PS3 Video Server, Media Server Preliminary Setup and Tests

**wbassett** · **08-08-08, 04:58 PM**

Quick update...

I tested The Matrix, The Incredibles, and True Lies and they all work fine.

A couple things to note though that could be different.

I put the mpeg extention on instead of leaving the files as .VOB
My copy of the Matrix is from the first run release and not the box set. There might be a difference between them and any encryption schemes on the discs.
I also have the original PS3 that has somewhat different hardware.

Anyway, I did test and didn't have a problem on my end. We'll figure out what's going on.

**08-08-08, 05:09 PM**

So I got that drive I mentioned in the update as well as the 21 DVD. When I first plugged in the EHDD it took like 5 minutes to find it. I had to go to view all and it had a couple other folders in it (I did delete everything on the PC) and then Videos, started 21 and it seemed a bit jumpy and laggy for the first 5 minutes. I pressed pause, then play, now it seems to play great.

Anyone else experiece this?

**wbassett** · **08-08-08, 05:26 PM**

Quote:

RWills81 wrote:

First thread here, just bought a PS3 and Samsung LN46A650 and will be doing the HD set-up. I have been wanting something like this for years and it will only improve.

First off thank you for creating this great thread and still here, still strong.

Few questions?

1. Has the new Firmware able to let you create sub folders?
- I just want folders titled 'Action' - 'Comedy' - 'Drama' - 'Thriller'
Can this be done?

I don't have the latest Firmware (as in anything that's come out in the past several months). I hope they allow multiple subfolders in new releases.

Under the 'VIDEO' folder you can have other subfolders. I have the following folders under my VIDEO folder on one of my My Books:

24 for the complete series of 24
BourneFiles- all of the Bourne movies in one folder
EnemyOfTheState- great flick!
IMF- Mission Impossible, all three movies, the TV series, including the 1988 series
RemoWilliams
The_Bond_Dossier- all 22 Bond flicks (Don't forget Never Say Never) and all the bonus discs and special features
TrueLies
xXx- Noooo, not those kind of movies! The one with Vin Desiel

This is my 'Spy' genre 'Book'. I still have over 100GB free on this drive. (It's a 320GB My Book). On my 500GB My Book I have the complete Highlander saga... all seven seasons and all four movies and I still have 200 plus GB free on that one.

I really wish though that you could do multiple sub folders, as in IMF/Movies IMF/Series/Season1 and so on.

Note: Don't waste your My Book space on music, I have tons of CDs on the PS3's internal drive and I doubt I'll ever fill it.

2. Subtitles - The only reason I ask are all my Kung-Fu flciks. I rather not learn Chinese

I never tried them, I always remove them when I reauthor. I'll do a movie and keep the subtitles and see if they work.

3. I have ripped some of my blu-ray movies on my PC, and is no big deal as I have only 6, but I know down the road but DVD collection sickness will bleed into Blu-Ray. So is there a way to get them playing on a PS3?

I've read that Bluray has a clause that states we can make one digital backup for our own use. You'll have to let me know how you do it.

As far as the PS3, that's a yes and no. Fat32 has a 4GB file size limitation, which you'll quicky exceed with High Def content. You can though stream it to the PS3 from your PC.

4. Thumbnails. I know others have asked, but havent seen an answer. Has there been a way to view them yet? Perhaps changing the icon itself with the 'perfect icon' program.

As far as I know thumbnail video on the internal drive- yes, thumbnail video on external drives- no.

I'm not sure if you can change the icon or not. The still frame thumbnails that you do get are from the actual video itself and not an ico image file.

5. Bill - I read that you want to split up your episodes. Perhaps 'Magic DVD Ripper' can have a solution, it you can convert DVD's into many different files and also split up episodes on those DVD's. I did with my South Park DVD's and converted them to IPod. - Check it out

I have to remember what I said as far as splitting up episodes. I do have multiple episodes of different series on my drives now and they work great. DVDs are fine, but when it comes to TV series, I really like having everything readily accessable like this... click the remote and watch whatever you want.

Also-
Has anyone hooked up their HDD by firewire instead of USB. It's faster

Thanks and keep up the great work.

I'll have to check, but the PS3 doesn't have firewire does it?

**wbassett** · **08-08-08, 05:31 PM**

Quote:

RWills81 wrote:

Went to the store to get the My Book either the 1tb or 500gb, but I was scared off with the My Book world Edition II with the networking options. I was thinking there might be a confliction . Would I have to format the My Book with a third party software? Or can this actually work? It would be nice to access and store my DVD's from my PC with the EHDD attached to the PS3 in the other room.

Has anyone have this model or any success?

It is really 2 500 GB built in one, is this still OK?

-Update-
I have been reading some really bad reviews about that drive, will end up buying....
Western Digital - My Book Home 1TB External FireWire/USB 2.0/eSATA Hard Drive
Model: WDH1CS10000N

I'd stay away from the World Edition My Book. Not because of anything I heard about it with the PS3, rather I've read some other issues with the World Edition. Plus it costs more.

You won't have to reformat the My Book or most any other name brand USB drive. They are all (most I should say) preformatted to Fat32. This allows them to be compatable with the widest range of computers out there. The PS3 only reads Fat32 (for now) so that's the format you want.

I just saw a 500GB My Book for $99 the other day. I can't remember if it was at Walmart, Target, or Best Buy though.

**08-08-08, 05:31 PM**

I believe there is a firewire in the back of mine. I have the 80 GB I bought with the MGS4 bundle

**09-17-08, 06:05 PM**

Quick question about the video files created by DVD Shrink. When I copy a DVD using DVD Shrink, I end up with a VOB file (that I simply rename - and I am using the mpeg extension). But I am left with a few other very small files in the folder. When I try to copy the next DVD, more of these little files are created, and I end up getting a message that files are already present with the same names. I have been deleting these other files - and it doesn't appear to affect playback. Anyone know what these other files are and if they are necessary?

EDIT: Dumb newbie mistake - I just read back a screen and found my answer. Sorry all!

**scrub** · **09-19-08, 01:32 PM**

Quote:

Etienne_72772 wrote:

Quick question about the video files created by DVD Shrink. When I copy a DVD using DVD Shrink, I end up with a VOB file (that I simply rename - and I am using the mpeg extension). But I am left with a few other very small files in the folder. When I try to copy the next DVD, more of these little files are created, and I end up getting a message that files are already present with the same names. I have been deleting these other files - and it doesn't appear to affect playback. Anyone know what these other files are and if they are necessary?

EDIT: Dumb newbie mistake - I just read back a screen and found my answer. Sorry all!

You may find that renaming the files creates problems with the FF and RW plus the elapsed time of the movies. I use VOB2MPG to convert to MPG. Make sure shrink is set to make smaller chunk VOBs as opposed to one single VOB.

Here lately I've skipped the MPG process all together and simply placed the single Shrink VOB file on my external HDD with zero playback problems.

**10-14-08, 06:16 AM**

Just wanted to thank Bill for his excellent information.

I've spent almost 2 days exploring the internet to try and find out how to get my DVD collection stored on my PS3 (I've upgraded the hard drive to a 250Gb model).

Nothing gave me the exact answer I was looking for until I came across this thread.

Just wanted to say thanks for the help. Just what I needed.

Lurker

**wbassett** · **10-14-08, 08:53 AM**

Quote:

scrub wrote:

You may find that renaming the files creates problems with the FF and RW plus the elapsed time of the movies. I use VOB2MPG to convert to MPG. Make sure shrink is set to make smaller chunk VOBs as opposed to one single VOB.

Here lately I've skipped the MPG process all together and simply placed the single Shrink VOB file on my external HDD with zero playback problems.

I just did a firmware update because Star Wars The Force Unleash needed it in order to play.

So far all my movies still play and still FF and RW, I'll run through a bunch this weekend.

You're right though scrub... for awhile now the FW updates have allowed the PS3 to read straight .vob files so the renaming to .mpeg isn't necessary.

As far as converting, as you mentioned and I have also there isn't a need to rename anymore so I wouldn't, but there also isn't a need to convert because DVDs are already mpeg encoded, that's why we can get away with just doing a rename. The problem with running things through encoders and converters is every time something touches that video source and converts it, quality is taking a hit. It may be minor but it is still happening. The rename method really isn't converting anything so there is no loss in video quality- just whatever loss happened depending on whether it needed compressed of not to meet the 4GB file size limitation.

My son has the newer PS3 and I have the original one and I have noticed some differences in build quality which does seem to affect playback, FF, RW and things like that. Simply put, the original unit is built like a tank and the new one has software instead of hardware emulation for some things, which is where I believe some of the problem lay. His unit is actually in for repair right now, the fan went out. Mine is coming up on being two years old and not one problem, and I probably use my unit twice as much as he uses his. (Which reminds me, I need to check on my extended warranty and renew it).

One FW update that I am hoping for is for NTFS support, that way we can get away from the FAT file system and the 4GB file size restriction. Of course one way around that is to stream from a media center PC, but my house doesn't allow an easy way to run cat5 to my HT room and I really don't recommend wireless streaming, too much loss.

With that said, I am going to be running cat5 eventually and setting up MediaMall's PlayOn. The online streaming content is finally starting to get a pretty big selection of movies and Netflix is even working on HD streaming content. Amazon is also getting into the mix, and there is always Hulu. If the PS3 could only DVR things it very well could be the ultimate media center device, but again with a network connection all that can be done on a PC and streamed.

Just a note though for people that want to do something like this, first right now the Watch It Now or 'On Demand' content (whatever you want to call it) still isn't fully up to DVD quality yet. Most is better than VHS, but not quite DVD quality. Second, I personally would recommend setting aside a dedicated MediaCenter PC system for content. It may seem like overkill but if a person wants the least amount of drops, skips and stutters that's the best way to go.

When will I get to all that? I can't say now that the weather is getting cold, but those are some things I have planned for the future and my PS3 setup.

**10-14-08, 09:32 AM**

Love the way I can play movies from ext hard drive...However, I found that the ps3 wont let me make video thumbnails from the ext hard drive. Only if the movie is on the ps3 hard drive. Anyway around this?

**wbassett** · **10-14-08, 10:26 AM**

Quote:

Lurker wrote:

Just wanted to thank Bill for his excellent information.

I've spent almost 2 days exploring the internet to try and find out how to get my DVD collection stored on my PS3 (I've upgraded the hard drive to a 250Gb model).

Nothing gave me the exact answer I was looking for until I came across this thread.

Just wanted to say thanks for the help. Just what I needed.

Lurker

First things first... Welcome to the Shack Lurker!

Thanks for the nice comment. That was the exact problem I ran into as well. I even spent some time up on Sony's PS3 forum and man, talk about some over zealous fanboys! I knew there had to be a way to do this but nobody was really interested. Everyone was saying 'DivX', and honestly, I'm not really a big DivX fan and don't like converting if I don't have to- as mentioned, too much of a hit in video quality in my opinion.

The real reason though is I have too many DVDs and to convert to DivX was taking hours, even days just for one movie, only to end up with some really bad playback video quality. For some it's all about max storage and how much they can cram on a drive, for others playback quality is the biggest factor. For me it was video quality and time needed to archive things.

Here is a slick little item I ran across...
Simply drop a bare 2.5" or 3.5" SATA drive into the dock! No adapters or other cables required. Perfect when you have multiple drives you need to access. The dock connects to your computer via USB 2.0.

Features:

Supports All 2.5” and 3.5” SATA HDDs up to 1TB
Supports USB 2.0 Transfer Speed
Hot-Swap
Capability for Rapid Multi HDDs Access & Exchange
Compact Docking Station Design Maximizes Heat Dissipation and Exhaust

Price: $36!

Seeing that SATA drives have come down a lot in price I may be switching over to this setup instead of the My Books. I do like the MyBook, but they do cost a little more and once you get over a couple of drives then you have multiple power outlets, multiple USB connections... This little gem has two drive bays for up to a terabyte of storage. Simply archive a complete genre or TV series on a drive and then drop it in. Granted the coolness factor leans more to everything connected and accessable instantly, but this is a nice alternative.

The other setup I like and showed previously and is worth another remention is the UltraStackable drives. Whether you connect directly to the PS3 or to a PC that is streaming content to the PS3 these things are like gold!
Here is the video once again-
YouTube - Ultra Stackable External Hard Drive Enclosure

And here are some other components aside from the drive enclosures-

To the left is the power suppy unit.
Each drive enclosure comes with its own power supply, but nobody wants two, three, or six separate power supplies, each requiring its own outlet. That is messy and takes up way too many outlets.

The Power Center has six power outputs, that's enough for five drives and the Hub. I personally would go with the Multi-Card Reader and 6 port hub over the 7 port hub mainly because the connections are on the back, meaning no wires on the front where people can see them.

To the right the units can be seen stacked, but they don't have to be stacked in a single column like that, you could actually split them into two stacks of three, or three stacks of two, whatever looks best and fits in your equipment racks the best.

The one negative factor I have read is that the power center is a bit loud from the fan, and also each drive has a fan... and then the PS3's fan... so that is something to take into consideration. I know even the slightest fan noise bothers some people.

**jbryngelson** · **10-23-08, 07:30 AM**

Great Thread, and my biggest thanks is for your attention to keep helping out - EVEN BETTER!

I have followed the directions, and copied 6 movies over to a FAT32 external USB HD, and connected to my PS3. All works great. My goal is to copy the remaining 300 DVDs to the unit, but I have some questions/concerns.

1) The naming convention requires only 8 character due to FAT32 - Correct? Makes it hard to create movie names I will recall in a year or two... Any suggestions on what to do to make these names longer?

2) Compression, this is going to be viewed on a Projector based system (120" screen), so quality is KEY. Every one of my movies had to be compressed to get them to under 4GB. I have not critically watched, but I am not liking 25-35% compression of a movie. Is this common? I am only copying the main title and the english DD-2.0 or DD-5.1 soundtrack.

3) Media Server - I have an extra XP system and could put a couple 1.5Tb drives into it, and just copy the movies there. I assume then I do not have 4Gb file size, or naming convention problem. What is necessary to make sure it easily sees the XP system, and the Video files associated with it?

Again, thanks for this effort. The PS3 and all its features really amazes me.

Jeff in Detroit

**dh2005** · **10-29-08, 08:23 PM**

Hello everyone,

I don't know whether my question is appropriate here, but I've recognised that there are some knowledgeable and decent people on this thread - and I'm in dire need of such people!

What I'm trying to do is back-up as much of my DVD collection as possible, store it on a large external HDD (or two...) and transfer what I want to watch at any particular time to the PS3's hard drive for playback. But I've run into some trouble.

I'm from Britain, so my native discs are PAL Region 2. All of my Region 2 discs (so far) run very happily on the PS3, but I have some NTSC Region 1 discs that are causing me all sorts of problems. Most of my Region 1 .VOBs crash during playback - the video freezes, the audio continues for five seconds or so, then the screen goes black and the audio dies and the PS3 just sits there doing nothing.

I'm completely new to this, but I did notice that, unlike my Region 2 .VOBs, my Region 1 files had no thumbnail images, and their running times were wrong (completely random - like, 0:00, 0:07, 12:18, 55:12... just anything), so I figured it might be a timecode problem. I installed MPEG Streamclip, which claimed to fix the timecode in the .VOBs, but it also insisted on converting them to .MPGs when it saved them in their repaired form - and when I tried to play these .MPGs on my PS3 it said that they were corrupted... yet Windows Media Player could run them just fine!

... I'm stuck. Have I done the right thing by fixing the timecode? If so, can anyone recommend a timecode repair program that will allow me to leave the files as .VOBs?

Sorry for the life story. Thanks for reading.

DH

**dh2005** · **10-30-08, 07:57 PM**

Quote:

joevigi21 wrote:

Greetings, fine posters:

I originally stumbled across this thread several moons back, but since the ability to include subtitles isn't possible with this method, I went in other directions. Well I'm back (obviously

) and come bearing troubles.

I've had mixed success with this vob extraction method when it comes to preserving aspect ratios, specifically 1.78. When I extract from a 1.33 or 2.35 source, the resulting vob is displayed perfectly on my PS3. When I extract from 1.78, I get BIG black borders on the top and bottom of the screen. It looks like a 2.35 that someone stepped on. I'll note that when I play back the same file on my PC, it displays perfectly in 1.78.

Any ideas?

Hey dude,

Yeah, I've had this exact same problem. So far, I've observed the key difference to be whether or not the DVD source is a movie or TV show - all of my 1.78:1 anamorphic movies remain anamorphic, whereas all of my 1.78:1 TV shows (like Seasons 2, 3 and 4 of House M.D.) appear to have lost their anamorphic coding, somehow.

Have you made any progress on this, yet?

Or can anyone out there offer some help?

Again, any input would be deeply appreciated.

DH

EDIT: I spoke too soon - one of my movie rips has presented with this problem, too. Guess it's not TV-only...!

**dh2005** · **11-05-08, 09:59 PM**

Wow... looks like I killed this thread!

I didn't mean to. If no-one can help, that's fine. Just carry on as before!

But, of course, if anyone CAN help with my timecode and/or anamorphic problems, I'd love to hear from you - drop me a private message, if you don't think it's appropriate for the thread itself.

DH

Edit: I'm noticing that the anamorphic problem occurs in patterns - for instance, all of Woody Allen's MGM movies from between 1970-something and 1980-something lose their anamorphism when they're archived, all of House M.D. after the first season do the same, and yet other shows and movies have no problems. I tried using DVD Decrypter instead of DVD Shrink to rip the .VOBs to see if it made any difference, but it didn't.

Clearly, there's something about the way these discs are coded that means the anamorphism doesn't get carried over. Which leads me to believe that there must be something that can be changed to fix it...

**wbassett** · **11-10-08, 06:46 AM**

I'll try but since I only use region 1 I may not have the answers you're looking for.

Quote:

dh2005 wrote:

Hello everyone,

I don't know whether my question is appropriate here, but I've recognised that there are some knowledgeable and decent people on this thread - and I'm in dire need of such people!

What I'm trying to do is back-up as much of my DVD collection as possible, store it on a large external HDD (or two...) and transfer what I want to watch at any particular time to the PS3's hard drive for playback. But I've run into some trouble.

I'm from Britain, so my native discs are PAL Region 2. All of my Region 2 discs (so far) run very happily on the PS3, but I have some NTSC Region 1 discs that are causing me all sorts of problems. Most of my Region 1 .VOBs crash during playback - the video freezes, the audio continues for five seconds or so, then the screen goes black and the audio dies and the PS3 just sits there doing nothing.

What are you using to archive?

Here is the million dollar question, do the Region 1 discs play on the PS3 without any problems? Most players I know of only support one region at a time unless they are region free. I honestly never checked if the PS3 is region free or can be set to region free but I assume it can be.

If the discs themselves play fine, then the problem is on the PC end and the software for doingthe archives. Again most PC DVDRoms are set to one region.

Can you give some more details about your setup please?

I'm completely new to this, but I did notice that, unlike my Region 2 .VOBs, my Region 1 files had no thumbnail images, and their running times were wrong (completely random - like, 0:00, 0:07, 12:18, 55:12... just anything), so I figured it might be a timecode problem. I installed MPEG Streamclip, which claimed to fix the timecode in the .VOBs, but it also insisted on converting them to .MPGs when it saved them in their repaired form - and when I tried to play these .MPGs on my PS3 it said that they were corrupted... yet Windows Media Player could run them just fine!

This sounds like a wrong file format to me, or as you are thinking there is a time code issue.

I haven't run into this myself. What PS3 Firmware are you using?

... I'm stuck. Have I done the right thing by fixing the timecode? If so, can anyone recommend a timecode repair program that will allow me to leave the files as .VOBs?

Sorry for the life story. Thanks for reading.

DH

**wbassett** · **11-10-08, 06:57 AM**

Quote:

joevigi21 wrote:

Greetings, fine posters:

I originally stumbled across this thread several moons back, but since the ability to include subtitles isn't possible with this method, I went in other directions. Well I'm back (obviously

) and come bearing troubles.

I've had mixed success with this vob extraction method when it comes to preserving aspect ratios, specifically 1.78. When I extract from a 1.33 or 2.35 source, the resulting vob is displayed perfectly on my PS3. When I extract from 1.78, I get BIG black borders on the top and bottom of the screen. It looks like a 2.35 that someone stepped on. I'll note that when I play back the same file on my PC, it displays perfectly in 1.78.

Any ideas?

What titles are you having trouble with?

The only one I had problems with was True Lies. When I played it back it had black bars on the top, bottom, left, and right. Turns out it wasn't anamorphic, rather a 4:3 'letter boxed' format.

Is this happening with all your 1.78 movies or just a few?

Shrink should be identical to what was on the disc. It doesn't change any formatting or aspect ratios or anything like that so I doubt it's on the Shrink end that's causing this.

Also make sure when you re-author that you preview the file. Some discs have multiple formats on the same disc and it's easy to select the wrong one, or an alternate angle version.

I see you mentioned when you play it back on the PC it looks fine. Also check your TV and PS3 settings to see if you have it forced to one aspect ratio over another.

Sorry that I don't have any solid answers for this one at the moment.

**dh2005** · **11-10-08, 09:34 AM**

Thanks for getting back, Bill. I realise you have plenty to do yourself without baby-sitting newbies like me...!

My PS3 is European, so it's locked to Region 2 for DVD playback. Ironically, accessing my Region 1 DVDs was one of my reasons for buying the PS3 - I have dozens of discs that I've not been able to watch in years since my multi-region player broke down, and I was told that if I used AnyDVD to remove their regional coding and ripped them using DVD Shrink that I'd be able to watch them through the PS3...

... and the thing is, sometimes it works perfectly. Region 1 Anchorman, Young Frankenstein, The Producers, Easy Rider, Taxi Driver, Best In Show etc. etc. all work absolutely beautifully, and I'm delighted about that. But the fact that some of them don't work, when I've ripped them with exactly the same software on exactly the same laptop, is a bit of a drag.

As for the anamorphic issue that both I and another user are having - I am absolutely certain that these images ought to be anamorphic. I'm one of those "hi-fi serious" (some might say, anally-retentive...!) people who get hung-up on DVDs being anamorphic, so I notice when they're not!

The overwhelming majority of the discs with this problem are MGM discs - all of Woody Allen's movies from the early '70s until the early '90s (with the exception of 1979's Manhattan, which works fine... weird), Married To The Mob, Something Wild, Carrie, In The Heat Of The Night, Boxcar Bertha, The Tall Guy, Drugstore Cowboy... In fact, nearly all of the discs that have this problem are MGM discs, which suggests that there's something about the way these discs are structured that's different from others.

I have my PS3 and my TV set to 16:9 mode, and most of the anamorphic discs that I've ripped retain their anamorphism and look exactly as they should, so I'm thinking that DVD Shrink is failing to bring across the data that tells the PS3 that the image is anamorphic. But I don't know where such data would be kept.

I suppose it's possible that the anamorphic data is not stored in the main .VOB, but rather in one of the smaller files that DVD Shrink creates when it rips it (like VTS_01_0). I delete these files without a problem, usually. D'you think that might be my mistake...?

Thanks again.

DH

EDIT: Sorry... I didn't answer your question, did I?

I'm using a 2x2.00GHz Sony Vaio with 2GB of RAM to rip the .VOBs. I'm using AnyDVD to remove the copy protection and regional coding, and DVD Shrink to do the ripping (I've tried DVD Decrypter and DVD Fab to overcome the anamorphic problem, but the output is exactly the same).

My PS3 is second-generation (I bought it a month ago), and the firmware, I assume, is the most recent because I downloaded a new update two or three weeks ago. My TV is a 32" Panasonic Viera (doubt that matters, but I thought I'd mention it...).

I'm storing the .VOBs on two Fujitsu-Siemens 1TB external HDDs, and connecting them to my PS3 via USB. The majority of my rips run absolutely fine, so I'm pretty sure there's nothing wrong with this end of the setup.

**wbassett** · **11-10-08, 10:38 AM**

DH I may see one potential problem with at least the Region 1 discs.

Shrink will also remove the region coding, but of course if the disc is in a region setting that the drive isn't set to then it can't read the disc. I have no experience with AnyDVD so I don't know if that's an issue and it's being passed off to Shrink or not.

One thing you can do since DVD Rom drives are so inexpensive is to get a second drive and set it up solely for Region 1 discs and then read the discs into Shrink from there and let Shrink remove any region coding. It's something worth considering at least.

Quote:

DH2005 wrote:

I suppose it's possible that the anamorphic data is not stored in the main .VOB, but rather in one of the smaller files that DVD Shrink creates when it rips it (like VTS_01_0). I delete these files without a problem, usually. D'you think that might be my mistake...?

No I don't think that's it, at least I haven't seen that information contained elsewhere than the vob file.

Since most are working this is definitely a problem isolated to those few titles and Region 1 discs. I can't say for sure but my guess is something is happening between AnyDVD and Shrink. I know it sounds like a pain, but see if you can put a second DVD Rom in and try using just shrink. You can of course change your region setting on your current DVD drive, but the software will only allow a limited number of changes before it locks it out to one region.

Okay, you can do this... change your drive to Region 1 (you can set it back to Region 2) and then use just Shrink to rip one of the Region 1 discs and see if that plays in the PS3. If it does, then get yourself a second drive dedicated just to Region 1 discs. At least this way you can test this theory without spending money on another drive. If it works... you're golden and then you can feel comfortable getting a dedicated Region 1 drive. If it doesn't... then we have to do some more investigating.

**dh2005** · **11-10-08, 11:13 AM**

Thank you for your thoughts. Can I also, more generally, thank you for your excellent "can do" attitude - it's very comforting when the frustration sets in!

It hadn't occurred to me that AnyDVD might be causing a problem... the first thing I'll do is turn-off AnyDVD then re-rip a Region 2 disc that was giving me the anamorphic problem, and see whether I've been bad-mouthing Shrink unjustly!

I'll report back ASAP.

**dh2005** · **11-10-08, 11:49 AM**

Nope. Still not anamorphic... pity - that was my best idea in a while!

I'll look into changing the region of my drive, now. May not be able to get that done today, but I'll report back once I have.

**dh2005** · **11-11-08, 08:47 PM**

Update: it's gonna be another few days before I get to changing the region on my drive. I'm in the middle of ripping the complete X Files - you wouldn't believe how long that takes!

**Doogz007** · **11-17-08, 10:14 AM**

[QUOTE=wbassett;121333] If the PS3 could only DVR things it very well could be the ultimate media center device, QUOTE]

It can now! I cut & paste details due to the fact I can't add URL as less than 10 posts. It's called Play TV for PS3. Apparently it comes with an EPG as well. Unfortunately for me the EPG does not work in Ireland so not much point of me buying it yet. Vrey reasonable proce of £59.99 as well. Cheers Dougie

Below is taken from Amazon.co.uk:
"
PS3 already gives your family next-generation gaming, Blu-ray movies, music, video, web browsing and PLAYSTATION Network support – all in one unit. Now, with PlayTV, it has the functionality of a state-of-the-art TV tuner and PVR – it’s great value and it’s one more reason to make PS3 the centre of your family entertainment.
Two TV tuners: watch one programme while recording another.

Electronic Programme Guide: a seven-day navigation interface that makes it easy to programme and watch PlayTV. It’s lightning fast and simple to use with either PS3’s SIXAXIS controller or the Blu-ray Remote Control.

Watch, pause and rewind live TV: TV programmes now operate at the viewers’ convenience. Just hit the pause button to take a break without missing a thing – and rewind any bits to watch over and over again.

Portable viewing with PSP: Seamless PSP connectivity allows you to set recordings remotely and to watch live TV streamed on your PSP wherever you are via a WiFi connection (using Remote Play feature).

Record TV:

while you're playing games on your PS3 "

**jwessel** · **11-18-08, 03:11 PM**

Hey you guys I have a couple questions. As of right now, I do not have a PS3, and am trying to decide whether to get one or not. Basically I have a 52" LCD 1080p tv, and have a lot of movies just like most of you do as well. I am starting to get blu-rays as well, and of course would love to store all of my movies including blu-rays on a hardrive to watch whenever. From what I have read, please correct me if I am wrong, The PS3 WILL play the blu ray file from the hard drive, however it must be less than 4GB, which is hard to obtain. Is this limitation because of the PS3?

The other option I have been thinking about is a Networked Media Tank, such as the HDX-1000. To be honest I don't play video games all that much, so the PS3 would mainly be a used as a Media server. I can get a used PS3 for around $300, and the HDX-100 is $270 shipped, so for $30 more I would be able to have the PS3 to play games as well.

My only concern is which would be a better for playing stored blu-rays and regular movies. Does anyone know if the Networked Media Tank has file restriction sizes just like the PS3 does?

Thanks for the help.

**BlueZero** · **11-24-08, 12:26 PM**

Jeff, check out the WD TV too. It's from Western Digital. It's about $130. Looks interesting but I can't find a lot of info on it yet. I started ripping my movies to my PS3 but am going to hold off for now till I see some detailed reviews on the WD TV.

Advertisement