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[Jong]

Hi guys. New user here  

I just wanted to say after 48 hours with MC17 I am completely blown away by it. I have been a serious HTPC "hacker" for over 10 years using a varying but always horrible combination of tools to try to get the job done.

Over that time I have been uisng myHTPC, then Meedio, then MeediOS as my front-end - for a long time hacking my own screen files to get near what I wanted. I have repeatedly tried XBMC and MediaPortal (maybe even JRiver years ago?) and always switched back as none of them had the flexibility and power I needed. On the other hand Meedios has always been a pig to maintain and has never had decent players.

For video I have for a long time been using mpc-hc for most and TMT(now 5) for the rest (DVD and Blu-ray). I have been a serious Reclock-nut - trying and 'just about' succeeding in getting smooth playback of everything from PAL DVD, to mkv and Blu-ray for the last 5 years or so, but boy has it been a pain!! I've played with MadVR for years, but as an AMD user needed GPU accelerated video I was never able to really use it. I had a lot of discussions with Madshi at the time he was incorporating Reclock style features to madVR.

A combination of things made me try JRiver (again?):

- I really do not have the time anymore to keep up with MeediOS!!
- I was excited by the prospect of being able to use MadVR with LAV Video and of switching to all internal players.
- I am sick of the problems getting GUARANTEED smooth playback with TMT5. I think it is basically impossible! It works much of the time, but it is not IMO dependable. I am sure others are lucky enough that it just works for them, but it is not IMO resilient.

I am astounded by the:

- staggering feature set
- ease of use
- configurability and customisation if you want it
- solidity

Despite the immense feature set it really does seem to do what it says - bug free and without the usual gotyas I have got so used to over the years

This is true not just of the main app, but also your DLNA server, which is the best of about half a dozen I have tried. It can even re-encode my blu-rays to play on my Samsung SmartTV in the kitchen!

In a little under 2 days I have completely transitioned 4 very large libraries (images, audio, movies and TV).

This product deserves more recognition and, IMO, blows all the competition, especially the much better known XBMC, out of the water. Well done all, I am staggered!!

I do have some comments. I am sure i will have more over time, but let's leave this post here.

 

[MrHaugen]

That's good to hear Jong! Welcome to the forums. I hope you'll enjoy our stay here.

As you say, it beats all other similar products. Even after using MC for 9-10 years, I still find new cool features to play with. I trust you will have a blast as well

[JimH]

Thanks, Jong.

[glynor]

That's good to hear Jong! Welcome to the forums. I hope you'll enjoy our stay here.

As you say, it beats all other similar products. Even after using MC for 9-10 years, I still find new cool features to play with. I trust you will have a blast as well

Here, here!

Welcome, Jong!

[Jong]

After another week of use and a few threads of hopefully constructive comments I just want to re-iterate how amazed I am by the quality of this product. With such an amazingly comprehensive feature set it is remarkable how easy and trouble-free it is to use. The devs have a sureness of touch - an understanding of what is just 'right' that is rare indeed. Sure there are some things I'd like enhanced but I can't believe how well they have things covered. Red October HQ is a treasure. Yes, I know MadVR and LAV are both available elsewhere but the way they are integrated and made easy is fantastic.

I know some will disagree violently with me on this, but if I had one wish it would be that JRiver licence, as a chargeable extra, a full Blu-ray navigator, from, say, Arcsoft, so we could play full Blu-ray discs, including 3D, inside MC, with Red October quality. Call me mad, as someone who over the years has paid for PDVD7, PDVD8, TMT3 and TMT5, I would happily pay the full wack again for full disc playback with guaranteed smooth playback. The giants Cyberlink and Arcsoft have nothing like Red October and their devs seem to have no idea how to get there!

[Denny123]

I too am a new user and was blown away.  I use JRiver as a server on my desktop PC and DLNA on a Marantz AV7005 to listen to music.  What was so astonishing to me after replacing Twonky with JRiver was the improvement in quality of sound.  Further tweeking of JRiver caused an even better result.  I spent several days re-listening to my music collection and discovered that there was a lot more music in the albums than I had ever heard before JRiver.  It is truly a superb product.

Were I to abandon DLNA and instead use a dedicated HTPC, e.g. the Assassin HTPC Audiophile, to deliver a JRiver rendered digital signal directly to the AV7005, would there be a significant improvement in audio quality?  I don't have a very good understanding of audio streaming and rendering which is why I may be asking a dumb question.  If so, my apologies.  What I am confident of is that the music played using JRiver is far superior in quality to Twonky or even my Oppo 93 playback. 

[Jong]

Yes, I agree and it is something I haven't mentioned. The audio quality is superb. I have got used to so-so audio since everything was digitised! But JRiver really brings it all alive again. I too have been rediscovering my music collection!

[NickF]

Were I to abandon DLNA and instead use a dedicated HTPC, e.g. the Assassin HTPC Audiophile, to deliver a JRiver rendered digital signal directly to the AV7005, would there be a significant improvement in audio quality?  I don't have a very good understanding of audio streaming and rendering which is why I may be asking a dumb question.

I think you should get a better result with a direct connection from HTPC to your Marantz.  If you are using digital, try using HDMI.  Some users have seen a significant improvement with HDMI

Nick.

[eddyshere]

After another week of use and a few threads of hopefully constructive comments I just want to re-iterate how amazed I am by the quality of this product. With such an amazingly comprehensive feature set it is remarkable how easy and trouble-free it is to use. The devs have a sureness of touch - an understanding of what is just 'right' that is rare indeed. Sure there are some things I'd like enhanced but I can't believe how well they have things covered. Red October HQ is a treasure. Yes, I know MadVR and LAV are both available elsewhere but the way they are integrated and made easy is fantastic.

I know some will disagree violently with me on this, but if I had one wish it would be that JRiver licence, as a chargeable extra, a full Blu-ray navigator, from, say, Arcsoft, so we could play full Blu-ray discs, including 3D, inside MC, with Red October quality. Call me mad, as someone who over the years has paid for PDVD7, PDVD8, TMT3 and TMT5, I would happily pay the full wack again for full disc playback with guaranteed smooth playback. The giants Cyberlink and Arcsoft have nothing like Red October and their devs seem to have no idea how to get there!

+1

[jgreen]

Regarding related licenses, it's the money.  I don't speak for JRiver here, but I've watched them balance competing priorities, and make hard choices in order to bring out a competitive product in the marketplace.  Bear in mind, most of the alternatives to JRiver Media Center are FREE, and yet so many people who want value for their money choose to pay for this premium product. 

Bottom line, there are well-established paths for doing what you want.  And the future will only get brighter and easier, as the JRiver propellerheads keep doing their thing.

Oh, yeah!!

[Denny123]

I think you should get a better result with a direct connection from HTPC to your Marantz.  If you are using digital, try using HDMI.  Some users have seen a significant improvement with HDMI

Nick.

Thanks for the tip.  I will give the HTPC connection a try.

[escaflo]

Just wanted to add as well, coming back from iTunes (due to iPhone but now switch back to Android) to MC, there's just a kind of pure joy feeling using MC compare to the PoS iTunes.

After playing around with Expression, and setting up the Auto Import the way I want it, I don't think I will ever be able to switch to another software for my HTPC and music needs.

[Jong]

Regarding related licenses, it's the money.  I don't speak for JRiver here, but I've watched them balance competing priorities, and make hard choices in order to bring out a competitive product in the marketplace.  Bear in mind, most of the alternatives to JRiver Media Center are FREE, and yet so many people who want value for their money choose to pay for this premium product.

By the way, Jim deliberately split off the blu-ray discussion to its own thread: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=73104.0

Any further discussion on that should probably happen there.