Explored: Windows 7 Media Streaming to XBOX 360 and PS3

Although both the XBOX 360 and Playstation 3 can support UPnP media streaming from Windows Vista, none of the video formats they use are natively supported by the OS. Streaming is difficult without the use of registry hacks, and it is undesireable to use transcoding programs like TVersity.

Since Windows 7 adds native support for these programs, we tested the streaming capabilities with both consoles. Will you be able to stream MP4 and MOV files straight "out of the box"? Read on to find out!

[KionicWarlord222]

now this is going to be good.theres two that say dont play on chart.

[kevnb]

i imagine they could probably make an xbox version.

[Captain Tuttle]

It works on the 360 too...at least my 360 recognizes it. I haven't really dug into it but I read on GAF that it works pretty well...needs a couple of small tweaks but it does a good job on the 360.

[MicroSony4Life]

we get a negative Microsoft comment from some rabid troll.

On topic this is should be interesting.

[Baka-akaB]

Meh for the ps3 at least , PS3 media server (the java ones) does a better job with the formats that really matters : mvk etc etc .

I also enjoy it because it's one of the few that let you access all of your Hdds without a fuss .
Dont want to specify video , photo or mp3 folders , especially if you got a lots of those ? Then you clear the folders and by default it will access all of them .

I've been using sometimes media player's server for avi ... but i still dont like it's windows interface , it's often capricious attitude , and having to deal with it's library system , it's also a shame it require upnp activated . At least it's good to have something that works well from the get go .

Beyond the subject of the player , i got no complaints so far about Win 7 btw , except Iexplorer

[Kushan]

You give a media streaming app COMPLETE access to your entire hard drive?

That's umm....that's not a good idea...

[Gue1]

That's a fact too. But what's the big deal about this? It's going to be crap anyway because it doesn't do any transcoding...

[GiantEnemyCrab]

Why would you want to transcode? Transcoding is resource intensive and the playback quality does not match a natively streamed video.

Transcoding and have to re-encode is garbage. I still see even with 7 you have to rename files so the PS3 can see them.. Lame Glad the MCE doesn't require any of that.

[Baka-akaB]

hum trasncoding is a bad thing quality wise ... to keep the same quality you gotta use far more cpu , not to mention the strain on most wifi setups .

I only dont care about Media player because of formats like MKV , and its interface , but otherwise , it's a big plus

[lowlight]

The last thing you want is to transcode your video, if at all possible.

With the PS3, it's possible to convert h.264 MKV files into h.264 MPG files. This is done without transcoding, and from there you should be able to stream the files. The video and audio will remain exactly the same. Check out www.mkv2vob.com

Those MPG files won't work on XBOX 360 unfortunately; I don't believe the MPG file container is supposed to be able to contain h.264 video.

[Jellzy]

"...it is undesireable to use transcoding programs like TVersity"

Why exactly? The PS3 goes hand in hand with media, and works flawlessly with TVersity and other similer programs, with the inclusion of the easy to use PS3 Media Server.

Since the PS3 supports a vast amount of files, the only file i find myself needing to transcode is .mkv (matroska) files and with a fast enough PC and the right codecs you can stream them without any loss in quality, and thats only if i cant be bothered to convert them.

You'll find the only problems that you will run into are containers which include .AC3 tracks which are not native. Again a wuick conversion will do the trick though, or a crazy code transcoding setup.

Anyhoo simply put these programs do the job decently enough. Cant comment too much on the 360's playback of streamed data as ive never tried it with mine.

[sukru]

It's more or less the same on 360. You cannot play mkv's but avi, h264, divx works. It has more screen resolutions (due to VGA output), and probably supports slightly more formats, but the difference is minor.

Basically every media server for PS3 (PlayOn, TVersity, etc) works for 360 too.

There is a FAQ at: http://blogs.msdn.com/xboxt...

[Jellzy]

Kl m8, thnx for the info. Dont think ive turned on my 360 in over a year now lol, so might stick it in another room and use it as a media-playback device.

Cheers.

[sukru]

Except for the high fan noise, 360 is a good media player, too (at least for me).

[lowlight]

It transcodes the video. In other words, it is taking a file that is already compressed from the original, and re-encoding it to another format. That means it is re-compressing the video (making it worse) and re-compressing the audio (making it worse). This uses up a lot of CPU resources and power as well.

So it's much better to keep everything ORIGINAL if possible, without having to re-encode it.

[romaink]

If this really works as they say, I'm doing a clean install as soon as the official RC file gets here. I just muxed my mkv files with AC3 sound into m2ts and they won't function well with my xbox 360. There is no runtime info and the file hangs after a few minutes of playing. Anyone else tried this?

[FragMnTagM]

These are things that should have been in Vista. I am still fairly happy with Vista, but it definitely was not a full upgrade, and Windows 7 looks to be what Vista should have been. Right now, I can get my 360 and PS3 to play all the good formats. It is quite a hassle, but not impossible to get all the latest formats to stream right now. This is a good step in the right direction of letting the user have full control of their favorite formats.

[JohnClark]

hmmm, close to what i wanted. If only i could stream the gameplay from my 360 to my computer, thus effectively using my monitor as the tv without the need for an HDMI adaptor or an external tv tuner(which i am using right now).