connector so you

can easily attach a hard drive from the side. The ISTAR is too mini

to have one fitted internally.

Now I have to say I dont like this solution too much because there

are no such hard drives enclosures using this connection type as it

is implemented and for which a cable is delivered. It practically

purposes those willing to create their own enclosure fitting this

option or use a naked drive connected externally which would look

something like this:

Luckily, there is another solution using eSATA external enclosures

that can be used in combination with an eSATA to SATA cable

which is included in the box, though this leads to 2 power cables,

one for the eSATA enclosure / hard drive and one for the ISTAR

unless they can come up with some universal solution powering it

from the ISTAR unit directly but will it cope with the amount of

power that needs? Will be investigated by ISTAR

Now, you might think again this is it, but theres again something

else we need to mention. The ISTAR is 100% silent as default it

comes with a disconnected cooler. Because there is no hard drive

inside, in most cases, the unit should not run too hot working hard

for you. If however, it does you can easily open the unit by

removing some screws and connect the cooler. This will lead to

some audible operation of the unit but it remains heavenly silent.

Only by placing my ear on the unit, I could actually hear the cooler

spin. The cable for the cooler is attached to the connector marked

by the red circle.

The Remote Control Now here is where we have been disappointed at first until ISTAR

replaced the remote with a better one. We could not tell anything

good about the old remote which included the materials used, the

feeling it has holding it in your hand, the operations and the style.

Ok, maybe we should take at least the effort to say it had

fluorescent buttons so things remain visible in the dark.

The new model is actually the

remote used most with NMTs

so far which seemed to be a

safe choice for ISTAR to make

and it is good. The ISTAR

version is black, holds labels on

top of the buttons and is well

arranged.

He remote incorporates a lot

of shortcuts to functions as

selecting TV-Modes, copying

files and then some which can

make it a little less convenient

but the NMT exceeds the

functions you can possibly

arrange well on a single

remote so we can easily

forgive these little flaws.

Errors we found in the layout

of the original remote are

gone and the feeling the

remote offers overall while

operating is reasonable to

good.

Off course, this is only my

interpretation. It could very

well be you will consider this

the best you ever had. (Says

much about the products you

owned so far ) but to me

this is a ok remote and one

that fits the price target of the

player which is around 200$

(249 imported into Europe).

The ISTAR Setup From here, things might look very familiar to you as we will start

discussing the Setup. Most things are similar to previous NMT

based products we have reviewed although options might or might

not be available based on hardware, so we run by everything again.

Preferences

Fist section are all about preferences where you can select your

language for the interface (English and Chinese), for subtitles

(English and Chinese or no subtitles), preference for default zoom

level (Full Screen, Actual Size and Fit To Screen), the default play

mode (Repeat one, All, None), a couple of transition effects, the

interval for your slideshows and last, the screen saver time out.

Especially with Transition I would like the ability to select all so it

will use all transitions in a random way to fight the dullness of

slideshows if all pictures come up in the same way.

Audio/Video

In the second section we can select our video output which offers a

long list of resolutions and output options ranging from default

Composite NTSC and PAL up to HDMI / Component 1080p in 50Hz

and 60Hz. More HDMI options are available separately using

different Hz settings beside the VESA resolutions (VGA) provided.

Remaining options for the AV section are setting HDMI Audio

active or disabled, The surround mode 5.1 or Stereo which next

offers you separate options for DTS, AC3, AAC and WMA Pro which

you can set based on your receivers abilities to decode these or

not.

Network

Like most of the players launched today, Wireless is not available

by default but achieved by add-on USB dongles. At a later stage,

Wireless N should become supported on these units. Since

Wireless 802.11 B/G are insufficient to work with on HD files, we

skip testing this like the reviews done before.

No surprises here where you can use either DHCP or manual IP

settings and set the NTP server if required for some reason. (I still

dont know why as one cant set the time or time zone anywhere).

SayaTV port is set here as well ( www.sayatv.com )

Network/Share

With the NMT firmware on the ISTAR you can add up to 5 network

sources to be used for grabbing content from. These can be a mix

of SMB and NFS.

One can browse the network to select available shares easily which

defaults to using the share as an SMB source. If one prefers to use

it as NFS, changes need to be made to the path to tell the player

serving this share as NFS before clicking the ADD button. Further

can one add a user and password to make this connection which is

pretty unique on a media player and introduced so far only by

Syabas NMT firmware.

DVD/AudioCD

In this section one can set the parental control level, Auto play

features, audio language

selection (Audio DVDs I

assume) and subtitle

language again. These are

not linked to the selection

under Audio / Video.

The last option in setup concerns the maintenance of the ISTAR

where you can administer firmware and hard drive applications.

Maintenance

The ISTAR can be used as a streaming player without hard drive or

with hard drive which has some benefits like torrent downloads.

The options for the hard drive will only become available after the

player is booted with a hard drive attached.

Without Hard Drive:

With Hard Drive:

The extra entry in maintenance will allow initializing the hard drive

and installing the NMT applications using a wizard either from

online directly or by using a USB sticking in the back USB2 host

which contains the NMT install file for the applications.

The following few images show the process of the installation

which is rather easy. Notice that normal firmware updates also run

from online sources or USB stick. Both are possible.

First time will only offer Fresh Setup which will format the hard

drive and install the NMT apps. After this, it will show 2 options

which is fresh setup and reformats the drive and reinstalls /

upgrade the apps, the other one is used only for upgrading /

reinstalling the apps called

You can select between both EXT2 and EXT 3 format.

After this selection a warning is shown that the ISTAR will format

the drive and all data on it will be lost.

In the last step, we choose the NMT application source. This can be

Online or USB.

After this selection, the ISTAR will format the hard drive and install

the applications. A progress window keeps you informed about the

status. This will take approx. 5 minutes depending on the size of

your hard drive. Once installed, the player will reboot and offer an

extra section in the Setup called NMT Applications where you

can start and stop services and enter the device name and network

the player belongs to.

Important to keep in mind is that every FW version has its own

NMT apps version which can be confusing sometimes. Mixing

versions that not match together cause errors or none functioning

options so its important to keep track of version numbers. The

online update section does so pretty much in a convenient way

listing both update and NMT app version together.

Conclusion Setup

The Setup is perfectly easy to complete including the installation of

new firmware and NMT applications. Everything is well arranged

inside the Setup sections which makes the setup at least user

friendly and straight forward in most cases.

Booting NMT: The Interface During the boot a splash screen is shown while the ISTAR loads the

available sources in the background.

Booting the NMT ISTAR player will take about a minute to

complete after which you are taken to the main page where your

sources for files can be selected. These include the USB connected

devices, the hard drive connected to the SATA port on the side and

all network sources you added. Sources can be recognized by the

icons.

From here you can select whatever source you like to use to play

Video, Music or Pictures although an extra step is required.

When entering any source, you must first select the type of

playback you wish to use at this time. The player will then filter the

content matching your selection.

At the left bottom are the quick links. The Media Source will bring

you back to the main source selection page, the Web Services

offers an overview of online additional video and music add-ons

(plug-ins) and the >Setup, obviously enters the Setup menu.

Browsing files over SMB and NFS is done by lists and the folders

and files are displayed as they are on the disk. Much like browsing

your PC drives.

Network Streaming Although SMB has been a targeted function over the last years for

these network media players to support, today we see slightly

different needs. Beside only SMB there is a growing need of having

NFS too and both are featured inside the PCH.

SMB is ok for normal content up to DVD ISO. For files with high

bitrates NFS is better due to its slight better stability and

performance. Its one thing to keep in mind of shopping for NAS

servers as well in the future which must have NFS.

Network Performance

Samba

One of the main limitations of the ISTAR in the form it is available

today, is having no copy abilities beside FTP and SMB. While both

use the network to transfer files, considering the limitations of the

Sigma Chip SMP8635 it is based on, this will always be far below

the performance we need or can accept for transferring HD files of

up to 10GB and more. With IOMETER we measured the max read /

write speed using SMB which resulted in the following MB/s

translation for files, in addition, we translated this speed into

actual file transfers further down below.

ISTAR MINI HD MB/s Minutes

Read Performance 3.3 Write Performane 5.1 8GB File (H.264)

26.4

4.3GB File (iso)

14.2

730MB DivX

2.3

If we would measure speed on really transferring files and not just

translate the MB/S measured with IOMETER, we would see even

lower performance results in write speed, around 3 MB/Sec while

copying a 8GB MKV file for real leads up to a massive use of time.

This translated to 40 minutes before the transfer was completed.

About the same performance is reached by using FTP (obviously,

same network). While this is currently a "major" limitation

considering the ISTAR is mainly a NMT HD player, we see it causes

some limitations in other sections too. For instance, torrent

downloads need to be transferred back to a PC if you want to

archive them. What use is fitting in a 750GB HDD if you need weeks

to fill it up with content? (MPC Tip for faster coying available here)

The ISTAR like any other NMT media player is a work in progress

and the severity of this limitation today does not necessarily carry

the same severity tomorrow, where Syabas has confirmed it is

working on solutions to provide higher transfer speeds in different

ways in the near future.

Hopefully soon enough

So, in the end, not having a USB Slave port offers no high speed

transfer abilities to the NMT ISTAR. It's something you should be

aware of before purchasing though, which is why we mention the

limitations and the future plans + the solution linked above using a

work around for the limitation. I don't see it as a killer for the

product, more as a current limitation for early adopters that is

painful if you need to copy a lot over to the HDD (like me for

testing files). Besides that, the streaming function is not affected by

these performance limitations.

FTP

FTP access works with the integrated FTPD. The Setup options

offer settings on FTP password. Username could be added and

controlled by the user in addition to the password only which is

valid for both SMB and FTP and contains a maximum of 4 numbers.

For now, FTP is used using a default user ftpuser.

ISTAR MINI HD MB/s Minutes

Read Performance 4.6 Write Performane 4.6 8GB File (H.264)

28.9

4.3GB File (iso)

15.5

730MB DivX

2.6

Conclusion Network performance

Weird how read performance is slower than write performance as

usually it is the other way around. A massive 40 minutes to copy

8GB over to the NMT using SMB (real time) is a killer and shouts for

a solution. The same speed counts for downloading your torrents

for example from the unit to central storage for archiving.

An FTP does deliver better speed in real time around 4.6MB/s

average but still is considered slow for HD files. One thing is

certain, another solution should be offered to get higher transfer

speeds to fill up the internal drive or move downloaded content

from the internal drive to a USB external disk as this is currently the

bottleneck of the ISTAR along with the fact we cannot find the

copy functions at all (see below).

Copy Functions With the ISTAR one is able to select between multiple copy

methods of which some offer better performance than others. As

discussed before, you can use FTP or SMB (in 2 ways, drag and

drop or select the files from the unit). Another way is using direct

attached storage, USB.

From the interface, wed have to use the Angle button to mark

the files and/or folders we desire to copy to the internal hard drive,

then browse to the destination folder and press the Search

button to start the copy command. Here it already shows on of the

awkward implementations of extra features stored under remote

buttons that have nothing to do with the actions but nothing a

little learning cant control.

General Sound Options In general the following options are available during file playback.

We gathered them in an overview for ease instead of drowning

them in the rest of the written text.

Player set to RAW mode

HDMI / Coaxial

- AC3 is supported and sent RAW over HDMI and SPDIF/Coaxial

- DD+ no output over HDMI or Coaxial / Optical

- DTS raw over Analog, SPDIF/Coaxial and HDMI

- DTSHD recognized as DTS on some receivers

- WMA PRO RAW on SPDIF/Coaxial and HDMI (if setup WMAPRO)

- WMA 2CH PCM on SPDIF/Coaxial/HDMI

- AC3/MP4 Analog 5.1ch, 2ch PCM on SPDIF/Coaxial/HDMI

- PCM/WAV/MP3 2ch PCM on all outputs

Player set to PCM Mode

- AC3 Analog 5.1ch or 2ch PCM on all outputs

- DD+ Analog 5.1ch or 2ch PCM on all outputs

- DTS No output

- DTSHD No output

- WMA PRO Analog 5.1 ch or 2ch PCM on all outputs

- WMA 2CH PCM on all outputs

- AC3/MP4 Analog 5.1 ch or 2ch PCM on all outputs

- PCM/WAV/MP3 2ch PCM on all outputs

ISO DVD / Video_TS One of the most popular functions for the past few years on media

players is the ability to play your DVD backups. Some prefer the ISO

method and others prefer the raw DVD files (VIDEO_TS) so this

section checks what can be done with these formats and what not.

Both ISO and VIDEO_TS load successfully from network storage

devices (PC and NAS). When using VIDEO_TS, the movie will load

after selecting the main folder so you dont have to browse inside

the Video-ts folder and select the IFO file which starts the DVD.

With both ISO and VIDEO_TS supported, we kind of covered the

possibilities without the need to play VOB files separately. One can

have 2ch PCM output while playing DVD or Dolby Digital if the unit

is set to RAW (digital) using SPDIF/Coaxial providing you have a

receiver off course supporting this format.

Trying a couple different ISO files reveals no hidden issues about

playback itself. All files tested run fine bit covering ISO and

VIDEO_ts.

Audio selection works fine as soon as you start a movie and

subtitles can be selected using the remotes functioning subtitle

button (did not work on the old one). A workaround was used

selecting a subtitle from the main menu of the DVD which offered

all languages supported so there was a little glitch here where

subtitles was not available by using the old remote.

The remote is sometimes a little awkward in presenting features.

There are skip buttons, the arrow buttons are being used during

DVD playback for FF/RW as well or for ZOOM. This is much better

implemented than the old remote. There is no A-B selection

though. Anyway, the whole remote experience can be somewhat

confusing but nothing one cant manage over time. Can you see

how confusing this guy is about all the remote options?

Now, what else can we say? Fast forward is featured ranging from

2X up to 32X, same for rewind. I can not pause video, then use

step by step option to not miss a frame of the video or select

subtitles and there is no bookmark function.

Zoom functions go from 100% to 133%, to 200% and finally 400%.

Conclusion DVD ISO

With all the generic NMT features

available, Im pretty satisfied with the

DVD playback especially because of the

player playing videos just fine. Its the

remote that helps the fun now being

more complete. Copying DVD files

over to the hard drive (at 20 minutes a

pop) is not a good option for me either so

proper playback from network sources is a

must have all the way. Luckily, thats already the ISTAR does well.

It makes me forget about the fact Im not playing a DVD but a

digital copy of a disk. Placing multiple copies on a single drive is

fun, turning the ISTAR around into a DVD JukeBox.

H.264 Playback So the most important stuff for many to consider the ISTAR, HD

playback. Most are based on USB/network playback and not from

internal hard drive.

The first thing we check is DD playing ok, which it is. Unlike with

DVD playback, the pause button functions here but there is no step

frame or slow playback features. The first test movie is watching

300 on which we will check many options to find out what is

available. First thing we notice is that rewind does not function

yet, fast forward is ok up to 4X. With 8X it no longer does it

properly. 16X is not available.

Subtitles are supported (embedded) but you can use SRT subtitles.

This is still somewhat under development though. Also with these,

we see some small issues. Subtitles are more grey than white,

un-sharp and few letters stick to others.

See how the g is always close to the next letter and even is worse

with the j that almost integrated fully into the next letter. There

is some work pending subtitles as it is a major feature from most

EU countries. Subtitle sync is available (press left/right arrow)

The grey subtitles are not always an issue. Rebooting helps often

to return to white and readable subtitles being shown but the

issues with the subtitles not displayed at once remains.

Subtitles are outlined which is good, but somehow the lines are not

projected at the same time. First line is ok, the second line almost

always shows a black outline first before it becomes readable.

Difficult to explain, so we made a short clip for you using a normal

DiVX files to present the issue which is the same issues as on the

PCH.

PopCorn Subtitles (same for ISTAR):

http://www.mpcclub.com/temp/subs_popcorn.avi

GoTo (Time Search) is available during H.264 playback. In general,

all files played fine without glitches though we prefer to have mass

tests before deciding playback is flawless. We saw no issues playing

at least 50 samples until we tried the Matrix. This seems to block

once in a while during the movie (each couple minutes) for a few

seconds. (File info: Matrix 720p, DTS ESIR rip). Embedded subs in

MKV files are detected and shown. Pressing subtitles will show

subtitles are on.

So, based on our tests, the main red line would be that MPEG4 AVC

is supported quite well as long as AAC and AC3 (DD) is used as

audio. When using DTS there are sound drops from beginning to

end which we saw on both the Matrix and other MKV samples and

movies using DTS. Theres a lack in options to control the movie

(Step, Slow playback, SKIP).

MKV holding Vorbis sound will play without sound (not supported).

Both 720p and 1080p files played smooth and fine from USB (not

tested streaming or internal but should work equally) and

embedded subs are not supported.

TS files play fine as well as long as it holds supported audio and

does not exceed about 40000 bitrates. We ran about all our

samples on the unit and came up with a score of 82% passing fine.

Rest used DTS, Vorbis or simply ware DiVX Low 3 files in an MKV

container which failed with showing no video at all.

AVCHD is supported as well. (Sony and Panasonic recorders). More

reports should follow shortly after the release as the real

performance and playback is measured using complete movies

(300 and Next played flawless and complete as a test).

Multiple audio tracks can be seen but not used as far as our tests

have outlined.

General test Video Video playback is still the media players main core and it shows.

Video playback is the most advanced and most featured section. It

does come with its own quirks though and Ill try to write

everything down briefly.

Supported subtitles are SRT, SUB, SSA and SMI. Multi Language SMI

show subtitles from both languages on one line instead of two and

if SUB/IDX is placed in the folder with the movie, the movie does

not play.

Featured tricks include FF/RW in addition of slow playback and

frame by frame support on all videos because of the new remote. I

can take notice of the time after halting a movie and use the GoTo

function to jump back to the time I was before using these tricks.

Fast Forward and rewind is smooth but featured up to 8X only (no

16X or 32X). Pressing INFO offers OSD info on movie length and

elapsed time as does it offer the info repeat status on/off, which

is used by the repeat button on the remote. If selecting more files,

you can repeat One, All, Off as options but I cant find shuffle for

video.

Pressing Info twice, offers more detailed info on the file playing.

Subtitles are outlined, but notice the issues I wrote before are the

same for the DiVX section. Up to 50 characters are shown on one

subtitle line and in the file menu while browsing lists up to 40

characters.

The ISTAR performed rather well in the DiVX section but we did

have some lockups especially with WMV containers using WMA9

Pro or standard sound profiles. After playback the unit would just

remain having a black display and no longer respond to the

remote. This happened in several other occasions as well during

the tests and should be looked at.

VCD, SVCD, KVCD, 720P Mpeg2 and 1080p Mpeg2 all passed. So

did DivX3 up to 6000 bitrates, up to 720p and 1080p as well. Also

with MPEG4 we saw no issues except with more than 1 warp point.

Nero Digital tests passed completely although chapters etc are not

supported. The files all played fine.

WMV9 then, 720p and 1080p ran fine as long as no DRM is used.

The ISTAR does not play native DRM protected WMV9 files so you

must go back to using a PC client that takes care of the licensing

and then streams to the ISTAR (Windows Media Player 11 for

example or in case with older versions, Windows media Connect).

Also MKV containers, not much to notice there. OGM containers

are however not supported and all files holding Vorbis sound will

run without sound as it is not supported.

In general, we are pleased with the supported files and playback.

Few glitches, few errors, few lockups, it all still sounds normal and

cant completely be avoided, yet, it must be reduced to minimal

possible.

Notice that with Video, there is no progressive zoom unlike in the

picture section. Here it is pure Full Screen, Stretch and actual size.

Overall on sound options, multichannel files play fine but in case of

using DTS, troubles start and sound either skips or locks up. There

is something fishy with DTS right now

The biggest mistake, and we arrive at the remote again is resolved..

The Syabas NMT features all functions we need including step,

frame and A-B and the new remote delivered with the ISTAR

nowadays has all/most of these mapped to the available remote

buttons. That in combination with the improved layout and no

production errors in labels anymore are lifting the player to a killer

unit.

Music playback Over the years people have built up expectations for the next

generation media players to become better and more versatile

music players. Although progress had been made by allowing the

user to continue browsing while playing back titles, the NMT kind

of takes that away again. Its a return to the old days where if a file

is playing and you want to select another one, you have to stop

everything just to get the file list again.

Even the info on the files is limited showing

title only so the music section is seriously

underdeveloped offering playback from

playlists, a folder with files or files one by one. What is missing?

Browse abilities during playback, FF/RW on bigger music files,

support for more formats and make it all spicier instead of dull.

Why?

The ISTAR does not have a VFD so playing without TV is not

possible to startup music so if you have to turn it on anyway, make

it a treat for the eyes.

Using files with ID3v1 tags will show

more info on the splash screen including

album title, title, code and artist info. But what is weird is that on

these files the Info button does not work. ID3v2 is not supported,

neither is album art so to lift the music section to a 3rd

generation

level there is work to do for ISTAR.

Support for music formats seem ok including FLAC but no Vorbis is

supported yet. ogg files are listed but reported by the ISTAR as

Could not play. File types playing ok are MP3, WMA, Flac and

AC3 files. Important missing formats here are AAC and even WAV

files for some. Also DTS and MPC are missing but less important for

most.

Im playing devils advocate here as in general the ISTAR delivers

just as much as most other players and has plans to add Vorbis

already. We just want to note this for everyone working on next

gen, that we want better music performance so we can get rid of

the need to buy separate players for Video, Music and Pictures.

Its the ultimate goal, isnt it?

Picture playback I never been a great user of picture slideshows on media players

and the main reason is that certain formats are mostly not

supported and features are usually missing to enhance picture

playback. Loads of enhancements could be addressed by the newer

models but are they?

Not completely but it has improved at some points.

Images are loaded with different transitions and the arrow keys on

the remote are used to Zoom in/out in a progressive style after I

pressed the zoom button. This allows for zooming in deep on

images especially those of high quality that remain watchable after

excessive zooming. Pressing ZOOM again, returns to normal size.

The problem here is, I dont always want to zoom in the center of

the image so the ability to shift left/right/up/down should be

added as well. Loading images is slow, up to 7 seconds of black

screen in between images of 3MB.

Rotations should be available using the angle remote key but it

isnt on the ISTAR. Pressing Enter on the remote will show

current selected picture, play will start all files to play. There is

no ability for background music during the slideshow, nor can you

pause the slideshow. When using ZOOM during a slideshow, you

have to press next to continue before the slideshow goes on.

Supported formats: Jpeg, GIF, BMP, PNG

Rotations only works on Jpeg!

Conclusion Pictures

Pretty basic playback remains the conclusion. Its good to see

transition effects and progressive ZOOM but missing out on

rotations or the ability to pause slideshow (and not stop and start

over) is a miss. Along with this, I might add the loading of images

takes quite some time and even with the newer players, it seems

picture abilities will remain as with the older players where main

advantages are to be found in the video section by adding newer

formats. Some very much wanted features like thumbnails etc are

probably not implemented due to limitations of the 300Mhz

processor.

About the navigation again, I usually keep a main media folder

without making subcategories like Video, Images and Music.

Although the player forces you to select the type of files you

want to use twice, it still cant show the images if not placed inside

the Photo folder. It will however read this from a NAS server where

it uses the filtering method, I mentioned above, to list file types

regardless of their location.

NMT Apps and options One of the ISTARs most attractive features beside video playback

is software where customers are allowed to run their own binaries.

Things are still at an early stage but available. In this section we

only cover the default features provided.

Samba Server

SAMBA server is just a server like a NAS server allowing me to

access the data on the internal hard drive from a computer in the

same network. It will show the content using the unc path or you

can map the IStar internal hard drive as a drive letter on your

computer.

Now you can copy data to and from the unit. The default setup of

the hard drive includes the default folder share in which we find

the default Music, Photo and Video folder. Two more folders

lost+found and .btpd are located here.

Torrent Downloads

The Torrent application is basic to enable users to download media

without the use of a PC. Almost! As adding files to download

requires the use of PC to browse to the integrated torrent server.

You can set the settings for torrents in the setup menu, but adding

files is done by browsing to the torrent page using the IP address of

the ISTAR device.

http://xxx.xxx.xxx/8883/torrent/bt.cgi

By now its time to get mad a little and pull out the MPC Mega

USB stick! Actually, 1GB holding the firmware for a new full

firmware flash (and losing all the content that took me hours to get

onto it in the first place). I want to test Torrent!!

From the online interface you can add torrents to be downloaded

and follow the progress along the way. This is done by loading the

torrent files into the interface using the browse method.

You can upload only 1 torrent at a time although I would prefer

selecting multiple files or a form allowing 5 torrents simultaneously

to be added. The uploading is very fast and the titles are listed

immediately when added with status information.

There should be more info though like the amount of peers,

estimated time of completion which could be offered by making

the titles a link to more info on that file itself.

Conclusion Torrent files

Rather limited options to see more info beside up/download

speeds and amount of MB downloaded. The torrent functions need

some more info but otherwise, quite handsome and functional. A

scheduler function would be good so we can schedule overnight

downloads for example and not during the day when we are using

the device for movie playback.

Also, adding options to move files to an unshared folder after

completion would be nice especially with a scheduler to prevent a

download finishing at 11PM while it remains seeding at 10KB until

8am in the morning.

Not everyone has unlimited internet bandwidth and this should be

kept in mind with further tuning of the functions. Its ok, nothing

too fancy but functional if you keep monitoring

myiHome Lite Server and online content

The myiHome Lite Server works fine as well. This is actually a server

that allows a PC using the content from the internal HDD (HTML

based server). It enables playback of the content on a PC, Windows

Media Player etc or can simply allow browsing the HDD content

from the web browser.

The online content exists of many plug-ins like YouTube and other

providers online. We already reviewed this on NMT based players

so we not repeat it here.

Conclusion Based on the outcome of this review and the issues discovered

with the remote, ISTAR has confirmed it will replace the remote

as soon as possible. Since at this time it is not available, this

review is based on the current remote control! Do keep that in

mind reading our conclusion. For the NA market, ISTAR will

arrange an exchange program.

Absolutely astonishing to find such huge value in the box at first,

but it seems we have been sent a special package which is not the

package you will find at stores with several optional cables. This

can lead to confusion. Paying 249 for a package that includes all

cables is very different to a package that holds no network, no

optical, no coaxial and no eSATA cable. Ask about the package

contents before purchasing is thus key to know what you are

buying. As long as the hardware and firmware came into question

along with the video abilities of the ISTAR, there was not a thing I

found troublesome enough to make remarks upon but once the

old remote came into the picture, it killed pretty much about

anything we did with the ISTAR. Luckily, with the new remote, we

can forget about that limiting factor.

Its easy, the ISTAR does convince me in every section because of

this new remote and stick with me for a few minutes so I can

explain myself. Fact is, it has nothing to do with the ISTAR player

itself or the firmware as the firmware has all the features

incorporated that we found missing on the ISTAR but being

available on other NMT products and the only reason for this is

that the remote control did not offer / use these options or simply

are not being mapped to these features. The issues with labels,

missing buttons, bulky design and cheap feel and so on pretty

much killed any level of features and convenience in everything

while it could be soooooooo good if not for this original remote.

By tweaking my universal remote control or using the new model

remote, I could make the ISTAR do a lot more than I could with the

original remote which proves these features are available, just not

being used in combination with the original remote.

The ISTAR has the same tremendous potential to become the best

available player along with the other NMT based media players and

has quite some power under the hood. Its a Ferrari with cooling

and a power button to shutdown the engine.

Music browsing, Vorbis, torrent tuning, copy performance,

bookmarks, Custom FTP user, some interface changes and more

can also be improved but carry less weight in general than playback

which the ISTAR does quite well.

Its not a finished product besides replacing the remote and people

purchasing this device should be aware that it will take time to

mature. For the cost of the unit this is acceptable up to a certain

level where we can see continuous progress but not everything can

be forgiven by the cheap price. We target with this line mainly the

music section which brings us back in time instead of making

progress.

I like the ISTAR, its small, has loads of potential but to become

what I had in mind, will take some enhancements and then some

more... The external SATA is awkward too but not a problem. No

problem here to recommend it with the new remote control.

Pros (prelim)

- Excellent price balance

- Very good file format support

- Small and Fan silent (ON/OFF possible)

- Samba Server

- Network Services (SMB/NFS)

- Torrent downloads

- DVD ISO/RAW support

- Picture transitions/formats

- Customization abilities (SE binaries)

- General Video Support

- MKV Time Search

Cons (prelim)

- Copy Network performance (tba*)

- DVD bookmarks (internal HDD)

- Torrent scheduler (tba*)

- External SATA little weird

Little extra Note:

Considering the ISTAR uses the NMT software, some excerpts

from other NMT reviews have been copied into this review where

our tests revealed the same outcome. All changes have been

adapted to reflect the ISTAR.

If any info is used from this review on other sites, please link to the

original copy located on MPC and NOT just spread the PDF. We

keep track of the amount of readers to measure popularity of the

products and MPC Reviews all the time as do we consider it

honoring our work.

The link to this review:

http://www.mpcclub.com/banner_log.php?id=5067

Enjoy

Hi-Jack!

Edits V 2.30:

- ISTAR changed default box contents

- ISTAR changed remote control. Revised all comments on

remote control throughout the review.

As always, updates are constantly applied. Use the forums to check

further enhancements based on FW. Our reviews are only an

introduction and not necessarily reflects the products in a later

stage and time.

2008-03-22T09:50:52+0100hi-jackI am the author of this document